Evangelina, the Mayan curanderita

Evangelina, the Tzotzil-speaking curandera

 

Evangelina is a 4 foot tall curandera who has the powers of a giant.  She is a small beautiful woman dressed in traditional clothing and she is clear as day about what she does as a healer.  She was introduced by Estela and she provided us with a ceremony to welcome us.  At the same time it was coincidently a parting ceremony for two of out members, Rob and Daniel, who for different reasons decided to return to the land of the dead in the USA, back home to Fresno.  The ceremony was conducted using a brazier, wood charcoal, and copal. You could smell the copal, it was strong and smoky.  It is a resin from the Copal tree which has provided the ancients with a way to make offering to the dioses and spirits for blessings and intercessions.  After the emotional experience of accepting that two members of our group were leaving we settled down to the platica that Evangelina gave us. She explained that she usually cures for soul loss due to the winds of susto, espanto, and tristeza (fright, magical fright, and sadness).  She focuses mainly on “energy”, how it flows through your body, whether its blocked or if it is free flowing.  She will diagnose your energy flow by taking your pulse at the wrist. One of the members of the group volunteered for the demonstration. I noticed that she feels for the pulse on one side of the wrist, the downward flow (left side), then the other side of the wrist for the upward flow (right side).  The volunteer had a weak pulse on the downward flow and almost no pulse on the upward flow (right side).  Evangelina said that she had lost her spirit in a “fall” and that she need her “spirit” called back to her physical body.  (In fact the volunteer had taken a nasty fall the previous week when we had just arrived to Cuernavaca.)  After the initial diagnosis she conducted a further assessment of the situation.  She took 4 kernels of corn and placed them on the table in front of the “patient” which represents the four “rumbos”, the four directions.  She also placed a small gourd figure representing the patient and when it falls it locates the direction where the “soul” was lost. The healer then takes several more kernels of corn and shakes them in a container.  I noticed that three kernels fell out of the container.  These represented the kernels which actually go out to look for the soul to entice it back to the patient’s body.  The other kernels stay in the container. The gourd is a whistle which the curandera blows and it makes a shrill sound and it also is a “calling” for the soul to finds its way back to the location of the physical body.  After the calling and the grounding of the soul back into the body, the patient says she is feeling better.  She is instructed to take the 3 kernels that fell out and plant them in her yard so that they sprout.  The other kernels in the container she is to take and ground into a liquid, water or juice, and drink to ground her soul in the body so that it is not easily shaken loose.  The whole process appears simple, but involves a complex set of beliefs which are not easily ascertainable.  A client of Evangelina had a story to tell about her experiences. That story to be told later. 

 

 

Dr. G

071608