The Rainbow House - Casa Acozamalotl
A podcast from the borderland of spirituality, race, identity, and community, the Rainbow House highlights the voices of mixed race and minority people who choose a spiritual path other than Christianity or generic spirituality. Walk with those of us who are looking at our heritage and hoping to craft healing, fight injustice, and honor our ancestors and ourselves!
The Rainbow House - Casa Acozamalotl
Taino Revivalism with Behike Sanakori
An interview with Behike DJ Sanakori about Taino Revivalism and NYC Puerto Rican identity.
Where you can find him:
https://tainoradio.com/
https://www.instagram.com/tainoradio1491/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4CTiG6MaxP1zml6ADJsHBA
https://www.facebook.com/NYCIndigenousMobileLibrary
All Beats provided by https://freebeats.io
Produced by White Hot
So I want to welcome everybody to this very special. Event, this very special interview, my first interview with somebody outside of the podcast. And I want to welcome DJ Sanakori, who's the Behike of the Araike Yukayak Taino Indigenous Caribbean Tribal Nation. He is the tribal founder and a member of the nation. And he's also the founder of the Taino Earth Prayer Lodge Society, Tainoradio. com and the Chorako Book. And so I want to welcome you to the podcast DJ Santa Cody, and I want to thank you for being on Casa Cozumel and sharing your wisdom and your experience with us.
DJ Sanakori:Wow. Well, my phone. Thank you. It's an honor to be here, Bernadette, man. This is great. Like, you know, I'm excited and I can't wait to share and thank you for giving me that talking stick so I can share, you know.
Nicte-Ha:We talked about it just a couple minutes ago, but I would love it if you could open up with just some words to your ancestors or to the gods or whoever you want to talk to to bless us in this conversation and bless the people who are going to be listening to our interview to open their ears and open our mouths.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, sure. Thank you. I have a calling song that I, I I call upon the, the, the Earth Mother, the Goddess, Creatress, Atave, in a Tainui way, and also she had a son. Her name is Yokahu. And that's in our Taino worldview. She's a mother and she also has a son and they both co created the universe and they still with us. So okama means listen, listen. So we listen. And then we feel this power, Taino Ti. Wokama, Wokama, Atame, Watame. Wokama, Wokama. The creative creator and the helper with. As we speak, we give honor to our dear holy Lord. Alright, thank you.
Nicte-Ha:Thank you very much. That was beautiful.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, you're welcome. Thank you for the honor.
Nicte-Ha:So, I got chills.
DJ Sanakori:It's good on a hot day. It's good to have children on a hot day.
Nicte-Ha:I am super curious about your background and, just your family, your ancestors. So if you can talk a little bit about your journey and your ancestors journey, I think. I am familiar a little bit, look we can get into it later, I'm familiar a little bit with the history of the Taino people, but I think a lot of people are often taught that there's no Taino people left. And so if you can talk a little bit about your ancestors in your history, that would be wonderful. Cause I think we would all like to know how you came to this and who your people are.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, I appreciate it. I appreciate it. You know, I like to start with my father because my father, he was born in Gaiape. Borinquen is the indigenous word for Puerto Rico. And he was 17. No, I want to say he was 16 years old, turning 17 when he came from Brooklyn, New York, he went back to Puerto Rico because he fell in love with my mom who was visiting during the summer break. And she was visiting her, her older sister. My mom's from Guanica. There's a two Taino words, Cayey and Guanica, and that's the Southwest region. Guanica, it's a beach, kind of beach area, faces the ocean leading towards the South America. And then my father's in the interior. So he fell in love. He went to Guanica looking for my, his girlfriend, that he fell in love with, who had to return back to Puerto Rico. So we hitchhiked from San Juan, Puerto Rico, four hours to Guanica. Yeah, she was, I believe she was 16. Yeah, he was 17. So they fell in love. According to my mother, I was conceived in Guanica. So, so like most traditional families, you know, once you get pregnant, that's it, man. You got to get married. So they, so they got married in Brooklyn, New York. So I was like, well, maybe eight months, she was like eight months pregnant. She gave birth to me. So I believe, cause I've been to Guanica many times and it feels like home. I believe that desire, that yearning to return back to the island. Was, was instilling me through my mother and dad, you know, and, unfortunately my father died at 41. He was, you know, he died a very tragic death and my mother's still alive. She's in her late seventies, living, still living in Brooklyn, New York. She never returned back to Guanica. So she sees me as the, the radical one, because I always want to teach this, what we call Taino culture. And so what happened was, after I was born, my great grandmother, who was born in Calle Puerto Rico, Borinquen, she made the decision to raise me. And I know that sounds cruel, but back then, back in the sixties and fifties, you know, I was born in the sixties when grandma spoke, no one questioned it. And many times when I shared this story, they were like, what? No one called ACS, you know, protect us children, protect the services. It's not man. When the matriarch speaks. You know, that's it. But it kind of led me to a journey of, shamanism and what they call, the, the medicine path, because my great-grandmother was what they call a spiritualist ra, also midwife, you know. So from birth I was able to experience a lot of the stuff that she did, and unfortunately she did it hidden cause in New York back then. You know, the church was very strong, very influential, the Roman Catholic church. it was seen as brujeria or like evil worship. So my great grandmother had to do this in hidden. So being a little bratty kid, spoiled kid, I always was behind her watching all her rituals and stuff like that. Now I learned this later on when I was a teenager, because I remember women coming to the house every Saturday. Many of them came crying. Many of them left crying. But my great grandmother always spent time with them the whole day. And she always had her plant medicines and so on. And they always went to the bathroom and I always found that strange. So when I asked later on in life, I, you know what I mean? When I became a young adult. I asked my great aunt, why did she always take those women into the bathroom and it was crying and, and then she would console them. She says, Oh, she was performing abortions. Like what? And this is before the Roe versus Wade, you know, in the sixties. So she was doing it in a traditional way. And I remember her, you know, consoling them and giving them the plant medicines and stuff. It was like, wow. So I remember that every Saturday And I would go with her to buy the medicines and stuff. She always had her saints, but within those saints, it was a lot different from when I would go to church, they were the same saints, but the ritual was different. So she always used like a cigar. She always fed the saints, you know, she always had these special prayers. And she even had this little, entity. Now, when I was a little kid, I thought it was a monster. You know, I was always afraid of it. I realized this was a ritual that she, she performed every year, every year. But basically what I was experiencing was an indigenous spirituality that was hidden, either fear of Catholicism, fear of family, what they would say, like, we're in a new world now, we just don't do these things anymore. And I used to hear relatives, yelling at her saying, this is not Puerto Rico. You don't do these things here. This is New York.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah. It sounds actually very close to like a candomblé or with the blend, like with the Catholic saints, it sounds a lot like African diaspora traditions as well that I know came into central and South America with the slave trade
DJ Sanakori:Well, I, I always start like in recent history, but if you go back 500 years, 530 years, you had a very ruthless, Roman Catholic church led by late medieval politics. If you were caught doing these ceremonies, you will be killed on sight. So a lot of that secrecy definitely. Kept it going. And, and out of all the cultures that went through Puerto Rico, went to the Dominican Republic, Cuba, you know, the Taino people they kept it quiet. They kept it a secret. They still keep it a secret.
Nicte-Ha:Is that something you run into being out talking about your heritage, talking about Taino spiritual practices? Do you still run into a lot of people who have that kind of shame or fear? And, or do you find that people are starting to get more interested in it?
DJ Sanakori:I think, I think there's a lot of of more interest, but in my experience, so people that I I've, I've had the privilege to learn under it's interesting that when you never find them on social media, you will never find them on Facebook. You know, they're still very hidden and they feel the shame that, fellow Taino people or the indigenous peoples who are trying to teach, who are trying to offer this medicine are selling it for profit as a business. And that's kind of a no no so the people I'm referring to are traditional people, you know, the last thing they will do is sell medicine or sell rituals. So when I'm taught, they always tell me, you know, you don't charge money for this. If you do something, I'm not responsible. What can happen to you? You know, it's, it's, it's like that stern kind of ancient way, it's interesting. It's a bit controversial now, you know, about how to deal with that in modern times, but but I was always taught, like, if you can't organize a ceremony on your own, don't do it, and a lot of it's like, don't offend the spirits, you know, don't offend the ancestors, don't offend God. So, it's interesting because a lot of people think we're extinct. A lot of people think we're ghosts, you know, we don't exist. And a lot of that came from the stories of Columbus and his goons. They decimated what we call the, the tribal living style, the politics, the social structure, and one of the things that he commissioned immediately was, we need to learn their religion, we need to learn their world view, so we can better divide them, and what we have right now in modern times is work by Ramon Panay, Panay, who was a friar, more like a lay brother, Not a priest. So he interviewed chiefs and medicine people. And basically his question was, who's your God? How do you pray? How do you worship? You know? And then he came to that report, went back to Columbus. Smallpox nearly exterminated not only the Taino people, but most indigenous populations after the 1500s. But what a lot of people don't talk about, smallpox did not exterminate the indigenous peoples. And I credit that to the Bajiques, the medicine people, the Bulanderos. They must have figured out a cure, to keep our people alive. Cause right now it's fast forward. 2000s when the, ancestry. com, the 23andme, you know, that it was like the style to get a DNA test, right? The craze. That's it. The craze. So, the companies themselves were like, yo, wait a minute. You know, there's indigenous. Caribbean DNA on the modern people. Wait, I skipped one important man. His name is Dr. He was from the University of Mayaguez. And in 1992, during the 500 year celebration of the Americas, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, they're all celebrating Columbus. There were these bones that was given to Dr. Fusado, who's a geneticist. They found these bones at a construction site somewhere. I think it was in San Juan. And nobody, no museum wanted these bones because they were pretty much like rumbled and it was no significant to the, you know, there was no appeal to them to put a museum, whatever. So he took the bones. And he got a grant to do a DNA studies on his bones. So he carbon dated them like, 1400s, right? Common era. And guess what happened? He took the DNA samples of his PhD students who were Puerto Ricans, you know, all different. Color shades, you know, in Puerto Rico, you can find a white person, a black person at the end, you know, brown skin. And guess what happened? 60% match those bones. So he's like, what the hell? 60% on the maternal line max matched my students. So then he got more grant money. And then little by little, those percentages were going up. So he was the first pioneer to the Juan Cruz shadow to really blow it up. Like, Oh, damn. You know, the modern Puerto Rican, when we say qua, we still carry the dna and I love how 23 and me give you a timeline and they tell you exactly the, when the mixture occur and like for my bloodline, the mixture became, the mix became 17 hundreds when, my Taino ancestor mix to a Jewish person actually. And they mark it off and I'm saying, wait a minute, 1700s. According to Columbus, the Taino exterminated 20 years after the invasion. Right. Right. So how can someone be living in the 1700s, a Taino, right? Full-blooded Taino, they say, right? And then more DNA samples came out and you saw 18 hundreds, 1850s, you know, so there is definitely this myth that the Tainos were exterminated, I personally was interviewing a person who's 97. Mm-hmm. from Dominican Republic. She had a lot of indigenous, worldview in her ancestry in, in her apartment. The alters and all that and then so she's 97 then her mom. I think she told me she's living to the 90s So now you're going back 200 years, right? And she said she knew her grandmother. 250 She remembers her mother speaking about her grandmother Sorry about how they how they worship how they set up the altar and when I saw the altar I know most of the history of what the Spaniards recorded, right? Everything I knew from these recordings that they witnessed was in this woman's apartment. And this woman had no idea who Ramon by name was. You know, she didn't know, she didn't have any access to these writings. She wasn't educated per se. But she was living it. You know? She's living it. Through the years I met these elders, they won't tell you they're you know, because that's, again, that's that mindset, you know, you just don't say that, but you hear them say enio, you hear them say thes, the ancestors, you know, you know. Many people will commune with them. There's a lot of people in Puerto Rico have that, gift of being one with the earth, and being one with the tree people, the waters, the flowers, the plants, they can cure That's very much alive. None of that was, is extinct. There's people that can still set your broken bones in place through traditional indigenous techniques. Unfortunately, our, our main ritual was the Cahoba ritual, which was a, so who's in a gym? Well, that's what the scientists say. It's, it's a, it's a medicine that has contains the DMT similar to Yopo. In South America, and ayahuasca, all similar. Right. Right. That, unfortunately that lineage was broken, but we also have other ceremonies. That was stood the test of time. Like for example, the, public ceremony that was everyone participated and basically it was centered on dancing and singing. So I don't know if you never met a Caribbean person who doesn't like to sing a dance. Right. Right.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah. I mean, for sure. Music, and dance is so integral. The best music comes from the Caribbean. You know,
DJ Sanakori:that's right. Our whole tradition of Sasa and, you know, the Maraca, the Maraca is rooted in indigenous culture, the Guido, that's indigenous, it's all into a mix, you know, but that was our, that was our spirituality. We, we will get together as a, as a tribe and sing and dance, the medicine person will share the stories. And in modern Puerto Rico, in my experience, when you go to a funeral, that's the time where the elder will speak the stories, you know, it's a time to speak. And not only will they speak of the deceased person, but they'll speak about the island, the lamentation of, oh man, the way it used to be, you know, and stuff. Yeah. The stories of before. And that's all rooted in the Jareto tradition, because what happens in a funeral service, you know, people eat. You know, and sometimes there's music that's, that's very ancestral right there. So those traditions are still alive and well, you know
Nicte-Ha:did you go a lot to Puerto Rico to learn? I mean, you mentioned learning from elders and with a lot of that connecting in New York with elders who had immigrated up from Puerto Rico into New York or, once you knew you kind of wanted to go on this path and explore more deeply, you must've gone back, it sounds like, it sounds like that's where you found more of a personal connection to the teachings
DJ Sanakori:After my great grandmother died, all that ritual died with her, you know. Cause no one really kept up with it. I got me really depressed. No, I missed that, that whole mysticism and power, and I remember saying to my family, cause nobody was really a church goer back then. I says, Oh, I want to go, I want to go to church. And I was like maybe 11 years old. Cause. When I went to the funeral mass in the Catholic church, I love the rituals, you know, what they were doing with the smoke, you know, it all reminded me of what I witnessed. So I started going to church and I really got devoted to the church. So much so that I went to college seminary to be a priest, and then something in me just stopped me, you know, something in my soul. It's just like, this is not, you know, the spiritual part is definitely something I could jive with. But, but the mindset just wasn't there, man. And then the more and more I started reading in college about how indigenous people were suppressed, you know, the Catholics, Catholic, indigenous, they couldn't practice their rituals in the church. That really got me upset. So then I said, man, I got to go back to Puerto Rico. I got to find people like my great grandmother. So I started doing that in New York. I started visiting people who are so called spiritualists. You know, a lot of people that I found. had that mindset of like, you know, oh yeah, I'll, I'll share some, but you got to pay me this, pay me that, you know, so that kind of turned me off. I did pay it though, but you know, kind of, I, I, I wasn't feeling it, you know? And then later, I went back to the church and became a Franciscan friar in the Capuchin tradition. Yeah. Believe it or not. So, a lot of the friars are telling me, yo, you got to go to Montana. I said, Oh, what's in Montana? Oh, we have some friars out there who work with the Crow Nation. And I was like, Oh man, I would love that. And I spoke to the priest that worked with them. So I went out in the summer there and I, and I loved it, and before I, it was like, I was seeing my great grandmother again. You know, I was like, oh my God, this is like, I'm back home. This is like, these people are like Puerto Ricans, you know? So, then I went to a sweat lodge ceremony. I don't know if you know the sweat lodge, the purification lodge. When I went into the sweat lodge, that's when my world just blew up, you know? And that's when I had to make a really strong decision of saying, you know what, I can't be a fryer. I can't be a Catholic anymore. I have to return back to my roots. And that's when my family was so confused. Like you're educated, you got a future ahead of yourself. Like what the hell, what are you doing?
Nicte-Ha:And also, coming from an intensely Catholic, my family's Mexican and the Catholic church is so strong it's, a lot of times it's like, Oh, that's great. Like our son or cousin or whatever is in the church. I mean, my grandmother was very devout Catholic. She was a very, very devout Catholic. She prayed the rosary, like I think every day, I remember as a kid being pulled in and she would have marathon prayer sessions in her room. The whole family had to come and we all had to at least sit and do a round of the rosary with her. And it would go like hours, like we all, everyone would be in her bedroom praying the rosary for whoever, so, I can imagine that you deciding to leave the church was very big for your family.
DJ Sanakori:Yeah. And I remember I resisted the notion, my body was breaking out in hives and I remember going to experts. And they had no cure for me. I'm like, I don't know what's going on with you. You know, I thought it was anxieties. And I just, from one night to the last cold Turkey, I just left. I've just left back a bag and I left. I went back to my great aunt's house and my hives were gone.
Nicte-Ha:That's amazing. Do you consider yourself to be Christian or have you moved outside of that? And how do you reconcile that? I was never Catholic. I mean, I was in the church, but I never really. called to me. And so I didn't really have to reconcile a belief for myself. I'm just curious how that, how that works for you and how that felt.
DJ Sanakori:Yeah. Well, you know, I was privileged enough to get a degree in philosophy and, and in college. And then I got a masters in divinity. So I was able to dissect and learn the Christian tradition of Catholic Christianity. And anyone who, anyone who's listening to me, this is a disclaimer. I'm not criticizing the Christian faith, but this is my understanding. I just didn't see Jesus as this God, as God. I saw more Jesus like this radical, this rebel, this political, rebel, you know, social activist. And I was getting in trouble for that in the seminary for saying these things. And I saw how people got sensitive about it. I said, wait a minute, these, yo, they're not getting it. I'm seeing something else, right? But here's the thing through my experience, through my great grandmother, my experience in the church, I realized, I guess as humans, we, we, we try to make sense of things, right? We try to make sense of, of the world. We're always constantly looking for the truth, right? And my personal faith journey, and this is why I totally separated myself from the Christian faith, is like, no, Jesus is not the only way to reach, salvation, or in a Taino way, huave, heaven, or the spiritual world. Because he's Jewish. He's, he's limited to one experience, the Jewish people, right? And then the Roman empire, whatever. So this guy was definitely not God. That's what I'm saying. And if he was God, and I don't want to know your God, because then that God is prejudice. Actually, I will say that God is racist because if, if God picks one culture over all cultures, then that's not right, that's not a true God. That's not my God. That's not a tiny little God. So then I, that's when I totally separate myself, but, but I understand how it feeds people. It gives people direction in life. You know, believing in Jesus as the price, you know, I see Jesus as, a radical turn the world upside down, or I see what the leaders, they call it. Hey, Yoko's, they walk backwards, they turn everything upside down the trickster, you know. So I still love Jesus like that as a trickster, you know,
Nicte-Ha:I love that. I love that reconception of Jesus as a trickster figure. I think that's awesome. I hadn't thought of that.
DJ Sanakori:Yeah, man. I learned that back then in the ancient world, religious Radicals would normally go far away you know, they'll go far away to the desert. Like John the Baptist, Jesus, the opposite. He went to the temple. and he caused havoc. That's the ultimate Trista right there. He's like, what? Turning tables over, like, you know, and it's like, yo, he's, he's going to get killed. But he didn't care because he knew the ideal of showing that, love one another, right? This system is not working. But so, so when I look, when I read the stories of the tricksters and native traditions in Puerto Rico, we have a character called Juan Bobo. He's like. In the story. He's like the dumbest person in the village, but at the end of the day, he saves the day. He's like the dummy, you know? Or the Campesino or the the he bottle in the forest. You know, he doesn't know much. He's not educated. He's barefooted. He saves the day. So I, I, I love that more, you know, and, and that's when I started looking for people who are like, who are like backwards in, in, in Puerto Rican society, they had this profound wisdom, you know, and it was related in a Taino spirituality. As one elder once taught me, Hey man, the Christians, they always look at heaven. We look at the earth, you know.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah, they always want to escape, right? They want to escape. They want to get away. And I'm like, the earth feeds us, like it clothes us, the trees breathe out the oxygen we breathe in. Like we evolve for this planet,, why do you want to get away? I agree with you. They always look at the heaven, but like, look at the earth under your feet. And so I've noticed that you speak Taino and you have words from Taino. So how did you, how did you find somebody to teach you the Taino words? Is there a Taino language revival that kind of goes along with the spiritual effort that you're putting forth?
DJ Sanakori:That's a very good question. I personally am illiterate when it comes to the Taino, language. through the years, since 1994, I've been trying to learn different words, different phrases, which I do. I know some phrases. I know some common words, that snuck into the Spanish language, like, things like that. Tobacco, you know, there's all types of words. But the thing is that I'm bad with languages. I admit it, man. I'm really bad. back in the nineties, I remember, they would speak this dialect, you know, we were all intrigued by it. And, then later on in, my journey, I met Dr. Yari Melendez, who was an anthropologist in Puerto Rico, who actually led an indigenous community in Puerto Rico, And she actually spent time with the Y U and, Columbia. The Ggo. What the Spanish call the Caribs, but that's kind of controversial word, but so she sat with all these different communities, and she created a nice system, beautiful system of dialect. And, she was teaching the children in Puerto Rico. emergence class starting in kindergarten, all the way to high school. Unfortunately, she died. She never was able to publish her book. And the most recent times, Javier Hernandez wrote a book called Boringaniki and it's an attempt of creating a system, you know, a basic system, you know, hello, how are you, you know, face, head everything, which was rooted a lot in the Wai'i religion, which is the largest speaking Arawak language group right now. But those are our ancestors. and then Hiawaha, which is another indigenous Caribbean, tribe, just they came out with their book and now the tribe that I'm part of, they're, they're also working on the dialect. So, so right now, what's really cool, that big wave. Is towards language, speaking up, the more dialects, the better, I think.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah, I think a lot of indigenous people and tribal people in the Americas are realizing how important it is, how much goes along with language, language carries so much. It carries how you view gender, how you view other beings in the world. And, it just carries so much. I'm trying to learn Nahuatl and that's, that's tough. I bought a book and I got two young kids and I'm like, man, I speak one and three quarters languages right now. do I get better at Spanish or do I try and teach myself Nahuatl? But I think I'm going to, I'm going to keep. Pushing it because I'm like pretty sure just based on, generally where my people are from and where my ancestors are from, I'm pretty sure I'm learning nawa, but people just think like, Oh, Mexico is Aztecs. And you're like, no, there's actually a lot of different tribal groups in Mexico that were subjugated by the Aztecs, so, there were more people than just the Aztecs there. I think a big thing for Mexican Americans in the United States is we latched on really strongly to this idea of Aslan and the Aztecs is this, very advanced civilization. There were a lot of other aspects to their civilization that, were, you know, just human beings, right? Cruel and beautiful and terrible and kind, just like. Everybody lives in their full spectrum in their in their civilizations, right? So, is there kind of a similar, story or mythology building that's within the, Puerto Rican community around indigeneity. Cause like Mexican American community since the sixties, right? Since the Chicano movements really built up this, attachment to this ideology around the Aztecs. And so I'm just wondering if you guys have similar mythologies and stories that you guys have have latched on to in the United States
DJ Sanakori:yeah, you know, there's something about in Puerto Rico that's very mystical. We call Borinquen. It's very mystical about it, especially the people when you go to the country and you speak to the people. Do come from the mountains. They always have these stories, you know, these cuentos, you know, these, these folklore stories. And a lot of it deals like with that trickster kind of stories, you know, Juan Bobo and so on. And they also have different scenes, you know, different cuentos, but a lot of it released to the Indian, you know, kind of the mobile, the noble Indian, you know, thankfully, thankfully. I'm grateful for it. Ramon by name left the work behind. So those are our sacred texts, you know, in, the book, when he published it and gave it to Columbus at the end of the book, he's like, I don't know what's first, I don't know what's last. And it was very confusing for him. He couldn't get it. A couple of times he said, Oh, this is, this is definitely devil worship. And then it was another. European scholar Peter Monner, he, he also got a glimpse of this work and he added his commentary, but that exists now. So the, the present thing, you know, right now, we've been pushing this whole, we need to learn this. We need to live this. These are our traditions There was a famous book that came out, The Cave of the Jaguar, by Antonio Arroyo Stevens. He was the first, anthropologist, Puerto Rican, who compared the different religions, different myths, mythologies, to the Taino mythologies, so, so called. You know, using their language.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah, I know. I love, how it's like, Oh, the Bible is the Bible, but all the rest of your creation stories, that's just a myth.
DJ Sanakori:Yeah, exactly. It was called a myth. It's our sacred texts. But so, he compared it and, and man, he put us right up there. So the Greeks and every, he even shared some comparisons with the Aztecs and also the South Americans, it's like there was this one common ancient knowledge and everyone had a piece of it. And that's how you know, I had a, I might ask this out a piece of it. So I'm very proud of it. So I'm always teaching it, over and over again. And in my podcast, tiny radio. com. I'm always, going over that creation stories and it just makes me laugh how they work these digs in it, Like there's one part that they're witnessing how they build this structure made out of palms. Well, some people call a hut, whatever, and then they don't keep the sacred objects in there, you know, and they were living beans. These were living beans, spirits, right. And then they will feed it food. Everyone will get food, get water, you know, just like the modern spiritualists who feeds their statues, right? So, and then the author is like, Oh yeah. Oh, I can't wait to see them. Eat all that food, you know, like, you know what I mean? And he's an indirect jokes, you know, like digs, right?
Nicte-Ha:came into the Americas and they did a lot of that kind of recording of native religion. And then they did what the Catholic church did everywhere. Like, oh, okay, we'll take this and then we can connect Jesus to this and we can kind of take this template and then we can put our spiritual template on top of it. And that's how we can explain Christianity to these people. I'm hopefully going to talk to an Aztec reconstructionist who's leading mostly digital community of younger people who are interested in exploring the Aztec religion and Pantheon. And it's interesting seeing that grow up. I'm one of the older people on their, community on discord.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, wow.
Nicte-Ha:And so it's wonderful to see people exploring their heritage. But at the same time, I'm like, I'm 43. I'm not old, but all of you are 21.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, wow. Oh, that's good. Young at heart, right? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Spirit. Young at heart. Yeah.
Nicte-Ha:And it's great to see them connecting over the internet. I mean, is that, that seems like that is a really good source for a lot of people who are. Reaching out and trying to find out more about their indigenous heritage. So has that helped you guys? Obviously you have a podcast, which I will link. And other than that, you see the digital presence as being really helpful in spreading the word about Taino practices.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, definitely. You know, you know, back in the late 2000s, I want to say it was 2016. I'm sure. The UN had an indigenous forum and, and, and the indigenous forum was talking about how indigenous peoples, they have to use media, they have to use the internet to, to, to share these stories, to teach, you know, so that kind of inspired me, I was like, Oh man, that's cool, you know, like podcasts and radio shows and, you know, videos and stuff like that. So I got to meet some, some indigenous peoples that were doing stuff like that. So that inspired me. So I think that's definitely great. Well, only problem is I think it's 50% great. The other 50% is meeting in person. I think that that equally important because sometimes the media, social media, internet, it can separate us too, because when we get too comfortable on the keyboard. But it's very important to meet in person. So on Taino Radio recently I've been trying to do events in the community. Recently I did a ceremony in Ingle Hill Park, with the Chiracapac Earth Keepers to connect people. And some people, a lot of people came. It was really nice, different people. Dominican, they came and, you know, we did some prayers and stuff. That's very important, you know, to meet in person.
Nicte-Ha:Yeah, ceremony and community, because religious practice of oneness is pretty hard. You need that community. And we need people like you who are willing to lead those public ceremonies. And I know you talk about it a lot in your podcast, but can you give people who are listening, like a little bit of a, just an overview of who the creator is in the, Taino tradition, what the cosmology looks like?
DJ Sanakori:Yeah, well, most, most of us talk about Yoka Hu, Bagua, Manokoti. So Yo Ka Hoo is the Yuka spirit, the Yuka. I don't know if you know, you, you got comes from the South America, right? It's a staple food, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals.
Nicte-Ha:Really delicious when fried.
DJ Sanakori:Oh, there we go. Fried yucca is like my favorite thing. Oh, there you go. So there you go.
Nicte-Ha:Better than potatoes. I'm just going to say it. I'm going to put it out there. I'm sorry, Peruvians. I'm sorry. But yucca, fried yucca, just much better than potato.
DJ Sanakori:Yeah, exactly. And then, and then the, all right the Taino ancestors, they used to make the cassava bread, the yucca bread. That will last a whole year of our molding, which is interesting. And, oh man, later I'll share something, but the thing is that so Yoka Hu, right? Yuka spirit, Bagua means the waters, the ocean, Marakoti, who had no father. And then the story goes on, he had a mother. So I'm like, wait a minute, hold on. So if Yoka Hu. It's this creator, right? Masculine, right? Had a mother. So wait a minute. Had no father. We had a mother. So the mother has to be also Supreme being right. So they didn't have a dualism here. There's that dualism, feminine and masculine. So our ancestors, you know, that that's the way they, they, they saw the creation story as, as both masculine and feminine, you know, mother. And son, that's why it wasn't so difficult. Even I think in a Mexican culture, you know, our lady, Guadalupe, you know Carirale Cobre in Cuba, you know, and that was the first statue they gave us of the Virgin Mary, you know, so holding on to Jesus as a boy, you know, so, or as a baby, so it's like that's our creation story, you know, that, that, that, that's our supreme beings. So it's, it's a two spirit kind of situation. Yucca who is the male is the male aspect of the Supreme being who, who is seen as is, you know, the force behind the Yucca, but basically, yeah, the Yucca spirit, the force behind the Yucca, the growth of the Yucca, the ocean. Right. The ocean feeds us, the fish, substance, right? And then he, who had no father. But then his mother, we see as this divine mother. The divine feminine, right? And then... And then there's that whole thing with with the Europeans say that animism, where everything has a spirit. It's really complicated. You know, reading the story and then you try to figure it out on face value.
Nicte-Ha:And then also apply it to like how you do with personal practice. That's been a thing that that's the thing that I'm struggling with is just connecting and figuring out what my personal practice and my everyday practice looks like, since I kind of left. Any spiritual practice. I just didn't do anything. I didn't even give thanks or gratitude before a meal. I just sort of lived my life and now coming back at 40 because I had two kids and I suddenly became really important to me. Right? Like, what am I going to pass on to them? Because you're more as a person, you're more than just, you do more than exist, right? You have to figure out how you bring beauty and what you love and what kind of person you want your kids to be. And it really woke me up to the fact that I didn't have that in my life. I was just sort of, I was drinking, I was partying, I was hanging out, I was playing video games, but I wasn't really connected to me as a, as a human being. And so my kids kicked off that journey into figuring out how to build ritual into my life and figure out what I wanted to believe in and what I wanted to pass on. And it's, picking out what kind of traditions to follow. It a little nice to know you can look back and be like, Oh, okay. Like this is what they did. These are the names of the gods. And I don't have to do it exactly that way. Or I don't know if that's exactly how it was done, but at least I can. I can honor that and bring that forward in my, in my life. And I've had some people ask me, why are you doing this in a podcast form? And so I know my answer to why I'm doing it in a podcast form, but I'm curious if you have a, perspective or thought on the particular media that you've chosen.
DJ Sanakori:You know, it's funny, I'm going to date myself back in the seventies, back in the seventies, there was a movie that always used to show on TV, it was called the planet of the apes, the original planet of the apes in the seventies. And there was one scene that kind of blew me away. I think it was called the battle of the planet of the apes. It was the, it was, I think it was the third movie, I forget which one. But it was the child of Cornelius and Zerah, caesar, Caesar. So Caesar actually went to the Forbidden Planet. And when they went into the Forbidden Planet, it was actually civilization in the past, human civilization that treated apes like slaves, you know? So he found archived footage of his mother and father, you know? And he was watching his father, Cornelius and Zero, and he was getting these ideas like, Oh my God, this is where we came from. This is the oppression that we live, you know? Oh my God, they were trying to make a difference. So as a kid, that kind of, that kind of planted a seed, like, wouldn't it be cool to go back in your past and find these videos of the Taino, right? Like, man, maybe they, you know, they left something behind, they teaching us. But when I first found out about podcasting and you know, I love radio, you know, I used to love Wolfman Jack, Wolfman Jack kid talking from. So it all came together, you know, like bam, bam, bam, bam. And then when the UN was like, yeah, you got to use the media. Yes. So when I do my radio show, I'm not thinking of present so much because I'm thinking about the future, say 200 years from now. Right. After, after a flood or, you know, climate crash and crisis, whatever, they're going to find a podcast. That's going to say Taino radio.
Nicte-Ha:So, when you run ceremony in public, in a public space, what's the feeling? And, if somebody wants to join the ceremony, who's not necessarily Taino or Puerto Rican, do you consider your practice to be open? So if people get curious, they listen to this, and they feel connection, right? I think there's a lot of people out there seeking for a connection, and I think there's a lot of. white people, white European descended people who are turning their backs on Christianity. you see the numbers of church going people declining in the United States. And so I think there's this hunger for people to look for a more earth centered connection spirituality. And there's a lot of people who are appropriating Lakota beliefs or other indigenous beliefs who are European descended people. do you consider what you teach to be a closed practice and then a follow up question, is. Since the spiritual connection is so strong with the island of Puerto Rico with the spirit of the Yucca and the sea, how does that translate and how do you still feel that connection, being so far away in New York, having a land based practice. Even though you're, displaced from that land. So it's a two part question. One, do you consider your practice more closed? And two, how do you practice your land based spirituality in a land that's removed from those forces?
DJ Sanakori:Yeah, there's four kinds of peoples that I invite into my, into the ceremony that I lead, the way I was taught. The first people I invite is the the human race, you know, the humans. Then the animal world, mineral world, and the plant world. So in my ceremonies, you're going to have all those four aspects. So speaking of the human beings, you know, hey, Any culture in the world, you know, you're invited, you know, we're one people, you know, we're one race. Only thing is I do say that, you know, wherever land I'm doing a ceremony at, I do my best always to honor those people. So I do mostly Nimue Hill Park, which is Shiraka Pak. That's the word that the the people use, the Lenape, land by the edge of the water. So I honor the Lenape people before anything. You know if I'm in Boan, you know, honor, you know and then, and I tell people wherever you're from, say you're England, you're German, whatever, you know, honor your ancestor. Cuz at one point we all lived on the land at one point we're all indigenous. And as the Hopi, say, at one point we all separated, many went their ways and, and specifically many tribes lost that, that connection to the land, you know, Which was suffering now. So I always invite people to do that. You always see plants in my ceremonies, the fruits of those plants and, and the minerals, you know, definitely the mineral people, very important, our body contains a hundred minerals about those minerals. And we have 99, we're going to get sick. So we're all, we're all one. We're all one. So I always teach people that. And I don't charge money. It's all about community. As Black Elk ones say, mending the sacred hoop. You know, it was broken. Thanks Columbus broke it. So we're going to, we're going to amend it. You know, we've got amended and it's going to call. And it means that we all got to work together. A couple of weeks I had a great honor. I was invited to participate in an African festival of uniting Africa with the diaspora and they invited me to represent, so I think that's amazing because that's the whole thing, man. That's the many in the hoop. What's your second question? I forgot.
Nicte-Ha:My second question was,, you practice the Taino tradition, connected to the land and if you're removed from that land how do you bring those forces up with you?
DJ Sanakori:Yeah. Well, I, I, I always lived in the urban cities and here in New York City but my great-grandmother always taught me to, you always have to have plants in the house. It's gonna give you fresh air, it's gonna give you good luck. So I always try to have plants in my apartment, right now I'm rented a room, so I have my windows, it has plants. You need that connection no matter where you are. And if you can have plants, you go to the park. One of my weaknesses as a Taino, and I'll admit this, you know, it wasn't my parents fault, you know, like I said, they fell in love and, the way the tradition was at that time, they had to come back to New York. If you ask my mother, she would have loved to still live by the beach, and I was born here in New York. I can't take that back. And I know a lot of people from the islands call me gringo, because I wasn't born on the island. But I'm proud to say that the people that taught me were from the island. So they taught me the island, so when I go back to the island, I feel I'm home. Through the stories, right? So when they talk about the trees, when they talk about the ocean, the rivers, it's familiar friends. But it's a battle. If you're in our communities, if you're from the diaspora, if you're from the islands, you know, we're still on Mother Earth. You know, it's one big earth, one big mother. but where you're living now, you make it your homeland as well. It's very important, very essential to have that connection to your homeland, and I think Caribbean people have that in their spirit, either through a flag or going back home to be buried, you know, or to buy that house. Just the other day, you know, I've been suffering from high blood pressure and they've been checking my heart. They've been checking my kidneys and the doctor said, we can't find anything wrong with you. Why are you having a high blood pressure? Right. I said, I know why she looks at me. He's like, I need to live by the beach. Give me a beach and I'll have perfect blood pressure. Give me give me some time to just float in the ocean, right? Soak up the sun. Yo, give me a canoe. Let me fish all day. I'll fish. There you go. I'll plant my yucca, you know, and I'll fight the neighbors. Yo, I don't have no blood pressure, no high blood pressure. And she just laughed.
Nicte-Ha:For real. but community sharing and having your fingers in the earth like super important for us spiritually as humans.
DJ Sanakori:You know, you know, I give you a quick story, but back in 2019, I was going through a nervous breakdown. A lot of people that knew me at the time. They were shocked cause I'm a social worker by trade and I do therapy and people were shocked like, yo, you know, all the answers you, you know what you need to do. I could see it in people's eyes. I was like, what the hell? Like, but I was lost. So, so I went back to Monique and I went back to the island. I went back like three and a half months with nothing, nothing. I remember telling my kids, I'll be back, man, but just, just give me a little bit time. And I was, I was down to like my last money, and I remember I used to go buy a 5 meal at, you know, you know, the roadside vendors. Yeah, your traditional foods, right? So you used to do rice, beans, or meat and a soda for five dollars, So, so that was my meal every day. That was my lunch. Sometimes my lunch and dinner So he always used to ask me, Oh, did you find a job? Did you find a job? Did you find a job? Never stopped asking me for months. I mean, I says, I don't know what it is in New York. I can get a job in two days here. It's no work. There's no jobs. And he's like, welcome to Puerto Rico. So one day he bends over and I tell you, I mean, I knew he was going to ask me, did you get a job? You know what he said? And this, this totally blew me away. And this is the spirit of the Taino. He says, brother, don't ask. I'm not going to ever charge you again. Just come here for food. And that's just like, wow. The next day I was going back to New York and I didn't have the heart to tell him, you know, that was leaving. But that's the spirit, man, of the island, you know. That's the spirit of the homeland. It will take care of you. It will embrace you, but you have to find the right people. Because some people won't embrace you. That's not the Taino spirit. The Taino spirit will be like, nah, man, you're home. You're home, brother. You know? So if there's any advice out there, any Taino, when you go home, if you get any negativity, whatever, nah, man. Just look for the right people, look for that right person to take you in, to teach you the way I was taught and and the sacred medicine I was taught, make sure people eat, make sure people drink, make sure they're all right, and don't let them leave if they're not all right. Find help. That's it. That's the, that's, that's what the Tainos practice and this is what the Spanish try to take away, you know, the invaders,
Nicte-Ha:but they didn't. And it's alive. And I want to say, thank you. I want to say thank you for sharing that medicine and that teaching with us and that wisdom with us. Thank you. It's been really beautiful. Thank you so much. Oh, Bomaton. Thank you for having me, man. So fun. Gracias. Thank you. I've, I have run out of time. I have to end the, our, our, our conversation, but I just really appreciate your time and your openness.
