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#2492: Answer to Ange Perrault (fwd)
From:Moibibi@aol.com
You write: "Denial of African Heritage is an evil that is eating black people
alive"
This may be true for some black people but not all of them. In Haiti, keeping
up with our African Heritage has been deadly for many at least 13 times in
the two past centuries (13 déchoukaj). Claiming and acting responsibly as a
pitit Ginen today is still like living as an outcast and being the target of
protestant missionaries and still, in some places, of the Catholic church.
I do not blame those who have chosen another path. We have to feel for those
who lack convictions and courage. They are the victims of centuries of
intolerance, brainwashing, and others refusal to recognize their dignity and
their basic rights. They act in self-defense.
It might be why, in Vodoun, we have chosen to keep an oral tradition.
Everything is in our songs and prayers. I personally wish it remains that
way. Quite a few books have been written about Vodoun and are available in
libraries. Most of them relate one's personal experience as an initiate, a
spectator or a researcher. No editor will pay a Haitian to do the necessary
researches which seem to be of interest to you. You might have to start your
own spiritual journey to know more.
Charlot, a Flathead chief wrote in 1876,
". . . We were happy when he first came. We first thought he came from the
light, but he comes like the dusk of the evening now, not like the dawn of
the morning. He comes like a day that has passed, and night enters our future
with him . . . "
We are not the only ones. I feel that we lack to identify with the sufferings
of our brothers and support, if not help, one another.
Bébé
A Haitian proverb states "The one who delivers the blow forgets, the one who
bears its mark remembers."