Saturday 8th of June Eagle, Vivian and I left Sedona in the early morning. We could spot a deer in the garden of Casa Remuda just before leaving, and an air balloon was visible above the house. We took those as good omens. While driving North, we could see the sun rising from behind the Red Rocks. We went to Winslow, where we met three friends of Vivian: Luminous, Barbara and Rose. Luminous was the one who had the contact with Darlene, the Hopi woman who had put out the invitation and who would then guide us to Second Mesa. We all had breakfast together at La Posada, the old hotel which is situated near the train station in Winslow and has 2 entrances, one facing Route 66 and the other facing the railway.
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| ARRIVAL AT "LA POSADA" |
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| THE HOTEL WAS BUILT IN 1930 |
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| MY COFFEE THAT MORNING |
We then drove towards North, along the State Route 87 and we stopped at the Little Painted Desert view point, to have a look at the breathtaking landscape. The idea was Eagle’s. He was enthusiast. We could see the peaks of San Francisco from there. We took pictures and laughed out of joy. That’s the place where my “Spirit” Name was given to me: Anita Cute Boots (!). [*** Later on, during my experiences throughout New Mexico in 2025, I felt inspired to change my Name to Anita Bold Boots, and I'll explain the reasons why in my next post***]
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| PICTURES SESSION AT THE PAINTED DESERT |
We went on along the same road, the SR 87. This time Vivian’s friends were leading, ‘cause Luminous knew the place or, at least, she told us she knew how to arrive at a certain referance point, from where she would then psychically found the home of Darlene.
 FOLLOWING BARBARA'S CAR ALONG SR 87 |
So we were crossing the Navajo land and we could see the desert all around us, here and there some little barracks, distant from the paved road, and then paths, fences, mail boxes, some water tank, no electricity, The creeks were all dried up. At that point there was no phone signal, and we had been repeatedly told that we were allowed to take pictures of the people, so I managed my cell phone just to take images and short clips of the landscape, which I found gorgeous.
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| IMAGES OF THE DESERT IN THE TERRITORY OF THE NAVAJO NATION |
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| A WATER-TOWER ADMIST THE BARRACKS OF A NAVAJO VILLAGE |
Finally we entered the Hopi reservation through the road 264. The Hopi reservation is enclosed inside the Navajo territory. As we approached the villages I was hesitant if taking pictures or not, ‘cause I felt a wave of respect. But as my first profession in this life was journalist, I also felt compelled to be a testimonial. So I was in conflict and switching on and off my camera.
Suddenly we understood that Vivian’s friends had to stop to tank, plus we needed ice!
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| A HOPI BARRACK ALONG ROUTE 264 |
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| THE GASOLINE STATION AT KEAMS CANYON, ALONG ROUTE 264 |
Eagle had provided the car with 4 buckets for the purpose of maintaining fresh the bottles of water. Fortunately, at the gasoline station, a guy stopped his jeep. He tanked while his sister entered the shop and approached me as he saw that I was moving back and forth to take pictures.
He told us “welcome to Hopi” and gave us indications because Luminous had difficulty to remember how to find Darlene's home. (“Her psychic abilities today were not so psychihc”, Vivian commented). The guy told us we had driven too far and passed Darlene's house, in the town called Polacca. So eventually we drove back and finally we found the place.
Darlene invited us in, her house was composed of more rooms, which is unusual there, and it had running water and electricity. The main room was the living room, built slightly underneath the level of the ground and whose floor was made of polished red rocks. The other rooms were above the level of the ground and had the floor covered by linoleum. Darlene introduced us to his brother, named Ervin (or something similar), allowed us to use her toilet, and said we would go to Second Mesa and then come back for “some snacks”. Her brother decided to stay at home, claiming that it was too hot outside. In fact, the house was relatively fresh. We knew that the celebrations were going on on all the villages. If we wanted to, she could lead us to more than one village. But first of all we went to Second Mesa as planned.
Darlene went on Barbara's car. We started to go up to the Second Mesa, which is a high plateau, isolated from the surroundings except as for one unique road. Above, three little tiny villages, characterised by some stone buildings, clearly the remnants of ancient constructions, plus small scattered and seemingly provisional barracks, connected by paths of sand and almost no infrastructures, are hosting thousands of Hopi inhabitants, descendants of one of the most ancient Native American Nation.
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| THE LANDSCAPE FROM THE ROAD TLEADING TO THE SECOND MESA PLATEAU AND A SIGNAL NEAR THE VILLAGE OF SHONGOPOVI |
It was touching. We arrived at the village of Shongopovi. As we parked and got out of the cars, we heard the drums from far away, we walked carrying the buckets and some bendable chair, until we saw all the people of the village gathered close to the access to the main plaza… Women and men of all ages were standing or sitting at the entrance of the plaza, there were two rows of chairs placed along a corridor leading to the squared plaza, and a central passage was left in the middle of the two rows of chairs. Children and teenagers were sitting or standing on the top of the roofs. All spectators were there to watch, assist and support the dancers. There were about 100 of them. They were dancing for the rain to come for their corn crops, recently planted. Dressed as Kachina dolls, they formed a big circle through rows of three or four dancers for each row. They were chanting and shaking their rattles, moving all together at the same rhythm, while slightly bent on their knees, seemingly taking little steps, but almost remaining each in their own spot, then turning backwards all together after a certain number of steps, while the drummer, who was standing in the inside of the circle, gave them the rhythm and the counting of the steps.
Here’s how they looked: the correspondent Kachina doll is an exact reproduction of their actual masks and costumes.
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| MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED DANCERS WERE DRESSED LIKE THE KACHINA DOLL REPRESENTING THE SPIRIT OF CORN |
Plus, their skin was painted with different shapes and symbols, and colours were yellow red and blue. Their moccasins were brown or turquoise. Their garment included a fox tail hanging from their leather skirt.
We were not allowed to take pictures, and I absolutely didn’t touch my iPhone while in Second Mesa. So I’ve got not images from that sacred place. But I’d so love to have recorded the voices, the sounds, the chants and the music. They're impressed in my mind, though. In the following days, I’ve researched some historic material and documents among the books of the Public Library of Sedona, and here’s some interesting information about the Kachina dancers and this specific ceremony:
The dance continued at that one and only pace, it was tremendously beautiful and dramatically involving… I could not help looking at the dancers while their hypnotic chants resonated with me.
In the area dedicated to the spectators, we met a man who seemed to me from the very first glance a sort of Heyoka. He was smiling all the time, unlike the others present, men and women, and his eyes were shining with a flash of both wisdom and joke at the same time. He identified me immediately as a stranger, so he approached me and he tried to sell me something, telling me that he had jewelry in his house. I was resisting, feeling a bit uncomfortable, and Eagle saw the scene.
The man, after patting on the back of a woman who was sitting in the last row of chairs in her violet shawl, went away. But after a while he came back. In the meantime I had taken a seat on one of the buckets, who worked also as a chair, maybe trying to camouflage myself among my fellow travellers. But the Heyoka man spotted me and came close to me again and spoke to me. He gently insisted that he had something for me. I wanted him to be specific, so I asked: “what kind of jewelry do you have? And how much does it cost to me?” He answered: “everything, everything for 20 dollars”. I looked at Eagle, who was somehow alerted. He stepped in and said to the man that he would escort me. So the Heyoka man invited us to his little tiny minuscule home. We followed him. While leading us, during the walk, he still approached others jokingly, even if no one seemed to give him much attention. For instance, to a teeneger who was running across us, he screamed: “Aww, you’re speeding!”. That confirmed my first impression, that he was a sort of Heyoka of the village, and I felt less fearful.
So we arrived to his house and he opened the door. The house was composed by one unique room, which size was about 3x6 meters, with no internal walls, only one door and one window. Inside, it was quite dark and I will describe the space in a moment… His girlfriend was there. He introduced me to her, by saying that I was from Italy, and the four of us made our reciprocal presentations. The woman’s name was Bonnie. I can’t say the name of the man, but he claimed that his name corresponded to one of the symbols of Eagle’s T-shirt. The meaning was something as “The One Who Completes the Cycle”, like a star which is always in the sky, from evening to morning… or was it the sun? Or the moon? Or other celestial body? I didn’t grasp it fully. But anyway… The symbol is this one:
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| HOPI SYMBOL MEANING "COMPLETION OF A CYCLE" |
The One Who Completes the Cycle and Bonnie were full of smiles. Eagle and I were at first embarassed, as they told us to take seat but there were only 3… wait a minute... 2 seats! Because the first one I saw just after entering was not a chair, it was a toilet… and I didn’t dare to look at it again, since I was afraid to find out it was not connected to any plumbing. Yes, that room contained it all: a table, a bed, two chairs, the toilet, and shelves. All their belongings were there: bags, boxes, objects and things I can’t tell, because of the few light filtering from the almost close window.
They both were so gentle… they wanted us to sit down like their guests, and talk, first of all. We found out he had nothing to sell me but a pair of old consumed child moccasin shoes: he offered me those for 20$ and I paid them 40$. I was enthusiast of that purchase, he too. He said they were auspicious for me to have a baby. I laughed and I said "thank you but I’d rather see these as symbolic for me to walk my path". I asked how could I say “walk the red road” in his language and he told me the sentence. I repeated them shortly after and my pronunciation was correct, they were surprised. Now I have already forgotten those words.
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| THE CHILD MOCASSINS I PURCHASED FROM TOWCTC |
They celebrated me. And Bonnie gifted me also with earrings which I had spotted on their table, they were serial earrings …but I appreciated them. They also gave us a plastic bag with different tipes of bread in it, a little sandwich and also cinnamon and cacao cookies. It seemed to me that that was the food they had just prepared for themselves, like a sort of take away snack to carry to the plaza and eat while assisting the ceremony… but I’m not sure. It’s like they could not thank us enough for our visit. They wanted us to stay more, while they were standing all the time (‘cause there were only two chairs…). We talked about Italy, they barely knew where it was, and what the Vatican is and who is the Pope. Bonnie told us she probably had seen the Pope in one occasion “in my little screen”. We couldn’t understand if she meant a TV screen or what. They then explained us about the ceremony. They described us how much secret there is around it. She said that one of the youngs had brought his mask to the school to show it to his mates, but that is forbidden and it caused disapproval in the community. I can’t say how much time passed. We exchanged a lot and so intensely. TOWCTC said he was a silver carver, but that he had no silver to carve. Eagle told him he would bring him silver for him to carve in the future. He was thankful. When I stood up, the woman laughed ‘cause she realized how tall I was in comparison with her man. The man commented about the fact that I was there a guest of Eagle and his wife, and that I had come all the way from Italy, for the first time to the United States, with the purpose to visit Hopi Land. Which was true, in the first place. He referred to me as the one whom moments before he had noticed near the plaza, standing in total silence, somehow isolated from her fellow travellers, starring at the dancers, with her folded hands, like praying, somewhat wanting to hide. And now I was in his house. I reinforced the description of our encounter and let them know that yes, moments before I was standing there that way, because I had been captured by the wave of emotion coming from the plaza, and I was trying to go unnoticed, while under my hat tears of commotion where running down my cheeks. I told him: “I was feeling so …I don’t know…ashamed”. He replied: “you have nothing to be ashamed of”.
They both warmed my heart, Bonnie and TOWCTC. Before exiting their door, I asked them how one can say "thank you" in their language. I already knew (‘cause I had seen it in a mail written to me by Elan Cohen, Gregg Braden's producer, who is a Hopi descendant), but I wanted to hear the sound, and learn it well, and grab it in my memory. So they taught us: “Askwua’li” is 'thank you' if told by a woman, and “Kwa’akwa” is 'thank you' if told by a man. I repeated the word “Askwua’li” many times and they were pleased. They wanted to hug us.
Eagle and I walked back to the plaza and Eagle asked me: “seen how humble they live?” and I nodded.
Since at some point the Heyoka man had told us that the ceremony would continue on with the clowns making jokes to the people, I told Eagle: “I believe that he himself is a clown!”
My initial doubts and mixed sensations about that man had completely vanished: he had shown himself completely transparent to me and now I deeply liked him and his way of being.
When we arrived to the corridor facing the plaza, another circle of dance had begun. With my joy, the Heyoka man appeared beside me again, telling me: “Miss Italy! Here’s for you” while handing me another bag, this time a paper bag, containig two cilinders of blue corn bread. I opened it carefully. Eagle was enthusiast of that other gift and gave the man a roll of dollars in the hand, saying: “for you, I give it to you”. The man was so happy, he couldn’t contain his enthusiasm. Eagle told him: “call me your friend”. But he said: “I call you my bank!”. And we all laughed together. It was his playfulness, his innocent childlike playfulness that had rubbed off on us!
The dance went on and on. I asked TOWCTC to tell me what exactly the dancers were saying in their chants. He told me: “let me hear” and put himself in concentrate attention in order to carefully listen to the words. He then said: “they’re asking for water to come, for their crops”.
At the end of that cycle of dance, the people attending let their approval be heard by making that typical Native American sound with their hand over their mouth, the sound we used to get familiar with through the western movies. The dancers started to pass among the spectators with baskets full of fruits and gifted everyone by letting everyone pick up whatever they wanted: in the baskets there were oranges, bananas, melons, cobs of corn, cookies and peanuts wrapped in plastic bags… They also started to launch their gifts to the children on the rooftop…!
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| THE DANCERS OFFERING THEIR BASKETS FULL OF FRUIT |
TOWCTC said to me: “it’s the day of giving, one gives to other, including to YOU, who are here”. He added, still in wonder: “so you came all the way from Italy to America, to see this ceremony? That’s a long journey!”. I confirmed: “Yes, it is”.
Since he wanted to keep on talking, I had the chance to ask questions to the Heyoka man, while I was looking at the dancers, in reverence and total participation, and waiting for them to come close to us. First of all, I was interested in getting some more information about that village and the ceremony. Here’s what I found out through his answers: there are about 4.000 people living on the Second Mesa. The parents of the boys around 11 years old decide if they want their child to go with the elders and learn from them the secrets of dancing and chanting in the ancient ceremonies. The dancers train for 2 weeks, usually in the evenings, before the actual ceremony. Nobody can see them, so they train indoors. They eventually perform their dance for the public during the sacred day from dawn to dusk, all day long, until the sun sets. It is not an event set for the tourists or for outlandish visitors: it is for the community itself.
We then talked about the water. I asked him if they have tanks. He said no. He indicated the sky with his fore finger and also with his look. He wanted me to understand that, if it doesn’t rain, there’s no water. I asked: “where do the dancers have the fresh fruits from, if the rain isn’t coming?”. Laughing, he said: “Unless they’ve got them from Walmart…” Once again, his humorous character made things confused... I was puzzling all time long: was he still joking? Or what? Plus, I really couldn’t get it: how do the Hopi can live over there without water? How may they drink, cook, wash themselves, or whatever? While arriving, still searching for the house of Darlene in Polacca, we had seen three water basins of circular shape, along the main road, but we had spotted only one water tank: the one beside the gasoline station.
On the plateau, we saw no water tanks, except one old fashion water tower cistern. We later understood that that one is a collective water tank and that the tribal council decides how to distribute the water.
Beside that, later on Eagle, Vivian and I found ourselves making all kinds of guessing about the HOWs and we dared many fantasies, for instance: maybe one of the casinos of the area is owned by a potent Hopi man who shares his richness with all the inhabitants of the villages. Except finding then out that other American Indians do own casinos, but the Hopi don't.
When I asked TOWCTC: “is the USA Government supporting the people here somehow?” (and I wanted to justify my general ignorance by remembering him that I am Italian, not American), he looked into the empty space, between perplex and amused, and slowly answered to me: “I don’t know. There’s our council representant for that. But he is like Donald Trump. Do you know Donald Trump? He has problems with the law now, you know…” And I replied: “yes, I know”.
Finally, as I was attempting to keep on with the same line of questions, trying to understand how his people can thrive or even survive in those apparently (=to my perception) hard conditions, and I started my next sentence with: “BUT HOW DO YOU…?” he definitely gave me the ultimate answer: “WE STILL PROSPER” he said. And he said those words with such a fierceness in his eyes, that I felt an enormous “WOW!” expanding in me. He shut me up, I had no more questions. I will never forget that man, his smiling face and the glimpse in his eyes. And those words. And the proud strong voice he pronounced them with. I was in awe and I still am.
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| THE DANCER CAME CLOSE TO LET ME PICK WHAT I WANTED FROM THE BASKET |
One of the Kachina dancers was coming closer to us with his basket, I felt a sensation mixed of reverence and a sort of terror. His mask and costume were even more impressive seen from near. Like all the others, he was slowly moving among the people with his basket held high, walking somehow bent on his knees, he didn’t talk, he just pointed up with his forefinger, while still holding the basket with both hands, which I interpreted to mean: “pick just one thing” and he did the same gesture to everyone he was approaching. So he came and offered us plenty of choice from his basket, and I picked up a lemon, a fresh fragrant yellow lemon, and I said out loud “Askwua’li”. My new Hopi friend picked up an orange and started to peel it and eat it, throwing pieces of peel on the ground, while he interacted with other spectators, who were doing the same. I understood the ceremony is about sharing and implies that one who receives, has to show thankfulness and participation by eating what he/she got. But I was resistant to eat my lemon, and I kept holding it as a sacred object in my hands, while standing there.
The dance started again.
I must say I’ve always been passionate about Native Americans and attracted by their culture and I’ve was told many times that the Hopi are the most ancient tribe.
So, I couldn’t believe I was there, with my feet on their sacred land, surrounded by their colors and sounds, their symbols and vibrant energy…. and I was standing under the baking sun, being present with them as they danced their dance, praying with them for the rain to come, feeling their devotion to the spirit of corn, as they were blatantly dressed as the Kachina of Corn… and I had a mystical moment when I was slowly falling into a trance by listening to their chanting until I allowed myself to be totally caught in it and I felt I had metamorphosed and shifted into a plant of corn! With my lemon still in my hands, in my lap, as a firm central point, I perceived I was connected to the ground through a long root, and above to the sky through attracting a thunder which would eventually bring down the rain. So powerful, so grounding, so unexpected l!!!
I want to add: I always loved corn, and everything made out of corn has always been my favourite food. In my region, Friuli Venezia Giulia, in Northern Eastern Italy, we had a tradition with dishes made out of corn flour so much so that I always wondered: how could we do without corn, before it was imported from America? And I always could say, since my childhood: corn is what I prefer to eat. From polenta to pop corn, from tortillas to roasted cobs… I like corn in each of its renderings. And I remembered, in that moment, that that morning I had eaten a delicious breakfast based on polenta, at "La Posada". So ...I was full of corn. I felt ONE with the plant of corn.
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| THAT MORNING AT "LA POSADA" I HAD HAD FOR BREAKFAST A DELICIOUS PLATE OF POLENTA WITH EGGS, CHILIS, TOMATO AND SWEET CORN |
I was mumbling and musing that way when my Heyoka friend waved goodbye to me. He had to go.
Bonnie had re-appeared in the last row of chairs, mysteriously, wrapped in her violet shawl. Once again, he patted on her shoulders to say her he was leaving. And he left. This time I saw her standing too, shortly after, she passed by me, touching me friendly and lovingly, and she smiled, and said goodbye, saying something like: “And I even gave you Piki” (=the blue corn bread).
I later had the time to savour the Piki.
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| ONE OF THE TWO CYLINDERS OF PIKI BREAD WE WERE GIFTED WITH |
Here’s some information about this bread:
So, water. Off course. And …how could they prepare Piki bread (or other bread) when the main ingredient is water? Once again, I was speechless, but I told myself: stop! And I made my mind blank because I refused to use the reason any longer. So I let my being surrender and feel that warm loving embrace that was pushing towards me from the beginning, I let go of all resistance, and I only felt gratitude. No more questions, no more puzzling, nothing, just me, there, among the Hopi.
I was at a certain level interpreting the part of the tourist, at the same time I was so lucid and aware of what was happening. An encounter among equal beings, so equal but also so different. I wish now I could be there again. I wish now I could have stayed longer. And I’m crying now the same tears of the same emotion I felt when I started to tune into the dance chants. Thankfulness. Thankfulness for them. All of them. The dancers, the women, the children, the teenagers, the babies, the old ones, the sick ones, the dogs, the ones who went unnoticed and the ones who distinguished themselves among others. There even was a young female albine. So rare. And the Heyoka man. That unique individual.
The women were traditionally dressed, with so vivid colors, and their tipical patterns, and their hair was long, black, glossy, shiny. The men among the public were dressed in a western way.
Eagle, Vivian and their friends were also full of awe and gratitude. We stood there some more time, then we left because it was too hot and there was no shadow where to find repair from the sun. We also decided not to go to any other village, because of the heat and because we all felt that our experience was already complete, at many levels.
We went back to our cars, and we descended the plateau using the same road but the other way, reaching the State Route 264 again. We then went to the Hopi Cultural Center, which is not far from there. I had virtually been there months before, when I was simulating through Google Earth all the trip I would have taken if I had participated to the guided visit to Hopi Land organized by Gregg Braden in its “Hopi Land Sacred Tour” which was scheduled for March 2024. I had started to be interested in the possibility of a visit like that since Autumn 2023. And now, 9 months later, I had manifested it. Beyond my own expectations. Wow.
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| THE HOPI CULTURAL CENTER AND THE SHOP IN IT |
In the Hopi cultural center there are a shop, a restaurant, a museum… and it seemed to us that we had the chance to make more questions there, since so many interrogatives had arisen in us after leaving the dance ceremony. We wanted to know more about the Kachina dolls. Barbara bought one as a souvenir. At the shop there were two attendants, a male and a female. We all asked for specific details about the dolls, the dancers, the drummer and so on. But we didn’t receive all the answers we wanted. In the meantime, Darlene was silent, as she had been mostly of the time.
We went back to Darlene’s house. His brother Ervin was there, waiting for us. He was wearing a basketball hat, like he had before, even if he had remained inside the house all the time, or at least it seemed that way. He took place on an armchair in front of the chimney and aside the fan on, and prepared himself to listen to our reports from the Second Mesa. I noticed there was chopped wood near the chimney and I wondered where could they have the wood from, since in that desert there are no trees for miles and miles all around, no plants of any type, no vegetation at all. Except the roses in Darlene’s garden, that had caught my attention since the first moment we had arrived at her home.
Darlene had prepared plenty of food early on that day, before our arrival, and she arranged the table of the dining room so that we could stay all together sitting around it. She invited us to serve ourselves, each one by her own, from the kitchen, where she had another little table with all the food nicely put on it. She had carefully cooked and prepared enchiladas to fill up as we liked, with meat and sauces, a delicious asian salad, fresh tomatoes, and even a squisite dessert with pumpkin. To drink, she gave us tea and fresh made lemonade. On the shelves of the kitchen, I spotted boxes of some famous American brand foods. I noticed this family was recycling the trash, by separating plastic from paper, and had set different trash bins for each material. She switched the radio on, she was searching for their local music, she said, but then she switched off.
Darlene is a pottery maker and she offered us to buy some of her beautiful creations. A relevant painting hanging above the chimney, representing a young American Indian on a horse about to cross a river among the Red Rocks, was calling our attention. She explained it was her husband’s. “He was a painter” she said. So we knew that she had been married. She is single now, and she has a son, who’s living in New Mexico, where she sometimes goes, to visit him.
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| DARLENE'S VISIT CARD |
While Vivian and her friends went to see Darlene’s pottery workshop, Eagle and I stayed sitting there, making conversation with Ervin. We talked about spirituality, traditions…and water. Ervin couldn’t really figure out that in my far Italian territory it had been raining every day (I mean every single day!) for the last two months. He was thoughtful and asked me: “So everything is green, over there?” I answered: “Yes, several shades of green”. Hard to believe, there, at 9.444 kilometers of distance, where the surrounding landscape appears of one unique color. It was profound, that moment of comparing our different weather conditions and consequent lifestyles. But he said he uses to feed and water the birds in their garden, as a daily routine, and that seemed to me like a fresh breathe of breeze in the implacable hot desert.
When the moment to say goodbye came, we exchanged greetings and I said “Askwua’li” once again. I was the last one to leave, and I had my foot already on the threshold, when Ervin called me back to give me a gift. It was a wooden handmade pendant tied up to a necklace. I instantly fell in love with that object, decorated on both sides. He explained the meaning of only one side: “this is auspicious for prosperity. It symbolizes the thunder and the waterdrops. It’s useful if you want to have a child”. One moment: again? So I smiled and I thanked him. I was enormously grateful.
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| DARLENE'S BROTHER GAVE ME THIS GIFT |
We went back through the same road we had arrived. Vivian’s friends would have stayed in Winslow for the night, at La Posada hotel. We got back to Sedona. Along our way back, Eagle, Vivian and I spoke a lot about the Hopi. But there were also long moments of silence, due to the bubble of mystery and fascination each one of us was still experiencing. We had assisted to something spectacular, something no one of us had seen before. Eagle told us that in the past he had found himself involved in other Native American ceremonies. But the Hopi Kachina Corn Dancers were new to all of us.
I later found that among the many treasures kept in Casa Remuda there’s a stunning Corn Kachina Doll, which I discovered belongs to Molly, the lovely house manager of Casa Remuda.
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| MOLLY'S KACHINA DOLL IN CASA REMUDA |
Once back to my hometown in Italy after my sojourn in Sedona, I am realizing that my encounter with the Hopi had been one of the most moving and shaking experiences not only of my journey through Arizona, but of my entire journey through life.
Writing and pictures © Anita Clara 2024
Photo n.2 by Vivian Lee Gabbard; photos n. 6, 8 and 9 by Walter Soaring Eagle Koehler.
A SPIRITUAL NOTE ON HOW I GOT MY WISH FULFILLED
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| THE "HOPI HOUSE" AT THE GRAND CANYON VILLAGE - GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK photo by Walter Soaring Eagle Koehler. |
These articles of the newspaper "The Arizona Republic" include images and videos.
TO BETTER UNDERSTAND HOPI TRADITIONS AND THEIR DEPENDANCE ON THE CORN, READ THESE ARTICLES ABOUT HOW CLIMATE CHANGE IS IMPACTING HOPI FARMERS:
TO READ MORE ABOUT THE WATER PROBLEM IN THE HOPI RESERVATION, GO HERE:
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