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By Claudio Hernandez (Na Ñuu Savi/Mixtec)

I am a Na Ñuu Savi (Person of the Place of Rain, Mixtec) born in Santa Maria, California, United States, to Nivi Ñuu Savi (People of the Place of Rain) who migrated there to work as farmers in the California agricultural economy. Ñuu Savi (the Place of Rain) is in Oaxaca, Puebla, and Guerrero, Mexico, where many pueblos are known by names that describe our history.

Cultural Survival Youth Fellow, Fermín Morales Hilario (Nahuatl), 22, is from Kalman Nimos in the mountains of Mexico, where his family grows corn, beans, and squash. His family is Náhuatl but his mother tongue was not passed down to him as his grandparents did not teach his father and mother to speak it. Fermin has five siblings and is the only one in his family to attend university. He aspires to finish his studies.

By Rosenda Maldonado Godinez (Otomi)

The smell of the cempaxuchitl (marigold) flower can be confused with the smell of chocolate that my mother makes at this time of year for breakfast and as an offering to the dead. In my community, the Day of the Dead celebrations begin on October 31 each year. When I was a child, my mother, my father, and my four brothers got up at five in the morning to make the fire, while I, still lying in a corner of my wooden house, listened to the noises that came from outside.

Este encuentro reunirá a las y los campesinos indígenas, a los y las poseedoras de conocimientos, narradores de historias, preparadoras o preservadores de alimentos, artesanos y artesanas indígenas; defensoras y defensores de los derechos al territorio, al agua, a las semillas, para que los seres sagrados del maíz que nos otorgan la supervivencia perseveren.

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