Ansel 11th Day

My day started off with the usual indigenous games, then breakfast. The day took a big shift from doing the usual writing classes with Shleva to going to Western University’s anatomy lab. I have been to the lab a couple of times before, so there wasn’t anything too crazy or shocking about the lab. What was different this time though is that since the program is full of very spiritual people we went through a ceremony before we went in with Tata Vicent. He brought a plant called rudda in Spanish (not sure about the name in english) from the garden at Pitzer, he told us that this plant is ancient remedy for ear aches but its also keeps you safe from different negative energies that linger with death. When we went into the lab a couple of students had difficult times being in the presence of deceased people so they had to step out; I was fine and actually became more familiarized with different human anatomy terminology that I had been taught before but forgot. I want to thank the native american doctor who facilitates the medical programming for us, she is someone who I have learned so much from in the past couples of years and someone continues to inspire me; thank you Kaydee (I think thats how you spell your name). Later on in the evening we had a workshop that basically was students sharing how they feel and the professor expanding on the idea of taking a different approach on tackling different social justice issues. The different approach is using our ancestral and traditional philosophies, culture, and tradition. Another topic the professor wanted to put a big emphasis on was the way in which our different languages and styles of talking are suppressed, oppressed, cut down, by this western educational system that doesn’t seem to work for most minorities.

If any of the mentors or staff read tonights blog post please fight for us to cut indigenous games tomorrow or the day after that so we can sleep in a bit and become well rested and ready for the day. I find that telling us to sleep during our breaks is a little difficult because some of us aren’t used to napping so I and Im sure other students would definitely benefit from time to sleep in.