Free online event Thursday, May 20, 2021  5 p.m.

How do a people who have endured generations of oppression survive?  It’s a question Beata Tsosie-Pena of Santa Clara Pueblo and El Rito is often asked.

Historical trauma and inequities and living in the shadow of a nuclear production facility motivated Beata to work in environmental health and justice with the non-profit Tewa Women United program for over a decade.

“These the are things our people have faced. But that doesn’t negate our strength and power,” Beata said.  “We are resilient.”  Her activist concerns led her to become a full-spectrum doula and breastfeeding support counselor as well as infant massage specialist. Even her poetry reflects a deep commitment to the land and its people and is evidenced in the Healing Foods Oasis Garden which she coordinates.  The Garden is a project of TWU and the City of Espanola.

Resiliency—that’s at the heart of the many stories that are lived and shared at the Garden.  On Thursday, May 20 at 5 p.m., Beata will conduct a free public online storytelling and dialogue which will highlight the collaboration between art, science and indigenous wisdom.  It’s a collaboration that offers a model of sustainability critical in this Anthropocene era of climate change, she believes.

(To register, contact:  earthwalks1@yahoo.com)                     

The Garden is both a symbol of the traditional Tewa Pueblo values of place and the teachings of water and a grassroots act of prayer, ceremony, song—as well as resistance and survival.  “It’s about building the beloved community,” she says.  For her, that community is both local and global.

Heirloom seeds hand-harvested at the Garden are donated to the Espanola Public Library next door and available to the public. Seeds are kept in a refurbished card catalog cabinet. After picking which types to grow, patrons fill out a “seed caregiver sign-up” form and become part of a growing cadre of those planting and caring for heirloom plants.

Children participating are taught how to use the library and learn about local farming practices.  It’s ecological literacy, what Beata calls “voices of the plant elders and relatives.”

The online presentation will be followed by a series of volunteer days at the garden for those who wish to help.

The event is being sponsored by Earth Walks, a cross cultural education program based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, original homeland of the Tewa Pueblo indigenous people.    https://earthwalks.org/   To register, contact earthwalks1@yahoo.com