The cultural context of biodiversity conservation - Oapen

Local expressions of indigenous knowledge
four cardinal directions, associated with different colours, indicate the integral worldview.
Flowers are signs of wealth, natural abundance and the human-nature relation.
Cacao is another sacred symbol that stands for harmony and peace. Animals like
chickens and turkeys are associated with death and transformation for generating new
life. Blood is a substitute for death, life and passion. Combined with the rituals are behavioural
regulations and taboos like abstinence, fasting and avoiding certain food
items. As one of the elders in San Benito said, they practice sexual abstinence thirteen
days before and thirteen days after the mayejak takes place. If these codes are ignored,
the harvest will be poor or damaged by animals. Likewise, misbehaviour can cause
human illness as the life cycle of crops and humans are believed to be intertwined. 56
Unlike Siebers (1996), who observed that such practices were not relevant for cash
crops, the mayejak, as performed by the farmers we worked with in San Benito, had also
been adapted to newly introduced crops such as cardamom. A farmer commented on
this practice: »Hay que hacer un mayejak para que sale el cardamomo, para que cresca, se sana. Si
no hacen mayejak no sale y viene enfermedad. Eso es costumbre.« In his experience, a mayejak
was necessary for the cardamom to grow well. Otherwise, the plants would not thrive
and would be likely threatened by disease. This is custom, as he asserted. By contrast,
an informant in Roq-há said that the mayejak was done exclusively for traditional crops
like maize and beans. Since Roq-há is quite diverse in religious terms, he reported that
only the 15 Catholic families in the village would practice the ritual. In reference to the
protestant families, he commented: »Los creyentes nunca hacen mayejak« – the believers never
do mayejak (field notes, 2003). 57 Among evangelical families, Siebers (1994) observed
that God often substituted for tzuul taq'a. At the planting of maize, for instance, most
of them did not perform customary rituals as described, but felt the need to pay ritual
attention to this particular moment, to ask God for protection and a good harvest.
Among the Catholic community members to whom we talked, other collective
rituals were performed by the eldest men and women at particular sites of worship
such as lagoons, riverbanks, mountain tops or caves. The latter are considered to be
sanctuaries, as it is believed that the tzuul taq'a reside therein and guard the forest animals
and control the climate, as an informant from the highland community of Xucaneb
explained. At the time of sowing, elder members of the community would go to
a cave to pray for a good harvest. Again, it is essential to provide copal pom, candles,
cacao beans, and animal blood to the land and the spirits of the elements. Likewise in
Roq-há, where five days before the seeding of maize takes place, a group of ten male
elders would go to the mountain. Women are not involved, because »the way to the cave
is difficult, there are many rocks, mud, ascents and steep descents«, as was explained by one elder
informant. By contrast, in San Benito, women were said to participate in ceremonies
held at such mountain sites. In both communities, the elders gather in the village
56 Most of the cultural codes and taboos (*awas) are idiosyncratic and particular to each community
(Wilson 1995: 109).
57 For an account of the history of the Catholic Church in Alta Verapaz and the influence of Protestant
churches on traditional patterns of Q'eqchi' culture, see Wilson (1995: 158ff.).
187