An Optimists' Breakfast Land Acknowledgement
"May you have a good way home"
An Optimists’ Breakfast
To celebrate the completion of construction on the first stage of Bending the River and to launch the next phase of the project, Metabolic Studio hosted An Optimists’ Breakfast on Friday, October 13th, turning a day considered unlucky into a day of celebration. Marcos Aguilar kindly agreed to open the event with a land acknowledgement.
Marcos Aguilar is an educational leader, traditional Aztec dancer and community organizer, and the executive director of Anawakalmekak International University Preparatory of North America. Through indigenous pedagogy, Anawakalmekak offers students a comprehensive education that combines academic excellence, Native wisdom, and Indigenous heritage and history. Anawakalmekak also recently helped secure the return of twelve acres of land to the Gabrieliño Shoshone Nation of Southern California, the largest land restoration to an Indigenous tribe in Los Angeles’ history.
Below, we have included the audio of Marcos Aguilar’s land acknowledgement, in addition to a transcript that has been lightly edited for clarity.
Land acknowledgement - Audio
Land Acknowledgment - Transcript
MARCOS AGUILAR: Good morning everybody. Good morning brothers and sisters. I’d like to thank, on behalf of Anawakalmekak, Metabolic, Lauren [Bon], Milli [Macen-Moore] and everybody else that’s been working on this era of human history. And I’d like to thank the original Peoples first. So we’ll recognize all the original Peoples in these territory, in our way. Chief Vera Ya’Anna Rocha is one of the elders that guided us as young people, in defending the sage fields, in defending what is still natural about Los Angeles. With her guidance, we opened a school over twenty years ago called Anawakalmekak, in East Los Angeles.
And Metabolic has been supporting us for several years now, to help us provide that access to Indigenous education in Los Angeles for Indigenous children and families. We’re the only school, after twenty years, we’re the only Indigenous Peoples’ school in Los Angeles. Although we shouldn’t be the only one, because Los Angeles is one of the capitals, demographically speaking, of American Indians in the United States, and certainly across the hemisphere of Indigenous Peoples.
But the original Peoples of this territory come from many villages. One of which is Yaangna, here locally. When Chief Vera Rocha guided us as young people, times were very different. Recognition of their nations was very different. And today there are more than seven tribal leaderships that represent the Nations of the many, many villages that existed prior to colonization, and even after colonization they continue to exist. Those villages then became rancherías, that became reservations that were not too far from here, that were reservations that were subsequently, after the governments transitioned so many times in this territory, those reservations were pushed farther and farther, literally, off the coast. And the islanders were brought onto the mainland. And forced to live here.
It was so much disorder, so much chaos. But from all of that, throughout all of that, the original Peoples continued to thrive. Continued to exist. Continued to defend themselves. Continued to live and love. But the stories are that the territory, and the places that they visited, no longer looked the same. Became unrecognizable. Even though they knew where something ought to be, other people that had come to settle had changed it. All of these tribal governments that exist here in the city that’s now called Los Angeles, are practicing their self-determination and sovereignty. The Gabrieliño Tongva, the Gabrieliño Kizh, the Gabrieliño Shoshone, which is the nation of Vera Rocha’s descendancy.
And her ancestry goes back directly to the revolt against the San Gabriel Mission in 1785. And the records indicate that their leadership was punished, since 1785 by the Spanish Inquisition. Which was ruling this territory at that time. Some people might think that the Spanish Inquisition is something that happens on TV, or is something that happened, you know, in Spain, or somewhere farther south in Latin America. But the original Peoples of this territory were subjected to the Spanish Inquisition. And then later were subjected to the American Inquisition. With the declaration of the need for genocide and the establishment of the state of California. So as survivors of genocide, we recognize them. And the power, and the resurgence that they represent.
What a beautiful problem for people that have settled this territory to now have to figure out, “Oh, who do I talk to? The Gabrieliño Kizh, or Gabrieliño Tongva or the Gabrieliño Shoshone?” What if we had no one to talk to? What if that problem didn’t exist, because they had all been eradicated? Or pushed off, and not survived. And that memory had not survived. So let’s deal with the complications. Let’s not ourselves try to colonize them into some new sort of ideological reservation that is more comfortable for us to deal with. And let’s be comfortable with that discomfort of the realities of colonization continuing. That river’s still channeled. Still enslaved. That river has life.
My people come from Mexico. And Vera and others like Tata Rudy Ortega of the Tataviam Nation as an elder, senior. And now Tata Rudy Ortega, chairman of the Tataviam Nation, has embraced us, we’re here now as a people, respectfully recognizing that ancestral relationship that we have through our languages, and through this entire continent, which exists without borders. And recognizing that ancestral tie, we think of the life of the river. As both a woman and a man. Now I’m gonna sing a song here. To give thanks to that giver of life. And also to give thanks to those that take our life.
‘Cause that same giver of life takes our life. And we become a part of this universe again. And return in the rain. And appear in the clouds. And are a part of the mist, and the whirlwinds that, that join us every day. And we thank the little ones that live underneath the ground. And those that fly. And those that crawl themselves around. And those that drag their belly on the ground. And those on four feet. And those on two feet. And those we don’t see… know you’re all special people because you’re here, understanding the importance of what the river means to this land. To the original Peoples. And to the people that live in Los Angeles now.
But the one thing we can’t deny… is that there’s still not enough water. For everybody that’s here. Two weeks ago I was in Guerrero, in a pueblo… one of our elders, co-founded our school, is from that pueblo. Nobody’s showering. And it’s the rainy season. I had my American Western customs already, so I felt like I had to shower. So I asked them for some space, and water to shower. And he gave me about three gallons of water. I tried to use… half a gallon. That’s not a sacrifice. It’s just a reality. And the tanks are full of rainwater. You know, like, Lauren has all these tanks here, they have tanks there, too. I stayed at a teacher’s house. There are parts very close to us that do not have water. And we know that when we turn that tap on, that’s coming from somebody else’s land. And they do not have water.
And we haven’t resolved that here today. But hopefully today we can be a little bit more thankful, understanding those blessings. But there’s got to be a balance here somewhere. And I think that that’s what’s most inspiring for us, that we’d like to make sure that our children, our students, who don’t have the privilege of fighting the state of California to get a couple gallons of water from the LA River.
But they can witness this. And they can see. And our relatives that come from Mexico, and from other parts that come to teach in our school can see what is being done here. And we can think about it differently and come up with a different solution. Because there are other parts of the Guerrero that do have a river! A huge river! And so, not too long ago, a Nahuat conference was held in defensa de la agua de la, de la vida.
And across Mexico, the Congreso Nacional Indígena marched to defend the right to the water. Because there, companies are coming from Canada to mine the territories… in Nahuat territory, to extract gold! The gold rush is not over, folks! And how are they extracting their gold? With water! Where there’s no water! And then they’re bottling another site’s water, and selling it back to the people as bottled water! Because we’re convinced that our water is not clean. Why is it not clean? Because they’re mining the gold! And all of that is running off into the rivers! Into the soil water!
I was asked to provide a land acknowledgement. But all of this is connected. And this river and these waterways, they’re all connected. And all of you are all connected. And so let’s walk away today thinking that this inspiration that we have is again a call to action. And some of us don’t need that. We wake up, we dream, we think. All day long. All night long! This is part of our reality. It’s in our fiber. The fiber of our being. I know that, that you’re here among us that way.
The truth is though, I don’t know what my children’s lives are gonna be like. I don’t know what your children’s lives are gonna be like. It’s very unpredictable times right now…
(Singing)
We’re gonna excuse ourselves. I hope you have a good day today, and that the entire day is inspiring, that all of this work is inspiring to you… So, thank you very much for having us today, Lauren, and Milli and Metabolic. Thank you, everybody here for listening today, and may you have a good way home.