Cultural Knowledge as Crisis Response

In this episode, we interview Lendrick Lomayestewa, a traditional knowledge holder from Hopi who reflects on the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in his community and how he responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by turning to traditional knowledge and cultural practices. When tribal leadership lacked an emergency plan, Lendrick and community organization members developed a comprehensive strategy rooted in Hopi teachings, including food distribution, medicine, and community care. Despite being rejected by tribal authorities, their efforts highlighted the resilience and relevance of cultural wisdom in modern crises.

This podcast shares Indigenous stories of resilience and mental wellbeing during and after COVID-19. Hear from first responders, educators, traditional knowledge holders, and recovery community members as they reflect on challenges, lessons, and culturally grounded healing. Each episode also highlights local resources for Indigenous communities in northern Arizona.

Created by NAU’s Center for Community Health and Engaged Research (CHER) with Hopi and Navajo Tribal members. Funded by Project HOPE.

We would like to acknowledge Dr. Darold Joseph for sharing his beautiful flute recordings with us. It brought a meaningful dimension to the podcast and his artistry is sincerely appreciated.

Resources: https://linktr.ee/voicesnativenations

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:04

Hello and welcome to Voices of Native Nations in the Southwest during the COVID-19 pandemic. I'm Melinda Smith, and in this series, we're speaking with community members who've stepped forward in unique and powerful ways during the pandemic. These conversations will highlight the lived experiences of traditional knowledge holders, first responders, educators, and members of the recovery community from native nations in the Southwest. Their stories offer wisdom, strength, and lessons for communities and future generations. Today I'm honored to welcome Lindrik Lamayestua, a traditional knowledge holder from the Hopi community. Lindrik, thank you for joining us and sharing your story. To start, could you begin by telling us a little bit about yourself and your role and your connection to your community before and during the pandemic?

SPEAKER_01: 0:58

My name is Lyndrick Lamaistua, and I'm a member of the Hopi tribe. I um come from the village of Samupavi, but I reside in um the village of Pwaka. Samupavi is a very untraditional um village that I come from. And I think it's probably the only village within the Hopi communities or villages that still practice its uh traditional form of government. And there are a lot of different certain practices that I don't even want to call them ancient, or maybe they are ancient practices that we still do in regards to any type of um attack, whether it be uh enemy or disease, that we have in um in our traditional um government, the way we um address these things. So that's what I was knowledgeable about, and that's where my expertise would be probably come out regarding um the pandemic that happened with COVID, using the traditional resources that was available already before the pandemic happened.

SPEAKER_00: 1:59

Great, thank you. Our first main question is what did you learn from the COVID pandemic in your role as a traditional knowledge holder in your community?

SPEAKER_01: 2:10

I learned that um nobody was prepared for this COVID pandemic. And um, even our tribal, I hope the tribal government was not prepared with any form of uh response to this type of pandemic. When this happened, I was teaching textile weaving to some of the male youth that we had when the pandemic happened, and they closed my school down, the tribe did because of when they locked everything down here. And so um we had to um quit our um training sessions and cut it short and then just start doing other activities to respond to this pandemic. When we went to the tribes, the Hopi tribal um government, they didn't have any form of emergency um plan prepared for this pandemic. So my my group, we I I have a little organization that I'm a part of that we do a lot of, like in my um thing, I do teaching um cultural knowledge and weaving textiles and certain different forms of textiles. My colleagues are they do um farming techniques, then um some of them do painting, text uh yeah, those kind of artwork, and then copy foods and cooking. Those are some of the things that we do in our organization that has to do with our um village and just teaching our people a lot of these this knowledge. So that's why we're in the midst of when the pandemic hit, and we had to um close down our um lessons just to protect ourselves, but we couldn't just sit around and do nothing. So that organization we ended up doing other things like food um distributions, uh, wood distributions, coal distributions, all that form of stuff to the to the village, to the members of the village that were on lockdown. The preparedness of it wasn't there. Nobody expected it to be like this, and it hit the community very hard. And especially with the tribe not having any kind of emergency plan, we were basically on our own. We had to come up with something, and so what we did was we looked back at our culture, we looked at our some of our traditional practices, and we used those um techniques from that practice to start the project, to start the um the planning. We have an oral tradition, so what we did was we instead of using oral, we we started writing it down. What are the techniques, what are the um things that we need to do? So we did that. We came up with a whole emergency plan. I think we were the probably the first village that created a plan for this COVID using our traditional knowledge and stuff. We presented it to the uh village uh religious leaders and they rejected it. They rejected it and they'd rather go with the um tribal. They finally kind of came up with just a really vague um plan, and they decided just to go in that in that route. And at that time, we only had like 11 cases in our village, and when they rejected this plan, within two weeks we were already at 100 next to you know, they started to um people started to die, and they really didn't have a plan on how to at that point where people were starting to die from it, they really didn't have any um thing there, you know. How do we because we do still do um traditional burials and how do we conduct these? We can't retouch the patients and all that. And then um we ended up doing all that, that part of it. And if they had just um accepted our plan, I think we would have saved a lot of people there, but because the uh the the the leaders they decided to go with the tribal plan that was ineffective. It couldn't keep the people settled, it just people were just going in and out, in and out, and that's the what that was the main cause of spreading the um COVID in our village. And um, our plan was that we would completely shut the village down for two weeks. Completely. Nobody's in and out. And we had all the necessities, um, mail runs for them. We were putting our life on the line, you know, as a clan, as a clan group. Uh, that was part of our responsibility was to um take care of our children. So we had to take that initiative and uh do what it was uh required of us as a clan, and we we um were to be picking up mail for them, their medications, or um any kind of resource like propane, if they run all that, and then food, we're distributing food that would last for two weeks. And just there was a staging plan, staging areas, all that stuff was going to be taken care of. We were the ones to um distribute all the necessities to the people, but keep them inside. You know, everybody was on lockdown, and apparently that's what they didn't agree with, so they just rejected our plan. And we lost a lot of tribal members, our elders mainly. So that's the lesson that we learned from that, you know, that our culture still teaches us these kind of ways, methods to combat some of something like this, if it does happen again. We just need to re-educate our our people and tell them that this is why we still practice these things. This is what it was meant for. It's not all ritual. This is these are some methods that we have to keep in mind and practice it. That way, if something like this happens, we have a way to save our people from it. Maybe I don't know, it's of if if um other tribes don't had those kind of methods in their uh some of their cultural teachings, we still had it. So that was one thing that was a strength that we were gonna get have it come around again. That would be the method to use, you know. A very stringent, very strict method. And so I hope that people real now realize that, except that plan that we created for our community.

SPEAKER_00: 8:21

Thank you. I really appreciate you sharing all that. It really shows how much you stepped forward during um that time and it was clear that you were doing everything you could to support, you know, the youth and your community, your village. And it must have been, you know, hard to see the emergency plan that you prepared, um, especially one that was rooted in traditional knowledge, kind of get set aside and um when it could have made a real difference. So it says a lot about your resilience and commitment that you still found ways to help, even when the structure around you kind of was lacking, it sounds like. Would you be willing to share more about the techniques or ideas you included in that plan?

SPEAKER_01: 9:04

We um we went we went and sought an individual that did work for the um tribe, open tribal government, but because of his um ways of preparing um techniques and stuff like that for the tribe, they they didn't like his his viewpoint. And so he was released from um employment for the tribe. So we picked him up and he was really willing to have, he's really knowledgeable on a lot of these things. We brought him in and then we talked about our traditional, the methods, the traditional concepts that we have regarding this thing. We had to share a lot of knowledge with him, and then he finally we figured it out and we started putting in them into certain areas. And eventually we came up with a probably a 25-page plan that included everything from um who's in contact with COVID, who got contacted, where we're gonna, you know, keep them at, uh, isolations, all that stuff, and then how we're gonna give out the materials to those people, the even their doctor appointments, you know, and then other things that they needed, who was gonna be there to do that for them. All that was we we hashed it out and we found out that some of our village community members did were um certified to help some of the people out. So we used them to go collect their mail at the post office. Uh, even the ranchers that were out there were um we considered them also. And the ones that had fields, the um traditional cornfields, those people, you know, we found a way for them to maintain their crops without having to come into the community. And all that was taken care of, the staging, where the trucks were gonna come and unload the materials, and we we had all that, you know, who was gonna be there to to inventory it and all that, and then how it was gonna be distributed. We had all that stuff planned out, and then on the last day of the um event or the last day of the um confinement, or there was a traditional um healing ceremony that was that would have been conducted that day. And that was the day we were gonna release the people from their um from their isolate insulation, isolation, and then they were gonna come out and um do the regular prayers that we do during those events, but um it never happened because the leaders they strictly refused to go in that direction with our plan, and that was something else, and it was today. I'm still not, I still can't find a reason why they did that. You know, there are traditional leaders, but do they know the system well enough to make that determination? And especially when it comes to accountability, you know, those kind of legal questions. And so to this day, I'm still, you know, if it does happen again, you know, maybe we weren't so we weren't too aggressive on that. We did explain everything to them, but we thought that would be enough. But I guess it wasn't enough. We needed to put the educational component of it, educate them on this thing, why why release our our um cultural practices, that sort of thing, and then maybe they'll understand it, and then they'll accept it next time. We um that's what we ran into on the where we um left off was what we didn't really kind of like just give up on it after we were rejected. We still had a huge responsibility to the community and to our people. So we decided to have the food distributions to our where we had our um uh organization operating, and we went and um had them deliver there. Then we had to get trained in how to deliver those things and how far to stay from them and all these things that you have to be aware of. And we did all that, and then we started to do the food distributions on there. But it was right around winter time where people needed heating resources like wood and coal and stuff. So we ended up um buying the coal from certain um individuals and then distributing that into the village, and then the wood also from Flagstaff, and we we ended up being um lumberjacks. You know, they bring these bigger logs and we would they just dump it off, and then we would end up cutting them up and you know, put splitting them and all that, and then piling and then distributing to all the village members. You know, we did that all throughout the COVID, and we were very well protected because some of our medicine they had they didn't concoct it. It's just uh one of the remedies that they had, they offered that to us, and we were using that drinking that a traditional medicine, uh, and that's what kept us from not getting COVID. And so even the precautionary measures that we had with our mask and everything, we still would drink that every day, every day. And it kept up our our strength, it kept our immune systems going, functioning right. And so we didn't we even though we were exposed so much, we didn't get the COVID till way later, until after I passed and all that, and then um we I I got the COVID after that. I think I put my guard down, and that's when I got the COVID. But um, yeah, so traditional practices, traditional medicine, all that was available to us. We just needed to utilize it in the and and um really um that would have been that would have worked a lot.

SPEAKER_00: 14:42

Hey, I really appreciate you opening up about that. I think that's a great segue into our next question. What sustained you during the pandemic in this role?

SPEAKER_01: 14:53

The people that were um affected by it were the ones that actually uh had the cultural knowledge, and then you know, it's just the the language, everything. And that if that got taken from us, you know, how would we, you know, how would it go again, move on forward? And I think that was what really made me we need to save some people here. And then um the traditional medicine man, they offer their remedies to us and to keep our immune systems going. And so they produced that for us, and that's what we were, we had to put our total faith in that. And um we we didn't get shots or nothing at that time at that time. We were just strictly relying on our traditional um medicine that was given to us, and and they were just like producing them because people they were giving it out to people too. That's what Penabla and that and the this the spirit that we have as clan. There's a lot of responsibility. I belong to the Sun clan, and we have to um Sun Clan is the Sun is our father in that concept, in our cultural concept is the sun is the father, is the father of all living things, plants, animals, and humans. Without the sun, we wouldn't be here. So, in order for us, if the sun is our clan father, we have to fulfill that role as a father figure to all life, plants, animals, and humans. So that responsibility is already given to us. So we have to put up ourselves and take that father's uh role responsibility and start helping our children, yeah. That's what was the thrive, the drive behind me and my uncles and my nephews. You know, we just we have to do it, you know, we have to do it. And nobody else is gonna do it. We have to do it. So we put our actually put our lives on the line team. And um, it was way later when we talked to this one uh elderly man, and he was one of the last of his clan from our village. He was the last remaining member of his clan, and he really gave us that because during the um 1900 smallpox epidemic, their clan did that too. They stepped in and they and so that's the result, that's the consequence of it. And he was the last remaining member of his clan, so he really kind of gave us a warning, a pre-warning that this could happen. So please, you know, just kind of if it's a matter of life and death, you really have to consider your clan or you'll end up like us. Those kind of things all came out too from from this, and a lot of other different forms of knowledge came out, and so now we're we hold that knowledge and hopefully we can pass it on to the youth because we don't know what kind of other pandemic is gonna occur in the future, you know, when we're not here, and so they have to be prepared, plus also to maintain our culture and our religious practices because that's where those they're um they're all because we uh we are um we have an oral tradition, nothing's written, everything is being represented through ritual, song, and dance. And so a lot of some of the things are meant for other things, you know, but there's certain rituals and stuff that are meant for specifically these types of uh events that if that occur, if they occur. So those are some of the things we need to figure out and you know teach the youth that this there's there's big, there's a lot of information in this ritual, or that kind of thing is now on the forefront of our our teachings now. So I'm gonna continue teaching cultural knowledge for the youth, but a lot more than what I was teaching before the pandemic.

SPEAKER_00: 19:03

Thank you. That's really powerful. You know, it's clear that traditional medicines teachings and just support from elders and capturing the knowledge and wisdom that they have play a big role in getting through such difficult times, such as the pandemic. If you're comfortable sharing, how did those shape the way you responded to challenges throughout the pandemic?

SPEAKER_01: 19:26

The challenges were there, you know. The challenges came like a big old locomotive train that just came in, you know, broke through the barrier. We had to, I guess, um, confront it as fast as we could, as quickly as we could, you know. You know, we had to be physically, mentally strong in order to do that. Because we knew that if we continue, we don't know how long it's gonna last. And you know, we might just burn down halfway through. And our strength and our energy had to be um, we had to keep it up. And we just like uh it was like um sometimes like oh we gotta get up and you know get back to work again, you know. And it was a constant um movement throughout the whole thing for us, and with uh, you know, trying to not to get the COVID and trying to use all the um the measures of um protecting yourself. And it was you know constant um reminding yourself that you need to be strong to finish this and to fight this thing and finish it off. So we constantly were like our uncle, my um the medicine men were um producing the the um medicine for us, and we're just kind of instead of drinking coffee, we would drink that in the morning, you know, but a couple of cup uh cups, and then uh we would go go to work again, you know. And you could feel the drain, you know, that you know, by three o'clock you're starting to feel drained out, and we'll just drink some more of that, you know, keep us going. So those kind of things really kept us going. Our cultural and traditional medicines, traditional foods, those kind of things kept us going. We were, I guess, had to keep in ourselves physically and mentally in condition in order to keep going. And you know how a lot of these um people that do have COVID now are they acquire COVID and their memory is really weak now. If they start drinking this on traditional medicines and herbs, then they're just like tea products, but they have a lot of these um certain um types of plants and stuff in there that produces that for us. That's what our body needs. It needs something that you know, just it instead of having side effects and stuff, it just goes strictly to certain organs and certain things to to enhance it or to um eliminate certain toxins from your body. And that's what we were using with one of them was was the toxin uh it clears our all our toxins out of our system. So that really feels good when you do that. It makes you energize real bad. And our skin was our the color of our skin was not the way it was. We were starting to really brighten up. So those kind of things were uh helping us out and uh keeping us going throughout the whole thing was just have to be strong, keep keep your keep telling yourself you need to be strong mentally, and then producing these um medicines that was helping us out, just keeping faith. And um, we are who we are, we're the Hopi people. Uh we've managed to pull through through a lot of these things, and smallpox was one of the biggest ones. And uh before this, I had already researched a lot on smallpox epidemics that happened on Hopi. So I kind of knew what this pandemic might do to us too, also. So um that's when we came up with that um the idea of um quarantine, lockdown, and stuff like that. And that's what they did back in the in the day when they had smallpox and them. They weren't allowing anybody to go anywhere and to visit their relatives in another village. They were engaged, they were kept confined in their homes till it until it left us, basically. You have to have your past experiences and you have to be knowledgeable about those kind of things too, and that way you can plan ahead. And so knowledge from the past will guide you to the future. That's just the way it works. And so a lot of these things are in those past events, things that happen, and we need to continue using those methods in the future for our groups and for our clans and for our villages. Um, the one of the main things is that the reason why our villages are small in population is because of that. We do not want to populate like some of the other tribes because of things like this. When they happen, it's a lot manageable for our people. And that was one of the things that we that's the reason why we're not you know populous. We we maintain our population. That was another thing that was taught to us already when we're youth. We put that into our experience with this one, found a place for it. And it was it was true, you know. I think if we were having to um do three or four other communities, I don't think we were pulled through. But we only helped two communities up, you know, there's a lot of work. The population parameters on Hopi is really minimal, like we only have about 15,000 or something of that population as compared to the Navos, which are about 200 some thousand, you know. Yeah, we did lose a lot of people in our villages and communities, but no, it's still maintained by the birth that we get. But it's just the knowledge that we're losing, you know, and we don't need to use that. So I think a lot of my my group, my generation, we're really eager to um step up and start teaching the cultural knowledge and uh and what our um Hopi um ceremonies and rituals represent. And it's not really that, it's about life. How do you pass through certain things that happen to our people? How do you get them out of how do you rescue them? Those kind of things in there. And so that's the knowledge that we need to pass on to our youth. I think um you probably understand what I'm talking about because your tribe is probably went through the same thing, too. I don't know how how big your tribe is.

SPEAKER_00: 26:09

We were pretty small, about 7,000.

SPEAKER_01: 26:12

Yeah, that's manageable.

SPEAKER_00: 26:15

Well, thank you for sharing that. Keeping in mind uh kind of this the sources of strength and hope that helped you through the pandemic. Uh, can you share a moment or memory from that time that stands out to you?

SPEAKER_01: 26:30

Well, the strength is that we still practice our cultural teachings. The strength is that we now know more than what its intentions are why we do those truths. Why do we why do we do the ceremonies like that? What does it really suggest to us? Now we have a deeper understanding of what they really are for. It's just not just a dance, it has a lot more meaning to it and a lot more of methods and teachings that we can use for certain events. So that's the strength that we got from there. We it opened up, it opened us up to a lot more of what our culture represents. It made us aware that this is not this what our our forefathers who created this thing had this in mind too. And that's why they we were an oral culture, they put it into representation. And it just was just up to us to interpret that representation. Today we can write it down. What they mean like with our emergency plan, we wrote it down. So that's the one of the benefits and the strengths of this, what I've learned from it. And teaching it to the youth now, and um, there's hope for the future. There's some youth that are very involved in our um cultural practices, and those are the ones that we really need to teach the full length of what they're going through. And that way they it's when it's their turn, they know exactly what to do, and it may be more than what we did. Um, those are some of the strengths. Cultural knowledge is very, a very um good, unique way of expressing yourself and also moving forward in the future. If we had lost this, I don't know what we would have done. Cultural knowledge is it's it's a it's an idea that they came up with and just keep practicing in um your culture, your religion, your rituals, your song, your dance, and eventually you'll figure it out. And they said that you don't just automatically figure it out, you have to continuously practice it, and then it'll come into your into you, and you'll be able to understand it. And which is, you know, I guess we're at the right age because I've been practicing it for over 35 years now, you know, and finally, you know, this thing happened and it just drew us in that direction. If I didn't have that practice, I don't know where I would have been, I don't know what I would have done. I probably wouldn't be out there in the front lines, I'd just probably be home in the house, you know, not doing anything for anybody. But because of that, I was out there helping out. What we hope to is to pass on this knowledge. It's almost like dissecting your your um practices. You have to dissect, oh, because a lot of there's so many things that are happening within that uh ritual. And let's just look at this one here. And this one is describing this, is telling us this. So it's a lot of that we have to sit down and really dissect it out, and then then hopefully write it down, and then we'll have a whole manual that's sitting in front of us. We did experience that with that emergency plan, and that was only from one ritual, and it it was a whole 25 page volume that we acquired from that, and so. those kind of things are still we could still do now and that's one of our strengths too that we could teach um the youth to continue their education also and then use that education bring it back in here and use the techniques from that to to to to um understand uh a lot of these things um we have um some youth that are going out for um i think um archaeology or anthropology or something like that and then we have some that are going into the medical fields those kind of things and use that knowledge and education and all that educators and bring it back and then you'll find what our the true value of our cultural practices are about and it's not just about ceremonial dancing there's just a lot more to it that's what we hope for the youth to carry forward and understand that that that there's a lot more than to it than just dancing and singing and I hope that um we still continue these um our cultural practices and there's um a lot of our youth are no longer speaking the hoopi language and it's all tight to the hoopy language so that's one of them that I'm doing working on right now is I'm building this classroom here that I'm sitting in right now where I will be teaching cultural knowledge and hooping language and how to write the language. That's my that's the reason why I'm building this classroom here. And it's almost completed but it'll be completed probably by after fall then to start continuing our classes again which we weren't doing since COVID you know we're still in the midst of it when um when that happened and now found me I got me a new building where I can teach everything in that building. I'm a teacher too but um I've left my um previous um jobs and I'm gonna do a whole different thing on my own cultural knowledge uh textile weaving on Hopi Lawai Hopi language and writing it that was not all just oral it's all written so that's my plan and that's my um what I give I hope to teach the youth that those kind of things in my classroom here.

SPEAKER_00: 32:24

That is great. Thank you for sharing that I guess I I just want to say um thank you for the work that you do just it sounds like your your upbringing and decades of living you know your traditional ways of life um really gave gave you a sense of strength um and a strong foundation and um especially during the pandemic and difficult times and thank you for your work you do in passing that on to youth through speaking with them and um teaching them your cultural teachings and ways of life. Thank you. I'll go ahead and move on to the next question. How did your experience during the pandemic impact you personally professionally and within your community?

SPEAKER_01: 33:09

Personally um before COVID hit before there was ever any mention of COVID I got real very ill to a point where um almost couldn't breathe it lasted for almost two weeks you know but I I just continued um drinking our traditional medicine I pulled through it but it affected my lungs a lot to this day I still have issues with my lungs I'm thinking that was that COVID that I got because the symptoms and everything that they described was the same thing that I was going through that was in December and then here the epidemic came later on a couple months later but I was already I went through it survived it you know without any kind of without going to the hospital without you know just just being at home and drinking my traditional herbal medicine and I've always wondered I wondered if that was COVID and I went through it. So that's why it didn't affect me during the COVID my immune system or something kind of like triggered it and it went against it. But I really got sick that was the only time that I've gotten sick was there all the symptoms that they were talking about COVID those are the symptoms I had my lungs and everything my breathing but um I'm I've often wondered why some of the my colleagues and my other um people that I grew up with didn't make it through after they identified it as it as COVID and I lost a lot of my um my peers to COVID because they didn't pull through their their pneumonia and their lungs you know that was the main thing that caused them to and pass on. Something helped me back. And then when COVID hit I was the first responder to it from the cultural perspective my clan and I we responded to it head on and that's that's what I experienced was that you know who's gonna do it? Who's gonna stand up to it? So we we were the first responders to it to COVID in our community everything from creating an emergency plan to um trying to implement it but but then we did other things aside from that we still maintained to um give out the food distributions and stuff that was in the plan you know and other things but we just couldn't do other things not not all of it just only some of it that we did but we continue with the plan that was my experience to it somebody had to do it. First responders they really admired them you know because they have to know everything that they know the skills and certain tragedies or certain things that they go in and they they risk their lives but if they know what they're doing you know they'll come back out safe and sound which is what we did you know kind of through history we know some of the responsibilities as well some of the methods and all that so that's the route we took using traditional medicines and it was way before that that way after COVID that we finally got our shots COVID shots and then that's when we got sick that's when I got the COVID shot and then here I got sick and then I was tested positive for COVID. Wow throughout the whole time I wasn't even affected and so there's a lot of strength in um our knowledge in our culture and we just need to pull them out they're not just they're just for practice you know they're they're for a reason and if we pull them out and write it down and put it to use then then it would be more effective for our people and those are some of the things that we learned and we still have meetings every now and then with my my clan and we discuss some of these things. Just other than that we had a meeting up till 12 o'clock midnight and so those are some of the things that I learned from it too. I ganged a lot more and I uh went over the threshold of how far we're supposed to practice our culture or practices I think we went over that now and so now I see it totally different. I don't see it as a ceremonial thing it's more it has more significance to it. So that's where I stand from I guess um at this age we need we're the elders now of our village because most of them passed on you know I don't see myself as an elder but agewise I guess we are now that's what I'm trying to pass on now to the to the younger generations and the ones that are willing to listen and take on this responsibility as we build as we as we move forward not just giving it to one clan the responsibility but the responsibility to all the clients and all the um the males of the clans they need to know exactly what to do give them that teaching and put another aspect into our cultural practice those are some of the things that I learned from it and I gained all that knowledge from and experience from from my position in this Hopi community. So now we're saying that it's not really just our responsibility if you're a father you have children you have to know what to do. It really opened up a lot of things for us you know this pandemic when it happened and yeah there's a lot of downfall that we lost a lot of people knowledge but we also gained a knowledge a lot of knowledge from it too now we have a whole different perspective of um uh moving forward with our culture and language is one of them and so that's what we're gonna tackle first to start teaching the language that way it's more understandable to practice it you know what you're singing about you know what you're doing so those are some of the things that we got from it my uncles they're they're the same way too one of them is really highly involved with agriculture you know that's his main thing his main point so he's teaching the not just the dry farming techniques that we traditionally use but he's implementing other forms of planting corn you know like through drip irrigations modern methods that's what he's learning from it too because we can produce our own food and when certain things happen we don't have to be reaching out to other places we have it all here we have our own fuels out there we have our own farms there that produces a lot of these vegetables and um stuff like that that was his thing you know he learned that from there and there's a lot we have land you know we just need to produce it into something that's going to be useful for us in the future so those kind of things that we um we learn from this from our little for our little organization that we have my part of that my branch of that organization is called or now it's called Agricultural Arts Project and it involves a lot of the arts like weaving and stuff like that the meaning of it the colors and then also language so that's what I'm doing I'll be doing in my classroom here. A lot of uh students are already eager to come and sit in my classroom but we're only allowing so many per month two months and then bring some more in a lot of um other men from other villages they're seeing this as a pilot project and they want to start doing this in their villages too this is almost like a culturally talking about this building it's it's a modernized version of a taquiba and where we do all our practice and teachings but it's more modernized I guess that's what this place is I call it the Hopi Topai Kiva language class kiba you know because um that's what it really is you know that's one of our um strengths that we have is that we do have these facilities that's supposed that are here for us that um allows us to continually pass on cultural knowledge and so that's what I'm gonna do here within this to pass on all the cultural knowledge that I possess that I have that I learned and put it into use for certain things certain events.

SPEAKER_00: 41:18

Thank you for sharing that it's uh really inspiring you drew on traditional knowledge not only to care for yourself but to support your community to also stay grounded through you know the Hobi language and farming techniques and other aspects of cultural practices. So that's truly meaningful.

SPEAKER_01: 41:37

I guess we we have two more questions what do you hope others especially the younger generations take away from your experience first of all they um need to really um dig into their history and then once they identify themselves and their roles and responsibilities in their clientship then they can start seeing what they're responsible for and teach them responsibility and that way they have to step up on certain things like this not just on events like pandemics and stuff but other cultural responsibilities that they have and do it properly. Don't just do it because you have to do it. Do it with meaning that's what I want to share with the youth I want them to actually know the meaning of certain things like I I teach the weaving of um the belt weaving and I tell them this belt weaving you look at it it's got designs it's used for a per it has a purpose but it's really a textbook and I tell them everything about that and it is a textbook it tells them everything of the way you should live your life so you have mental stability physical strength that way you can be able to continue with your families doing what you love to do. And that's what a belt really is and it's so it's a way it's a kind of like a process of how you can live your life to the fullest without injuring yourself you know without putting all these chemicals in yourself but being physically and mentally straight pure I guess. And that's why the color of the belt is red. And so all that the meaning of the colors the design everything on that what it represents and it really brings like the teach the students that I taught that they really looked at it differently their side them side and how they used to just abuse their bodies with drugs and alcohol you know that's you know the way to live so those are our textbooks to tell them and if you see that you need to pass that on. Tell your children about what it is. Read them the textbook that you have right now in your hand and so that's hopefully they're doing that right now. A lot of people are giving me calls and can you come over and talk to us about that you know yeah if I find time to do it just schedule a date and time and I'll schedule my time with them and then come and I'll teach your family about these things. And so that's the beginning of it now you know and people are starting to realize that you know there's more to it than what they know and they want to know more. That's my thing now my my personal wish that I want you know just to everybody for everybody to be at the same level as that we're supposed to be you know some of them are way down here and you know bring them up you know knowledge wise you know don't don't be um hoarding your knowledge be open to everybody and that's what I am that's how I am you know people always ask me when I get home how do you say what does this mean you know I'll tell them nothing's really sacred people say it's sacred you can't talk about it. No it's because they don't understand and they don't know that's the reason why they say it's sacred you can't talk about it. Of course you can't talk about it it's it's those are messages for you for learning things for you you know it you advance your knowledge a little bit more so that's where I stand from and um that's my um my um strong points from that I got from COVID. It really opened up a lot of things for me.

SPEAKER_00: 45:23

I'm not where I was at before COVID and my elder status I'm accepting it now even though I'm still young I'm I'm considered an elder now and I have to take that role and responsibility of another and if I can do more then I'll do more also that's my take on on this thank you that's really great advice for everyone and the youth especially just focusing you know on responsibility integrity risk respect and truly valuing their community and their culture that's thank you for your work again.

SPEAKER_01: 46:03

So the final question is what message would you share with someone who is preparing to serve their community in times of crisis my message would be that to start understanding their cultural knowledge and their culture more the people before us left it for us for a reason to fall back to it in times of need. And so it's all there the song prayer ritual medicine it's all there we just need to find that out on our own terms and just and consider those things make use of it for ourselves and for our people because um like I said you can't help everybody out so the smaller the group the better it is we all share that responsibility we can take on a whole group of people a lot more but in your little area do that learn about your the knowledge that it teaches us and use that and share that and understand what it's about that way you will have a really good idea of how it will protect your people because it's all about that when I first when I was younger I always used to think that all of our thing is about it's war tactics our dances are it's all war tactics why we're supposed to be peaceful then I now understand you have to know that in order to avoid it and you have to know how to respond to it. That's why I saw that already our culture is based on war tactics but then now I understand that because an enemy comes in you got to know how to respond to it. And I look at the other other tribes like their powwows and stuff like when they do their dances and all that they're on track you know they know what what those things are about. Now they need to put it to use when something like this happens you know you know to save their people. So that's what I um want to pass on is look clearly deep into your culture your practices pull these things out from you because that's where it's at that's where the knowledge is at and we need to understand that in order to make it work when something like this happens. So that's my my message to the people and don't be afraid to take on responsibility do it for your for your people and for your family.

SPEAKER_00: 48:32

Thank you Lendrik for your time and insight and your willingness to share your story and wisdom your reflections contribute greatly to a broader understanding of how native communities responded with resilience and care and cultural strength during time of great uncertainty this is Voices of Native Nations in the Southwest during the COVID 19 pandemic and we're honored to share these conversations with you thank you for joining us for Voices of Native Nations in the Southwest during the COVID 19 pandemic podcast series this podcast was developed by the Center for Community Health and Engaged Research at Northern Arizona University with support from Project Hope, a global health and humanitarian organization transforming the health and wellbeing of communities around the world. For more information and links to resources related to this series please check the podcast description thanks again for listening and we hope you'll continue to learn from and share these powerful stories