By Magaly Muñoz,
Post Staff

On Monday, the Indigenous Peoples Day Festival was held for the fifth consecutive year at the Yerba Buena Gardens in San Francisco. This event was organized in collaboration with the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) to celebrate and honor the traditions and heritage of Native Americans.

Art exhibits, music performances and vendor stalls were set up at the garden’s public park and cultural space on Monday afternoon with many people stopping by to purchase items or watch the cultural events.

Among the performers was a Mexican native group called Grupo de los Wawas del Centro Ceremonial de Tajín hailing from Veracruz, Mexico. The group belongs to the Totonaco Nation, which is primarily based in east-central Mexico.

Group leader Vidal Perez has been performing a traditional dance called “Danza de Voladores” and one called “Danza de Wawa” for over 30 years. This dance has been passed down through several generations of men in his family.

“We do this dance to celebrate Mother Earth, so that she brings rain, a plentiful harvest and good energy,” Perez said.

He said that they tour all over California, performing for a few weeks before heading back to Mexico to continue expressing their culture through dance. He pointed out that they come to events like this because it allows both Native American and Mexican groups to recognize and celebrate the resilience of communities that strive to preserve their cultural heritage despite enduring a long history of colonization.

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“We want people to remember that there are still old customs and cultures to learn about. No matter where we live, the point is to acknowledge where we came from,” Perez said.

Cristina Ibarra, Yerba Buena Gardens Festival’s Strategic Projects Director who is co-organizer for the event, said that this festival is her favorite one to put on each year.  She said working with all the vendors and performers has been the best experience, likening it to being in the company of family.

“It’s so beautiful to see all the families, especially the elders and the kids, celebrating their culture,” Ibarra said. “We do probably 150 events every year and this is still one of my favorites.”

Ibarra stated that this year’s festival has seen the biggest turnout since its inception. She affirmed that they’ll continue to host this event in the future as a platform to “uplift Indigenous Peoples voices.”

In 2018, San Francisco made the decision to replace Columbus Day with Indigenous Peoples Day as a means of acknowledging and addressing the historical violence and discrimination faced by Native Americans in the U.S.

Andrea Carmen, the executive director of the IITC since the ’90s, said every city and county on this side of the hemisphere should consider revising this date on their local calendars. Instead of honoring Christopher Columbus, Carmen suggested to celebrate the people impacted by the explorer’s arrival.

“We’re celebrating our survival, the resiliency and strength of our cultures that still exist. We’re honoring our ancestors that sacrificed unbelievable amounts of suffering so that we could have these ways, the dances, the language,” Carmen said.

Carmen observed that it’s been over 500 years since colonization began in the Americas. She stressed that the IITC is committed to preserving their history and teaching it to those who are willing to learn.

She said it’s important for non-Natives to know that there is an ongoing struggle to revitalize languages, reclaim stolen land and preserve tareas that once belonged to Natives. She added that despite the horrors that Natives have endured, they’re still standing.

“We’re still here, our culture is still strong, and the amazing thing to me is that we’re still willing to share it with those very descendants of the ones that carried these things [colonization] out,” Carmen said.

Magaly Muñoz

A graduate of Sacramento State University, Magaly Muñoz’s journalism experience includes working for the State Hornet, the university’s student-run newspaper and conducting research and producing projects for “All Things Considered” at National Public Radio. She also was a community reporter for El Timpano, serving Latino and Mayan communities, and contributed to the Sacramento Observer, the area’s African American newspaper.

Muñoz is one of 40 early career journalists who are part of the California Local News Fellowship program, a state-funded initiative designed to strengthen local news reporting in California, with a focus on underserved communities.

The fellowship program places journalism fellows throughout the state in two-year, full-time reporting positions.

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