My first visit to Botanica Yoruba

My first visit to Botanica Yoruba was definitely an interesting one. I visited the botanica located at 474 E. 49 St. on Friday Sept. 24 around 4 p.m. I had spoken to the owner, Luis Perez, a few times on the phone so he was expecting my visit. I expected the botanica to be a lot bigger. In fact, I actually missed it when I first drove by. It is located in a very small shopping center. The shop itself stands out with it's bright green window sign and window decals that read "Botanica Yoruba" and "Articulos Religiosos" (religious items). I walked into the shop and realized it was probably no bigger than our classroom. Despite the size, Luis had filled it from top to bottom with beads, dolls, statues, herbs, bottles, coconuts, saint figurines and machetes. Luis stepped out from a back room in the shop, and I shook his hand to introduce myself. He had a confused look on his face; I'm not sure why. It was a bit awkward because I didn't know how to begin our conversation, so I thanked him for once again letting me come over. Luckily, at that moment a customer walked in so he had to go attend him. In the mean time, I told him I would look around for a bit,which I thought would give me enough time to come up with some intelligent sounding questions.


Though I know about santeria from both my Cuban culture as well as courses I have taken on Cuba, I still felt like I didn't even know where to begin with my questions. While Luis was attending his customer, I noticed there was a young girl there in a uniform, and I asked her if she was his employee. She was actually a student from Hialeah High School who had just started getting involved in the religion. She told me about how a few months back doctors had detected a tumor (I think she told me it was in her pancreas). She was distraught at the thought of having a life threatening disease, so her mom took her to a spiritualist for some consoling. After meeting with the spiritualist, she started learning more about santeria, a religion which she felt would cure her of her disease. A few months after the spiritualist encounter, she is now much better. She no longer has the tumor, and she is now fully involved in the religion. She actually made a "pact with death," a ceremony that assures the participant that he or she will not leave this Earth before it's their time to do so.


There were so many questions I wanted to ask her, but she had to leave. Fortunately, she gave me her cell number and e-mail, so Iwill hopefully keep in contact with her.


By then, Luis was done with his customer. We walked around the store together, and I would point to different objects and ask what they were used for, such as the different potions that were used for healing purposes as well as the different pots that were used for ceremonies. I was a little uneasy when I saw a bucket full of  machetes, so I asked him what those were for. He explained that those were used in rituals for warrior spirits. The machete is placed in a mini cauldron-like bowl, along with a secret mixture of herbs and liquids- a mixture which he wouldn't reveal because it was considered sacred.


He also told me about how he came to own the botanica. He came to the United States in Sept. 1980 after serving four years as a political prisoner in Cuba. At 18 years old, he had been accused of sabotage. It's been about 30 years since he came to this country, and he has been involved in the religion for 18 years. He is now 57 years old. When he was about 40, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and was given approximately a year to live. Prior to his surgery, he met with a spiritualist. The spiritualist had a "vision" in which Luis was in an emergency room. He told Luis not to worry because he would come out of the surgery perfectly fine. The day of the surgery came, and Luis was confident that he would be O.K. He told the doctors, "Yo estoy en las manos de dios primero, y despues en los tuyos" ("I'm in God's hands first, then yours.") The doctor's response has also stayed with Luis till this day. "Procede con este valiente," ("Procede with this brave man.") To Luis' surprise and that of the doctor, the tumor below his pancreas had vanished during the surgery. The doctor could not find  it, though it had been clearly visible in several x-rays. The only medical explanation he could give was that the mass that appeared to be a tumor was perhaps some kind of liquid that just dissolved throughout his body.


Since that day, Luis has been fully committed to Bantu, a derivative of Santeria that deals with the spirits of the dead.


I will be meeting again with Luis sometime this week.


Below are some pictures of the items sold in the store:

My goal for this semester is....

My goal for this semester is to try to look at my community and those living elsewhere throughout South Florida a little differently. My goal is to analyze neighborhoods from the bottom up rather than starting from the top. Our class discussion really helped me realize that the people reporters should interview are those directly affected by the issues we're covering. Sounds simple enough, right? Well, actually it isn't, or at least we don't practice this as much as we should. We always go for the obvious sources, i.e. city officials, rather than talk to the locals themselves. They are the ones who can help us report what's actually going on in our communities. Our job is to tell their story, not  go into a neighborhood with a story already in our heads. That's when reporters get into trouble. That's when reporters end up writing stories that reinforce stereotypes we should be trying to avoid.


As we discussed in class, Robert Samuels' article about the mass shooting in Liberty City is a great example of a potentially great story gone wrong. The stereotypes are all there: the run down establishments, young girls with babies, spray paint, the works. As Reisner pointed out, Samuels didn't interview the people who actually know the most about Liberty City and the problems residents are having. These reservoirs of knowledge are the church women, who many consider to be the "back bone of the back bone" of Liberty City, the back bone being the church itself. 


We can learn from Samuels' article. Though I know it's easier said than done, we need to do our best to interview a variety of sources, not only to get different points of view but to also avoid perpetuating the same stereotypes that have been with us for decades. 

Exhibit A:

Stereotypes and how to avoid them

                 

Stereotypes are an unfortunate part of our lives, and though we should try to avoid perpetuating these stereotypes at all costs, it is hard to escape them completely. A perfect example was seen in this year's MTV Video Music Awards. Almost everyone knows who Sofia Vergara is, mainly because she's a drop dead gorgeous Colombian woman.


Watch this clip of Sofia Vergara introducing the nominees for one of the MTV awards (forgive the terrible quality, but it was the only clip I could find....)

I understand that she has an accent, which is perfectly fine. But I think they purposely wanted her to exaggerate her accent in an effort to  play the stereotypical Hispanic woman- I guess it was supposed to be funny or maybe even sexy, but it was just irritating. At least for me, it was definitely painful to hear. 

On the opposite end of the spectrum was NPR's attempt to stay far away from stereotypes. The stations story on the fasting football player was probably one of the most memorable pieces I've seen. As we discussed in class, it really humanized Ramadan and the people who observe it. We didn't get the traditional story about people praying. Instead, we got a glimpse of a young football players decision to balance religion and sports, as well as family members at home and on the field.

During our class discussions, it has been made quite clear that efforts to increase diversity in newsrooms are failing miserably. The assumption is that Hispanics can cover Hispanics, blacks can cover blacks, etc., which is so far from the truth. As we noted in class, many second-and third-generation Hispanics can't even speak Spanish, completely breaking with the assumption that all "brown" people are the same. 

Keeping this in mind, it is important to recognize the stereotypes we carry and avoid passing these on to our children. If we try to move in this direction, maybe we can start bringing real diversity to newsrooms and the stories they produce.

My caveman instincts and Opa-locka

So now we know we have our biases and that it's completely normal. But what do we do once we acknowledge this? Absolutely nothing! It's somewhat of an odd concept, but all we have to do is just acknowledge that we have them and move on with our lives. In the case of reporters, we just have to try to produce the best coverage possible. But moving past these inner feelings is easier said than done.  

Recently, I realized just how difficult it is to try to accept your biases and behave in a way that is rational and fair. During one of my interning outings, I was driving behind an NBC 6 live truck. We were coming back to the station after going live from Hollywood for the 11 p.m. newscast. I am notoriously terrible with directions so I was following the station's truck like my life depended on it. When I finally got to an area that I recognized, I decided to get off at another exit and head home. This turned out to be a terrible mistake. Despite my seeming familiarity with the road, I actually took the wrong exit and ended up in the heart of Opa-locka. I was terrified. 

I continued to drive straight down the road, passing dark parking lots with run down businesses and shady alleys. After about five minutes, I called my parents so they could help me find my way home. The minute I told them where I was, they started panicking. How was their white daughter in her little Elantra going to survive driving through "black people" town? I felt bad for being so scared, but I couldn't help it. It was almost 1 a.m., I was lost and I was in a bad neighborhood. Like Reisner has said, was I simply being street smart by being ultra aware of my surroundings, or was I just being racist? I don't know. What I do know is that I wanted to get home desperately. I can't tell you how relieved I was when I started to see Lincoln Marti schools and other Hispanic establishments. Needless to say, my parents were relieved too.

Does the cross-race effect really exist?

The cross-race effect sounds like a really scientific phenomenon, but essentially, it is a part of our daily interactions with those around us. Basically, we struggle to recognize the faces of people that are not of our same race, which I think is only normal. Since we are born, we are surrounded by our family members, who all kind of look like us in some way, shape or form. Like we've discussed in class, we're primitive in a sense because we gravitate toward our own and are skeptical of those who are unlike us.

Putting that primitiveness aside, however, we need to try to think outside our racial/ethnic box. Like the article suggested, people that live in integrated communities don't struggle as much to differentiate people who happen to be of a different ethnic or racial background. Even if we unintentionally isolate ourselves from others, we are still contributing to this cycle of silent bias for our own people, and in turn, becoming more and more ignorant.


One of the best things we can do is to teach kids to appreciate those of all ethnic backgrounds so they can become more open-minded, accepting adults. The article actually gave some scientific evidence for this. In one study, kids in first and second grades recognized white and Asian faces equally well, strongly suggesting that this "natural" bias may not be 100 percent innate. In other words, our parents and social groups influence us A LOT  when it comes to shaping our views of others.


What do you all think?

What my test scores say about me...

I was a bit scared about taking this test because I didn't know what the results would be, and whether I would be prepared to see them. As with all of us, at some point or another I have said something negative about someone from another ethnic background. This usually happens after I have had some kind of negative interaction with this person, i.e. if they cut me off on the road, which I am notorious for screaming at people for.


I was definitely not looking forward to what the results would say. I am not a racist by any means, but I know that I do have a preference for my own people, if you will. Though my skin is white and I look American, I am Hispanic and proud of it. I don't even feel comfortable when I'm driving through northern Florida and have to go to rest stops. I feel out of place because I don't hear any Spanish, see any Hispanic foods or hear Spanish music from a car stereo.

As I expected, the results suggested a strong automatic preference for European American compared to African American, as well as a moderate automatic preference for other people compared to Muslims. I was so embarrassed that my biases were so blatant, but it is something that is out of my control. We all have our biases, we just need to accept that we have them and learn how to deal with them. Hopefully in learning to deal with these feelings you can maybe reduce your automatic preferences over time...or at least I hope so.

I'm not applying for any HR positions any time soon!

Hi everybody,


 So it is clear to me that I need to stay far away from any Human Resources jobs that become available because I can't abandon my own biases even if my life depended on it. 


From the results of our hiring exercise, it is clear that most of us can't abandon them either, which is why most people in the class automatically placed the Japanese man in a position that involved math.


 So far we've also talked about the biases we all carry inside, and if one thing is true, it's that we ALL have them. All of us at one point or another have heard our family members say something mean about someone from another ethnic background- I know I certainly have. Cubans tend to have a very negative image of black people, especially older Cubans. This kind of mentality has even seeped into conversations I've had with my father. And the sad part of all this is that from time to time I find myself thinking the same things.


Take this picture for example:

I couldn't help but laugh when I saw this (mainly because of the little boy's expression,) but at the same time, I felt horrible for doing so. It's a terrible message, and really exemplifies how we have come to think of the people in Africa. We have come to associate them with diseases, corruption, and poor neighborhoods. We never hear of any positive things, like how close knit many of their communities are, as well as their intricate ceremonies and rich history.


I'm not sure how to break with these stereotypes or even if we should at all. It's something that's a big part of how we grew up and has molded who we are today. I think our best bet, like Reisner said, is to acknowledge that we do have these biases in an effort to produce the best coverage possible. 


Any thoughts?