Reina del paraguay

Reina is a peasent from Paraguay. She opened the doors of her house to me and we lived there for twenty days. Reina speaks Guaraní and very little Spanish, and maybe thanks to that, our meeting was profound and simple. I joined her mores and rituals. We danced with the dead and planted cassava.

In August of 2017 I went up to my little car all I needed to be in Paraguay for a month, and I went away driving alone all way upstream along the Uruguay River: from Buenos Aires, Argentina, to Itapúa, Paraguay. I loaded my cameras, picked up the watercolors, a microscope, chocolate and more. Ramona, the lady who helps me with the housework in my house, had invited me months ago after our mothers died almost at the same time. She inherited a field and wanted me to go there to heal old and new wounds. I had never been to Paraguay but since I was a girl I fantasize about immersing myself in that wild area. While traveling Ramona told me that she could not accompany me, but that her sister Reina was going to be waiting for me. She opened the doors of her house to me, and we lived there for twenty days. Reina speaks Guaraní but very little Spanish and, maybe thanks to that, our meeting was profound and simple. I joined her mores and rituals. We danced with the dead and planted cassava. She helped me to make a grave for my mom, a small sanctuary where I could meet again the power of life and death. Reina blessed my journey through the mountain, the reserves, the roads, the encounters with men. That piece of land was a home and a deep root in which to sow alliances of women without borders.