-- A dozen Girl Scouts -- all Latina, all residents of the Reedville Apartments -- gathered before a wall-sized slideshow, mesmerized by images Antonia Santiz Giron had made of her life in Chiapas, Mexico.
When Santiz Giron showed an austere black-and-white photo of chicken feet, the girls gasped. What looked like worms replaced the chicken feet. Santiz Giron said this was a picture of a traditional dinner.
"Do you like them?" one girl asked, her voice timid, in Spanish.
Santiz Giron grinned. "No," she said with a laugh.
When the slideshow ended, some whispered that they'd like to do what Santiz Giron had, share their lives through pictures.
"You could show your culture and help people experience something new," said 11-year-old Patricia Garfias-Garcia.
Last Saturday's workshop in the apartment complex's community room is part of a nationwide
program aimed at teaching about media. Girl Scouts will analyze magazines and videos to think critically about how the media portray them, said Bernice Rivera, coordinator of
for the
.
Troop 43103 in Aloha is one of two Latina troops, Rivera said, doing a pilot program, "Put the ME in Media." The girls are exploring multimedia and trying to remake it to better reflect their reality. They'll learn camera and video skills so that they can produce portraits of their cultures. They'll create images of themselves as they want to be known.
Santiz Giron and other Chiapas photographers know that process well. Since the
began in 1992, indigenous Maya people in Chiapas, Mexico, have documented their lives, producing books and shows that are in museums around the world.
The program's founder, nun and artist Carlota Duarte, created the project so that the Mayas could tell their stories through art. Work from the program's latest series -- "Nuestra Comida," or Our Meal -- was exhibited at the Walters Cultural Arts Center in Hillsboro this month. Two photographers from the program -- Santiz Giron and Juana Lopez Lopez -- have toured Oregon, hosting workshops and events like this one, since early October.
After the slideshow, the scouts settled down to share pieces they had brought from home to explain their ancestry. Some brought statues; others, cookware. The lone Guatemalan, 11-year-old Monica Salazar, brought jewelry and money from Guatemala.
After the show-and-tell in Spanish, Duarte sent them to tables to draw examples of what they might later exhibit through photography.
At the tables, the girls switched to English. They struggled at first to draw the indigenous items Duarte hoped to see. She urged them away from drawing bracelets.
"Can I draw a spoon?" asked 10-year-old Janet Nava.
"If it's not typical like other Americans," Duarte answered.
"How do you draw a tortilla maker?" Ariana Ramos, 11, asked a friend.
Ariana drew a large bowl then pronounced it too boring to draw. She crumpled up her paper, grabbed another then thought silently. After a few minutes, she exclaimed, "Oh! Salsa bowl! What's that called? The bowl made of rock?"
She pantomimed putting spices and tomatoes into a molcajete, using the pestle to grind the ingredients into salsa.
"It's cool how they make their own things in Mexico," she said.
Janet said she was excited to move on to the photography lesson. "When we went to Mexico, I took photos of the pools," she said. "They were really, really big."
The girls moved over to the Chiapas photographers, who guided them through taking pictures of each other. The girls held up their statues, their bracelets and money. They mugged for the camera.
"Go home and look at the items in your house. Ask your parents, 'Is this from Mexico?'" Duarte said. "You have two cultures. That's your inheritance."
The day wrapped up with its own cultural exchange. Santiz Giron and Lopez Lopez doled out presents from home, giving each girl a Maya bracelet or belt. The girls offered their own gifts in return: boxes of Girl Scout cookies.
--