Rematriation: A OaxaCalifornian Journey

On choosing and reclaiming the lands our families call home

Today’s dispatch comes from Areli Morales Lopez, a bi-national, Zapotec, multilingual freelance multimedia journalist, community documentarian, and cultural worker who grew up in Venice, CA and now lives in Oaxaca, Mexico. She covers the Oaxacan diaspora, Zapotec and colonial history, migration, and environmental effects.

Foraging for mushroom in the Northern Oaxacan Sierras, 2023. | Courtesy of Areli Morales Lopez

For a long time, I didn’t consider myself indigenous. I am US-born and my parents never learned the mother tongue that our grandparents were discouraged from teaching. Progress was defined as moving north, getting an education, and assimilating; all the things that now allow me to return to Oaxaca and reclaim my Zapotec culture and way of life.

I am the first US-born woman on both sides of my undocumented family. I understand the privileges that a US passport holds, of being the link that crosses borders which otherwise keep us divided. Naree la Arel, my name is Areli, the only Zapotec phrase I know confidently. I was raised in the Zapotec migrant community of 1990’s Venice Beach, California. I knew Tlacolula de Matamoros Oaxaca, Mexico as home, where my grandmothers lived and my parents' hearts remained.

Posing in our traditional gala outfit with my cousin’s in the early 2000’s. } Courtesy of Areli Morales Lopez

I was in middle school when I started to think about moving back to my ancestral lands of Oaxaca. This process is called rematriation, restoring Indigenous people's ties with native lands, and reconnecting with the culture and soils. As I grew older, my solo trips to grandma’s house hit me with the realization that my folks' happiness was profoundly tied to our land, meaning my happiness and life were too. As much as we planned it, there was never a right time or right way to leave a life and the modern comforts we grew to depend on. The pandemic was my push. I was feeling burned out by the nonprofit industrial complex that afforded my LA life. At the same time, my last living grandparent needed the end-of-life care that my mother couldn't physically give her. I moved for her and my family. Fortunate to be able to build upon the work of my elders, I was able to transform the abandoned, trashed plots of land my parents left into the homes and gardens they will one day return to.

My great aunt Lupe and I in the early 2000’s. | Courtesy of Areli Morales Lopez

More than a spiritual move, this is a quest for knowledge. I aim to answer the questions my parents could never answer like why we hold such devotion to certain saints, what the roots of our traditions and celebrations are. I want to document the history they were too busy surviving to learn. I aim to protect and restore our river, land, language and culture that too many are eager to exploit given Oaxaca’s growing popularity. It’s up to my generation to ensure that the land is loved and cared for like our ancestors did for generations, and to uphold the communal way of life deeply rooted in traditions like tequio, community service and Guelaguetza, mutual aid. We Zapotec people today are those fortunate enough to be Bini ni nu’u gal nazak, gente que tiene patrimonio, people who have inheritance, rights and obligations to the culture and the land. 

Zapotec scholar and poet Eliazar Garcia transcribing an interview in 2023. | Courtesy of Areli Morales Lopez

In this journey, the most rewarding aspect so far has been found in my attempt to learn Zapotec or Ditzha. BAK DITZA is the native tongue of our town. Each town has its variant, and ours is endangered, with less than 60 elders holding its knowledge. The house I live in was once a Zapotec-speaking home, but my grandpa never had the chance to teach us or his children. Assimilation is to blame. But I still want to be able to talk to him in the afterlife and teach my children in this realm. Classes I'm now taking have given me an insight into a culture that was never explained before, like our deep relationship with nature. Elders still thank the sunlight every morning, and our greetings are based on the position of the sun. My classes have also shed light on the meanings behind traditions and beliefs like those of our death rituals, where a rosary prayer is recited for nine days, helping loved ones who have passed across the nine levels of the Mesoamerican afterlife. 

Interviewing Zapotec Scholar Eliazar Garcia in his San Juan Guelavia home 2024. | Courtesy of Areli Morales Lopez

Through our language rescue collective DITSA XHTEEN GEDX BAK, I learned from our elders the correct way to pronounce our words, but also the pain they harbor in their gaze. How they were treated and beaten by the colonizers settling in our town, the Guisssh Catrin, the well-dressed devil. The poverty that led to migration. The generational trauma left for us to confront.

Bini baak naree re’e gula’a ne rée inadios. Soy de Tlacolula yo aqui naci y aqui me pedira dios. I am from Tlacolula, I was born here and god will come for me here, says an elder and former Bracero, Jose Marcial. His was one of only fifteen interviews we were able to conduct to preserve our fading maternal tongue. His interview resonated with me as he spoke about how hard it is to have been able to return and how hard it is to lose loved ones on the other side. I see that same pain in my father’s eyes, the longing being a recurring theme.     

While I take on the labors of protecting this land and culture, my deepest reason for rematriating is to let my father and mother thrive and ultimately rest on their native soil.

–

A reminder that this Saturday we’re celebrating 2 years of publishing this newsletter. Come hang out with us at Bellevue Park! There will be free pupusas, pan dulce and coffee as well as Making Our Neighborhood magazines for sale. RSVP here!