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12. Ochun in the Bronx
- Indiana University Press
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c h a p t e r t w e l v e Ochun in the Bronx George Brandon O Mio Ochun!1 Legend has it that Ochun was once a native of Ekiti state in Nigeria and well admired there for her courage and clean habits (Epega n.d.: 25). Now her veneration extends to Cuba and Brazil, Venezuela and Mexico, Argentina and Spain, and the United States from Miami, Florida, to the South Bronx in New York.2 In New York on September 8th, hundreds of santeros, santeras, and devotees show up at drum dances for Ochun and at church services honoring Ochun as the Virgin of Charity of Cobre, the patron saint of Cuba. The custom of making offerings to Ochun at the riverside still survives, but streams of fresh water are hard to come by in the Bronx and devotees have to travel some distance to the riverbank. When the winters are bitter cold, as they often are in New York, rather than go to the river one can bring the river to the devotee—in a pail. Many Afro-Cuban stories tell of Ochun’s love affairs with the male orisha and one of her roads in Santerı́a is as a prostitute. Ochun’s Nigerian love life was just as dense and complicated as in Cuba and in the Yoruba stories she married or lived with most of the important male orisha, learning from them, baring their secrets to the other orisha, and having their children.3 All of this came to the Bronx and took root here along with her priesthood and devotees. It is clear that she relishes the power that her beauty gives her over men; and in some of her stories she may appear to have the attributes of a spoiled brat. Nigerian Yorubas often describe her as vain, beautiful, and somewhat narcissistic; by the time Ochun reached the South Bronx from Cuba she had also become a mulata with long, straight hair. Ochun is an attractive but paradoxical figure: while she did not originate sexual love, she is its queen. Despite her knowledge of the erotic arts she never successfully married. Some santeros maintain that she never married at all. Inti- mately connected with fertility, she is a bad mother who has children but doesn’t take care of them. Ochun finally escaped the battles male orisha waged over her, and the demands of her numerous children, by turning herself into a river; yet she is willing to intercede on behalf of human beings in their relations with the other saints.4 With her honey and cleverness she is able to sweeten and calm them so that they will be better disposed. When possessing her devotees in ceremonial trance Ochun shows her happiness through the possessed person’s streaming tears and her displeasure through laughter. Ochun’s basically sweet, charitable nature does not prevent her from being cunning and astute and her devotees sometimes fear that she will turn against them abruptly. In a prayer to Ochun the late Cuban santero Eduardo Pastoriza summarized her most apparent paradoxes for his Bronx devotees. He addressed her as “My mother, owner of all the rivers of the world, where every child of the saint goes to bathe and receive the blessing of sweet water to have happiness and joy.” Then he continued, “But pay attention, take care, for we do not know when she is angry,” and finally concluded , “Woman, death-maker, messenger of Olofi [God], I thank you” (Pastoriza Martinez 1972). To tell something of Ochun’s nature in contemporary New York I must tell you about Bianca, even though I can only write about that part of her life which she would tell me. There was, as surely as there is in any other life, much that we do not and could not tell even if we desired, and much that we manage to keep secret even from ourselves. Bianca: A Priestess of Ochun5 These things I heard and know; these she told me: Bianca was born in Puerto Rico. Her mother gave birth nineteen times. Bianca was among the seven that survived to adulthood and, according to her mother, signaled her spiritual gifts before she was born by crying in the womb. Much of Bianca’s early childhood experience was interpreted through the lens of spiritism.6 Once, for no apparent reason, she simply walked away, and disappeared . Later family members found her a considerable distance from home...