10/11/2025
There once was a woman from the land of the Orinoco, where the rivers twist like silver serpents and the people have grown weary of empty promises. Her name was María Corina Machado — born not from the ashes of poverty, but from a house of comfort. Yet the Kihci-Manito, the Great Mystery, has strange ways of calling people to their purpose. Sometimes the call does not come through suffering, but through stillness — asking, “Tânisi, nîtisân? What will you do with the safety you were given?”
In her youth, she could have stayed behind her gates, where life was easy, where others carried the burden. But when she saw her homeland bending under the weight of tyranny, her heart stirred. She felt the mîyo-pimâtisiwin — the good life — slipping away from her people. So she stepped out into the storm.
With others, she formed Súmate, a circle of citizens who sought to keep the flame of truth alive. They became like oskâyak, the young ones who rise again when the old fire has dimmed. Together they said, “The people have a right to choose, to breathe, to be seen.”
That was her first crossing — the moment she left wîtaskêwin, the comfortable ground, and entered sâkâw askîy, the wilderness of struggle. Once crossed, there was no going back.
The rulers came for her with words like weapons: treason, conspiracy, betrayal. But she answered with tapwewin, truth. She said, “To speak for the people is not treason — it is our sacred duty.”
Years passed, and the road grew long. She entered the halls of power, only to be cast out. Soldiers blocked her path, guards tore her name from the doors. But she did not stop. She walked among the people, among the nôtinikewak — the mothers who mourned their sons, the elders who remembered freedom. She reminded them: “The truth cannot be outlawed.”
This was her ordeal, the shadow time, when fear hunts you even in your sleep. Many fled the country, but she stayed. Hidden. Watched. Waiting. Like a coal beneath the ashes, she kept her fire alive. And her story spread — through markets and kitchens, across the winds — whispered like pimwêwêhk, the sound of wings in the dark.
Then one day, the nations of the world looked again toward the south, and saw her light still burning. They gave her the Nobel Peace Prize — not as a crown, but as a signal: that Venezuela still lives, that its people still dream of miyo-wîcêhtowin — good relations, just governance, peace rooted in truth.
When she spoke, she did not claim victory. She said the prize belonged to her people — the ones with empty tables, tired eyes, and strong hearts. She said, “This is for those who never stopped believing.”
Because a true leader does not rise to rule — she rises to remind the people of their own strength.
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Reflection
If I were telling this story beside the fire, I’d say:
She is not perfect — no one who walks the path of change ever is. But she did what the old ones always ask of us: ê-pimâtisiwak, she lived on, she stood where she was needed, even when the wind turned cruel.
And I would tell the young ones listening:
Not all battles are fought with weapons. Some are fought with courage, with manâtisiwin — sacred dignity.
That is what peace looks like sometimes: not silence, but persistence.
—Kanipawit Maskwa
ᑲᓂᐸᐏᐟ ᒪᐢᑿ
