Gajnémiadái Chijñecare
Gajnémiadái Sings
I’ll get a rope and be like I used to be, and go out and kill someone, a non-Ayoré. And then the people will kill me too. But I’ll kill someone first. And then someone will kill me.
I will sing about Gajnémiadaté. Before we were with the non-Ayoreos she made fun of me. That was before anyone fought with me.
I came upon some people killing a tiger, but they pointed their gun at me and shot at me instead. I didn’t know what to do and I didn’t retaliate or try to kill anyone.
The Ayoréos tried to stop me from doing something, because they didn’t know what I would do. If I killed someone, then I could get a Chiquejnoro woman of my same clan. But normally I should get someone from an outside clan.
Dear Erábia was someone I had known about. But I wouldn’t let her sleep with me. I didn’t desire her. I didn’t want the little one. “Go somewhere else to sleep. I don’t want you,” I told her. But she was stubborn and slept with me. I mistakenly thought she was a Chiquejnorodaté, from my same clan, and that’s why I refused her. But once I slept with her, being different didn’t matter (our color was lost on each other).
(Garajade was a brave uncle of Yocaoi and this was his song.)
Gajnémiadái – Tobité, Bolivia – 1965
Transcribed by: Joyce Davis Buchegger
Translated to English by: Maxine Morarie
