This is my own description of how this document arrived to me, may call the Ati and Mindhiva documentary:
Since I was seventeen, I have been working internationally in many facets of the art world. My resume includes working as painter, as a furniture designer, as an art conservator (with a specialty in easels, murals, frescos, paintings, wood sculptures, wood artifacts and altarpieces), and as an art director and production designer for films and television. Additionally, I have co-founded a variety of projects that endeavor to protect and create employment for female artists in my native country of Colombia.
Two years ago, Ati and Mindhiva were guided my way by a friend in common. Ati and Mindhiva are sisters, and part of the Arhuaca tribe, a culturally rich tribe indigenious to Colombia. The sisters asked me to help them achieve their dreams of higher education. You see, the sisters wanted to achieve a college degree that would allow them to give back to the culture & the people they love so much. But a series of obstacles had rendered it impossible for the girls to attend the National University.
While I wasn’t find a way to help them into the University, I was really impressed by their drive, compassion, and determination. These girls were literally fighting to learn, to be educated, so that they could give back to the people around them while still maintaining the tribes bountiful culture. I tried to make the media and press aware of these two women and their fight for knowledge, but not a word was broadcast nor a sentence printed regarding their struggle... I never got an answer from press nor media.
This only fueled my passion for the sisters battle & I became inspired to tell the story of these two sisters on my own. I wanted to share their journey in order to create support for the Arhuaca women of the Sierra, women who want to achieve a higher level of education to contribute to their people and help them preserve their culture.
I obtained the permission from Ati, Mindhiva and their relatives to record them with a small HD camera. I recorded them for a year, accompanying them through the good and bad. After that I taught myself how to edit, & edited the footage for almost another year.
Which brings me to the here and now, this present moment, and the question of Ati and Mindhivas story. Will they be able to find the strength to continue pursuing their dream? We will follow them into their adventure.
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ATI & MINDHIVA Their quest
ATI & MINDHIVA Their quest for knowledge starts far before my camera ever made it to their tribes
land. Their great-grandfather was the son of a Spanish man and an Arahuacan mother. He joined the Arahuacan culture, prospered financially and became a Mamo. The family clan is close-knit, full of love and respectful of the environment. The girls mother didn’t want her children to miss the opportunity to learn how to read and write-- even if this meant sending them far away from home. So, Mindhiva left home at age twelve and Ati left at age ten in pursuit of education. Ati means mother creator, feminine force and fertile land. Mindhiva means healer.
The first barrier they have to overcome was the language. Having accomplished this, they completed secondary education at a public-school.
Now a secondary school graduate, Ati wants to be a dentist but she realizes she can’t get the education for this in the Sierra. Mindhiva also wishes to study medicine so that one day she could go back to her community and combine the ancestral knowledge together with the Western medicine in order to keep her people healthy & thriving.
Now with the dream careers in mind, the sisters priority has been to prepare for the ICFES admission test in order to enter the country’s major university—the Universidad Nacional. Ati and Mindhiva do their best, but neither of them obtains the necessary scores. Their disappointment is huge. They go back to the Sierra to consult the “Mamos” in order to regain their strength, & to keep their determination strong. They are earnest in their quest & begin to look for other ways to get an education. They consider private universities, but run into the same issue as the Universidad Nacional; admission into a private university has one requirement—passing the ICFES a standardized test. So, the girls prepare to take the ICFES again to raise their scores.
Mindhiva applies to study medicine in Cuba but time passes by and she doesn’t get an answer... suddenly she receives a call with the news that she has been accepted. She leaves for Cuba in a rush while Ati stays and takes the ICFES exam again. She spends her time between applying to private universities and weaving traditional backpacks for money. In need of guidance, Ati goes back to Kariumaku the great blind Mamo who has been her guide since childhood. Hope and disappointment have shadowed her but her will shows us that she will not crumble.
Ati is admitted to the University del Bosque. Mindhiva comes back from Cuba and tells us about her experience.