The Shalakos of Shungopavi

We are waiting for the dancers. We have waited forever. "When will they come out?" A gap-toothed smile in a broad, brown face: "When they are ready." We are in Shungopavi on Second Mesa, one of the oldest Hopi villages. It was by sheer chance that we heard in Flagstaff that a dance would be held here; that the Shalakos would appear. And so, this July afternoon, we have toiled a hundred miles across moonscapes of desert, afraid the whole way we would be late. But one cannot be late in Hopiland. Time has no place here. I do not look at my watch.

Soon it will be evening, but fine dust sifting between my sandaled toes retains noontime heat, and the rough stone of the pueblo walls is still hot. The air is crystalline. The San Francisco Peaks, some 70 miles away, are sharply etched on the southwestern horizon. Below us, the Painted Desert is drained of color. It is a pewter sea, sailed by slow black shadows cast by purple, gold-lined clouds. One of the clouds trickles lightning and, after an age, thunder growls softly. We narrow our eyes against miniature dust devils that whirl across the plaza.

The crowd swarms over the houses, clings to roofs and walls like bright bees, buzzes with quiet excitement. Since we were not invited, I feared we might feel intrusive. But the Hopis are a friendly, cheerful people. They absorb us and the handful of other Anglos gathered here. We are ignored but not shunned, and I am not too uncomfortable in my pale skin and less than black hair. It is important to behave correctly. During the ceremony, we must not laugh aloud or point; above all, cameras must remain in the car.

An old woman in black with a shawl of fuchsia, gold, and blue sweeps the plaza with a balding broom to ready it for the dancers. Other elderly women sit grouped on wooden chairs, ablaze in shawls patterned with luminous cabbage roses. Someone says the shawls are imported from Portugal. I wonder where they are purchased, and why. Many older men wear Western hats, but some have kerchief bands knotted about their brows. Younger men and women are in jeans and T-shirts.

Small children play with plastic-foam cups in a heap of sand. A girl of about six in a black tunic with red and green sash and pale buckskin moccasin-boots joins them. Her hair is shaped into "butterfly wings," in years past the standard style for Hopi maidens. The shining black coils are molded onto wooden frames, which are then withdrawn. She walks with a self-conscious swagger.

A young woman in a Save-the-Whales T-shirt sits in a doorway, holding a small puppy. He lies on his back in her lap, and she strokes the taut freckled belly with one finger. Dogs are everywhere, part of the crowd, waiting too. The wait has been years long. The Shalako spirits (pronounced Shala-ko) are more than kachinas. Divinity-like, they are the powerful, droughtbreaking cloud people, and they appear rarely.But in spite of no concession stands, no food or drink to help pass the time, no radios, there is no impatience. Just this quiet, anticipatory hum. Even our own youngsters are not nagging, although their last meal was-when? An eternity, another life ago.

Careful not to point, our son tells us to look upward at the roofs, and we see the eagles. Four great birds are tethered by the leg to beams. When the crowd presses too close, they spread gigantic wings and hiss. They do not know the honor that awaits them. They do not know that tomorrow they will be named, then killed, their feathers collected for next year's dancers. They do not care that they will be buried with ceremony afforded the most important members of the tribe. They sit, hunched, discouraged. Cold eyes stare out to the desert and the open sky.

Now a stir runs through the crowd. The swarm seems to lift, swirl, and resettle.

"They're coming! They're coming out!" But still we wait. The kachinas dance in all three plazas of the village, and ours will be the last. Over the heads of the crowd, bobbing feathers are briefly visible. The temptation to point and exclaim is almost irresistible. Small children are lifted onto shoulders, but the crowd is too thick. Indistinct and strange, high cries reach our ears.

At long last, with the sun dipping behind the San Francisco Peaks, the crowd parts soundlessly, and the column of dancers winds its way into our plaza. The only sound apart from the rhythmic shuffle of bare feet is the clop-clop of tortoise shells tied behind the dancers' knees.

I have done my homework. I know that the Hopis believe everything exists in two forms, the physical and the spiritual. Kachinas are the spiritual doubles of the material world. The sun The Hopi Indians believe that everything in the physical world has its counterpart in the spirit realm. In this illustration, the distinguished artist and anthropologist Barton Wright interprets the roles of kachinas and other spirits in bringing rain to the Hopis' high-desert homeland. At far left, the Danik'china or cloud guard appears at the wind-driven periphery of the storm. The Tukwinong Taka and Tukwinong Mana, male and female (center panel), personify the dark, rain-bearing portions of the clouds. They are led by Sotuknangu, the lightning kachina. Poised above the pueblo, (above) and awaiting the rain are Hahai-i Wubti, the kachina mother, and Eototo, spirit representative of the village chief. The towering Shalakos (also male and female), visible in the thunderbeads, are the divinity-like beings who control the entire storm.

and moon, rain clouds, birds, beasts, plants, people-all have their kachina counterparts in the supernatural world. The kachinas' home is high on the San Francisco Peaks, but in spring, they visit the villages. They emerge through doorways in the kivas, the underground ceremonial chambers. Through the spring and into the summer months, they remain among the people. In late July, they return to the peaks. The Hopis do not worship them; rather, they treat them as friends or companions who can intercede with the gods. Each kachina is loved, respected, or feared according to its character. The kachina dances are part of a complex religious ritual, the driving force of which is the eternal need for rain. Since it is difficult to relate to unseen spirits, the Hopis don stylized masks and costumes and use symbolic gestures and actions to represent the kachinas. All the dancers are male, although female characters are impersonated. Once costumed, each man puts aside some of his own identity to become one with the kachina. I have read about the Shalako dance and can identify the dancers by their strange, musical names: the Tukwinong, the cumulus cloud kachinas; their female counterparts, the Tukwinong Mana; the Danik'china, the cloud guards; Hahai-i Wubti, the kachina mother; the two Shalakos themselves, male and female, Shalako Taka and Shalako Mana. But I am still unprepared. The muted colors surprise me. Skin daubed with gray clay; green spruce ruffs; some ocher and rust, black and white-earth colors. I am used to the strident acrylics of kachina dolls. The dolls, or tibu, are not toys. They are miniatures of the dancers carved to teach the Hopi children the forms, characters, and habits of the various kachinas. They have become costly collectors' items.

An intense hush has fallen over the holiday crowd, and I wonder, can this village be on the same continent as Flagstaff, as Phoenix? On the same planet as Ohio? Many of these people must live and work in cities, in the world I know. Surely only a very few call the reservation villages home, raise sheep and goats, plant corn in arid fields at the foot of the mesa-and beg the gods for rain in tune with this dance. I know no statistics. But certainly everyone here, of every age group, is rapt, involved. The only ones who are purely spectators are white. he Shalakos are tall, tall! Six-foot cones of layered eagle feathers are topped by three feet of carved castellations, intricately painted and plumed. Hahai-i Wuhti leads them through every movement. Her falsetto voice and bossy manner would have been amusing-yesterday. The four Danik'china wear distinctive masks, their heads obscured in balls of eagle feathers. With stiff, mechanical motions, they dance outside two flanking columns of Tukwinong, whipping the dust into stormy swirls with willow switches. The Tukwinong shake gourd rattles and stamp, making the plaza ring to the sound of their tortoise shells. Three elderly men with single feathers plaited into their hair are the kachina fathers. In constant motion, like sheepdogs with an errant flock, they direct the dance, eyes anxious behind spectacles, white kilts swinging beneath round bellies. The Shalakos shuffle and bob, bob and shuffle. Quite suddenly, the chant begins. And now I am no longer just a spectator. My ears, my eyes, my whole head are filled. I am drowning in the sound. The voices are deep bass, the language, alien-too strange to distinguish words. Perfectly synchronous, pitch and beat change at indiscernible signals. Inexorable, almost tuneless, the sound is shocking and unearthly, punctuated only by Hahai-i Wuhti's thin cries and the commands of the kachina fathers. The Shalakos curtsy and sway, sway and curtsy. When at last the chant ceases, the silence is absolute. I let out my breath and feel the whole crowd exhale with me. The dancers are motionless. Women from the crowd come forward slowly, shyly, offering prayers of cornmeal and water. The kachinas do not move, and the women leave the offerings at their feet. A slender young man with shining waist-length hair appears. He has a wonderful face-a swarthy Michelangelo's "David." He blows gentle smoke at each of the dancers from a long pipe. The women in their shawls are wistful. Tonight the kachinas return to the peaks. They will not come again this year-or for how many years? For the oldest, the Shalakos will never return. At a signal, young faces are covered, for now the great Shalako masks are snatched off. Children must not see the men concealed beneath them. The masks are whirled away, down the ladder of a kiva. The dancers file quietly away, downhill, out of sight. A baby is wailing. Slowly the crowd comes back to life. The plaza begins again to hum. Outside the village, an engine bursts into life, and the first pickup truck bumps away over the rough road. Reluctantly the crowd disperses. The sun has set, the light almost gone. Silhouetted, the captive eagles hunch. Their eyes glint gold, answering the lightning that flashes regularly now. To the south, massive cumulonimbus clouds tower and roil. We walk stiffly to our car. Looking at my watch at last, I realize we have been standing for more than four hours. As we leave Shungopavi, we take our place in the line of pickups. The road twists down into the night and onto the desert plain. We follow the route the kachinas will take toward the San Francisco Peaks and the storm. Our destination again is Flagstaff, whose glow we can see on the far side of the peaks. I thought the chant had entered my soul, that I would never lose it. But already it has left me.