Connecting People Through Time – Makowa: The Worlds Above Us with Misha Pipe and Kaela Waldstein

[00:00:00] Misha Pipe: What our elders and our ancestors knew and learned already, there was a boundary set to not disturb anything, because we don’t want to rock the world. You know, we’re going to be here for a little bit of time. We know it’s its own being. It’s alive in its own way. So, you know, we are scared to step into science.

And we are scared to, you know, poke at it because we’re afraid of the backlash. We’re afraid of—what if we were never meant to bother certain things? What if they were there to keep us in our place?

[00:00:38] Emily: ¡Bienvenidos! This is Encounter Culture from the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. I’m your host and editor of El Palacio magazine, Emily Withnall.

(intro music fades away, shifts to contemplative piano music)

[00:00:54] Emily: Every evening I walk my dog when the sun is setting. Not only is it cooler during the hot months, but the New Mexico sky at sunset is often the most dramatic, with its cumulonimbus clouds backlit by the last rays of light. Often, the clouds are a vibrant pink, orange, and purple, reminiscent of cotton candy.

And even though I know the photos I take on my phone will disappoint me, by failing to capture the light and colors I see, I keep trying to document the beauty of the sky. My appreciation of the sky is a part of a long tradition that is many, many centuries old. 

[00:01:39] The new exhibition Makowa: The Worlds Above Us at the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture, tells a story of the deep knowledge Native people in New Mexico had, and continue to have, with the sky. From understanding the role lightning played in ensuring strong crops, to planting when the sun was in the right position, to tracking the solstice and equinox in petroglyphs, ancient and contemporary Pueblos and tribes have lived in close relationship with the skies. 

In one area of the exhibition, photos of the great kiva at Casa Rinconada in Chaco Canyon demonstrate how it was built in alignment with cardinal directions on North-South and East-West lines. Likewise, a map of the more contemporary campus of the Institute for American Indian Arts & Culture shows how the structures were designed in similar alignment

Both ancient and new architectural alignments along cardinal lines, and astronomical events such as solstices, reflect the ongoing importance of living in equilibrium with celestial bodies and movements. In addition to rock art and architecture, Makowa showcases a wide range of art that references and honors the skies. 

[00:03:01] From stunning photographs of the Milky Way to paintings of the moon, baskets and seed pots that emulate the night sky and textiles depicting lightning and cumulonimbus clouds, the objects span over a thousand years. Depictions of the Sun Dagger Celestial calendar site at Chaco Canyon date from as early as 1000 CE, and Steven Yazzie’s digital photograph of the night sky at Ship Rock was taken in 2023. Makowa was created with collaboration and insights from a wide range of scientists, artists, and storytellers who all have a deep knowledge of, and connection to, the sky.

Two of the guest collaborators for the exhibition joined me in the studio to share their knowledge and insights. Misha Pipe is a Native American Astronomy Outreach program manager at Lowell Observatory and Kaela Waldstein is a videographer and storyteller who interviewed native scientists and others for the exhibition.

Misha and Kaela each talk about their own relationship to the skies, their roles in helping to shape the exhibition, and the significance of ceremonies and cultural connections to the worlds above us.

(piano music fades briefly into foreground)

[00:04:32] Welcome to Encounter Culture. Thank you both for being here with me. To get us started, can you each introduce yourselves and what you do? 

[00:04:41] Kaela Waldstein: Yeah. My name is Kaela Waldstein and I’m a videographer-filmmaker-photographer living locally here in Santa Fe. The majority of what I do is short documentaries in the realm of arts and culture, high production value films with emotional resonance and a strong human element. So, I am doing a six-video series for the exhibition, Makowa. 

[00:05:03] Misha: Hi, my name is Misha Pipe. I am the Native American Astronomy Outreach Program Manager right now. We go out to the Reservation, we work with teachers, and we teach anything science, anything from gravity to Pluto’s atmosphere. Really, we’re introducing teachers into science and how to teach it, but also, we’re trying to establish how science can be applied to their current environment. 

So, a lot of these Reservations they’re going through a lot of climate change or global warming, you know, things like that. So, we’re really bringing a lot of science into their schools and hopefully one of the students steps into science.

[00:05:45] Emily: That’s wonderful. So, Misha, how are you involved with the Makowa exhibition? 

[00:05:50] Misha: I am one of the outreaches that they had. We’re a very small team, but we’re very hands-on with science, and we’re bringing in different teachers, different grades, and a lot of different backgrounds of science just into classrooms for indigenous students, mostly. 

A big part is just us going to classes and going on the Reservations, bringing science awareness and trying to represent Native American students within the science field. So, we really want them to step into that world and know that they can have a place there, just like everybody else has a place there.

And then we also are trying to preserve cultural language, any kind of cultural practices—whether it’s ceremonies or you know, planting season, stuff like that—anything that is kind of fading away within our cultures, we want to preserve, and we want to include it with science. But we are based out of Lowell Observatory.

We have one of the first interactive science buildings here in Northern Arizona. And I think it’s opening the eyes of a lot of teachers and a lot of students to step into science. And it can be scary, but there’s room for you guys. 

[00:07:08] Emily: I have so many questions about that and also about the ways that ties into the exhibition.

One of the curators for this exhibition is Marlon Magdalena, who we have featured on this podcast previously, and he, in an article that’s going to run in the summer issue of El Palacio, has talked about the skies as being more than just the stars, but also the clouds and the birds and everything. I’d love to know from each of you, what is your relationship to the sky, and has it changed over time?

[00:07:42] Kaela: When I think of the sky—and as a filmmaker, I am always kind of trying to tap into the zeitgeist—well, I’m always tapped into it. I don’t have any choice. I’m always kind of sensitive to the feel and atmosphere of the world. And you know, things are pretty tense right now and concerning. A lot of people are in survival mode, and the first thing that came to mind when I was asked if I wanted to do this series was the importance of remembering that wider perspective, to say the least. 

You know, the vastness of the sky and yeah, all those worlds beyond us. When you really consider it, it makes you feel insignificant, as cliche as that sounds. And I think that’s a really healthy place to go in our minds right now. Not in a dissociative way, but in a connective way. 

And I think that can create a lot of space within ourselves as we connect to that larger story. And yeah, I think people in the world need to be around people who have some breath in their body moving freely.  

[00:08:49] Emily: Do you have any memories from when you were a child maybe, of noticing something in the sky or having something pointed out to you?

[00:08:56] Kaela: Yeah, well, I’m a city kid. I mean, I grew up in the city of San Francisco, but I also went to, you know, YMCA summer camp and we’d do slumber parties in the forest. And that was my first experience of seeing the night sky without any light pollution, and the Milky Way. And I remember just having a lot of trouble getting to sleep on those trips ‘cause you know, new environment and all.

So, you know, that would be a place I would, I would look off to. And it’s just like, “This is always above us and we never think about it or you know, connect with it.” 

And actually, that’s something that came up in my interview with Misha when I went out to the Observatory, about the effect that celestial bodies or the atmosphere of the Earth or clouds or all these things—how they can affect us even when we’re not aware of them or we don’t see them.

And I thought that was interesting. 

[00:09:49] Emily: So more recently then, since your time of camping, and looking at the stars when you couldn’t sleep, do you still look at the stars a lot? Has doing these videos for this exhibition prompted you, or reminded you, to look at the stars more?

[00:10:04] Kaela: You know, like when I take the trash out, (laughter) I’ll try to remember to look up.

But you know, I’m generally in my head, a lot. And the beauty of being a filmmaker and getting to interview such a wide variety of people is that that is my way to connect with others and also with their perspectives. That’s how I kind of widen my view of the world. 

And then I translate that, through many steps, in an interdisciplinary way, to the screen—and hopefully that will connect with others.

The more connected I am to the subject matter, I think the more it translates, and the more curious I am, which is kind of the benefit sometimes of being an outsider. I work with a lot of Indigenous, you know, communities and people and actually sometimes not knowing, not being of the community, creates that drive to learn more. 

[00:11:02] Emily: Misha, what about you? What is your relationship to the sky, and has it changed over time? 

[00:11:07] Misha: Oh yeah, definitely it has changed over time. But as a child, I feel like my upbringing was very traditional. 

And when I say traditional, I mean as Navajo people, we carry out ceremonies throughout the year. There’s different times that certain ceremonies take place, and then there’s different events that happen. So, when I say traditional, that means my family followed those ways. And so, it wasn’t just one ceremony as well. I was kind of raised in a few different branches. 

One we call the Native American Church, which is more of a teepee setup with peyote, you know, and that happens year-round. But the significance of the stars and the constellations that are out during the time of the ceremony, you know, the weather, the season—all of that makes a difference on our ceremony. 

And then during the wintertime, there’s something called the Yéʼii Bicheii ceremony. 

(light piano fades quietly into background)

That ceremony is a very strong healing ceremony, you know. It’s for individuals who have something serious, like cancer, you know, some kind of ailment. 

And so, when we have those ceremonies, there’s usually a story or a connection to the constellation that’s out, or the brightest star that’s out that night of the ceremony. And so, a lot of times as a kid, I think I was still learning my role, trying to figure out where I sit in these ceremonies and what I do as a woman or as a young maiden.

[00:12:37] But then as you get older, your role is already defined and you have to kind of step back and teach the younger generation what to expect, how to behave, you know, what are the dos and don’ts of the ceremony. And then also why it’s so significant during the time that it’s happening. So, a lot of times my life has kind of brought me to where I am because of those upbringings, because of our teachings.

You know, a simple storm could have a reason behind it, and I think that a lot of times, even though we’re going so fast-paced, it is easy to kind of not see what’s happening around you. It’s easy to like, “Oh, I gotta get to work. I gotta get the kids to school,” and then kind of forgetting, well, there’s a purpose and a reason like things are happening in this pattern. 

Or there’s a reason, you know, there’s a full moon tonight. There’s a reason there’s an eclipse. When we need to get together as a family and slow down and we go into this reverent mode, we close the curtains and you know, we sit together.

(piano picks up tempo and fades into foreground for several seconds before fading back again)

[00:13:57] Misha: So as a child, I think learning all that was something that just happened naturally in our family. It was just this thing like, you have to do it. This is what you you’re gonna do, ‘cause everyone’s doing it. As I got older, you know, it’s something that was so powerful and so humbling. It kind of makes you press pause.

It makes you slow down, it makes you appreciate your family. It makes you, you know, stop in the tracks that you are and just kind of observe around you. But definitely, I’m not the only Native that feels like this for sure. And I’m not speaking for the whole Tribe, you know. We all have different teachings and upbringings from different regions, but there’s this huge connection from living on the Reservation and then coming to city life.

If I see another Native on the day where there’s an eclipse, we’re stocking up on food. We’re getting ready to go into our little caves while everybody is celebrating this huge eclipse. There’s a small handful of us who are like, “Oh, we’re preparing to stay inside for the next twelve hours,” you know, however long. 

We have to fast. We can’t sleep, we can’t eat, we can’t make love. You know, there’s so many taboos and it’s so honoring to know like, “Oh, while everybody’s out celebrating and looking, I’m over here keeping my eyes closed, and I’m not looking at the sun or the moon,” you know? 

It definitely is kind of empowering. It’s kind of this little bit of sacredness that I get to hold to myself, compared to the rest of the world that’s moving so fast. And it is kind of fun to say, “Hey, I can’t work that day, because the cultural reasons.” (chuckles)

[00:15:50] I think with our program, it’s nice to go back to the Reservation and relate to these kids who are also where I’ve been, you know—they’re currently learning their role or they’re currently understanding why it was so important to have a butchering over the weekend; and to people who are coming from the outside, they say, “Well, what was so important about the butchering?” 

And there’s so many things important about it, from butchering the sheep to having family around, to learning your role. Then knowing the stories behind our stars or our weather, or the sheep itself. There’s so many teachings and so it’s really humbling to be able to go home, teach science, and then these kids get close to us knowing like, “Hey you, you’ve done this before,” or, “Hey, you’ve been in the same wash as I have, and now you’re in the big city.” 

And I’m like, “Yeah, it’s a small city though. It’s not all that.” (laughs)

I think our people have a lot of ties to the cosmos, to, you know, the weather, to our surroundings, to any kind of change in the sky. I think a lot of people notice it when there’s Aurora lights even—we have our own stories about it, and so as an adult I think it’s more meaningful and it’s just giving me this opportunity to turn around and say, “Okay, now how do I teach my own children these things?” You know? So, big responsibility. Big shoes to fill for sure compared to when I was a child.

Just, okay. Yeah. The stars are out. (chuckles) 

[00:17:34] Emily: Mm-hmm. I’m interested in what you said about growing up and just having this idea of, “Oh, this is how we do things,” and then having a deeper appreciation and knowing all those stories now. So, were those stories around you when you were a child and you just weren’t paying attention, or are you making more of a deliberate choice to share more of those stories with your own kids and other kids around you?

[00:18:02] Misha: I feel like it was so natural. We just knew every weekend we were going to grandma and grandpa’s house. We knew—well, the whole community knew actually—if the teepee was up, then that was the ceremony.

You know, everyone knows to gather at Maryanne’s, which was my late grandma. It was just this natural cycle like, “Oh, we’re going to grandma’s this weekend.” “Oh, I’m making, you know, fry bread, or I’m helping with the fruit salad.” 

And then when you’re there, you’re playing with all your cousins, but then you know, okay, it’s time to feed the elders.

So then you walk in with this tray, and then you go, “Okay, I am gonna go play, my part’s done,” you know? But as you get older, it’s like your elders had so many stories to tell you. They had so many things to teach you and just you taking in that little tray of food, you know, they would stop you in your tracks and they would kind of give you this respect and tell you, you know, “You’re beautiful and thank you so much for helping,”

You know? They stopped you. And I know it sounds so, you know, plain or normal or, “Oh, people do that every day.” But when it’s said in our language and when it’s said after a night of prayer, it’s so much more powerful. And I think as a child you kind of switch. You go into puberty and you realize, “Oh, this is my role and I’m beautiful in this role. I belong in this role.”

And so, I would be carrying, like, donuts or crackers and cheese ‘cause we had diabetics in our family, so we couldn’t always just give out donuts, you know? And I was so humbled as a kid to slice the cheese and make the little sandwiches. And then as I got older I—you start to handle the bigger things, the coffee, the stew, you know, things that the older women did.

[00:19:58] And then now that you have kids, you know, you want to teach them these things. I want to teach my kids these things. I want them to know that you’re gaining respect by serving others before yourself. You’re honoring your grandparents when you’re taking that time for whatever weekend plans you have, you’re taking that time to come to the ceremony and you’re serving them. You know, you’re doing things that they can no longer do now that they’re old. 

And so, my kids, now that we’re in the city, it’s like a different upbringing than I had. It’s a different kind of parenting style, where we’re living in this Western world.

Yes, “Keep your grades up, clean your room,” you know. But then going back home, it’s like, “Oh, this is how we do it back home: You no longer come first. Your parents come first, your elders come first.” The children that are running around, you have to learn to bear the children and take care of them regardless if you’re male or female.

You’re really taught to roll up your sleeves and help, without being told. You see something that needs to be done, you do it. And you don’t know these things until there’s a ceremony, until it’s wintertime, to do the Yéʼii Bicheii ceremony. When you see Dilyéhé, which is the winter stars that we follow—when you see that star, you know that ceremony is coming out, and you know what needs to be done for that ceremony to be successful. So then, what’s your role during that ceremony? 

And so, I feel like a lot of times when you’re learning all these teachings from the Reservation and you come to the city, that’s what gets you through living in the city. We’re really taught to persevere. We’re really taught, you know, get through these hard times and go without food and water sometimes, or go without all these big fancy things that you see in the city. Remember to humble yourself. 

So I feel like I am deliberately trying to teach my kids these things. I want them to know these things and how to survive, you know? But at the same time, I don’t want to push it on them. I like how I was brought into this circle and it wasn’t forced on me.

[00:22:15] And I’m seeing it now where my kids, they want to go home, they want to be in the ceremony, they want to be a part of this butchering and (chuckles) little things like that where I didn’t push it, and I’m seeing them react positively. 

(up-tempo music begins to fade softly into background)

I know somewhere down the road they’re going to remember, “Oh, this is how we stored the meat,” or, “This is what we did to get by during that time,” and it’s going to help them down the road.

(Music plays)

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[00:22:45] Emily: There are a few museums that can evoke a sense of place as strongly as the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture. I recently stood in a corridor of the Here, Now and Always exhibition, listening to the sounds of thunder, and could almost feel the raindrops on my skin, and almost smelled the vanilla scent of Ponderosa.

The museum is world-renowned for centering the perspectives and voices of Indigenous people. Come learn about the art, history, and living cultures of the southwest at the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture. Visit miaclab.org for tickets, events, and more. 

Did you know the New Mexico CulturePass is now available to purchase online? CulturePass gives you access to each of the fifteen state museums and historic sites we feature on Encounter Culture. Reserve your CulturePass today, at nmculture.org/visit/culturepass.

(Ads end)

(Music continues, then fades)

[00:23:59] Emily: To shift gears a little bit and focus on the exhibition, I’d love to hear from you, Kaela, about this video series that you did and what you learned from the process from each of the people you interviewed—including Misha, right? 

[00:24:12] Kaela: Yeah. The exhibition is about Native people’s relationships to the stars from a variety of scientific perspectives, personal perspectives, cultural perspectives, and you know, no one person—kind of like Misha was alluding to it herself—can be a representative for their whole culture.

So, it’s kind of like their interpretation based on where they come from and, just how they feel personally about, you know, about the sky, how they relate to it. So Misha was coming at it from an educator perspective, and as somebody from the Navajo culture. And she was a great interviewee, as you can tell. 

She was speaking from the heart the whole way through. I don’t know how I’m going to condense her video down to like ninety seconds, to two minutes, is the idea. So, each of the videos feature one interviewee, and they are, last I heard, going to be played on a loop in in the media room.

Marlon Magdalena, who you mentioned, who works at the Jemez Historic Site—I got to interview him. He actually has a contribution to the exhibition as an artist. He was speaking from the perspective as a Jemez person who makes power shields. There’s a power shield in the exhibition, which is something I guess you’ll have to go to the exhibit to learn more about. (laughter)

We have Jon Ghahate, who’s also an educator. He is Laguna and Zuni. And you know, he said something really deeply, kind of philosophical, I think, about—people since ancient times have been looking at these celestial bodies and the stars and they’re the same bodies and stars that exist now for modern day people.

[00:25:59] I felt like that’s pretty profound ‘cause that draws a connection between people through time. And there’s something really stable and enduring in that whole idea, which, to have that wider perspective and something that can anchor us in really tumultuous times and calm us even—it’s like being present in the moment in a different way.

Like, getting caught up in everything going on in the world right now is not exactly being present. You’re affected by it all. So, it’s a disconnected way to kind of experience life, I think, when you’re living in anxiety and reacting to everything, which I think we all do—I’m speaking in a kind of aspirational way, like I’d like to live more like this mentally, being connected.

And the exhibition also talks about, you know, that relationship to the Earth. And that’s come up in each of the interviews, I’ve noticed. When speaking about the relationship to the sky, inevitably it’s how the sky relates to the seasons, how the stars can kind of point the way to what it’s time to do.

Whether it’s planting or ceremony, it kind of dictates, it’s a map, you know. The way I interpreted it is just in these stories, there’s lessons to be learned that can apply to everyday life. Going into this exhibition, it’s very star-centered, and so when I think about the skies and space, stars are kind of like the predominant, you know, visual that I see.

[00:27:36] But there’s all kinds of layers to the sky that you don’t really consider, that extend from the farthest reaches of space right down to our own atmosphere and—and how all that affects the ground we walk on, and the soil. And all that connection to planting and agriculture that’s dictated by the sky. 

And I think one of the things that’s been kind of driven home for me in the process of doing all these interviews—I learn something with every interview I do, but I—that common thread of Indigenous people’s relationships. 

There’s always this land-based element to it. Nothing kind of exists in isolation, it seems to me. It’s all about relationships, you know? And sometimes in—I don’t know if you call it Anglo culture or religion, say—you know, heaven is something, maybe disembodied was the word I was gonna say.

There’s like a, a kind of disconnect. Like you’re doing things in this life to get to that next stage, you know. You just hope you’re gonna get into heaven. You’re not there yet, but you hope to experience it. 

But with Indigenous people, it’s like a day-to-day thing, and it’s a constant connection, and especially as the seasons change and everything changes, if you’re going to be following this map and letting it guide your life, you have to constantly be tuning in and like, you know, farmers touch the soil in the morning to feel the temperature and then they look up in the sky, you know? 

[00:29:14] Emily: So, the series title is called Career Journeys, is that correct? 

[00:29:18] Kaela: That’s a good question. So there’s, there is actually two components to this video series. So there’s this six video series we’ve been talking about featuring, you know, one interviewee from a certain field and that’s going to play within the exhibition.

But at the same time, when I’m doing these interviews, I’m asking each of these people about their career paths, because there’s going to be a traveling component of this, where it’s going to travel to different tribal schools. And this video on the career piece, it’s something that’s gonna speak specifically to tribal students.

That’s going to be like a four-to-five-minute video that’s going to incorporate all the interviews and kind of weave it together. And I think it’s going to be something really inspiring based on what I’ve been hearing from people, especially, you know, Misha, and you heard her talk about how important it is to work within the community.

I’ve learned along the way doing this work, how much representation matters and how meaningful it is for people to see somebody like them out there when you’re living in a world that’s pretty exclusive as we know, in a lot of ways.

(echoing music with rippling piano, rhythm, and wordless vocals fades to foreground for several seconds)

[00:30:32] Emily: Misha, I am curious about what you’re learning in your role about the skies and, and what connections you see between Western science and indigenous ways of knowing. 

[00:30:44] Misha: Well, I feel like when we go out to the Reservation and we teach really anything STEM related, a lot of times the teachers don’t have any kind of standards, like Arizona standards or science standards to go off of.

So a lot of times, you know, if they ask about tectonic plates, you know, “How do we explain this to our kids, and how do we tell them why it’s so important to know?” A lot of times we tie in our cultural language, our Native language, you know, “How do you say ‘sand’ in Navajo,” “How do you say ‘rain’ in Navajo,” whatever it is that we’re teaching.

And then when they ask, you know, “Are we allowed to touch this? Is this taboo? Are we allowed to play with this? To look at this?” It gives us a good opportunity to say, “Go home and ask your family, what they think about it.” “Go home and ask your family if there are any teachings from your family,” ‘cause every clan in every region, sometimes they do things a little different from each other.

So then it brings up this chance, this opportunity for our people to speak about things that might be taboo. For example, looking at the sun is kind of a no-no to some people. So we have this video from NASA and it shows different filters, different angles, zoomed up really close into the sun. It’s showing sun spots and solar flares.

[00:32:10] These are some things that we don’t have a term for, you know. “Coronal mass ejection” is not a term in the Navajo language. How do we teach this, and how do we encourage teachers to teach it and not be, you know, afraid of it? 

There’s kind of a lack of connection in certain areas for science within our tribe, within our people, but what our elders and our ancestors knew and learned already, you know, there was a boundary set to not disturb anything. 

There was this taboo put in place because we don’t want to rock the world. You know? We’re going to be here for a little bit of time and we’re going to try our hardest not to disturb it. So then, our view of it is way different from how science is viewing it, from how the Western world they will depict something and they will scratch at it and learn every little thing about it. 

Whereas us, you know, we know it’s there. We know it’s its own being. It’s alive in its own way and we’re not going to disrupt it. So, for us to have that kind of understanding, you know, we are scared to step into science. 

We are scared to look at certain things, and we are scared to, you know, poke at it, I want to say, because we’re afraid of the backlash, we’re afraid of, what if we were never meant to bother certain things? What if they were there to keep us in our place? And so I think when it comes to going out to the Reservation and making those connections, we just like to bring up the topic. We also don’t wanna rock our program.

[00:33:50] We don’t want to disturb anybody and step on toes and say, “Hey, this is what you should be teaching your kids,” Instead, we want to bring up the topic and hopefully the parents get involved, because that’s a big thing too with our program, is parent involvement. I think the older generations were very scared and very cautious of what they did learn what they got into, what they carried down to their kids. 

Nursing is kind of flourishing right now. A lot of kids want to be in the nursing field. And a long time ago, that was not the situation because we were taught to never handle human blood like that. Not only our own, but other people’s blood, you know? And now it’s this, this huge opportunity of, “Go ahead, but don’t play with it. Be respectful. Go about it the right way.” 

So, I think now the connections we’re trying to get with these students is just to bring up the topic enough to where they go home—we want them to go home. We want their parents to hear, “This is what I learned today. This is what we did.” 

And a lot of times there could even be an herb you have to take. There might even be juice you have to take and drink because you looked at the sun because you, you know, touched someone’s human blood. There’s ceremonies that put us back into balance, and so there’s this huge window and it’s really based on how each family handles it. But there’s a huge opportunity for students to jump in to science, to really just represent themselves and their families and still have that balance with their culture.

Because wherever you go, you’re taking your culture, you’re taking your language, you know? We don’t necessarily have Sunday Church, but we do have days where we do kind of bunker down and we say our prayers. 

So then on these other days, these normal no-event days, you know, do we still think about those taboos? Yeah. Do we still carry the yes and the nos? Yeah, we do!

[00:35:59] And I think bringing that to the classroom and telling them, “You could still do what you want, but still carry your culture,” it’s totally doable. It doesn’t feel like it, it feels scary, but, I think we’re here to just be a resource for the teachers and then we end up forming these relationships with the kids, where we see them five years down the road and they say, “Hey, you know what I’m doing? I’m going into college for this, and it’s because you guys told me I could.” 

And we’re like, “Oh, no, no, don’t, don’t put that on us,” (laughs) “We don’t want to pay for your ceremony. That was your choice,” you know? (more laughter)

But yeah, there’s definitely a huge disconnection and it’s because we’re living in two worlds. We’re living in, we call it, you know, the white man’s world or the Western world. And then we also have our traditional cultural world. 

And we’re trying to promote living in both worlds and keeping your balance and keeping your identity. I might be going off topic a little, but I think coming into the city from the reservation, there’s a huge wake up call. You know, you really struggle with your identity: “Who am I? Where do I belong? Which world or how do I belong in both worlds?” 

And so, a lot of times, you know, if you have a Native American friend, check on them. You know, “How are you doing with this eclipse that’s coming up?” Or “How has your last few months been with Mars and retrograde?” You know, whatever the situation, because I guarantee we’ll have that story, or we’ll have that reason of belief like, “Oh, well because of Mars…” (chuckles) you know, we’ll blame something.

We’ll have that reasoning. But for us, it kind of re-grounds us.

(rhythmic music fades into foreground for several seconds)

[00:37:52] Emily: I would love to hear how you navigate balancing both of those worlds. Like for example, do you look at the sun spots through the telescope? And if you do, then what do you do after? 

[00:38:03] Misha: Actually, when I first started working at Lowell Observatory, it was really scary because I was looking at everything in the night sky, and you kind of get trained on telescopes right away.

And so everything in the night sky I thought was fine to look at—nebulae, star clusters, you know, planets. Then whenever I saw Native Americans come in, or specifically Navajos, I would ask them, you know, “What color do you see in there?” A lot of times, elders, they don’t see the same things that we see. 

Their eyes are a little more strained, and so I’d be able to connect with our language and talk about the shapes or the colors they’re seeing, and then one grandma actually told me like, “It’s good to see you out here. It’s good to see a Navajo here. Make sure you go home. Make sure you put this away.” 

And so in our culture it’s called taking things back to the fire. You go to the fireplace and you pray about it. Anything wrong you did or anything wrong, you saw, you put it back in the fireplace and you’re rebalanced.

So, you have ceremonies. And I did do quite a few, those first few years I was working at the observatory. I started to look at the sun and I was like, “You know what? I don’t think I’m supposed to be looking at our sun like this. Our Father Sun. I’m just looking at him like he’s bare naked and it don’t feel right!” (chuckles)

[00:39:27] And so I would go home and tell my mom like, “What is our clan teaching about this?” And she said, “Oh. I didn’t know you were doing that. Let’s get a medicine man today.” (laughs) And so we did. 

I went through a few ceremonies where, you know, I had to cleanse myself. I basically had to give my offering back to the universe, and then I had to kind of re-humble myself in a way where I gave thanks every time I had the opportunity to look at the sun. 

So if I was taking a couple to look through the solar telescope, you know, my first thought wouldn’t be like, “Oh, I have to walk up the hill and I have to set up the solar scope for this couple,” which is most people’s thoughts, because it was random during the day.

[00:40:15] My first thought was, “How honored am I to be able to show this couple the sun spots that are on the sun today?” You know how people say, “God willing, this is going to happen for you,” for us, it’s, “If Creator allows us to see it.” “If the sun does have sun spots to show, and if it lines up for this couple, how lucky am I to be the one to show them this? And to be the one to educate them on this.” 

And so I had to change my whole perspective on being fortunate to do that. So a lot of times now I do come home, and I still honor our ways. During an eclipse, I do not work. I tell them, “Hey, I—you cannot schedule me. I will not show up.” (laughs) 

If there’s other events happening, sometimes we come home and we cleanse ourself using sage or cedar. Sometimes I have family members back home who will make an herb for me to drink, you know? I think that having that in my back pocket feels like a weapon. I’m protecting myself in my own way, against thunderstorms, against snowstorms, against the coyote crossing my path, against seeing a snake—These are all big things in our culture. 

But I know if I rebalance myself while I’m away from home I’ll be okay until I get home. And for me, home is about three hours from here, and back home it feels like everything is there. I feel like once I step out of my van and I touch the ground, you know, I don’t have to worry about what medicine I need to take. I don’t have to worry about what I saw in the city. 

It can be really superstitious things too to most people who are not native or Navajo. Little things like an EMT crossing your path, you never know if somebody passed away and took their last breath in that EMT while it’s passing you and you just crossed over that path.

[00:42:11] I get to go home and I get to recenter myself knowing, “Oh, this is my Hogan, this is Mother Earth right here. This is the motherland for me, and even though these herbs are bitter, my mom made them and I’m gonna take ‘em.” (laughs) 

And it does feel like I cleansed myself. It feels like I washed away, you know, whatever I saw in the world, that’s not mine. I’m trying to work on getting that idea that this world is not mine, because that’s what we’re trying to teach these students is, “You’re more than welcome to step into the science world. You have a right to just like everybody else, and you still have the right to carry your culture with you. You can still have your long hair, you can still wear your jewelry, your turquoise jewelry.”

“You can still wear your moccasins,” you know, because our belief is when we do those things, that’s how the holy people know, oh, she’s ready for her blessings, or she wants to be seen. We see you. We know you’re our child when you’re wearing our moccasins. 

(contemplative flute music begins in background)

So, I feel like a lot of times it kind of comes back to how you continue with your culture and carry yourself stepping into a world that’s not yours. You could still carry your culture, you know?

(music fades into foreground for several seconds)

[00:43:39] Emily: I would love for you to each talk about the importance of the curriculum work you’re doing. So, Kaela, for example, these career journey videos that you’re making, I’d love to hear a little bit about why they’re important and where you’re bringing them, what you hope kids are gonna get out of these videos.

[00:43:56] Kaela: Yeah. The first thing that comes to mind for that is just, I don’t really know what the students are exposed to day-to-day, but I have the feeling that the video that we’re creating is something very specific and very directed and is probably not something a lot of kids get to have communicated to them.

My job in every video I do, at least what I strive for, is that human element that can connect to somebody’s, you know, heart and mind, no matter who they are. I’m a nonnative filmmaker, but I think it is connecting to the humanity in any person, which is what builds the bridge. And the more I can connect, the better I am at having the content connect with others, just the more potential there is for that.

So that’s my hope. You know, in the process of creating this series, there’s some special, you know, magic taking place that I hope comes through. And Misha mentioning students in later years coming to her and saying, “Oh, because of you and what you all told us, I’m going into this field.”

Like hopefully this series will have a similar effect. I think that’s the best outcome that I can think of. 

[00:45:17] Misha: I feel like one of the big takeaways from our role—you know, our whole team does what I do. We all go to the Rez and teach. We are really trying to be inclusive. We’re really trying to take up that space and hold that space for Native Americans.

When they walk through the door, we really want them to feel comfortable. We want them to see themselves here. I always tell them, you know, “You could be where I’m at. You could play with liquid nitrogen too, but you could also do more like I’m just here playing with liquid nitrogen and you know, the vacuum chamber and dry ice, but there’s so much more than this.”

And I’m just the little doorstep. I’m just the little bridge. I’m the first, you know, “Hello. Welcome to the observatory,” that you’re going to have. What if you can actually get into the studies? What if you can actually do what some of the scientists and astronomers here are doing, you know? 

So I think a big part for us is just encouraging them to step out of that timidness, step out of that era of, “We shouldn’t be in this, we shouldn’t do what everyone else is doing.” I think we’re trying to encourage them to bring the awareness home, bring the opportunity home, but also jump into it. And if it’s not you, maybe your little brother will see you, maybe your little sister, you know, maybe somebody down the road will say, “Hey, they went into nursing. What if I want to be a surgeon?” You know, or “They went into science teaching, but what if I actually want to study something there?” 

So I think for us a big takeaway is just trying to get students the confidence, trying to let them know that they can be there. They can take up space and they can try something new, while still having your culture intact, while still representing who you are, still take up that space with pride. You know, wear your ribbon dress, wear your moccasins, wear your turquoise, speak your language, even if you’re not sure if this is a term in our language, how would you describe it? Because our language is very descriptive, so then break it down. You know, don’t be afraid to break those borders.

[00:47:40] And I think for a really long time, a lot of trauma from our history as a people have really limited us. I think we have still been in that mindset that “This is enough. We don’t have to go farther. We can stay on these reservations and we can stick with these limited jobs. We can only get our bachelor’s,” you know?

No, you could go and get your PhD, you can represent us and you can represent yourselves. You can bring that home. And so I think a lot of times just having that space and being inclusive, giving encouragement is a big part of our job. And that’s the most important part to me, is being able to be that bridge for a lot of families, a lot of teachers, and especially the students.

So when we go out to these star parties—and a star party for us is where we take the telescope to the community, we take it to the school and we hold a community wide star party—that’s my favorite part of the job. ‘cause I do get to hear my language. I do get to meet relatives and they also get to play with the telescopes while we’re there.

So that’s probably the highlight. That’s our big finale of the school year. 

[00:48:54] Emily: Amazing. Well, is there any last details or information or things that you want to say about your work or this exhibition that you think listeners should know? 

[00:49:03] Kaela: The exhibition focuses also on encouraging people to look at where they find meaning, how they find meaning, whether it’s in the sky or on the Earth, and how they can maybe do it in new ways, so inviting people to be more present in it and more interactive and interpersonal in a way. 

[00:49:27] Misha: Something I want to share is if you are Indigenous from any tribe to get out there and share your story, share your culture. With respect, of course. I know there’s certain things we can’t talk about and we can’t share, but there’s so many things that I think our people and our, our past ancestors, they have known for years, and it’s kept us here for so long.

And to share it means that these stories get to continue. So, you know, if you’re Indigenous and you’re listening in and you’re unsure about what to share, this is your little sign to go and share it, to take up that space and keep these stories going because they are fading away. And I understand it’s such a fast-paced world, so they’re going to fade away, you know?

But find these little parts of yourself that you can continue with other people. So if there’s anyone Indigenous listening, you know, take that leap and share what you can.

[music increases in volume briefly before fading away] 

[00:50:35] Emily: If you are interested in learning more about Makowa: The Worlds Above Us, check out the article about the exhibition and the summer issue of El Palacio. The link is in our show notes. Makowa is on view at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture in Santa Fe through August 17th, 2026. To learn more and plan your visit, go to indianartsandculture.org.

[music fades into theme music and closing credits] 

[00:51:21] Emily: Encounter Culture is a production of the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs. 

Our producer is Andrea Klunder at The Creative Impostor Studios. 

This season is produced and edited by Andrea Klunder and Alex Riegler with additional editing by Monica Braine. 

Our recording engineers are Collin Ungerleider and Kabby at Kabby Sound Studios in Santa Fe. 

Technical direction and post-production audio by Edwin R. Ruiz. 

Our executive producer is Daniel Zillmann. 

Thank you to New Mexico artist “El Brujo” D’Santi Nava for our theme music. 

For a full transcript and show notes, visit podcast.nmculture.org or click the link in the episode description in your listening app. 

I’m your host, Emily Withnall. 

The New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs is your guide to the state’s entire family of museums, historic sites, and cultural institutions. From Native treasures to space exploration, world-class folk art to ancient dinosaurs, our favorite way to fully explore is with the New Mexico CulturePass. To see everywhere CulturePass is accepted and reserve yours today, visit nmculture.org/visit/culturepass. 

And if you love New Mexico, you’ll love El Palacio Magazine. Subscribe at elpalacio.org. 

Thank you for listening, and if you learned something new, send this episode to a friend or share it on social media. We love celebrating the cultures of New Mexico together. 

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