Strawberry Festival and Theresa Bear Fox's 'Diamond'

Hi Folks,
I just returned back from the Mohawk Strawberry Festival.  If you can make it next year I so recommend going.  For me it felt like being around my mother again.  The community is so warm and open and loving, the vendors are full of beautiful artwork, everyone was welcomed into circle dancing, and the sounds in the air were of melodious traditional music from all over the world...including lots of live Beatles hits covered in Mohawk!  There was an open mike at the end of the day and I was encouraged to get up and sing...I was so afraid, but felt so much love and support, so for the first time in my life, I did.  I felt like I shouldn't because all I had coming to mind was a medicine song from Brazil and not from my own people but Theresa Bear Fox and other Mohawk people said it was ok, to sing, and just trust spirit.  I really want to be of service to native wisdom in the form of song, and told Theresa Bear Fox this.  She wanted to hear me sing.  I had to get over myself and sing.  It felt good to let go of my mind and just try and move from my heart. 
Rowers from the Onondaga came on canoe via the waterways and brought water from that land; Theresa Bear Fox and I used this water for the sacred tobacco growing on the Mohawk land. Then a Mohawk community member and I went and sat by the river to pray with tobacco in the traditional Mohawk way; they taught me Mohawk ways of doing things and said it was ok for me to use these things in my life, too.  They let me sit with a feather of their family's that was over a hundred years old.  I felt super grateful beyond words...I just tried to keep opening my heart and receive it with love.   
When I arrived at the festival Theresa Bear Fox was drumming while another woman played the flute.  I found some shade and just let the music sink into my heart.  Luckily, I found myself sitting at the feet of Kevin Deer, a Mohawk Clan leader who'd given the opening address (which I had missed).  He was telling some friends about how he felt the Europeans had brought a spell of greed for money and power with them and when they set foot on this land it cast this same spell over the people and land here.  He said he went back to that spot where the Europeans first set foot and did prayers to break that spell.  He also said that the spirit of the Peacemaker is returning to bring healing for all people and all of the land.  I asked him and Janet, another Mohawk person about the difference between cultural appropriation and Europeans learning native ways and visions for healing/peace in a respectful way.  Kevin and Janet both said that I was overthinking things, to come from my heart, to not judge people.  I said, well what about colonization of the soul, what if European colonization is now happening through taking beauty, ceremony, art, and ideas from native cultures and not honoring or giving back to the native communities?  Janet and Kevin both said that people who know how to respect and love what they are taught will reap the benefits and those who take and don't understand what they are learning just won't get it.  It didn't sound like they felt cultural appropriation was any threat.  I realize that these two voices do not represent everyone, and it is not a carte blanche for European Americans to go and do whatever they like with Native American cultural ways.  It was interesting for me to hear the message they were giving me personally, it seemed, which was to try not to judge others, to not come from the mind, but to come from the heart.  They said I would know by way of the heart what is right.  Kevin is one of the founders of and is now on the board of the Hiawatha Institute for Indigenous Knowledge.  HIIK's mission statement:
'Our first mission is to develop and offer academic programs and resources in partnership with Syracuse University in order to practice, protect, enhance and disseminate Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) knowledge for future generations.
The vision of the HIIK is the creation of a positive environment for the illumination and cultivation of traditional indigenous knowledge to enhance human relationships with each other and the natural world to fulfill our responsibilities for the continuation of life.'
http://www.hiawatha.syr.edu/missionvision.html

Here is a version of the song I sang at the festival.
https://soundcloud.com/shivanistgeorge/beijaflor-june-storm

Here is one of Theresa Bear Fox's songs, 'Diamond'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F3xBOLrhw8

https://search.yahoo.com/yhs/search;_ylt=A0LEVjj4THBXXksAqAUPxQt.;_ylc=X1MDMjExNDcwMDU1OQRfcgMyBGZyA3locy1hZGstYWRrX3NibnQEZ3ByaWQDMFlDbU1NQmxUWVNhZXJVZkhMRnpCQQRuX3JzbHQDMARuX3N1Z2cDMTAEb3JpZ2luA3NlYXJjaC55YWhvby5jb20EcG9zAzAEcHFzdHIDBHBxc3RybAMEcXN0cmwDMTUEcXVlcnkDWW91dHViZSUyMGFsdW5hBHRfc3RtcAMxNDY2OTc3NTY5?p=Youtube+aluna&fr2=sb-top-search&hspart=adk&hsimp=yhs-adk_sbnt&param1=20160503&param2=c93a60b5-a95f-4c34-945e-3b439871b826&param3=transit_3.1.1%7EUS%7Eappfocus29&param4=bing%7Efirefox&type=appfocus29_tr_ff

This Friday my son and I are going to Colombia, to the Sierra Nevadas, the mountains of the Kogi.  Here is the movie of their message to 'little brother'...all the rest of us.  I recommend watching this.

Love,
Sareanda