In this video, Eulalie and Gracia, as they prepare arepas, differ on what is spiritually best for Eulalie’s 4-year-old son, David, who suffers from Pervasive Developmental Disorder (the child still cannot sit up, stand, walk or speak). Eulalie is staunchly Catholic and prays several times a day, while Gracia is a woman free from colonial religious constraints. I have imagined her as someone who might still carry old beliefs passed on from her lost African homeland. She had three children with a Portuguese man, whom she chose to never marry. I play both women because I carry both of them inside me. It’s a simple dialogue. I wanted to see what it would look like if I played both women, performing a task they did on a daily basis. I wish I could have done this in a Trinidadian home, to capture the real feel of the place.
Translations to Spanish dialogue:
Gracia: All your prayers aren’t going to change anything.
Eulalie: And your archaic beliefs will?
Gracia: Yemeya protects children.
Beat.
Gracia: Where is everyone?
Eulalie: They’re still at carnaval.
Gracia: Oh, you don’t like my necklace, but the carnaval, you don’t have a problem with.
Eulalie: David could choke on it.
Beat.
Eulalie: God gave him to us like this. We have to accept him the way he is.
Gracia: Of couse. Of course!
