On Day of the Dead, May You Always Be Remembered

What’s up? Iroko “Kíko” Keith Widyolar, the creator of New York Latin Culture Magazine, here. Everywhere I go, except New York City, people tell me, “you’re not from here.”

Claro que si. I’m a native-born multigenerational American of the United States who chooses to live in Spanish. My point of view is also Caribbean and Yoruba. I’m a son of Eleguá and Yemayá. My birth story is like a movie. ¡Aché!

My first home was in Boyle Heights, a Chicano neighborhood in Downtown Los Angeles. I was also raised in Bangkok, Thailand. I’m a 20-year New Yorker. Yo soy Boricua (de corazón) pa’ que tú lo sepa. In the Caribbean, Cubans and Dominicans say I am “aplatanado,” a foreigner who has adopted local customs. I’m just me.

The Magazine is my way of understanding and supporting the Brazilian, Argentine, French, Colombian, Puerto Rican, and Afro-Dominican families in my life’s journey. I have a mixed up Creole accent, but my family doesn’t speak English.

Soy calle. What I learned from the road is that we are far more African and Indigenous, and Latin culture is a far bigger part of United States culture, than most of us have been taught.

So over nearly 20 years, my concept of Latin has grown from the traditional Caribbean and Latin American; into the great mix of Indigenous peoples of the Americas plus our mother cultures in Africa and Europe, with Jewish, Arab, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Irish, and even German influences.

“Tout moun se moun” is Haitian Kreyòl for “All People Are People.” There is only one human race and Afrika is Mother. “If you are not African, you are not human.” Please quote me on that.

Appearance is a false flag. We are all mixed, and when you learn to love and respect all peoples, your world grows exponentially. Mine has. I don’t just write about Latin culture, I live it. ¡Mi Gente, Ustedes!

Ven, ven, Iroko, ven ven ~ Kíko

The blues is the root of most American (and some Caribbean) popular music and dance, including: jazz, rhythm and blues, country, rock, reggae, soul, funk, disco, house, hip hop, reggaeton, and trap. Even American country music originates in Mother Afrika.

Together, the Latin family has created music, dance, and food that is uniquely American, and loved around the world. Latin culture brings people together and turns the blues into joy. ¡Aguanilé!

The Kalûnga is the border of the realms of the living and the dead in the traditional Kongo culture of Central Africa. It is the horizon in the Yowa or Dikenga Cross, the Kongolese cosmological diagram which represents the spiritual journey through the stages of life and death. Psychology texts use similar diagrams to describe psychological development. La Altagracia taught me this. ¡Mmm!

The Atlantic Ocean is the Kalûnga in life. Kongolese knew that anyone taken away across the ocean, never came back. It was believed to be a terrifying journey to the land of the dead. But it turns out there was life on the other side. More or less, that is the mix of Indigenous, European, African, and Asian peoples in the Americas, that we call Latin.