#this makes me want to move back to latam like im just

[woahajimes]

grah

[brujoenlafrontera]

hi!!! I’m a puertorriqueño/nicaragüense enby looking into resources for learning bruja stuff, any good place you know to start?

I’ve gotten a couple of asks about this lately, and i’m so happy to know there are more latinos finding their way to the practice, tumblr’s brujeria tag often gives the impression that theres so little of us out there reclaiming our practices but getting asks like these brings me a lot of faith that thats not true :) first and foremost:

GETTING INTO BRUJERIA IS HARD.

it really is. baby brujos like us know that better than anyone- getting started, is often the hardest part of doing anything, and its no different with brujeria. it can feel so overwhelming and feeling lost is natural. from my experience, although i am still a newbie ive been able to find a lot of information out there, here are the best places to find info, sorted by priority:

FAMILY! a little self explanatory, but brujeria at its best is truly is an inherited, familial practice. If you can, before delving into internet resources, definitely connect w your family if you’re able to and ask them for guidance and about their experiences!

Your family is always the best resource over anything you can find online; theres so much misinformation out there or information not relevant to your region and if someone in your family already has established practices, always trust them first

 Do some thinking back to all your cultural traditions, quirks, stories, and superstitions that you’ve  learned from your family across time and never thought too much about- and rediscover them under a new light

KEEP IN MIND: brujeria is NOT a singular , concrete practice w concrete rules in itself, the term blankets a lot of traditions across latam, the caribbean, mexico, but imo its always best to stick with brujeria related to your heritage and where your connection is.

this can be hard for people (like me!) with huge family taboos toward brujeria that make it unsafe to ask around about, and/or limitations in family connections (also like me unfortunately). I personally can really only get the tidbits and stories that my family accidentally slips out when I occasionally see them. i try to write them down as much as possible, but the info i can get is limited... and thats where the following comes in.

ONLINE COMMUNITIES. i.e, youtube, tumblr, instagram brujx communities. notice I haven’t said “internet” in general- the reason why i trust community based social media more than random individual websites you find on google is because, in the case of brujeria and honestly any non-european craft, you’re often gonna find a LOT of white people writing blogs, books, etc about their “spiritual experiences” in latam countries and wrongly/incorrectly taking ATR or indigenous traditions (like with smudging). I know, with social media, although those same white people are also on insta and tumblr, it’s a LOT easier to see the face behind the accounts and differentiate who to trust, who’s legit and has real experience to share, rather than a nameless, faceless, website that is actually some colonizer sharing colonized ideas who thinks theyre on a spiritual journey taking traditions all willy nilly. And the fact that in social media, its much easier to find a lot of good brujas at once bc they tend to follow each other lmao.what ive personally done to find information tho is essentially SCOUR tumblrs, insta accs, and watching tons of youtube videos for posts, accounts, videos, etc, and narrowing down good info from there through , namely:

CHECKING WHO YOUR SOURCE IS!!!

ASKING YOURSELF FROM WHAT EXPERIENCE THEYRE SPEAKING FROM

ALWAYS TAKING EVERYTHING WITH A GRAIN OF SALT

AND STICKING TO INFO FROM CULTURES OPEN AND RELEVANT TO ME.

again, brujería is different depending on where your family is from in latam, and if you have an established connection to indigenous and/or black roots, so it’s useful to use keywords relating to that when searching (like if ur black, you can look into ATRs(african traditional religions) which tend to mix deeply with brujeria, if ur indigenous, finding other people from your tribe is great, and if youre not pursuing your already learned traditions you can think about connecting to them more deeply(altho indigenous traditions are their own thing, sometimes they do mix with brujeria too), and apart from familial roots, if ur catholic/christian and/or want to explore it, saint work/catholic brujeria might be a good fit for you!)  

tumblr: there are a couple of fantastic brujxs on this site with great blogs and resources who have sadly left the site, but i still go through their posts heavily for spells, rituals, scraps of info! etting started w brujería is hard bc there’s really not that much info out there right now, but i compile as many good brujeria posts i find on my acc.

@brujeria-n-bongs great for catholic brujeria, now at @Upliftherbs on instagram

@brujeria-lost @barberwitch @reina-morada @highbrujita

@naomi121406 is by far the most active and informative tumblr resource ive found, shes an afro-indigenous diaguita curandera from argentina so shes also really helpful if ATRs are in your path!

Im not black myself and dont follow ATRs so i don’t really know many good blogs for afrolatine brujxs out there but if anyone would like to tag some in the replies thatd be awesome!

instagram: Ive found that instagram #brujeria tags has a pretty healthy active stream of posts. You’re gonna have to sift through a lot of them to get to the good stuff though- imo a lot of hispanics use the brujería tag not to mean “latine brujería” but just the spanish word for witchcraft, so a lot of white hispanics will put wicca/neo witchcraft in the tag. imo that’s really not something i’m personally interested in bc it’s not true to brujeria’s traditional nature, is very white/eruropean , and that wicca shit basically just got here. its a relatively a recent thing😭 so i try to stick to bruja accounts that aren’t influenced by that.

youtube: The youtube brujería tag is hit or miss? and again, contains a lot of wicca. But there are some good practitioners on there like The Mexican Witch! You just gonna look around, and dont be afraid to click on videos by really really small youtubers; they often are the ones with the most informative and legit things to say!

Everyone’s path as a bruja/o/x (sjdf trying to be inclusive w gendered language is difficult) is different but here are some topics i think are great to look into as a beginner!

ancestors: start at the bottom and figure out who they are, where theyre from, and set up an altar. it’ll help you a lot with figuring out your identity and path as a bruja later on.

setting up a grimoire

divination: tarot is actually what got me into brujeria at first! tarot isnt strictly traditional and is european in itself but its a wonderful tool for connecting to dieties, saints, etc as well as super fun and helps a lot with introspection

ritual abrecaminos, aka road opening spells!

amarres (love spells... proceed with caution)

limpias, mal de ojo

saint work: even if you’re not catholic (im ex catholic), a growing number of us (especially lgbt latines like @/upliftherbs on instagram) are starting to take back and decolonize our view of saints like La Virgen Maria and removing her from the rigid european/colonized interpretation thats been forced into us

candle spells in general (i fucking love candles tbh, cheap, easy, fun, and WORKS)

spiritual colognes, how to cleanse

finally, here are some helpful posts yall should definitely read and think about moving forward!

about using tumblr as a resource

about looking into brujeria as a part-white part latine

bruja psa + about reclaiming lost indiginety

honestly naomi’s entire brujeria tag is great and super informative for beginners and basically holds answers for almost anything at this point

hope this post helps yall out!

EDIT: oh lord now that this is posted the outline format i tried to use is all kinds of fucked up please dont mind the odd numbering lmfao tumbr hates organized formats

[woodlandpoetic]

One-Shot RQ. {Savior}

@ininteligibleart asked:

Idk if you still doing request but here comes one, ¿what about a Kidnaped Reader who's beign saved by Leon, Ada, Claire and Chris, bc they are friends of reader? Srry for my english im from latam, greetings from Chile ¡I love your work! Keep going            

Pairing: None

Fandom: Resident Evil

Based around: RE4

Theme: Action

Warnings: Cussing

Writer’s Note: I’m so SO sorry this is beyond overdue!! Life’s gotten in the way of my writings and it’s frustrating, but sitting as a draft for a bit I FINALLY got it done!! This was actually super fun to write and I loved every part of it! Thank you for requesting from me love! ♡

Your eyes slowly flutter open, feeling your head dangle from your neck like a grapevine you feel panic quickly settle into you. The room is barely lit from where you sat, till about a few inches in front of you— gloomy red lights hung over your head. ‘Don’t panic,’ you attempt to pull your arms back forward to only feel zip ties tightly cuffed around your wrists and chair, causing you to shift harshly back and forth in hopes they’d snap. Nothing. You don’t remember how you ended up here, where you were, all you could get a glimpse of was being sent on this mission and arriving on sight. That’s it. Everything beyond that was a blur, causing a massive headache to wash over you, your head hanging once again wincing in pain. Your arms tugged relentlessly at the tightened zip ties, feeling the chair shift creek beneath you. Shit wooden chair, this should be easier than it’s portrayed to you— although deep down you were hoping your group would find you. The eerie lighting covering the room didn’t help in settling your nerves to concentrate, lifting your head again to peer around.

“Ah, Miss {Y/N}.” A voice spoke deeply through a muffled speakers above you, echoing through the room you had been enclosed in. Your head snapped to the right of you in response to the muffled voice, “Bastard.” You growled. A deep, static laugh skidded out from the speakers in response to your bottled anger.

“For such a strong, stealthy woman, you really let yourself slip this time.” The unknown male voice scoffed, “Pathetic.” Your head lazily flicked itself back with a smirk on your face, staring at the ceiling. The red lights barely skimmed the ceiling, faintly outlining the speakers lined vertical across it.

“A woman doesn’t let herself slip.” You scoffed, “Its a little disappointing it took you *this long* to get me at this mercy state.” Sarcasm escapes your tone, the voice chuckling in response. You kept tugging your arms outwards, though, the creaking and splitting of wood began to loosen the two arms of the chair behind you.

“Well, with you, it’s a different story.”

“Ohhh, still mad about that night, huh?” You laughed in response, “Don’t you worry, I know you’re angry with me. So sorry I had to dip like that.”

An irritable grunt came from the speakers, if you learned anything from Ada— it was the stealth and persuasive/sarcastic tone. Heading the wood crack, you chuckled under your breaths.

“I’m a little disappointed in you, as well.” His voice bellowed over the speakers, “{Y/N.}” Dragging our your name, you responded in a disgusted tone.

“And why’s that, Rac?” You chided, although getting sick of the small talk he was prolonging on. You wondered if your team was coming after you, although you should be more aware they need you on this team.

“You joined Redfield’s rambunctious team, although I offered you this more... luxurious high-end job.” He denounced, you shake your head with a prolonged, sarcastic sigh.

“I don’t join teams, love, I play solo on my missions. They needed me, I took the job for now. You sound disgustingly jealous, Rac, that’s not like you.” Reassuring his jealousy in dragged out sarcasm, you hear a sigh, then beeping across the room. Your smirk instantly fades as your head snaps forward, seeing a bright flashing red light about six feet in front of you. Groans of the undead stumble out from the sliding doors,

“You fucking..REALLY.”

“You should learn to behave yourself, {Y/N.} Or, at most, who you come into contact with.” You hear the speakers click off, staring at the undead quickly making their way to you as they notice you sitting away from them.

“At least make it interesting and get a metal chair next time, Rac.” Lifting up from the chair, breaking the two pegs off from the seat of the chair. Pressing the back part of the chair against your back, you harshly ripped your arms forward— snapping the back into two pieces.

“Okay, not what I wanted. But it works.”

The herd quickly made their way to you, god these things moved like hell-hounds. Swinging your left arm in front of them, you threw your other arm up as your melee defense against them. Puncturing the zombie’s skull with the sharpened end by your elbow, pushing yourself through the semi-big herd. You kept going, these stakes of the chair worked good as a defense from the herd biting you. Practically shoving your elbow into the nasty fucks, you found the door, the opening you gave yourself provided a brief minute to get through the door and quickly smash the button on the other side to close it. You hit the other side of the hall, catching your breath and gathering your now—new surroundings. Lifting up your right leg, you pulled out a pocket knife from your boot— flicking it open as you sliced the zip ties off of your wrists.

“Fucking zip ties.” Rubbing your wrists as you pushed yourself up away from the wall, you were in a testing—lab of some sort. White walls with black lined bottoms dividing the wall straight across, heavy duty metal doors lined down the left side from where yours stood. A glass rounded window peeked at the corner of your door, wrapping around, causing you to round the corner to see where you just were.

“Still has to find a way to see me.” You shook your head, suddenly the halls went dark, those familiar red lights lining the halls now.

Building on lock-down, staff must respond to their safety lined departure rooms.

“Of course. Never this easy for me.” The voice repeated in the background several times as you made your way down the maze like halls, the lights have the building a more eerie like tone to it. Not like seeing the, infected bodies in the glass water-casing, or in plexi-glass casing just staring at you. Seeing someone round the other corner about a foot away from you, your back quickly hit the other side from where you stood.

“And all I got is a knife.. great.” Peering the corner to check your surroundings, you feel a hand grab your upper arm. Habitual instinct, you slam your gripped arm into, who you assumed was either Rac or his men, into the wall as you swing your body and other knife-gripped hand up to the person’s neck. Using your knee to pin one of their legs to the wall, it took you a brief second to recognize who it was.

He didn’t even seem to budge or be inflicted by your response, he just stared at you.

“Well, at least you picked up on my techniques the most.”

Sighing, you released him from the wall as you backed up.

“I have my own techniques, Leon, don’t give yourself too much credit. Hm?”

Going to turn away from him to find a way out, he hands you one of his pistols. Confused, you looked back up from the pistol to look at him.

“Really? You, carrying multiple guns?” You remarked, he half smiled at you in response.

“And the sarcasm?” Taking the pistol from him, you cocked it back.

“Again, my own tone Leon. I just know your personality.” Returning the half smile, your eyes shifted back to the eerily lit hallways that spread like a maze. Leon steps in front of you, holding his pistol in front of him, gripped with both hands as he turned his head to the side as a way to talk to you from behind him.

“Stay close.”

Nodding, you two took off down the maze-like hallways as you rounded every corner skidding of your shoes against the floor as you rounded corners. You wondered if the others came along with Leon, or if it was just him alone. Either way, it wouldn’t surprise you as you turned off from the another corner—

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Seeing Leon stop dead in his tracks, you come up from his side to see a line of men blocking the way into the main hall. Guns pointed directly in our direction, you stood your ground as you held your pistol up to them glancing over at Leon.

“Any bright ideas now, genius?” You huffed, watching him side glance over to you in irritation.

“Stand behind me, we’ll move in unison.” Sighing, again you move close behind him as you shifted your pistol pointing past the right side of his neck as you started moving forward. Hearing their guns clock, you swallowed down the slight choked up fear you felt.

“Leon maybe we sh—“

Loud blasts of guns came from the other side of men, watching them drop to the ground like a line of dominoes. You threw yourself off of Leon’s back side as you stepped past him, seeing past the smoke you notice three other figures.

Claire? Ada?! Chris?!

“How in the ever-loving fuck—“ You topple over your words as they quickly approach you two with relief streamed across their faces, Ada and Claire coming to your general direction.

“{Y/N}!” Claire greeted you with a bear hug before letting go, you smiled in relief to see them both. Ada smiles faintly at you, she wasn’t much of an emotional woman but that fit well with your personality.

“I was hoping you guys were with Leon,” You breathed from the panic, Ada shook her head as she stepped forward.

“Seeing as how somebody had to go solo, the three of us stuck together.”

Looking over to see Leon finding his response, the red lights began flashing repeatedly. All of you instantly looked at one another, as if you predicted what was about to be said.

Self destruct sequence activated, all personal and staff must exit immediately.

Repeating itself in the background, loud alarms began ringing and echoing throughout the halls.

“Could’ve expected that.” Leon spoke up, all of you turned towards the direction of the main hall.

“Follow me,” Chris steps forward in front of your group, “but stay close.” One after another, again you took off into the hallway through the flashing red lights, sirens and slight panic you all felt. Leon stayed in back while Chris took the lead of you three, accepting the fact they were both protecting you, Ada and Claire from any possible threats blocking your way out. Closing in on the exit door to the roof, a large metal door quickly begins descending, then another behind you.

Chris skids to a stop, quickly ushering the three of you to get past the metal door.

“Go!”

You managed to slide past the quickly closing in metal door, then Claire and Ada quickly following behind. Watching in panic as Chris and Leon barely make it fully past the metal door as it slams to the ground— locking itself in place. Watching Chris dart to the front he ushers you all to start running up the roof door, watching him kick it down without hesitation. Stepping back as you three nearly flew up the stairs, Claire kicking down the other door.

You’re greeted with a loud helicopter-military like aircraft, heavy winds circling it as you’re forced to cover half your face with your arm. Feeling someone press on your back and assuringly pushing you towards the aircraft, you notice it’s Leon quickly pacing beside you as you all make it onto the back. Chris stepping on quickly at first with Claire and Ada following close behind,

“Let’s go! Move!” He shouted, the pilot responding as they quickly lifted the craft off the landing pad as it shot across the sky. Watching the back of the caboose close, you didn’t get to see the building itself self-combust, but for now you were alright with that.

“Next time, take one of us with you.” Leon commented to you, leaning forward off of one of the seats in the back. Ada smacks his arm in response, glaring at one another before she looks over to you.

“Don’t listen to his arrogance, you’ll catch on soon enough.” She stood up from her seat, approaching you as you stayed standing up for now.

“Besides, I see potential in you, so does Claire and Chris.”

“I never said—“ Ada points back at him, as if shushing him from where she stood.

“I didn’t ask.”

Claire laughed, smiling as she shook her head.

“Ada’s right, it takes time. Besides, when you were captured we were on our feet within seconds.”

You smile in response to their kind words, nodding at Ada as she went to go sit back down beside Leon.

“Glad to have teammates like you four.” They all faintly smile at you as the copter flew away from the scene itself, your eyes wandered to the large windows in the front as you finally catch your breath.

It’s good to be back home.