IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 3 ENGLISH | Page 97

weapon, similar to the matembe of the Congos,
with a wide blade. There are kitchen knives, made
of stainless steel and with superior strength. Worn
out on a stone, their teeth are dull. The cutter was
the old fishing knife. The shears, which used to
be saw blade. It could be folded, its blade hidden
like a razor; a real steel piranha, with three rows
of teeth; a blend of shark and crocodile jaws.
These three things together: those three animals
together in one tool.
They say that a Congo duel consisted of both guys
getting into a 55-gallon drum with one hand tied
behind their backs and a knife in the other.
And over there, in the area of Camagüey, the
peasants in the bush try their hand at competitions
that consist in seeing who can slice more guava
bars with a machete.
There is something behind all this. The Spanish
colonial government prohibited the transit of salaried slaves with their tools in their shoulder bags,
the Haitian paké cong man was irreplaceable as a
worker. Because the lord of all iron is Oggún
Arere, who also governs Saint Lazarus’s crutches.
The criollo imagination has designed the most incredible weapons both for work (according to
how they’re used and the efficiency it requires)

and defending one’s self or attacking. From the
bone, the cattle bone in a museum, to wooden letter openers.
The brigades of choppers who are charged with
trimming the roadsides have created a doubleedged machete. They work by fully swinging
their arms over the grass. And this is not with the
typical, let’s say, syncopated, interrupted swinging used in clearing, as we usually see with this
kind of tool.
Sculptors in deepest Africa have designed just
one tool for everything. They are stars in a steel
sea, or disorderly, Victorinox Swiss Army knives,
or who knows what shape their edges, points and
diverse blades take. The fauna and nature, and
work, awaken and contain—reflect the most intense and strangest form of communion in violence.
In a film about gypsies a guy sticks his shaving
razor in a credit card, and uses it to slit someone’s
throat. And in a Cuban prison, a razor blade broken up in teeny pieces and put into a bar of soap
is offered as a gift.

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