Post by Okwes on Feb 28, 2007 16:07:40 GMT -5
Edge of the Rez: A Philly Husband, a Navajo Wife
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6677263
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6677263>
[Frank and Fena Armao] Enlarge Shannon Rhoades, NPR Frank and Fena
Armao live in Winslow, Ariz., a town of about 10,000 that borders the
Navajo reservation. [Downtown Winslow, Ariz.] Enlarge Dan Lutzick
Downtown Winslow. Historic Route 66 runs through the center of town.
A Hotel Defies the Odds
"Nobody believed [La Posada Hotel] could be saved," says Allan Affeldt,
who came to Winslow, Ariz., with his wife, Tina Mion, to do just that.
It seemed improbable that a first-class hotel could thrive in a border
town whose streets were chockablock with so-called "drunk bars,"
catering to American Indians who drove in from liquor-free reservations.
Affeldt and Mion did succeed in restoring the 1929 hotel, which was
built for the Santa Fe Railroad. As the mayor of Winslow, Affeldt now
tackles the issue of alcoholism by citing bars for violating liquor
license terms and by pushing for a detox center.
* Hear Winslow Mayor Allan Affeldt
[Allan Affeldt, the mayor of Winslow, and Tina Mion] Enlarge Dan
Lutzick Hotel saviors: Winslow mayor Allan Affeldt, his wife, artist,
Tina Mion, and her dog, Needles, on the grounds of La Posada. [La
Posada Hotel] Enlarge Dan Lutzick Shuttered from 1957 to 1997, La
Posada Hotel is now back in the business of pampering guests. "No
one really thought you could have a first-class hotel in a little border
town like this."Allan Affeldt NPR.org <http://www.npr.org/> ,
December 27, 2006 � In "Edge of the Rez," member station KNAU
<http://www.knau.org/> probes American Indian identity. The series
profiles American Indians and non-Indians who live in northern Arizona
communities that border the Navajo and Hopi reservations. Frank Armao
remembers the night before he began working as a doctor in Winslow,
Ariz., a reservation border town that sits on historic Route 66. He
"checked into some seedy hotel ... with sand blowing under the door."
Armaso, who grew up in Philadelphia, came to Winslow as part of a U.S.
Public Health Service scholarship after medical school. He had hoped to
land a job on a Navajo reservation, but this was a close as he could
get. Thirty years later, he's still in Winslow. He married a Navajo
woman in 1985. Frank's wife, Fena, was born on the nearby Navajo
reservation and moved to Winslow when she was 6 years old because her
mother wanted her to attend school there. "I was fortunate enough to
have a great teacher," Fena Armao says. "She was real patient with me
and taught me English." Frank met Fena playing bastetball during his
first year in town. "She was a very good basketball player," he says.
"I was not." Together, Frank and Fena have learned to negotiate the
complicated cultural terrain of a border town. The day after their first
child was born, Armao came to the clinic where his wife was
recuperating. "She was basically sleeping there, but she had rubbed
meconium, the baby's first stool � into her face." Armao thought
that his wife had contracted some strange, blotchy disease. But she was
only performing a Navajo custom. His wife believed that putting the
first "poop of the baby" on her face would eliminate discoloration that
can occur on the skin of a new mother. "When I seemed a little
quizzical," says Frank Armao, "she reminded me that all through her
pregnancy, she would come into our place and we would send her down to
the restroom to urinate in a cup � I think that's kind of a paradigm
for the whole process of cultures trying to learn from each other and
accept some of our idiosyncrasies, if you will." The three Armaos
children have grown up in Winslow, where half of the student population
is American Indian, mostly Navajo. While the children definitely view
themselves as Navajo, says Frank, he regrets that they don't participate
more in tribal customs and traditions. Fena says that members of her
generation, who grew up on the reservation, often deal with an inner tug
of war "because we all have the memory of the Long Walk." She made the
decision to spare her children the internal struggle that comes from
living in two worlds.
www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6677263
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6677263>
[Frank and Fena Armao] Enlarge Shannon Rhoades, NPR Frank and Fena
Armao live in Winslow, Ariz., a town of about 10,000 that borders the
Navajo reservation. [Downtown Winslow, Ariz.] Enlarge Dan Lutzick
Downtown Winslow. Historic Route 66 runs through the center of town.
A Hotel Defies the Odds
"Nobody believed [La Posada Hotel] could be saved," says Allan Affeldt,
who came to Winslow, Ariz., with his wife, Tina Mion, to do just that.
It seemed improbable that a first-class hotel could thrive in a border
town whose streets were chockablock with so-called "drunk bars,"
catering to American Indians who drove in from liquor-free reservations.
Affeldt and Mion did succeed in restoring the 1929 hotel, which was
built for the Santa Fe Railroad. As the mayor of Winslow, Affeldt now
tackles the issue of alcoholism by citing bars for violating liquor
license terms and by pushing for a detox center.
* Hear Winslow Mayor Allan Affeldt
[Allan Affeldt, the mayor of Winslow, and Tina Mion] Enlarge Dan
Lutzick Hotel saviors: Winslow mayor Allan Affeldt, his wife, artist,
Tina Mion, and her dog, Needles, on the grounds of La Posada. [La
Posada Hotel] Enlarge Dan Lutzick Shuttered from 1957 to 1997, La
Posada Hotel is now back in the business of pampering guests. "No
one really thought you could have a first-class hotel in a little border
town like this."Allan Affeldt NPR.org <http://www.npr.org/> ,
December 27, 2006 � In "Edge of the Rez," member station KNAU
<http://www.knau.org/> probes American Indian identity. The series
profiles American Indians and non-Indians who live in northern Arizona
communities that border the Navajo and Hopi reservations. Frank Armao
remembers the night before he began working as a doctor in Winslow,
Ariz., a reservation border town that sits on historic Route 66. He
"checked into some seedy hotel ... with sand blowing under the door."
Armaso, who grew up in Philadelphia, came to Winslow as part of a U.S.
Public Health Service scholarship after medical school. He had hoped to
land a job on a Navajo reservation, but this was a close as he could
get. Thirty years later, he's still in Winslow. He married a Navajo
woman in 1985. Frank's wife, Fena, was born on the nearby Navajo
reservation and moved to Winslow when she was 6 years old because her
mother wanted her to attend school there. "I was fortunate enough to
have a great teacher," Fena Armao says. "She was real patient with me
and taught me English." Frank met Fena playing bastetball during his
first year in town. "She was a very good basketball player," he says.
"I was not." Together, Frank and Fena have learned to negotiate the
complicated cultural terrain of a border town. The day after their first
child was born, Armao came to the clinic where his wife was
recuperating. "She was basically sleeping there, but she had rubbed
meconium, the baby's first stool � into her face." Armao thought
that his wife had contracted some strange, blotchy disease. But she was
only performing a Navajo custom. His wife believed that putting the
first "poop of the baby" on her face would eliminate discoloration that
can occur on the skin of a new mother. "When I seemed a little
quizzical," says Frank Armao, "she reminded me that all through her
pregnancy, she would come into our place and we would send her down to
the restroom to urinate in a cup � I think that's kind of a paradigm
for the whole process of cultures trying to learn from each other and
accept some of our idiosyncrasies, if you will." The three Armaos
children have grown up in Winslow, where half of the student population
is American Indian, mostly Navajo. While the children definitely view
themselves as Navajo, says Frank, he regrets that they don't participate
more in tribal customs and traditions. Fena says that members of her
generation, who grew up on the reservation, often deal with an inner tug
of war "because we all have the memory of the Long Walk." She made the
decision to spare her children the internal struggle that comes from
living in two worlds.