Yemaya resides in a blue and white soup toureen painted with large flowers.

Yemaya is summoned at the seashore with a gourd rattle. She always has a fan made of duck feathers.
Her fetish is surrounded by a sun, a full moon, an anchor, a life preserver, a boat, seven oars, seven silver rings, a key, a siren (which she holds in her open arms),and a star. All of these objects are made out of silver or white base metal like lead. Her altar is decorated with nets, sea shells, sea horses, starfish and anything to do with the sea.

An agbegbe, a peacock or duck feather fan decorated with mother of pearl and cowries shells. A horsetail whisk with blue and white beads. A bell is rung when her worshippers call.

White or crystal and blue. The collar is made up of seven crystal beads followed by seven blue beads. Then, a crystal bead alternates with a blue bead seven times. The sequence is repeated until the desired length is obtained

Yemaya wears an embroidered crepe mantle. She waves her agbegbe. Her dress is navy blue and has blue and white streamers, with little tinkling bell sewn all over it. A wide cloth belt with a rhomboid stomacher goes around her waist.

Sacrificial Animals: Lamb, ducks, roosters, turtles goats. Fish and pigeons.
Sacrificial Foods:
Banana chips and pork cracklings washed down with chequete. Black-eyed peas. All her food should be liberally spread with sugar cane molasses. Yemaya's favorite fruit is the watermelon. Her water is seawater.

When Yemaya "comes down", she breaks out in loud peals of laughter. Her body moves like the waves of the ocean, first gently, then agitated as if by a storm. She proceeds to turn like a waterspout. She may mime swimming and diving into the ocean and bringing up treasures for her "children". She also mimes rowing. The other dancers circle around her. They make wavelike movements that grow faster and faster until they begin to twirl.

Chango first saw the light of day thanks to Obatala (in a female aspect). However, Obatala soon became indignant with her son's pranks and threw him out of her house. Yemaya took pity on the young Orisha and raised Chango as if he were her own child.

Chango grew up and left home to find his fortune. Chango forgot the details of his upbringing. He had no past. He wandered the world without roots and without goals. Many years passed and many women crossed his path. He had many amorous adventures. So many, that he forgot, in time, Yemaya's face.

Time passed. Chango kept chasing women, fighting and going to parties. It was at one of these parties where Chango met Yemaya again. He was drumming and singing. The people were dancing. When he looked up, he saw Yemaya.

He immediately felt a very strong attraction towards her. His heart opened and he felt an intense tenderness wash over him. He did not remember feeling like that before, so, he confused it with passion and sexual attraction. He was wrong. What he felt was the love of a son for his mother, his second mother, the woman who had brought him up.

He stopped playing the drums, stood up and sidled up to Yemaya.

"Have I met you somewhere before?" he asked.

Yemaya turned her back on him for an answer.

"We could go off and be alone," said Chango. "Just you and I."

His lips brushed her shoulder. She shrugged him off.

Yemaya knew the dissolute life that Chango had been leading. She knew he was a drinker, a brawler and a womanizer. When he attempted to seduce her, his own mother, she decided to teach him a lesson.

"I'm going to teach him respect for women," she said to herself. "I'm also going to teach him a little humility." She turned to Chango. "What did you have in mind?"

Chango jumped at the opening. "Let's go to your house and keep this party going. But, more privately." He did not want to go to his house, since his wives would not exactly approve of a conquest under their own roof.

"Why, I think that's a wonderful idea," purred Yemaya, leading him on. "Come with me."

She walked through the crowd. Chango was close behind.

"What an easy conquest," he said to himself. " What a virile man am I."

They walked through the sleeping town until they came to the seashore. Yemaya went to a small boat tied to a rock. She got in the boat.

"Please undo the lines," she told Chango.

"But, where is your house?" asked Chango. "I thought that you wanted to have a little party."

"My house is over there," said Yemaya, pointing towards the dark line of the horizon. "Come with me."

She stretched out her hand to Chango, who gingerly climbed into the boat. He was rapidly losing his enthusiasm for this romantic adventure. He was afraid of boats and did not like the water because he could not swim. But, it was too late to change his mind. He would appear frightened. He was, but he would admit it to any man, let alone a woman.

Chango tightened his grip on the gunwale as the little boat bobbed over the breakers and headed out to sea. The farther out they went, the more nervous Chango became. The little boat was out of sight of land.

"That's enough," said Chango.

"Isn't the sky lovely?" said Yemaya.

"I said, that's enough," growled Chango, striking the oars from her hands. "Who are you who has the strength to send this boat flying over the waves?"

Yemaya did not answer. She sat in the boat calmly, her hands crossed on her lap.

"Who are you who can live out in the middle of the ocean?" demanded Chango.

Instead of answering him, Yemaya dove over the side and swam straight down to the bottom of the sea.

Chango was petrified. He had no idea how to handle a boat. He didn't know what to do. Clumsily, he picked up an oar, but got it tangled in the lines coiled in the bottom of the boat.

While Chango struggled, Yemaya sent a gigantic wave towards him. It was a wave taller than a mountain. When he saw the wave coming, Chango dropped the oars and covered his head with his hands.

"I can triumph over men," he muttered, curled up in the bottom of the boat. "I can triumph over women. But I can't triumph over this wave." He took a peek over the side. A blue wall of water was bearing down upon him. He tried to make himself small. He tried to make himself disappear.

The giant wave came crashing down on him. It washed him off the boat and sent him tumbling and bubbling to the bottom of the sea. It was quiet and blue. Chango was afraid.

He fought his way back to the surface and felt immensely grateful to Olodumare when he was able to pull in a lung full of air. The boat was floating right next to him. He scrambled into it. He did not sink and drown.

Yemaya came gliding on the waves, her feet barely touching the water.

"I think you are going to have to save me," said Chango through chattering teeth.

"I will save you upon one condition." said Yemaya. "Name your condition."

"You must respect your mother," said Yemaya.

"My mother!" blustered Chango. "My mother abandoned me when I was a baby."

At that instant, Obatala, Chango's mother, who had been magically aware of the lesson being given to her son by Yemaya, appeared in the boat.

"You have to respect Yemaya," said Obatala. "She is your mother."

"You are my mother," he yelled. "You abandoned me when I was a child. You kicked me out of your house."

"I brought you into the world," said Obatala. "But it was up to another to bring you up."

"You forget women too easily, Chango," said Yemaya. "You have hated your mother, but you have forgotten your second mother."

"You have forgotten that she is your mother, as well as I," said Obatala. "I brought you into this world and she raised you."

"You have two mothers, Chango." said Yemaya. "you have two mothers in a world where many people have none."

A stiff breeze sprang up and washed Chango clean of the hatred he had carried for many years.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry I hated you, Obatala. I'm sorry I forgot you, Yemaya." He sighed. "It is indeed wonderful to have two mothers."

From that time on, he began to respect women more. But, he is still a womanizer.

Notes:

Yemaya is the Orisha that controls all the seas and the oceans and all the creatures that live in them.

She is considered the mother of all human beings.

When Yemaya comes down and possess someone, she endows him or her with all her grace and very spicy personality. She will immediately call for a long gown tightly belted at the waist and for her fan. She dances with movements that are like the movement of the waves. When the drums heat up, she dances like waves in a hurricane.

She is full of love and tenderness, as befits the mother of all mankind.

Santeria, A Practical Guide to Afro-Caribbean Magic.
By Luis M. Nuñez
Copyright (c) 1989 by Luis M. Nunez
All Rights Reserved
Copyright (c) 1992 by Spring Publications, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
ISBN 0-88214-349-2(pb)
Luis M. Nunez
P.O. Box 750228
New Orleans, LA 70175
e-mail: lmn02@gnofn.org