By Cira Pascual Marquina and Chris Gilbert – Oct 26, 2026For generations, the Warao people have made their lives along the caños (waterways) of the Orinoco Delta in eastern Venezuela. Near the ocean, the Orinoco divides into a maze of channels that have been the setting of a distinct way of life centered on the curiara, a dugout canoe crafted from a single trunk. These waters are also a site of resistance to colonialism and capitalist modernity: a world of stories, spiritual practices, and shared life. The Warao call themselves “canoe people”—a name derived from wa (canoe) and arao (people). In contrast, they refer to outsiders as hotarao, meaning “people of the dry land.”Janokosebe—“many houses” in Warao—was built in the mid-2000s on the outskirts of Tucupita, the capital of Delta Amacuro state, for Warao families displaced from the caños. Ecological destruction had eroded the conditions that sustained life in parts of the Delta, livelihoods were vanishing, and food, healthcare, and schooling were hard to come by; for many, the move was a matter of survival. Some six hundred people now live in Janokosebe, in individual homes, with little land to cultivate. The community sits on the river, but its life is less tied to the waterways than that of communities deeper in the Delta. It belongs to the Mariscal Antonio José Sucre Commune, which brings together twenty-one communal councils, Warao and hotarao alike.In this two-part testimonial account, part of the Communal Resistance Series, residents of Janokosebe speak about the world they left behind, the work of rebuilding collective life, and the effort to maintain Warao culture in the city. Their experiences raise a larger question: how does a people sustain its collective life when the material conditions that once supported it have changed, and can communal self-government help make it possible?From the Caños to JanokosebeLife in the Delta’s changing waterways rested on the knowledge of generations. Over decades, some Warao moved to Tucupita to flee ecological devastation or reach conventional schooling and healthcare.Life before JanokosebeLoannis Delgado: We respect the water as we respect the forest and the mountain, because they give us life. For us, everything spiritual has an owner; what was created was made for all of us, not for a few. Before entering a mountain or cutting a plant or a tree, we have to ask permission from our father, Kanobo, the God of everyone. Kanobo is very sacred to us. When we make offerings to him, we perform sacred dances, such as the Nahanamo, and we bring yuruma, a traditional food made from the starch of the moriche palm. Kanobo teaches us not to destroy what belongs to everyone.One of our origin stories tells how our ancestors lived in the clouds and found the Earth below through an opening made by an arrow. A young archer, known as Jara Yakera, or “Good Arm,” shot an arrow at a bird. It struck the clouds and tore open a gap. He pulled out the arrow and looked through the opening. Below, he saw winding waterways, forests, trees, and life in abundance. Our ancestors liked what they saw and decided to come down to Earth, where they found fruit, plenty of water, fish, and land to cultivate.Jesús González: The life of our people in the caños has always rested on agriculture and fishing. My father, my whole family, my grandparents—all of them worked planting corn and ocumo [taro]. That was our work.Before we came to Janokosebe, we had only an axe and a machete, but the earth was generous, and we harvested plenty of corn. The caños gave us fish as well.The curiara was essential to our lives in the waterways. Each family made its own. We chose a tree and hollowed out its trunk, shaping a boat that could carry us through the waterways. With our curiaras we traveled between communities, went fishing, reached our plots, and brought back what we needed. To know how to make and handle a curiara was to know how to live in the Delta.We still know how to build curiaras, and they remain vital to us—even if life in Janokosebe has changed. We live along the river, but we also sit beside the main road, so we no longer rely solely on the waterways the way folks deeper in the caños do.Loannis Delgado: We have our own culture, stories, myths, and legends. I told you about Kanobo, but there is also Tida Navarao, the mother of the water. We can fish in her waters, swim, drink, and travel on them, but we must protect and respect them.We must ensure that future generations keep our beliefs and traditions alive.The making of JanokosebeHouses of the Janokosebe community. Photo: Cira Pascual Marquina and Chris Gilbert.Domitilo Silva: The name Janokosebe joins two Warao words: janoko, house, and sebe, many. The first inhabitants came from the Indigenous community of Yakariyene. I was a little boy at the time, so my parents were the ones who told me about the Warao who first settled here and the hardships they faced. I think it was in the early 2000s, shortly after Chávez came to power.Loannis Delgado: In 1965, the closure of Caño Mánamo drastically altered the western Delta and violently upended the lives of some of our ancestors in the caños. Saltwater moved in, the fish died, many Warao died, and others were displaced. That intervention didn’t only damage the ecosystem and uproot people; it destroyed the way of life of many Warao.The effects unfolded over decades. Some people moved closer to the city then; others came later, looking for medical care, schooling, or work, or because it had become too hard to stay in the caños.Jesús González: My family comes from Hanamana de Araguao, not from the western Delta where that catastrophe took place. We cultivated a large plot and harvested plenty of corn. We worked with Granos Selectos San Félix, planting and selling what we produced. But eventually the company closed, and we had no way to sell our harvest. How were we going to work? There was no wholesaler left to buy from us.Domitilo Silva: Things were getting harder in the caños, too, with new illnesses encroaching on our territory. We lost our outboard motors, there was no gasoline, and everything had to be brought in from town. There wasn’t even medicine. Where could we go if someone got sick?I was born in the municipality of Antonio Díaz, a journey of at least two days by curiara. I came to Tucupita to study because the caños had no high school, only primary school. My parents stayed back home, and I lived with my aunt. It was difficult. Later, I earned a degree in administration.Jesús González: We Warao used to live in the caños in large communal houses. When the displacement began, the big house in Tucupita where people coming from the caños could stay began to fill up, and people struggled to find housing. Chávez listened and promoted the construction of homes for our people.Janokosebe was built between 2004 and 2006.Rebuilding collective lifeThe Warao habit of deciding things together did not end with the move to the city. In Janokosebe, the communal council has taken root, with women playing a leading role.Yalitza González: I am a communal spokesperson, and in the communal council I’m part of the Women’s Committee. What is the role of women here? Everything. We are warriors: we do most of the work in our communal council, and we lead as well.Loannis Delgado: This community is very organized. Whenever there is news to share or a project to carry out, we meet and work together, as earlier generations did. Among the Warao, this was the case long before Chávez, but he rekindled some of these practices. Sometimes we have problems, but we solve them together. Sometimes that way takes longer, but the good of the community always comes first.Women are very active here. On October 12, the Day of Indigenous Resistance, we organize the women to perform dances that belong to Warao culture and tradition. Women also come whenever community meetings are called. We kept active during the worst of the blockade and afterward, whenever we were needed. That is how we have held the community together through everything.Rural Communes Strengthen Venezuela’s Push for Food Self-RelianceDomitilo Silva: In our communal council, there are 22 committees. Each committee has two spokespeople, which makes 44 in total. There are committees for health, education, water, gas, telecommunications, older people, women, youth, sports, the economy, and finance, among others.Yalitza González: When there is a meeting, we call the spokesperson responsible for the area concerned, whether it is sport, handicrafts, or services. Some people participate more than others, but the organization brings people together around the work that needs doing.Keeping the Warao way of life aliveUse of the Warao language, along with traditional weaving and games, continues in the urban context.Warao people in a boat on the Orinoco. Photo: Cira Pascual Marquina and Chris Gilbert.Language and cultural transmissionLoannis Delgado: My grandmother taught me to weave. She made hammocks from moriche palm fiber, and she told me stories about our ancestors, their lives, and our myths. She spoke only Warao.Today I also work with bora, a plant that grows along the margins of the river here in Janokosebe. We collect it, dry it, and prepare it for weaving. I make hats, bags, sandals, visors, necklaces, and earrings, all of it within the Warao tradition. Moriche fiber is hard to harvest around here, so most people here buy it when they need it. My grandmother and my aunt know how to harvest it themselves, but I haven’t learned yet.We must teach our children and the younger generations to keep our culture alive: our spirituality, our dances, our ways of weaving, and, above all, our language. If these practices die, our people will die with them.Jesús González: The children in our school learn to write in both Spanish and Warao, but many children born here in town no longer speak the language at home. They understand when you speak to them in Warao, but they answer in Spanish. This worries us a great deal. That’s why we have sabios [wise people] who teach the Warao language here. I am one of them, and we are working hard to keep our language from disappearing.Yalitza González: I’m also a teacher at the school. Because it’s an Indigenous school, we try to teach much of the curriculum in Warao, so that the children don’t lose their language and culture.Domitilo Silva: I work at a language institute created to preserve Warao language and culture. We don’t want to lose our grandparents’ and great-grandparents’ language. We have to preserve our dances, songs, and traditional clothing, too. Some Warao are now embarrassed to wear the batola [traditional dress]. If we lose our language and our culture, we will be uprooted as a people.Houses and landLoannis Delgado: In the caños, we lived in traditional Warao houses, open and thatched, where extended families lived together. We built them together beside the caño because the water was at the center of our lives.Here in Janokosebe, the government built conventional houses for the families who arrived from the caños. Now we live in single-family houses, but we are still near the river, and it remains central to our lives, even though our houses and routines have changed.The conuco [subsistence plot] is also part of Warao life. We plant a variety of fruit and vegetables, especially ocumo. At the school here, the children and teachers tend a conuco beside the building, as part of their education.Sport, celebration, and sharingFranklin Migueles: I work as a sports coach, mainly in volleyball and indoor football. We also organize Indigenous games, especially javelin throwing, log racing, guatura, and log cutting. We need to keep practicing these sports, and to remember that they are part of Warao tradition. We should play them every week in our community, so that we do not lose them.In guatura, you fill a mapire, a basket, with five or six kilos of yuca, strap it on, and run. Whoever finishes in the shortest time wins.Yalitza González: When there is a sporting event, the people responsible for sports organize activities for the athletes, the young people, and the children, from the age of five up. We want the children to be strong so that Warao athletes can be recognized in other states and abroad as well.Wildemar Silva: The Indigenous games are held every year to preserve our traditions. They include javelin throwing, log racing, jumping rope, tug-of-war, and Indigenous wrestling. Wrestling used to be a tradition, too.For us Warao, these games are always a celebration. The whole community comes together, and everyone brings a little food: yuca, ocumo, fish, whatever they have. We put it all together and share it after the games. In Warao, we call this ori wara: sharing as a family or as a community. (Monthly Review)