‘She has let go of the past’: dance eases the trauma for Peru’s Shining Path survivors

An Asháninka friend uses achiote, a local berry, to paint Luzmila Chiricente’s face, before the performance of Buenas Noticias. Photograph: Dan Collyns/The Guardian

With a hand on the shoulder of the woman in front of her, Yolanda Rivera Charete begins to sway gently. She sings “Tsame tsinane, ashintsitanakebe” (Come on women, let’s go forward with strength) in Asháninka, the language of her tribe.

Dressed in a kushma, a long clay-brown tunic, face patterned red from achiote seeds – the source of annatto colouring – Rivera Charete, 63, and 15 others, dance to remember and to show their missing loved ones what has been happening in their lives.