Consultations and Services

Our Cabula provides readings and services regularly for the public:
• General Consultations for any purpose ($100)
• Consultation to Determine Exu & Pombagira ($121)
• In-Depth Consultation for the Year Ahead ($321)
• Services: making offerings to Ancestors, Exu, & Pombagira on behalf of someone (prices vary)
• Workings for love, money, road opening, cleansing, health, retribution, and more… (prices vary)
• Tutelage (Quimbanda coaching one-on-one) ($100/hr)

To schedule a consultation, please use our online scheduling portal.
For services, workings, and tutelage, please email first.

In addition to these readings and services, we often have charms, incenses, baths, and guias (beaded necklaces) related to Quimbanda available through The Pact.

On Divination

Divination through consecrated oracles such as shells, bones, or other items as well as direct incorporation by our spirits, guide the everyday actions and rituals of the Quimbandeiro. Each lineage of Quimbanda may utilize different forms of jogo de buzios, a game of shells, which may vary in number from a handfull of consecrated shells to several dozen. Within Kimbanda Kongo, divination is performed through Vititi Ngombo,–sortilege–or more properly, the Vititi Mensu Fua, the oracle of bones. Yet the importance of divination is not just the means. It reinforces our connection to our spirits, and serves to provide advice and warnings that we might guide our lives better and avoid setback where possible. Divination is active participation in the world rather than passivity. A good consultation continues to unfold well after the session has ended. We use the language of matter to move through the world of spirit–ku pemba–and through the consultation, use the language of spirit to in turn work through the world of matter–ku nseke. It keeps our rituals and our days reified with spirit, avoiding stagnancy and complacency. This is not a prophecy spoken long ago, but guidance from the mouths of every-day prophets who are in communion with their spirits and renew, revivify, and this revolutionary language:

Pertence a Freire a ideia de que, antes que se possa ler a palavra, cada um de nós aprende a ler o mundo. Como ele mesmo diz: a humanidade leu o mundo ao longo de milênios e, só desenvolveu a linguagem. Assim também, somente alguns séculos depois de desenvolver a linguagem, desenvolveu-se a escrita. Esse marco - a invenção da escrita - já serviu para distinguir os povos civilizados dos povos bárbaros, justificando todo tipo de horror colonial. Ora, é a civilização que tem nos levado ao fim do nosso mundo. Quem dera pudéssemos reaprender a ser selvagens. Nesse sentido, entendo o papel fundamental das nossas comunidades como bolsões dessa selvageria radical que, conectando-se, produzirão as fissuras necessárias a por fim de vez ao projeto colonial.

Somos caudatários de tradições orais e compreendemos a espiritualidade como mais uma forma de linguagem. Assim, o oráculo é a escrita radical de nossa selvageria. Um bom oraculista deve, antes de aprender a ler os signos dessa forma escrita, desenvolver a capacidade de ler também o mundo através dos sentidos (não só dos olhos) de toda sua ancestralidade: sua ancestralidade sanguínea, sua ancestralidade herdada e toda a ancestralidade da sua terra.

por Tata N’ganga Mukunji, Athos Guizzardi, de Cabula Cassange

Freire is the author of the idea that, before we can read the word, each of us learns to read the world. As he himself says: humanity read the world over millennia and only then developed language. Likewise, only a few centuries after developing language did writing develop. This milestone - the invention of writing - has already served to distinguish civilized peoples from barbarians, justifying all types of colonial horror. Now, it is civilization that has led us to the end of our world. If only we could relearn how to be savages. In this sense, I understand the fundamental role of our communities as pockets of this radical savagery that, by connecting, will produce the necessary fissures to put an end to the colonial project once and for all.

We are followers of oral traditions and understand spirituality as yet another form of language. Thus, the oracle is the radical writing of our savagery. A good oracle must, before learning to read the signs in this written form, develop the ability to also read the world through the senses (not just the eyes) of all his ancestry: his blood ancestry, his inherited ancestry and all the ancestry of his land.

written by Tata N’ganga Mukunji, Athos Guizzardi, of Cabula Cassange

We may bring all things to the oracle: daily issues we need perspective on; large life matters we are planning for in business, travel, or rites of passage; and tradition-specific queries regarding a path in Quimbanda, or the particular Exus and Pomba Giras that may walk with a person. Part of our oracles is the mention of advise as well as remedy. If a problem is identified, then we endeavor to proscribe and prescribe to alleviate the problem or lessen its impact. If blessings are predicted, we seek to strengthen our connection and receptivity to those blessings. If we come with a desired outcome, the oracle can recommend the best course of action to secure the desired result, and workings are thus tailored through not only the repertoire of tradition and innovation by the Quimbandeiro, but confirmed and guided by the very spirits by whose força we might secure our desires.

Consultation Types

Consultations may be performed for a number of reasons, but they are indeed the start of any road in Quimbanda, whether it be advice, a working, or empowerments and training. Some of the varieties of Quimbanda consultations (consultas) we offer:

• General Consultation: This is a divination session in consultation with Exu, Pombagira, and the Ancestors and may take up to 45 minutes. All things begin with divination, and all workings and spells are prescribed through divination. The first part of the reading will be in dialog with the Ancestors and Spirits that come forward in the reading, and then the client is encouraged to ask questions and bring issues to the oracle. These may be everyday concerns or a specific query or worry. These types of readings do not bind one to Quimbanda, but instead are seeking the advice of our spirits in answer to common needs and concerns. There is no commitment to follow up or practice Quimbanda, and courses of action and possible remediations may be recommended. The Temple can perform all functions related to the reading that might come up, on your behalf. An audio recording of the reading will be provided within 5-7 business days.

• Consultation to Determine Exu & Pombagira: This is a consultation with Exu and Pombagira to determine one's path in Quimbanda, including confirming the identities of one's personal Exu and Pombagira, and may take up to an hour. An audio recording of the reading is provided within 5-7 business days as well as a brief written report with further information. This is often a first reading in Quimbanda, and is meant for those specifically seeking a path in the tradition, as well as the specific advice and information that may arise from open communication with Exu and Pombagira.

• Consultation for the Year Ahead: This is a longer consultation with Exu and Pombagira to examine the specific advices of each of the Seven Kingdoms, as well as the Dead and the general advices of Exu and Pombagira for a specified passing of time, often a year-at-a glance. Certain prescriptions and proscription might be advised, certain spirits flagged as beneficial to cultivate awareness of, etc.

To book any of these consultations, please schedule one through our online scheduling portal.

Services and Tutelage

• Services and Workings: We are happy to provide workings (“spell work”) in love, money, road opening, cleansing, health, retribution, and more. The client is usually asked to sit for a reading and the spirits consulted to see what’s possible and what might be negotiated to draw the maximum efficacy with the contracted spirits. Workings require a general reading first, and then the working is tailored from the information in that reading and specifics set after. Honoring spirits in thanksgiving or offerings in gratitude yearly are also things we provide through the Temple. Such specificities are best discussed over email and then designed according to your indiviudal needs and means. We provide documentation of all offerings made, and all workings performed, especially if done remotely.

• Tutelage: If you’d like mentoring one on one with Quimbanda, whether its help with recipes, pontos cantados or pontos riscados, more in depth knowledge about an Exu or Pombagira, we provide individual mentorship in addition to our public classes for those not a part of the Temple. If this is of interest, please contact tata.apokan@gmail.com and mention your specific areas of interest and we’ll continue the discussion.

Exu and Pombagira always have the Final Say

For the Quimbandeiro it is our spirits that animate and empower our work, mitigated by and interpreted through our vision and training. Because of this engagement and contract, Exu and Pombagira have final say in all workings and readings. They are also to be shown gratitude and deference when it comes to their advice. If what they say benefits you, it is normal to reward that spirit. Sometimes such reverence comes in the form of offerings or donations to the Temple or Spirit on behalf of a person, sometimes that is about fulfilling a promise to show up in person and make an offering or consider initiation. Central to our practice is the cultivation of agency–it is ultimately each person’s choice to follow up, or not.