I recently watched an old 1985 movie called "The Mission",
starring Jeremy Irons and Robert De Niro. It's one of those beautifully
written theatrical gems that have been lost to time, which is
unfortunate because it's a movie that covers a significant historical
event that itself has sadly been lost to time. Set in 18th century South
America, it dramatizes the Guarani War, an uprising of indigenous
Amazonian natives with the aid of Jesuit missionaries against their
destruction by Portuguese/Spanish forces. Of course, the ending was
nothing short of predictable - another heart-breaking climax where
basically everyone dies. But the final scene of the film captured an
image of a handful of surviving native children riding off in a canoe
down the river, the last survivors of an ancient people,
slowly disappearing into the rainforest.
To say the movie was "touching" would be somewhat of an
understatement. Rather, it sparked a whole series of colorful memories
worth preserving, memories of my own experience as a child in the
rainforest. If an image of me running around naked with body paint
through the jungle came to mind, that isn't exactly what I meant... but
you're getting there.
It was June of 1998, I was 10 years old, and my family was embarking
on another annual foreign excursion. The target locations were India and
Nepal, and our backpacks were all decked out for a Himalayan adventure
that, should things go according to plan, would culminate near the base
of Everest/Lhotse. To say the least, things definitely didn't go
according to plan and, sparing you from a complicated blur of details, I
eventually found myself several weeks later on a rickety local bus
making its way to the southern jungle outpost town of Puerto Ayacucho on
the Venezuelan-Colombian border. I'm sure things have drastically
changed over the past 16 years, but from what I recall, Puerto Ayacucho to me
was the end of the known earth. It was a quiet and dusty little
town, with a central square where a medley of indigenous people (in
varying degrees of nakedness) would come to trade and sell goods - home
cooked foods, exotic produce, live animals, woven baskets, bone and seed
jewelry, furs and feathers, machetes and rifles - like a living scene from the
colonial exploration era.
Our arrival in this town, where we were the only foreigners as far as
we knew, was completely unscripted. We ended up staying with a local
man in his home/office on the edge of town. I remember him being an
educated, middle-age Venezuelan man who was exceptionally courteous and
highly passionate about his country. His place was filled with
topographic maps and photos of the Amazon, expedition notes and
documents, and indigenous artifacts hanging from the walls gathering
dust. At the time, I wasn't quite sure what exactly it was that he did,
but now in retrospect, I believe he was some combination of a rainforest
conservationist and a recently turned eco-excursion operator - back in a
time when taking trips out into the Amazon for people other than
researchers or risk-takers was just starting up. Spending time with
him was completely inspiring to me as a child, as he told me of the
wonders of the rainforest and its people, as if it were a hidden Eden.
By the end of the second day, I was practically begging my parents to
take me into the jungle. Naturally, my mother was the most hesitant, but
after a few hours of convincing (father) and whining (myself), she agreed.
The entire next day was spent organizing a dinky motorboat, food,
supplies, a translator, and other necessities for a 5 day journey into
one of the remotest locations on the planet. It was determined that the
group would consist of my family, along with a Mestizo boat commander, a
Spanish-English translator, and an Indian guide of the Piaroa tribe.
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| The Piaroa guide |
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| The Venezuelan translator |
Setting off from the village of Samariapo, we made our way down the
winding river further and further from any traces of civilization. The
river initially was wide, but by the afternoon of the first day had
become narrow enough for only two-way traffic. The Orinoco eventually
branched to the point where we were miraculously navigating through a
labyrinth of rivers and waterways, surrounded by dense jungle on either
side. Every twist and turn yielded the same exact scene - a tangled web of lianas and hovering canopies. The frightening
thought of how to return home should our Indian guide be separated from
us didn't even cross my mind, which was too engaged with the
breathtaking primordial landscape that lay before me. High volcanic
plateaus rose from the sea of trees, covered in lush vegetation with an
evanescent mist, from which towering waterfalls both trickled and
plummeted. Playful monkeys could be seen prancing from branches and
vines, colorful birds with fluttering plumage soared above the
motorboat, and a symphony of frogs and insects resonated through the
air. A lunch of bread, dried fish wrapped in banana leaves, and fresh vegetables was spent at the
bottom of a series of shallow rapids, where the water was only
knee-high, refreshingly cool, and crystal clear. While every moment of
that first day was as exciting as it was incredible, the true highlight
of the day was encountering the people who called this place home.
Standing in long canoes carved from entire tree trunks, men from a more
remote tribe made their way past our boat. We kept our glances minimal while theirs stared back piercingly, the entire image filling my mind like an animated NatGeo photograph. They
were completely nude with the exception of trace designs in black wavy
brush strokes on their smooth brown skin. Short in stature, their bodies
were thin but showed signs of great physical strength, their hair jet
black and bowl-shaped. They looked fierce with sharp eyes, their
bows and quivers strung over their shoulders and with arms rowing in near
perfect synchrony. It was a brief encounter that almost seemed to pass
in slow motion, a documentary that came to life. I'm still unsure as to
what tribe they were from, but my best guess would be
Yanomami, based solely from their appearance. Before nightfall, we
arrived at the village of our Indian guide, a small cluster of mud and
thatch huts for around 15 family members. Typical of the Piaroa, as well
as many other Amazonian tribes, they lived in small family groups in
small clearings throughout the jungle. The village was right off of a
small river and secluded, virtually invisible until one rowed around the
bend and closer to it. Most of the family, shy and suspicious, quietly
avoided us for the first several days with the exception of the
children, whose curiosity eventually spawned into enthusiasm over the
“outsiders”. They followed us everywhere throughout the village in
search of playful attention. The oldest boy was the same age as me, and
despite initial timidity, we eventually became “buddies”. His Indian
name has long since escaped my child memory, but I was told by our
translator to refer to him as Eduardo.
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| Navigating by motorboat along the tributaries of the Orinoco, along the Venezuelan-Colombian border |
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| Plunging deeper into the savage Amazonas region |
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| Entrance to the village, tucked away off a small river |
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| Inside a Piaroa hut, with characteristic hammock and woven manioc strainers |
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| Some of the native children I played with |
As a “buddy”, Eduardo showed me the Amazon in a way that no other
could possibly relate to. It was an experience that I have somewhat
taken for granted until now, when I have finally realized just how
unique and truly valuable the encounter was. This wasn’t some leisurely dime-a-dozen tour. Rather, it
was a cultural crossover adventure seen through the eyes of two 10-year-old kids from
completely opposite ways of life. And while we had no other means of
communication apart from simple hand gestures and smiles, Eduardo shared
things in a way that seemed to make language obsolete. He first
introduced me to his younger siblings and cousins, who ran throughout
the forest semi-nude and barefoot, with protruding stomachs as a result
of malnutrition. But even in light of what I perceived to be the
harshness of life, they smiled and laughed at the simplest pleasures.
The highlight of every play date was a trip through a dense jungle trail
behind the village to a hidden lagoon where we swam and splashed around
to escape the heat. A network of tree roots appropriately served as our
natural “jungle gym”. Another exciting way to spend the afternoon was
to watch the women dig up manioc roots and grind them into shreds before
placement into a tipiti, a woven palm basket strainer (somewhat reminiscent of a
life-size Chinese finger-trap). When the ends were tugged, the strainer would constrict, squeezing the manioc shreds within and releasing its toxic juices (which
I would later read contains high amounts of natural cyanide). The flour from this root was
eventually used to make the tortilla-like flat bread spoon to eat the
savory fish and root stew that our guide graciously made over the fire.
Nights around the fire were calm and peaceful, with a thousand stars
above and the sounds of bullfrogs and crickets chirping away into a
tropical lullaby. With no concept of time, we eventually retired to our
hut after the fire died down. Our hut was completely empty with the
exception of three hammocks woven from palm fiber and complimentary
nylon mosquito nets. I completely understood the need for nets, as I struggled not to scratch open the thousands of bites that pockmarked my body, often leaving enormous welts on my arms and legs. Asking Eduardo why no one slept directly on the
ground, he took an oil lamp and illuminated a trail of massive red leaf-cutter ants on the dirt floor. He then proceeded to pinch himself
all over and playfully scream.
One day, we set out on an expedition to Autanatepui, the sacred
pinnacle-like mountain that, according to the Piaroa, was once the Tree
of Life that had been chopped down by the demon spirit. Indeed, this
massive cliff sprung thousands of feet straight up towards the heavens
from the relatively flat rainforest around it, it’s top perfectly flat
like the stump of a megalithic stone tree trunk. Around the back was
another small mountain they called Waharitepui, whose sheer rock facade
bared traces of a natural human-like face dubbed to be the demon spirit.
Riding in hollowed canoes, we made our way towards Waharitepui to climb
to its peak. Being June, it was wet season in the rainforest and the
water had risen to high levels, flooding trees and making it harder to
get to higher land. Reaching higher ground meant traveling deeper into
the jungle through the trees, away from the would-be river shoreline;
the deeper inland, the denser the foliage. It often came to the point
where the trees were so thick, that everyone would be forced to get
out into waist-deep water and shove the canoe through the
tangled branches and leaves. With every shake of the trees, hundreds of
hand-size tarantulas, in all of their vivacious colors and varying
levels of hairiness, would rain down into the canoe and upon us, some of
them landing with a rather heavy thud or splash. Watching a gargantuan spider slowly crawling up our translator's back, I could do nothing but confine myself to the narrow canoe in a hyperventilating horror. Even heaven has its nightmares,
which for me took the form of the astounding array of multicolored, over-sized arachnids and arthropods unlike anything I’d ever experienced prior.
For my mother, it was another menace. Upon getting into the water, my
mother felt it necessary to inquire about the snake situation. Word was
passed in English to our translator, who passed the word along in
Spanish to our Indian guide. This was then followed by a somewhat
lengthy and unsettling conversation in the Indian language, before
returning to Spanish, in which the word “anaconda” was thrown around a
few times. Returning to English, the response was simple and literal: don’t worry
about it.
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| Approaching the sacred mountain of Autanatepui (4003 ft) from the river |
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| Pushing the canoe through tarantula-infested trees |
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| View of Waharitepui and the entire rainforest from a nearby hill |
The hike up Waharitepui was a way of getting in touch with the
rainforest up close and personally. Pushing through thick leaves, we
trekked up along a tiny trail in the dark shadows beneath the tree
cover, occasionally wading through pools of water whose bottoms could
not be seen. Bizarre insects and foot-long centipedes crisscrossed the
jungle floor. In an effort to not completely panic, I decided to focus
my gaze upwards where my eyes were met by a polychromatic palate of
orchids and other exquisite epiphytes and fungi attached to moss covered
trunks. The strangest flowers and pods blossomed, along with plants
whose leaves formed natural cups of water that in themselves formed
miniature ecosystems. The truly spectacular find of that afternoon was a
series of neon colored frogs, whose bright yellow, blue, and red tones
echoed a package of colored highlighters from your local office supply
store. But their beauty was only for the eyes; we were told that
touching them guaranteed death, literally in a matter of seconds.
Eduardo would later show me the blow gun darts that they gently poke the
frog with to release its neurotoxins, prior to hunting for monkeys.
Halfway up the mountain, our guide thought it would be fun to “take a
ride” and relieve our feet. Questioning what he meant, he reached upward
for a thick, cable-like vine whose origins vanished into the canopy
above. We had reached a portion of the trail that contained a prominent
edge, a drop of about 12 feet. "
Vamos! Take a swing!". The idea of the
vine snapping and me falling into a dense blur of vegetation, likely
filled with tarantulas and poisonous critters, was initially hard to overcome. But when I eventually did, it proved to be more riveting than any theme park
ride I can remember. It was a long and wide glide, giving me plenty of
time to burst out laughing as I conjured up images of Tarzan swinging in
the Congo. I think I even added an appropriate “
ahheeaahheeahh!!” somewhere in that
duration. The climax of the hike was the summit of Waharitepui, which
gave us nearly 360 degrees of an unobstructed Amazonian panorama.
Hundreds of miles of rainforest could be seen, like a massive green
carpet laced with snaking rivers. It was a remarkable sight to behold,
as we sat on the rocks above, drenched in sweat and filled with
accomplishment. To think that we could be so happy and at peace, away
from “civilized” society and material burdens, the stresses of work and
school, and the trivial frills of life. It was a place nearly void of
people, but simultaneously overflowing with life. Maybe it was teeming
with life as a result of being void of people. Even as a 10 year-old, I
couldn’t help but ponder the sight before me, how it was one of the last
places on the planet that hadn’t been raped by mankind, how thousands
of years had passed and, should it survive to see another millennium, it
would still remain unmoved, unchanged, and timeless. It was then that
we were told it was time to head back to the village before it got too
late.
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| One of many vibrant orchids |
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| One of many colorful, poisonous tree frogs |
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| A massive termite mound in the tree |
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| Alien-like vegetation in the world's most diverse ecosystem |
Our time at the village continued peacefully, with more waterfall
swims, neighboring village visits, basket fishing, dugout canoe races with the
children, and amazing free-range dinners by the fire. Eduardo continued
to fascinate me through jungle walks, where he showed me plants with
antiseptic properties and the magical “bubble tree”, whose stems when
broken in the right spot could generate soap bubbles with a simple blow.
But despite the timelessness of the village life, my family knew it was
destined to return to the world outside, the “other” jungle. Leaving
the Piaroa tribe was a heartbreaking moment for me. I had learned much
about their culture and survival in the rainforest, far more than I can
express in this entry. As a people, they impressed me with their
generosity, serenity, and egalitarian mentality. They had nothing except
the forest around them, but offered it as if it somehow equally
belonged to us as well. What many would consider to be a hostile
environment was suddenly starting to seem more like a home to me. And
leaving home was downright hard. I said (more like cried) farewell to
the villagers and gave a final hug to Eduardo. I knew I would never see
him again.
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| Pushing through the dense jungle during the wet season |
We embarked on our journey back to the civilized world. But the Amazon
wasn’t finished with us just yet. Little did we know that it would send us home with
a quite a story to tell. We had already floated several miles from the
village when suddenly the motor in our boat decided to die. Our boat
commander fidgeted with it for a while before tying and pulling the
starter chord to get it running again. We continued several more miles
further before it started smoking and died yet again. Being near another
Indian village, we stopped for lunch on the shore and ate while our
commander opened up the motor in an effort to fix it. We had no modern
tools except for my father’s Swiss Army knife. Desperation ultimately
called for desperate measures; working together throughout the afternoon, my father, the
commander, and our translator slowly dismantled the entire engine and tried
reassembling it - using only the knife. Hours passed painfully
slow. I kept myself entertained in a variety of ways, from collecting
colorful butterflies on wet sponge to catching baby piranhas with a reed mat. My
mother spent most of her time desperately trying to find an ideal bathroom spot unoccupied by giant
iguanas. An old woman had passed by with a basket suspended from her
head. An old man had also set out in a canoe with a machete and rifle. Time
passed. The old woman eventually returned with the basket filled with manioc
roots. The old man also returned, empty handed, as it was not a good day for monkey nor
jaguar hunting. As the late afternoon approached, we began to grow weary and
worried. Somehow, the motor started up again and we immediately set
off away from the village. Time passed as we cruised through the river
network, the sun fading as the skies grew overcast with thick clouds.
Every direction looked identical and with every turn of the river bend,
we began to ponder just how far we had actually ventured away from
civilization. Then, at the worst possible moment, the motor died. And I mean completely dead. Almost
perfectly on cue, like that infamous line from scenes on the verge of
disaster (“it could be worse…”), we were struck with a fierce downpour. They
call it the rainforest for a reason, as we quickly learned from the
buckets of water that fell upon us, drowning our boat as it slowly
floated down the river. With only two oars, the translator and the
commander began to quickly row while our Indian guide navigated. My
parents rushed to cover the little remaining food and the backpacks. I
tried to scoop water with a small bucket out of the boat at a futile rate. The situation was
bad, as we even ended up losing one of the two oars
during the initial fiasco. To add to my personal horror, the tarantulas and other critters that had so successfully been hidden in the boat gradually began to emerge as a result of the gradual flooding. It was pouring and getting very dark, and
there was no nearby village. A frantic conversation in Spanish arose
among our guide, commander, and translator, which didn’t do much in
pacifying the stormy ambiance. And so we aimlessly floated on the open
river, thunder grumbling.
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| Watching a native wash and prepare shredded manioc while the men worked on the boat engine |
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| Taking another jungle stroll |
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| Off to hunt monkeys with a rifle and machete |
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| Me fishing for baby piranhas while the commander tries to fix the engine |
Hours passed and it was pitch dark. We had virtually no food left and our
flashlights were running low from extended use. I was somewhat
apprehensive, but primarily tired from a physically draining day. As a
naïve child, I felt that as long as my parents were around and in good
spirits everything would work out just fine. But after thinking in
retrospect, I now realize that my parents themselves were genuinely
terrified. What if we never made it back? There was no one in the world
that knew where we were, and that secretly troubled them. They would
later tell me how they imagined the headlines – a family of three
ventures into the forest and never returns. It was a dreadful idea until
our Indian guide peered out into the sheer darkness as if it were day
and exclaimed. Apparently, we were very near to the village of a
neighboring tribe. We rowed into the marshes but were told to conceal ourselves in
the boat, as it was typical that the tribe was highly distrustful of outsiders. It
was extremely dark and we couldn’t see any trace of a village, but our
Indian guide and boat commander walked off into the gloom of the jungle.
Nearly an hour had passed and they had not returned, leaving us sitting
in the canoe in relative silence with the exception of the sounds made
by hundreds of invisible creatures. My mother experienced it
the worse, given that it was her time of the month and she lacked the
necessary sanitary implements; my father ended up having to cut our only remaining shammy. Exhausted, hungry, and drenched, we didn’t
want to wait any longer. Yet none of us had the guts to float off into
the darkness without our guide, either. We were essentially
trapped. Thankfully, the two eventually returned and with amazing news.
The village just happened to have a single carved canoe that was
recently outfitted with a motor. It apparently took heavy persuasion,
but the village chief agreed to lend us the canoe. Our hunger and
exhaustion was instantly overcome with silent rejoicing as we quickly
piled our backpacks and equipment into the nearby canoe and set off
before the chief could change its mind. The journey home was peculiarly
pleasant and to some degree even romantic, as we cruised down the river
in blackness, the only lights in existence being the sea of stars above
and fireflies bouncing off the river’s surface. Our guide sat at the
front of the canoe, using his innate “night vision” to steer us clear of
invisible logs and to pull us out of the maze of rivers back to the
Orinoco proper. Seeing the dim electric lights on the Samariapo dock
generated a rush of relief, the lights at the end of a thick, overgrown
tunnel. And there, standing on the dock was the dark silhouette of man,
his arms crossed and stance unmoving. It was the eco-operator from
Puerto Ayacucho, his face stern and showing signs of intense anxiety. As
our boat approached, he gave out a sigh of intense liberation and
rushed down the dock to tie the boat down and bring us out. He had
already contacted the regional authorities, who had feared the
possibility of our being taken hostage by the group of Colombian rebels
across the river border, and police were on the verge of being
dispatched. But in the end, he was truly ecstatic to see us return
safely. Despite being past midnight, he insisted on buying us dinner at a
local cerveceria on the river’s shore.
My time in the rainforest, albeit brief, was truly one of the most
significant episodes from my childhood. It covered every range of the
emotional spectrum, truly leaving a permanent mark in my repertoire of life experiences. It opened
my eyes to the staggering natural beauty of our earth, a priceless
environment that is in danger of being destroyed forever. It also
introduced me to the customs of fascinating indigenous peoples, rich cultures
that are in danger of being wiped out alongside their habitat. But ultimately, it
redefined for me the importance of life, teaching me not only to love
life when times are good, but to appreciate it and be grateful for it
when things are not faring well... or just positively perilous.
