Tratado sobre la No Proliferación de Armas Nucleares

In this and in the next two chapters I am going to deal with shamanic initiation. In this chapter I will consider the condi- tions that must be fulfilled in order to become a vegetalista, the diet and sexual segregation. I am also going to discuss the concept of plant-teachers, and to present general information about ayahuasca and about some of the plants that are conside- red plant-teachers. In chapter 4 I will deal with the spirit world of the vegetalistas, and in chapter 5 with the transmis- sion of shamanic power in the form of magic chants or melodies, and magic phlegm.

Although culturally vegetalistas have a very strong influence of Amazonian cosmology, and the prescriptions they follow in order to become vegetalistas conform closely to those found among some Indian tribes of the upper Amazon, they do not iden- tify themselves nor their ancestors with any specific tribal group. There is no concrete community or social group backing and supporting their initiation, nor is there any public ritual in which they are officially recognized as vegetalistas. Their initiation is a matter of personal choice or individual voca- tion. It seems that there is a gradual recognition on the part of the community -and on the part of the vegetalista himself- that he is endowed with shamanic powers.

In the end of the preceding chapter I mentioned some of the circumstances in which some of my informants took ayahuasca for the first time. Both Don José Coral and Don Celso Rojas did it in order to find a cure for an illness they had. In the case of Don José, it was a magical illness, a magic dart shot by an evil practitioner. Don Celso did it to cure himself of a bad infection in his leg, which the doctors wanted to amputate. These examples correspond to a certain pattern apparently com- mon in the Amazon, of how one becomes a vegetalista. One gets a terrible illness. The Western doctors are not able to cure it. The person either goes to an experienced vegetalista, or takes

ayahuasca by himself and gets cured. In the process of being

cured the person acquires certain powers and becomes a healer. I have heard stories nearly identical with those of Don José and Don Celso from the mouths of several vegetalistas. A simi- lar story is presented by Regan (1983:2:20): A man had an in-

fection in his ear. In the hospital they gave him injections and tablets without any effect. The doctor said that he had to remove his ear. He went to a vegetalista, who gave him ayahuas-

ca, catahua and lupuna colorada (all plant-teachers). He fol-

lowed a diet for a certain time. In his visions he saw the per- son responsible for his illness. He was cured, and at the same time learnt how to heal others.

3.1.1. Don Emilio's account.

The following is an abbreviated account of how Don Emilio began to take ayahuasca, and how he gradually began to practise. This information was gathered during several interviews. Don Emilio is an eager narrator and story-teller. Instead of interrupting him all the time in order to get precise information on the questions I had prepared, I let him talk. This was often rewar- ding. Many interesting details about his socio-economic cir- cumstances emerged in his free narration, which in turn have helped me to understand the particulars I was primarily inte- rested in.

"I had a neighbour whose name was Juan Hidalgo Nina. He was a corporal of the security guard. He suffered badly from asthma. Not even in Lima could the doctors cure him. He only got "calmantes" (analgesics), and was getting worse all the time. But then his sister, Eloisa Rios, told him to ask for two or three months of leave in order to visit a vegetalista called José Benavides Sánchez, who lived somewhere down the ri- ver. In fact he got leave, bought all that he would need -rice, soup, kerosene, salt, tobacco and other things-, hired a canoe, and left. I went with him on his second visit to that man. I was fourteen and worked building palma houses and gathering wood for construction work. I earned 15 soles a month.

One afternoon, at about half past four, I saw se- veral people arriving from the bank of the Amazon river. I asked Esteban, a nephew of the patient: "What are those people going to do?" "Hush!. They are going to take ayahuasca", he said. "Don't they get tired sitting there for hours with so many mos- quitos buzzing around them?", I asked. "They are used to it. Besides, they don't feel any discomfort, because it is as if they were watching a film", he said. "And what about this ayahuasca", I asked. "It is a little bitter, like beer", he said.

Two or three times they gathered to take ayahuas-

ca. I watched everything without uttering a word.

Among these people there was an old woman called Ve- neranda Vásquez. She knew very much, not only about

ayahuasca but about other plants as well. She had

followed the diet prescribed. One night she asked me: "Emilio, when you were living in Iquitos, didn't you ever go to the cinema?" "Yes, I did", I answered.

"It is just the same thing. Besides, you will cure your body. And if you want to see your father or mo- ther or girlfriend, you can see them in mareación (in your visions)".

I approached the circle formed by the people. In the center was the ayahuasca pot. The maestros asked me whether I was going to take the purga. "Yes", I said. "The woman here has invited me." "Very good. Take your chance. You won't have to pay anything. If you take this brew and follow a diet, you w i l l cleanse your tubería (intestines), and you will learn many a thing.", they said. I received a little bowl with the brew and gulped it down. I waited about ten minutes. Then Don Juan Nina asked me: "Are you ma-

reado" "No, I don't see anything", I said. I drank

another bowl of the concoction, and ten minutes later yet another. I did not see anything. Meanwhile the others were singing or throwing up. One of those pre- sent, Don Salvador, an old man, said: "Do you want to know why this young man does not see anything?". "Why?", asked Dona Veneranda Vásquez. "It is because his stomach is very dirty: it is full of the essence of all sorts of species, like garlic, and pepper, and also of pork and other things. Only by following the diet will he be able to see something."

The first three times I took ayahuasca I did not see anything, but I continued being on a diet. The fourth time I saw something. That made me believe that it was indeed true what they said. The fifth time I took the brew I really had a vision. I saw luxurious cars, huge boats, helicopters, airplanes, trains and people of all kinds. I liked it. But in the beginning I felt that my face was turned back- wards. I felt that all my body had changed. I wanted to scream. But the maestro told me to remain silent: "It is worse if you scream", he said. Then he took his cachimbo (a large pipe), told me to lie down, and blew smoke over me. He then sucked the pit of my sto- mach three times, and again blew smoke over me. Then I calmed down. I saw an old woman coming to sing near me. At times she waved a handkerchief. She told me: "You have to listen carefully, my son. This is an

icaro. You can heal with it. You have to follow a

diet: You must not eat pork, sweets, salt, pepper. And you must not sleep with a woman. Ayahuasca likes you. You are going to learn from it."

Don Emilio told me that he stayed in that place for four months, following the diet. It was during this time that he learned his icaros or magic melodies. In other interviews Don Emilio affirms that he followed the diet for three years. He told me that in the beginning he very seldom treated patients. Only after he settled down in Quistococha, and because people insisted that he was an effective healer, did he decide to de- dicate two days a week to his patients.

I have been reconstructing Don Emilio's autobiography, and there is no room, really, for three consecutive years in total isolation, which he considers the ideal length of time to become a good vegetalista. I think that a factor that has to be taken into account is that my informants are not always presen- ting me with their own experiences. I have a distinct feeling that some of the episodes they told me happened to them, do not, in fact, correspond to personal experiences. They rather correspond to ideal models that are implicit in the cosmology of that cultural area, a body of knowledge that is tacitly ac- cepted as plausible, and which is repeated again and again.

This is also reflected in their stories. In a collection of tales about the Quichua-speaking communities of the Napo river, edited by Mercier (1979), I found several of the stories Don José Coral had told me had happened to him or to somebody he knew personally. Vegetalistas are often great story tellers. I later understood that references to neighbours or to "a woman or a man I met in such and such a place" are simply narrative

devices probably used in the entire cultural area9.

3.1.2. Don Josefs account

When I questioned Don José about how he became a vegetalista,