Shaman awakening

To see photos of Ecuador, click here

We left the farm to go to the Rhiannon Community in Malchingui, another ecological farm where a shaman ceremony was taking place. We got a ride with a truck almost instantly who told us about Vilcabamba, a village in the South of Ecuador where the people live very long lives, some up to 130 years old they say! The village attracts many with curiosity, to see with their own eyes these old but very healthy people wondering the streets, going about their daily lives. Many foreigners have moved to Vilcabamba in search of a healthier way of life and of course, a longer lasting life. They say it’s due to the minerals in the water that there is such longevity of life in this village.

The afternoon before the ceremony, I was unsure if I really wanted to go through with it, being put on especially for the volunteers at the farm, I felt as if it wasn’t going to be authentic. But since we had made the effort to come especially for the ceremony, I carried on with it. We were told that we needed to think of an individual intention for the night, what we wanted to work on and what we wanted to get out of the ceremony. We weren’t able to eat anything from 4pm onwards so as to not interfere with the effects of the medicine. Night finally came and after a long sleep in the massage room (the only place where there were no people!). We all congregated together in the main house waiting for the Shaman to finish preparing the ceremonial room. The two girls with their periods (me being one of them) were given special protection, being a sun ceremony and periods being from the polar opposite, there was a possibility for us to affect the ceremony in unwanted ways if we didn’t have protection. We were given four miniature red cloths to fill up with special tobacco; four cloths to correspond with the four elements and the tobacco being a product used to communicate with the gods. We attached these sachets to a red string and put this around our waists to have with us for the whole ceremony. Finally we were called through to the ceremonial room. Cushions were placed all around the border of the room for us to sit on. A small table was set up in the middle of the room with candles and also where the small fire was alight. The Shaman sat closest to the table and had a range of different items set up in front of him, including a lot of tobacco and a large plastic bottle with a strange liquid inside. Once settled with blankets wrapped around us and cushions under our bums, the Shaman proceeded to tell us about the rules of the ceremony: we can’t leave the ceremony unless we urgently need to and if we don’t come back we will be searched for; don’t ever put your back to the fire; don’t go to sleep; don’t ever cross in front of the person who is talking to the fire; The Shaman proceeded to tell us about the beliefs of his indigenous people. The Gods when leaving earth left behind two sacred elements, tobacco and alcohol. These sacred elements are vehicles to communicate with the gods, the gods being attracted to them. The highest position that a Shaman can aspire to is converting him/herself into a boa. The only Shaman who has been able to do this is the last Inca Shaman, Atahualpa, who is thought to still be roaming around as a boa. These indigenous traditions and customs have been stigmatised and Shamans have been persecuted for practicing these beliefs. The Shaman also explained to us that to heal people, Shaman’s first try and change the diet of the person and if this doesn’t work then they try herbs, and if this doesn’t work, natural medicines (such as San Pedro, Ayaguasca, Peyote, Mushrooms). San Pedro is used in ceremonies to purify us and to enable us to connect with the grand spirit and see things more clearly. Shamans believe that San Pedro, along with other medicine plants, is an ancestral teacher plant which is here to help humanity heal and awaken to its full potential. These plants are messengers of the earth calling us back into harmony with nature and union with spirit. They also believe that each plant has a spirit and a consciousness and that it’s the spirit of the plant that heals the person and not the chemical properties.

The Shaman proceeded to bless each ceremonial item, including the sacred tobacco, the large variety of incense, the alcohol that he was going to drink and the San Pedro as well as a few statues at hand. He lit up the sacred tobacco and gave it to Pablo who had been chosen to set the group intention for the ceremony: unity between all. From there he went around the room and gave the tobacco to each person while they spoke their personal intention to the fire and asking the grand spirit to accept their intention as well as agreeing with the group intention. Once everyone had gone around and said their peace, San Pedro was sent around the room, first acknowledging the fire and then drinking the not so nice tasting shot of herbs and eating a piece of chocolate afterwards to wash it down. This was followed by some singing where everyone got a chance to sing a chant that they knew as the maracas and the two sticks came around. All but the girls with their periods were allowed to do this, the reason being that their energy could interfere with the ceremony. When the singing subdued we were asked if we wanted more San Pedro and those that did were given another shot. Everyone accepted another glass. And then the singing continued. Incense was placed on the fire every so often, by the wife of the shaman at which point we needed to take the smoke and gesture it over our head and do the same to our heart. Upon the third call for more San Pedro, Pablo was asked to strip down naked and stand in front of the fire asking the grand spirit to cleanse and purify his body and spirit as a symbol for all of us. As he stood in front of the fire and the shaman instructed him to speak to the fire, he suddenly yelled out “Wachuma” (which is another name for San Pedro that the ancestors used), lifted his hands up in the air and then put his hand in the fire and grabbed a small piece of hot coal, which he quickly let go of as it burned his hand. He appeared dizzy at this point and was unable to walk properly back to his spot, tripping and trying to hold onto anything along his way. Sitting down, the shaman told him to stand back up but he was unable to by this point and started to call out the name of a person (who we learnt was the name of an ex-girlfriend of his). The shaman tried to communicate with him but Pablo wasn’t responding and appeared to be in a trance (or so it seemed from my only experience of seeing someone in a trance!), not responding to anything that the Shaman was saying. He fell out of it when the Shaman breathed a strong liquid first into his face and then all over his body and Pablo started to react and cough. He whimpered and sobbed quietly while the Shaman reassured him that he was going to be ok and the Shaman’s assistant helped him to put his clothes back on. The shaman proceeded to one after the other, breath liquid in all of our faces as part of our re-birthing process. The liquid was strong smelling and made you wake up. The Shaman started to sing again, along with his wife and the assistant, sometimes in Spanish and sometimes in their traditional language. Often they sung about mother earth, our relation with nature and the grand spirit. I slightly felt sick at this point and laid down listening to the singing. My senses were somewhat heightened and I felt cold at times and then hot wanting to leave the room and feel the fresh nightly breeze from outside. Unfortunately, the type of ceremony that it is doesn’t permit you to leave the room for the entire ceremony and so I stayed put, letting the music carry me through the journey. San Pedro acts subtly on your body. Initially you feel as if it is having no effect and then suddenly it comes upon you in a rush and just as suddenly, leaves until before you know it, it comes back to hit you.

The closing of the ceremony was the water ceremony where water is blessed and honoured and then finally passed around the room and drunk by all. It appeared to last for hours as the assistant shaman spoke and spoke as the sun rose to start the day.

The next day I felt fragile, especially from not having slept the night before. I wanted my own space but there was little of that around. People were throughout the entire house, scattered around the farm. That night I slept like a baby, everyone camping out in the ceremonial room as it was the last night for many, we all went to sleep nice and early and slept very profoundly.

Our journey to Banos was to be a long one with many rides (8 in total!). It started from Malchingui to Guayllabamba with Victor the truck driver. Back of a ute from the Y intersection to Cusuvamba which is 5 mins up the road. From Cusuvamba to Quinche with Gonzalo from Chile who works in a Social Development NGO (funny how you meet similar minds!) who told us that the environment is well protected in the new constitution (opposite to what Ximena told us) but that these changes are harder to implement than write. From Quinche to Pifo with the taxi driver and his little girl. From Pifo to Papallacta with Narsiza and Enrique who told us that the traditional dish Fanesca keeps you going all night as he explained with a flick of the elbow and a grin. From Papallacta to Baeza with Raul the engineer that works for the national petrol company who told us that the private companies who extract petrol in Ecuador now only receive 1% of the profits and 99% goes to the government, just like in Venezuela. From Baeza to Tena we rode with the Evangelists first in the back of the ute and when it started to rain they told us to get in the front with them and explained to us the difference between Evangelists and Catholics (that they only follow what the bible says (or what they interpret it to say) whereas the Catholics follow not only the bible but also the pope and its made up traditions). They told us that there are many different streams of Evangelisms just like there are many different streams of Catholicism and that they are Baptists Evangelists. They believe that you don’t have to follow one particular religion but that you need to believe in Jesus and believe that he died for your sins and that we are all sinners and therefore to be salvaged we need to have Jesus in our lives. The husband is a missionary and works with indigenous communities where they carry out social development programs especially around agricultural projects. He believed that giving out money was not the answer as a lot of organizations do and that teaching is a better approach. He believed that the indigenous spiritual traditions and rituals are full of superstitions and myths and believed that they should be converted. He asked if we believed in Jesus and we avoided the question and didn’t respond, Agustin changing the subject rapidly. At Rio Napo (Tena) Agustin asked the Grand Spirit for the next car to stop for us and amazingly, so it did, both of us with looks of astonishment and bursts of laughter. Antonio was the man who picked us up and took us to Puyo, a primary school teacher who seemed very organised and ordered in all aspects of work (especially from the appearance of his very neat car).

We passed many rivers along our way and decided that Ecuador was the country of rivers, tunnels, well maintained roads and little rubbish polluting the environment unlike many other Latin American countries. There are many pro-environment signs along the roads which obviously are having an effect on the population, or so it seems. Our last ride was in the back of a ute again, winding our way up to Banos, passing one amazing waterfall after another along our way up, as well as many tunnels that have been chiseled through mountains. Finally arriving in Banos we saw the bright white cones of the cathedral lit up in the night, shining from the main road into Banos and the cross looking over the city on top of a mount, at which point we gladly got out and thanked the ground we were standing on for finally arriving in Banos safely.

While in Banos we visited the expansive waterfalls dotted around the countryside in impressive locations, off mountains falling into valleys. The force of these waterfalls is breath taking and awe inspiring, continually flowing from the never ending springs situated in mountains. We got a ride to the waterfalls with a 1962 old beat up jeep. The guy told us a tale about a man who was going to commit suicide in a place with 12 waterfalls but instead found a huge nugget of gold – the story goes that there’s gold buried in this area as is the case in many parts of Ecuador.

Along the street in Banos you see store owners kneading a sugarcane consistency over and over again on a hook, located on a door or a wall. They sell this sugarcane in different flavoured strips, which by this point has become a sticky and chewy consistency of candy. Rico!

In between Banos and Guayacil we decided to go and check out the Devil’s nose train ride which goes through some spectacularly hairy mountain gorge, the train having to do switchbacks to ascend the steep climb. We got lucky and met someone going to Guayacil and were torn with the idea of going straight to Guayacil and missing out on the train ride. We decided to not miss the opportunity and left the ride at the turn off and went our separate way towards the train. Upon arriving at the train we were informed that it had stopped operating for the next 6 months. Disappointment washing over us, we left to go back onto the road cursing ourselves for having chosen to leave the Guayacil ride. A truck picked us up which went extremely slow and got us to Guayacil 4 hours later than what we would have arrived if we’d gone straight there. Our couch surfer for Guayacil told us that she would come and pick us up from the bus station but when we arrived and tried to call her she didn’t answer. We tried again 15 mins later and this time she told us that she was already home and didn’t want to come for us. I was absolutely shattered by this point and used all of my energy to maintain my anger. We caught a bus that took us to her house in an hour, by this point being 11pm. We realised that all the signs had been telling us not to go to Guayacil. It’s a big city with little to see and the traditional Easter with an Ecuadorian family fell through as we learnt that they weren’t going to celebrate Easter.

Cuenca was next which is where I started to get sick with a Bali belly, just in time for Easter! We stayed with a great couch surfer who was from the states but had just moved to Cuenca and was working teaching English. We had wonderful adventures around town and to little towns nearby (such as Zigzig) where Sunday markets take place and where I finally bought my dad his famous Panama hat (which in fact comes from and is made in Ecuador from a village called Montecristi). An old couple gave us a ride to the next Sunday market (our first old couple ride!), both of them adorable and sweet, the old man driving with caution but almost causing an accident in the first minute that we got in, overtaking a car and pulling in right in front of the car that he overtook, leaving no space in between them. We finally tried Fanesca, a typical dish that is only eaten at Easter that consists of 12 different grains and cod. Awesome tasting! We also tried another soup called Encebollado with onion, beans, fish and veges, also damn nice tasting!

Leaving Cuenca we had set ourselves a very long trip ahead of us aiming for Cusco in Peru, approximately 1500 kilometres away. We chose the wrong road and the wrong border crossing, adding an extra 3 or 4 hours to our trip without knowing it. The advantage was that the border crossing that we crossed didn’t have the bad reputation that the coast border crossing (Tumbes) has, which apparently is where a lot of people get mugged. One of our rides to the border gave us his opinion on the current government in Ecuador, stating that it is one of the best they have seen; caring and attending to the poor, managing the economy better, improvements in the road conditions and better salaries for government workers such as soldiers (a soldier himself, therefore benefiting from these new developments). He continued saying that people who are well off want to get rid of Correa as they are being taxed more and are having some of their privileges taken away. Another opinion on what is a hot topic in Ecuador.

We crossed over with no hassles, arriving late in the afternoon. We took a bus that took us to Chachapoyas, a big town which was my first impression of Peru; people everywhere, mud all over the streets, a chaos to work out what buses go where (there not being a main bus terminal but different bus agencies spread across the length of a few streets). We took a night bus which took us to Trujillo the next morning where we got a ride all the way to Lima (7 hours away) in a super nice luxurious car!

A trip to the equator – Ecuador

The day we were to cross the border, we had very little pesos left, hardly enough to get there. Luckily the generosity and kindness of people came through that day and without asking, a couple gave us 5000 pesos ($2.50 US) after having heard our conversation about the little money that we had left and another woman waiting at the bus station gave us 1100 pesos ($0.50 US) to pay for the mini bus to the border that we couldn't afford.

Stepping into Ecuador, we headed straight to the famous cemetery of Tulcan. A topiary garden cemetery, decorated with large trees (shrubs) shaped as animals, angels and gods, it’s an impressive and unusual cemetery, pleasant to walk around, gazing at all the wonderful tree characters populating the cemetery and adding an Alice in Wonderland feel to the place of maze like paths and wonderful tree characters.

As we travelled through the highlands near the border of Colombia, we encountered arid green-less mountains which receive very little water and have little life living in its vicinity apart from the odd village here and there. Black communities have formed here, people saying because it reminded their ancestors of their homeland, before they were bought over from Africa as slaves by the Spanish.

We aimed to get to Quito (the Capital of Ecuador), the same day that we left Colombia and encountered on the road an environmental engineer who chatted to us about the political situation in Ecuador. The current government is a socialist leaning government in line with Chavez from Venezuela. Correa, the President, has been voted in for a second period in elections that took place in 2009. Our new friend commented to us that like with any government, there has been a mixed response to its programs. He believes that there are more than half who are against the President. He mentioned that most public sector employees have been banned from joining a union and instead, associations have been put in their place but don’t have the same power as unions and don't permit workers to participate in collective barganing. Correa later on this year will call for a referendum to vote for or against his policies and programs. The engineer believed that he will loose the referendum. He also mentioned that many private companies have become public in the last year or so e.g. electricity, energy, petrol and mining companies, and that this has been good in terms of the country recuperating its resources. This means that the government can control the prices set for customers and that the state can manage the activities of the company (especially to do with environmental issues) and not necessarily choose money over people or environment.

Ecuador reminds me a little of Guatemala, maybe due to the fact that there is a large indigenous population (approx. 25%), similarly to Guatemala. The rest of the population is mestizo with a small minority been Spanish or of African descent. The indigenous people seem to be much more integrated in society here than in other countries in America. Their culture appears to be celebrated rather than condemned and is seen throughout the Capital just as much as in rural communities.

There is a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables available on the street which is extremely cheap but prepared food on the other hand, is heavily fried with a lot of meat. There’s a lot of meat available and I can safely say that it’s so far the least vege friendly country I have come across in terms of street food. There is a lot of cassava and corn as well as potatoes available and many new fruits which I have never seen before including naranjilla which is part of the tomato family but tastes sweet and is excellent as a juice.

The ancient part of Quito is a treasure, which has been recognised as such by UNESCO as a World Cultural Heritage. It has beautiful, well-kept colonial buildings, pleasant plazas, numerous churches and palaces. Cobbled lane-ways which come alive especially at the end of the week, folkloric music emitting out of almost every hole in the wall café/restaurant which invites passers by to taste the traditional food on offer, not to mention the warm alcohol called canelazo available that is made from fruit such as naranjilla.

We visited the middled of the world while in Quito, where the Northern and Southern hemispheres meet and you can have one foot in both hemispheres at the same time. An exciting feeling for some reason!

Our main aim for heading to Quito was to reach a farm that we had decided to volunteer at. The farm is located in the beautiful cloud forest of Nanegalito, a beautiful landscape of thick rainforest with a rich diversity (one of the most diverse of the planet and one of the most deforested of Ecuador, having lost near 80% of its original vegetation) of birds, plants and animals that many come to observe and admire.

We stayed at the farm for two weeks and helped out the small family of only mum and daughter on their new farm. They had exchanged the 33 hectare property for another much smaller piece of land located in Quito with an old man who couldn’t continue to take care of the large property. This occurred three years ago and they have since planted an abundance of coffee plants, some vegetables as well as reforesting the land with native flora and practicing permaculture and biodynamics. Their objective is to help conserve the area using an organic, ecological philosophy and alternative food production. The plan is to turn the farm into a meditation centre in the nearby future. They plant according to the moon, meaning that there are certain days that are perfect for planting certain flora and others when it’s not advised. They had recently started to apply biodynamics which I knew very little about before volunteering there (and am still a little confused!) but from what I understand, is a practice of agriculture that believes that nature holds a spirit and that this spirit needs to be nurtured and energised for nature to produce well.

We were given the task to make circles around the young coffee plants located on steep terraces that they had built with a lot of overgrown grass. This meant clearing all plants and grass surrounding the coffee plants to make a small circle so as to give the plant some breathing space and also enable to see the plant and not accidentally chop it in half. It took us a week to finish the circles and thank god we finished as I was getting visuals of the process every time I closed my eyes. We also sprinkled biol on the small coffee plants which is a biodynamic concoction of sugar, milk, yeast and nitrogen to give extra nourishment to the plants. After finishing making circles, we cut the long grass that was left covering the slopes using a whipper sniper, destroying everything in my way when I was let loose with the machine (including one coffee plant, doh!). We also dug holes where the coffee plants had died, with a special tool that’s damn heavy to carry around but makes the task much easier than with a shovel.

The mum (Ximena) does most of the work on her own apart from the occasional help from volunteers like us and a 75 year old man who previously owned the property many years ago and ironically, is now helping to replant what he had once deforested. The large property is situated on a heavy slope with a long and steep driveway joining the house to the dirt road. Forest scatters around the house with creeks and small waterfalls within the vicinity. The place is tranquillity at its maximum with the nearest neighbours one kilometre away and the main road quite a few kilometres away, all you can hear are birds and the sound of the rain in the afternoon, during the rainy season.

Ximena is a very serene, admirable woman with a lot of gung-ho and is a large source of knowledge upon many different topics. She is a vet that uses homeopathy to treat animals and is self-taught in biodynamics, ayurvedic medicine, plumbing, woodwork and electricity amongst many other things. A she-woman!

From Ximena, we learnt that the government is wanting to transfer to a mining based economy (being a socialist based government who needs funds to support its programs) and is currently searching for resources to excavate. They have a law in place which states that the bottom soil of any property belongs to the government therefore giving them the right to take any property if they see fit. This means that there is little room for conservation of the environment. Farmers, we were told, receive very little support from the government and aren’t acknowledged for the work that they contribute to the nation. They are exploited by many, especially supermarkets who dictate how much they will buy their produce for. If supermarkets don’t sell all of the produce, they send back the leftovers to the farmers and demand money in return. If they have two for one special’s they expect farmers to fork out the costs instead of the supermarket. The prices at which customers buy goods is not represented in the price that the farmer receives for their produce. For example, Nestle buys milk from farmers at 27 cents a litre and then goes on to sell if for $1.30.

While at the farm, we learnt how to make yoghurt and butter and I realised how simple it was to make these food items that I love! We also made bread and granola, making as much as possible to combat the little food stock that we had to eat on most days. This was partially due to the simple manner in which Ximena eats, adhering to ayurvedic methods of eating according to constitution type, she added little spice or salt to her food and didn’t eat certain things such as onion or garlic which I crave!

We were left alone for several days to look after the farm and the animals started causing a ruckus on the first day! We took in the sheep before the rain and a couple of hours later, none were left in the shed where we had herded them to. We started to worry, imagining having to trek all night over the mountains to try and track them down. Luckily we found them happily munching away in the paddock next door, looking sheepishly at us as we came to herd them back. They put up little fight to be guided back to the shed but we did notice that there were an extra two that had appeared out of nowhere. They also went with the flock, as sheep do. Once inside the shed Agus tried his skills at being a cowboy, making a loop out of a rope and trying to catch the two odd sheep so as to send them back into the wilderness. After a few goes, it worked. Sheep snuggly locked inside, we were still three llamas and two donkeys short. A few minutes later, two llamas came wondering through the gate on their own accord, as if back from school or from a hard day of work in the fields. A little later the remaining llama, who thinks she’s a donkey, returned as well as the two donkeys. Sadly, chickling, a spritely and energetic chick who continuously followed us around the house, sometimes annoyingly, died on us from the cold, after a very cold night in the tool shed.

We visited Mindo on our day off, a village nearby which is known for its beautiful wildlife including waterfalls, butterflies, hummingbirds and orchids. We visited a butterfly, orchid and hummingbird reserve and were reminded of the amazing process of transformation that a butterfly undertakes. Amazing! But the most beautiful part was seeing transparent butterflies which my dad had told me about and that I had been wanting to see since.

Ximena invited us to a meditation session and managed to explain the integration of meditation, biodynamics and ayurvedic medicine. The meditation that she led held the objective for us to be conscious of ourselves; our breathing, our body, how we feel, our thoughts, etc. She explained that biodynamics is the process of putting receivers in the earth to help connect with the cosmic energy which feeds nature. She explained that we receive this energy through the earth and feed it back to the cosmos (through meditation for example). Meditating once in the morning and once at night is taking time out from the day to calm down the mental noise and have some peace, she explained. In biodynamics, she continued, it is believed that each planet relates to specific plants and holds particular characteristics – the colours are significant and indicate what planets they relate to as well as the type of roots they have and the life span they hold e.g. Yellow flowers relates to Jupiter; Long roots also relates to Jupiter, a short life span of 30 or so days relates to the moon, green relates to the moon.