Written on June 21st 2008:
Dearest beautiful human beings and syncopators of cosmic amazement,
Happy solstice! I have been gone for over a month, so I think it is a good time to send some news. I have come to Peru learn about the Yanesha people who live in the Andean Amazon; their language and culture are currently in the process of disappearing. I am writing my thesis on the topic of their sacred songs, which are woven into their mythological and geographical landscape like musical topography. (I have decided to take a break from my obsession with the ancient Indo-European world for the moment). I am working in collaboration with an organization named El Instituto del Bien Comun that deals with cultural and environmental conservation in the Amazon (it's a long story to explain how I got here! but suffice to say it was a combination of wanting to learn more about Peru, doing research on dying languages for courses at school, a couple of strokes of luck and a fascination for the Amazon, the Lungs of the World).
The IBC is an amazing organisation protecting Amazonian rights.
http://www.ibcperu.org/
I thank Richard Chase Smith for allowing me to work with him on his project.
For more details on the project that I just became involved in, check out: http://www.ibcperu.org/index.
Peru is in the process of intense change and economic development; the last time I came here to visit my family in Lima was five years ago, and I barely recognize some of the streets now, they have changed so much. In between trips to jungle, on the other side of the Andes, I have been spending my time in Lima working at the institute, organizing the archives of Yanesha songs.
LIMA
This crowded city of seven million is a crammed nervous system of hyperactive highways, where pulses of diesel buses and taxis fume in dirty, interlocking grids, in an endless ebb and flow. The bus companies are in constant competition for passengers, and they cut each other off and wreak havoc in the lanes as they pull towards the curbs, merrily shoving people on and off their packed vehicles, yelling out street names and destinations, trying to entice people to get onboard. In the fleeting moments where traffic stops, brave street-children weave between buses selling large bags of popcorn that they balance on their shoulders like fluffy extra heads. As the onslaught of vehicles comes towards them again, the children carefully climb onto curbs, avoiding the crush of the maniacal cars. Getting around this city is a frightening adventure.
I have been staying at my aunt's house, located right near an amazing traditional market where Andean ladies come to sell their hundreds of different types of corn and potatoes everyday. However, a giant new superstore has been constructed two blocks away, now dominating the landscape of this neighborhood with its garish lights and leaping designs. And an ugly new two-story restaurant, marketing ancient Peruvian dishes in a fast-food type of way, clings tightly to the outer shell of the superstore with its grotesque neon claws. The restaurant's emblem is a huge, illuminated cartoon of a happy rooster in a traditional Andean outfit.
I ventured inside the superstore to buys some insect repellent. Inside, young Peruvian salesgirls wait for customers every five paces, in every aisle. One of them sprays me with the product she is trying to sell; "Señorita, try this full-body perfume product, it is made in Peru and it is perfect for any time of day." Another takes my hands and rubs gooey lotion on them. "Señorita, try this new cream, made from the purest of Peruvian avocadoes, milk and honey and it is guaranteed to make you resplendent and healthy." I exit quickly, sneezing and buttery. I dislike superstores with a passion, and I was trying to figure out if this one was less bad because all the products seem to come from Peru... There is the economic progress of the country for you. Like Wal-mart on Peruvian cocaine?Right outside the superstore, just to give you an idea of how surrealistic Lima can be, there are many poor vendors in small carts selling fried yucca, fried potatoes, fried guinea pigs on sticks, fried beef hearts on sticks, purple corn pudding and quinoa drinks. People exit the superstore walking past them, carrying wide-screen TVs, jumbo packs of toilet paper and new gaudy ornaments for their kitchens.
Getting out of Lima is definitely the key, but with the traffic it takes at least 2 hours to exit the city. With my family, I took some weekend trips to different ruins near Lima, including Caral, an astonishing 5000-year-old temple complex in the desert. With help from the institute I am working with, I also got a chance to spend a week in Oxapampa, in the Andean Amazon, and finally meet people of the Yanesha tribe that I have been reading so much about.
OXAPAMPA
A bit of context. Oxapampa is in a type of region called Ceja de Selva (the Eyebrow of the Jungle... better known as the Unibrow of the Jungle?) which is on the eastern foothills of the Andes, but covered in lush tropical growth. From Lima, one must cross over the Andes and into the jungle regions on the other side. The town of Oxapampa was actually founded by several hundred Austrian settlers in the mid 1800's, and the people who live there today are blond-haired descendants of Austrians, mestizos of Spanish and native descent from other parts of Peru, Quechua-speaking people from the Andes as well as native tribal people from the surrounding jungle. The resulting mix of people is quite amazing, with small blond kids playing soccer in the streets, screaming in German, and tribespeople selling plates of yummy pituka jungle roots, speaking a mix of Spanish and Quechua with some native Yanesha and Asheninka words thrown in. The town of Oxapampa is surrounding by gorgeous green mountains, and the river that runs through the town is still clear enough to drink from it.
The Yanesha reserve is located about an hour's bike ride from the town. A breath-taking ride on small unpaved roads lined by eucalyptus trees, and alternating thick patches of forest and wide expansive fields. The Yanesha live on small farms (called chacras) on the sides of the mountains. I went to visit most of the homes in the native community and people were all super welcoming. They were surprised I came alone on a bike, and that I am 25 and have no children. They would ask a lot of questions about Canada, and mention a Canadian woman that had visited the area 6 years before, studying the magical plants you can find there.
The first Yanesha family I met was the Espiritus, and Celia Espiritu showed me all around her little farm. She grows at least thirty different kinds of plants and trees each one is more beautiful than the next. Avocado trees, grenadilla trees, mandarins, pineapple? not to mention all these rare species of Amazonian orchids - different kinds of lady slippers - that I am sure some biologists and gardeners in Canada would freak out over. There they were, in full glory, and Celia says, in her Yanesha-accented Spanish, "Oh yes, these are my orchids, nice, no?" I was dumb-founded at their size and texture and insane colors. From what I could tell, the diversity of the farm seems to mimic the biodiversity of the surrounding forest so that the soil does not get depleted too quickly. They let lots of weeds and old stumps stay in the farm, to keep the soil moist, so it looks a little chaotic, but actually the farm is organized and sustainable for quite a number of years, until they slash and burn it, according to the traditional way of farming in the Amazon.
Celia's husband, Paco Espiritu, took me to many places in the valley that are also part of the native reserve. We went through many tall grasses and saw amazing wildlife, and he explained to me how the Yanesha go hunting with bow and arrows and go fishing with spears. The hunters watch for the signs and traces of certain animals. For example, one species of bird can always be heard singing, or spotted in a tree, right before the arrival of a certain mammal in the underbrush. The different species of animals often travel together, Paco said, and if the bird detects the presence of a hunter, it will alert the mammal, who will then go in a different direction. In this way the animals communicate and protect each other.
Paco also told me several Yanesha myths, each one more beautiful than the next. The best one is the story of the Mother Moon, Yachor A'rrorr, who comes down from the sky at night to bathe in a sacred lake on top of one of the mountains nearby. The water in the lake is pure and has magical curing properties because the Moon Goddess bathes there, so the Yanesha people bring back that sacred water to the villages, so pregnant women can bathe in it, and wash their new-borns with it, so they grow strong and healthy.
I had heard of an extremely old woman who lived in the community, so Paco brought me to see her. We arrived at her hut on the other side of the valley, and I met Teresa, who is 100 years old, still lives with her 10 great great grandchildren and one of their mothers (sadly, the rest of the adults have left for larger cities to find work). Teresa is very wrinkled and spotted and her eyes are almost all white. But her mind is still very clear and lucid, and she started speaking to me in her psychedelic mix of Spanish and Yanesha and I couldn't understand her at all; Paco had to translate. This is the amazing story that she told us, "Oh, you are so young, like a flower. I am glad you are visiting me. You better come back. Look at me, I am really old now. So old. But I live here! This is where I live! (she taps the ground really hard with her cane). You know I almost died last year. I was in my bed, I was very sick. I had so many dreams when I was sick. I flew up to the sky in my dreams, it was so beautiful there. The ground is made of mirrors and there are buildings that shine, like they were gold. My soul wanted to stay there, in the sky of mirrors. But then I saw a giant hand. It came down towards me from above and it pushed me down back all the way down to Earth, I heard a voice that said I still have to live in my mortal body. It is not my time yet. So here I am! I am still alive!" I was transfixed. Holy shit, it was crazy.
Then she proceeded to sing a garbled yet gripping song about two stars in the sky, two lovers that want to be reunited again. It is an ancient Yanesha song that she loves. Music is the most important personal ritual in the Yanesha culture, and performing one's songs allows one to communicate with the spirits of lands and the heavens? She asked me to bring her back from Lima all the recordings she made of her songs back in the 1970s, when she was in her 70s.
Sure enough, back in Lima, I found in the archives dozens of her sacred songs, which I am going to bring back to her in July, when I spend a month in different Yanesha communities. The head anthropologist of the project, Richard Chase Smith, has given me the task of distributing several cultural- historical maps that he has produced with Yanesha elders over the past 30 years. They have just been printed, and hopefully all the mythological and oral history data is going to be correlated with the songs at a later stage in this work. I feel really strongly about this whole project, because it is bridging my different interests (music, the ancient past, linguistics and indigenous cultures) in a new unexpected way that I can contribute to.
Coming back to the city was rather awful because of all the pollution and craziness here, but one of the guys I met who works in the ethnomusicology archives (where the Yanesha songs are stored) happens to be in an wonderful fusion band, and I started jamming with them over the past week, which has been super. The band is called Radio Huayco (which means 'flood' in Quechua) and they play a crazy mix of salsa, cumbia, traditional chicha music, with some electronics and noise dropped in. I am playing a show with some of them later tonight! At electronic music festival in the countryside. it's been most amazing to meet them and be able to work with them in this short amount of time. you can listen to some of their music at - www.myspace.com/
And some of my photos are here,
http://flickr.com/photos/
So much love, peels and nectar,
your friend Anna Banana
No comments:
Post a Comment