Part 2-10 of the tale of my latest trip adentro
Editor's note: below is the continuation of the story I posted earlier this week. Lest I be accused of not doing any work in my site, let me assure you that I have been sick at home the last three days...so I had a lot of time to write on the laptop in bed. Enjoy.
A beat up pick up truck stopped in front of the store with crates full of squawking chickens. A boy, about 15 who had a distractingly disfiguring scar that ran from the bridge of his nose to the corner of his mouth and then down his neck, hurried around the store to try to find an empty cardboard box. Once a box was located, the truck driver tried to stuff all the chickens into said box. Our bus driver then pulled out some of the chickens from the overcrowded box and put them in a rice sack so that they were not all on top of one another. Meanwhile, I whipped out my pocket knife and proceeded to try to cut some holes in the box and the rice sack so as to give the poor creatures some air. The birds were so crammed in the box, though, that I feared stabbing them with the knife as I cut into the box. I went back into the store to suffer through yet another painful process of watching someone try to add up the bill on the receipt. Finally, after what seemed like hours, we loaded back on the bus and were on the road again.
So, about an hour and a half into our 3 hour trip down the Via Auca (the road carved by the oil companies into what once was primary rainforest and part of the ancestral Waorani hunting grounds) Noemi leans over to me and asks, “Where are the chickens? I don’t smell them.”
“I was in the store with you, remember, when we were paying for them. I didn’t see the drivers load them,” I replied. We start looking around the bus. No chickens. “Oh, I saw them load them,” one woman said casually. “They’re in the storage area underneath the bus.”
Noemi and I looked at each other in disbelief. The whole reason we went through all the trouble of trying to find and buy live chickens in Coca, rather than Puyo, was so that the chickens would be ALIVE by the time we got to the community. Even putting them in boxes and bags with air holes in the passenger area of the bus was no guarantee that they’d make it. But putting them in the dark, suffocating airless compartments below was a cruel death sentence. She yelled for the drivers to stop the bus. She and the driver got off the bus to survey the damage. I decided to stay in my seat. I didn’t want to be part of the discussion or the discovery of what I could only imagine was chicken misery.
Incredibly, four of the chickens lived. They were re-loaded on the bus in such a way so that they had a chance of surviving the rest of the brutal bus ride. Not 10 minutes later, we all smelled the chickens…
About an hour an a half later, we arrived at the bridge over the Shiripuno River.
We were all relieved to finally get off the bus. I suppose we would have stampeded each other to get off were we not so weary from the long trip which by that point had lasted over 24 hours.
It was a cloudless, brilliant blue sky, which meant the sun was beating down on us with a stifling intensity. We all crowded in what little shade was available while transferring our backpacks and food into black plastic garbage bags…just in case. There was a steep embankment down to the shore of the river where the three large canoes were waiting. Women hefted the big bulky bags of rice and flour on their shoulders, and gracefully descended the bank. Me, on the other hand, not so graceful. I about wiped out twice. Before loading my stuff, I dug into my bag to grab one of my travel wipes (aka baby wipes) and my sunscreen. Before lathering every centimeter of exposed skin with the sunscreen/bug repellent combo, I washed my face with the wet wipe---which quickly turned brown from all the dirt and dust I had accumulated. I also dug out my Peace Corps issued PFD and put it on. I wasn’t taking any chances. Unlike the ubiquitous big, bulky orange life vests, this was a sailing vest that was small and snug and would inflate instantly with the tug of the emergency cord. It also had a manual inflation tube tucked away behind thick strips of red Velcro. I hoped and prayed that I would not need to use either. For one thing, the instruction booklet for the damn thing was a freaking book. By the time you read through the damn thing you’d be dead anyway. The booklet did come in useful, however. I used it to shield the intense sun from my forehead as we sat and baked while we waited for the other to load up.
Noemi started freaking out when the first canoe, which was packed to the gills with supplies and backpacks—including hers—took off toward the village. She had hoped to ride in that canoe with her stuff (which included a wad of cash to buy artesania) but there was no room for her. So we tried to find a place to sit in another canoe, which for me turned out to be the two inch wide wooden cross bar. Just what my arse needed after that hellish bus ride.
After five women got out of the canoe to push it out of the sandy bank, we finally made our way downstream. It was so relieving…both for the fresh, moving air it provided and for the fact that we were no longer on the dreadful bus. I was actually looking forward to this leg of the trip because I was hoping to see some cool wildlife and a view of the territory from the river. At first, however, it was a little scary because we had to maneuver through an obstacle course of iron bridge posts. Given the canoe was so long, it required a fair amount of navigational skill to make sharp S turns---essentially half of tight figure eight. For the novice passenger, it made for some scary moments because it requires the canoe to be aimed directly at the iron posts. There were a couple white knuckle moments where I was fought the urge to grab the pfd rip cord.
The banks of the river ranged from lush dense foliage where the trees on either side met in the middle, creating luxurious shade on the river…to grassy, deforested patches where colonos had abandoned their attempt to eke out an existence raising scrawny cattle. Sadly, there was too much of the latter and not enough of the former.
Over the din of the outboard motor, we did hear the chatter of a flock of parakeets flying overheard. We also saw a turtle sunning himself on a log before we startled it and it slid off the log into the chocolatey river. There were a lot of interesting birds cruising around us and I regretted not digging my binoculars out of my bag. Evidently, the first two canoes saw more wildlife—including a caiman—but everything had been scared off by the time our canoe passed. At one point, I looked down and noticed that the chickens that had survived the ride from Coca were huddled in the shade that my shadow cast. Poor, stressed little critters.
The women at the front of the canoe passed around chunks of a tart citrus fruit and plastic cups of warm generic cola. Tiyane, one of the Women’s Association officers, was sitting on the edge of the canoe and was supposed to be watching out for submerged logs, but she was more often than not chitchatting with the other women. We definitely had a few close calls with some logs. My pulse was racing on more than one occasion. My fear was heightened by the fact that one of the women decided today would be a good day to let her teenage son command the boat. Of course he wanted to drive really fast. Meanwhile, his mom kept barking at him, “despacito, despacito!” Slow! Slow!
The only other boat we passed on the river was a large canoe loaded down with wood, undoubtedly illegally logged from area. We cruised by the two men in the boat in silence.
Someone had told me it would take around three hours to get to the village, so I was surprised when we got to the village in less than an hour and a half. This never happens! We scrambled up the steep, muddy bank with our stuff. Noemi slid twice and sported a big streak of mud on her leg and butt. The mud shlurped my Croc right off my foot. Our lack of grace was all very entertaining to the Waorani.
Once reunited with her stuff, Noemi and I went scouting for a place to set up our camp. We were invited to stay in a two story wooden building. We chose a small second story room to set up my big tent. The room was probably no bigger than 10ft x 10 ft, so trying to thread the long tent poles in this cramped space was challenging. We worked up quite a sweat doing it. We got our stuff arranged and then went to find some place to bathe. A young girl directed us to a “well” which was mainly a 5 ft x 8 ft hole that was fed by a spring. A woman was there beating her clothes clean with a flat wooden paddle. To bathe, we basically dipped a big bowl into the water and then poured it over our head. It was primitive, but refreshing. Unfortunately, the clean feeling lasted less than an hour, because it was just so flipping hot, that you worked up a sweat just breathing.
We helped some of the other women prepare dinner in the kitchen house. It was a small, one story, ground level building that once served as a school. Like many of the other “public” buildings in all the villages I’d seen so far, the lower half of the walls were wood, the upper half had a type of chicken wire. The roof was corrugated metal Two steps inside the building is a big fire pit, that, if you are not careful, or don’t have enough light at night, would be easy to step into. I helped rinse off the bowls before we used them. I say rinse, because there wasn’t any soap. So I basically dunked the bowls in a bucket of cold water, swished them around, then stacked them on a grungy wooden table.
There was a big controversy brewing because some of the supplies and food were missing. I found the list we used to place the order and read it off to Noemi while she rummaged around the storeroom trying to locate the food and other supplies. Kintal (100 pounds) of rice? Check. Case of crackers? Check. 9 bags of noodles? Check. And so on. What we were unable to find, however, was the sardines, salt, candles, the Yupi, the powdered drink mix that the Waorani love, and a couple other things. Everyone had their theories about what happened. Some thought the store where we bought the stuff shorted us. Some thought we might have missed a box loading onto the canoes. Others thought someone had lifted them. We never did find out what happened, but I have my theories. Nonetheless, it put a damper on our moods. We started to worry if we would have enough food for the entire workshop. I was grateful I had brought a small bag of my own food, including a couple PB&J’s, some crackers, nuts, raisins and a couple Take 5 candy bars that were melting. I decided to ration those, just in case we did run low on food.
That night everyone went to bed pretty early. I hadn’t really slept the night before, so I was ready to crash out as soon as it got dark…which was 6:30. I read about ¾ of a page in my book and then passed out.
The next three days of the workshop went fairly smoothly, all things considered. At the start of the workshop, my counterpart spoke for quite awhile but I have no idea about what, because it was all in Wao terero. She gave me the opportunity to talk a little bit. I briefed the women on the increase in sales at the store and the importance of making high quality artesania. I had made a list of suggestions of ways to improve the quality and went over them with them—most of it pretty basic stuff…like making sure the clasps on the bracelets and necklaces are not too big or too small. They seemed receptive. I tried to make it funny, but I’m not sure some of it translated very well.
We then divided up into different groups so the women could work on a variety of different types of handicrafts. My friend Noemi was teaching the women to make some really cool macramé belts using their traditional chambira palm and seeds. My counterpart was leading a session on traditional weaving, plus she showed some women how to make traditional combs. There were a lot of options. I was pleased that so many women wanted to join my earring workshop. We squeezed into the tiny school desks arranged in a circle and got to work. I handed each of the women a small bag containing 10 pairs of the silver earring posts, some nail clippers to trim the string, and a few other supplies. I had also made some sketches of some simple earring designs using the most commonly available seeds and handed those out. It was kind of cool seeing them diligently following the different examples I made, then branching out to make some of their own designs.
The first day of the workshop, I felt like all I did was drill holes in beads. At one point I was sweating so much I was worried that my hand would slip and I’d put a hole in my finger, rather than the bead. I kept wiping my sweaty palms on my pants in an effort to improve my grip on the tiniest of seeds. We broke a lot of drill bits throughout the day. Thankfully, this time I brought a big supply. At the previous workshop we had a serious drill bit crisis when half of the drill bits broke within the first four hours of the three day workshop. The other half were actually too small to fit in the drills, so we couldn’t use them at all. Really sucked considering that we needed seeds with holes in them in order to make our jewelry. But this time, we brought almost 100 drill bits. I walked around and kept handing them out to the women. Most of the breakages happened when using the manual drills. It was easy to slip off the seed and drill the floor or the vice press, thus snapping the really thin drill bit. There is an incredible amount of labor that goes into each and every bag and piece of jewelry—from the twisting of the palm string, to the drilling of holes in the seeds…not to mention the collection of the seeds and the palm leaves before we even get to that point, or the weaving afterwards.
That night, Noemi and I went to the one of the few houses that had a generator in order to see if we could charge the drills there. It was interesting to see that one part of the tiny village had light, and the other part was completely dark. Stepping inside the building it was clear that this was not your typical Waorani house. They had a stainless steel oven and stove, a large screen t.v., a stereo, two mattresses, a dresser, lots of pots and pans…and the kicker: a full sized refrigerator. I wondered what was the point of having a refrigerator if you could only power the generator a few hours each day… I wondered how the heck they got all this stuff to this village (trying to picture loading a mattress in a canoe)… I wondered how the heck they paid for it all…and then I was reminded of the fact that this was the house of the guy who has been negotiating with the illegal loggers. Ahh…yes. Now it makes sense I guess. But, wow, what a contrast between the other houses. As we waited for the drills to charge, Noemi chatted with a Waorani woman holding a newborn baby. The baby was cranky, so they wrapped the baby in a little blanket, pinning one of her arms inside the blanket. Noemi said that if you wrapped one or both arms inside the blanket, that babies sleep better. As their discussing this, I shift my weight, and narrowly miss the blades of a fan that were spinning rapidly without any protective cage. It was just a strange scene. Naked boy conked out on a mattress next to his baby sister who is wrapped with lots of layers on and her arm pinned to her side…largescreen t.v. blasting some really violent American movie…fan blades spinning…generator running…oh, and some random birds that looked like baby chickens in a box in the kitchen.
The sky that night was incredible. It was so amazing being able to see so many stars without any light pollution to impede the view.
The second day of the workshop was not unlike the first. Everyone kept working diligently on their projects. There weren’t enough school desks, so most of the women sat on the dusty wooden floors—the same ones they had slept on the night before—to continue their weaving. At one point there was some commotion outside and everyone ran to see what was going on. Not wanting to miss out, I too went to see what all the excitement was about. It turns out, one of the men in the village went hunting with his son and brought back 5 wancanas…which the Waorani described as wild pigs. The man had a shotgun propped on one shoulder, while dragging a small wancano with the other hand. The women were very excited, as it meant that they would eat well tonight…and tomorrow as it turned out. I went back to working on my project, and not 10 minutes later my counterpart starts yelling at me to come with her. I had a feeling I knew where this was going. Sure enough, she wanted to show me the butchering process of the wancana. I steeled myself and entered the kitchen house. Three women were standing over the carcass of the pig, which was splayed out on the concrete floor of the building, its sausage-like intestines placed on the floor beside it. I actually did fine with all of this. I thought I would be grossed out, but strangely, I wasn’t. So, the poker face that I maintained actually wasn’t forced. I acted very non-plussed about the whole scene, which may have surprised or maybe even disappointed my counterpart. She told me to take some pictures, which I did, and then moseyed back to the schoolhouse to work with my earring group.
We wound up our workshop around 5 that day and everyone went to the river to bathe. I stripped down to my sports bra and my wick dry shorts and waded in the water. There were at least a dozen other women in this small section of river; some rubbing their heads with bars of soap, others scrubbing and slapping their clothes on a board in the river. One of the women directed me to a section of the river where the river was flowing—where they said the water was cleaner. I shampood my hair slowly, rinsed it out, then sort of stood there for a while trying to figure out what to do next. I had already soaped my body with my hotel-sized bar twice, almost releasing all the sand and grit that had stuck to it after dropping it on the bank. Natural loofah, right? I was starting to get eaten alive, so I decided to go back to the tent to change. As I dried off, I noticed that one of the women was standing in the river cutting and washing some of the meat, just a few feet where others were bathing.
I walked back with my new little friend Vilma, who was about 8, I’d guess (she didn’t know either). She shadowed me around for most of the next day. I actually enjoyed her companionship. The other kids were either shy, or outright scared of me. I later learned, as a mother explained apologetically. that the reason her daughter literally ran away from me was because she thought I was a doctor and that they thought I was going to give her a shot. Oh.
At dusk, there was a fantastic lightning storm off in the distance. It lit up the sky with brilliant flashes of pink. Noemi didn’t know what it was and didn’t believe me that it was lightning. She thought it was some sort of explosion. It made me second guess my explanation. It was unusual in the fact that we never heard any thunder…and that it stayed in just one part of the low skyline…
I wasn’t really hungry that night, and contemplated not even going to dinner, but knew that someone would track me down and drag me there anyway. It was well after dark by the time dinner was served. The kitchen house was lit only by a two small candles and Jer’s headlamp, which I lent to Laura so she could see what she was serving out of the big aluminium pots. I guess it was best that wasn’t able to look closely at what was in the bowl I was handed. All I knew was that it was a big piece of the wancano meat---about the size of a fat man’s fist. It was just huge. I know that the women were trying to be nice about serving me a lot of meat, but yikes. I felt guilty looking around at what I could see in the other women’s bowls…which had more rice than meat. Crap. I started to sweat, and not just because it was 100 degrees in the kitchen. There is no WAY I can eat all of this, even if I was A) a meat lover; B) hungry; or ) confident that it wasn’t the heart or some other organ. But, it would have been really disrespectful to refuse it. Adding to my agony was the fact that there were no utensils left, so I had to pick up the steaming piece of meat with one hand and feebly gnaw on it. My counterpart started to tease me about not eating meat, which made me annoyed and that more determined to prove her wrong…because in fact I WAS eating it. Just not much of it. She is still oblivious to the irony in her teases, as I have still not told her I was a real, live vegetarian for almost 15 years. Oh well, lucky for me the meat was actually ok. I wouldn’t go as far as saying that it was delicious and I definitely didn’t devour it. It was a red meat that definitely had a beefy-taste to it. When a spoon was finally freed up, I asked for a little rice and added it to the substantial amount of broth in the bowl—which I admit was pretty tasty. After working on the chunk of meat for what seemed like an eternity, I casually walked near the door and flipped the rest into the darkness of the night, knowing that one of the many skinny dogs roaming the village would devour it long before the sun would rise again.
That night Noemi and I chatted for hours in the tent before going to sleep. We were like pre-teens at a sleepover. Our conversation ranged from the philosophical---comparing the differences in the crappy healthcare systems of our respective countries---to the gossipy---.she told me crazy stories of some of the Waorani parties she had attended over the years. I confessed my recent anxieties about my period skipping two months. She talked of her challenges of being a single mom. When our conversation tapered off, I started reading my book, Running the Amazon by Joe Kane (also the author of Savages). She asked what the book was about. I started to tell her about the first expedition to run the entire Amazon river from the source of its longest tributary in the mountains of southern Peru to the Atlantic. I kept talking and talking about, what I thought was a fascinating voyage, the motley crew of kayakers, their rough start in Peru. I later asked her if she had ever been to Peru. Noemi? She was sound asleep. I stifled a giggle, then went back to reading my book.
About 11 a.m. on the third day of the workshop, the sky suddenly got dark and then opened up and rained with a violent intensity. It was as if a hundred little hands were pounding on the corrugated metal roof. The cacophony made casual conversation impossible. Not unlike a scene at a punk rock concert, we had to cup our hands and literally yell into the other person’s ear to communicate. About 40 minutes later, the rain stopped as suddenly as it started, leaving a lake-sized puddle outside the school building.
That afternoon, my counterpart invited me to take a break and to come visit one of her friends. We shlepped up and down a muddy path to a narrow log over a big pool of water. I thought I would just walk through the water rather than risk slipping and falling off the log. It didn’t look very deep, anyway. Well, on my first step, I sunk into muck almost to my knee. It was all I could do to get my foot, much less my Croc extricated from the slime. So, guess the log was there for a good reason. Once again, I was the source of entertainment for all.
The woman’s house we visited was made of the traditional thatch, but was open at both ends, creating what felt more like a big V-shaped shelter than a house. She had a veritable zoo hanging around her place. There was what I think might have been a juvenile crested eagle tied to a post, a green macaw hopping around, a squirrel monkey (or was it a capuchin) tied to a grate, a sloth (two toed, maybe?) cradling its baby on a cross beam, a baby wancana (like last nights dinner) dragging a chain, and a mean mama wancana tied up out back.
Another attraction was the gleaming white new toilet located about 30 feet behind the house. No walls, no roof, just an al fresco white crapper connected to a pipe that ran to the edge of the river bank and then stopped abruptly. Supposedly this was all part of the new water system that the company installed that week…. …
We sat around chatting and goofing around and eating freshly cooked ungurawa nuts that turned our teeth black before heading back to the workshop. It was a nice little break. I am glad I got to see some wildlife, but sad that they weren’t in their more natural state…
As a cultural exchange moment, I gave each of the women at the workshop an Ohio buckeye as a small gift and good luck token. I explained that its name in English means the eye of a deer (actually, I said ‘large animal in the forest’ because I totally blanked out on what the word for deer was in Spanish. Argh!!!) and that it was so important to my ‘culture’ that big sports teams and organizations were named after it. I told them that every Christmas my mom and I would make peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate that looked just like the buckeye…and were called buckeyes. I went on to explain, that where I am from we also make jewelry out of them. I ended with telling them that people from our state (province, as people here don’t understand the concept of states) give them to friends for good luck. As I handed one to each woman, I said, “good luck.” I got some really appreciative thank you’s from some of the women. Others just stared at me blankly. Some asked if they could eat it. NO!!! It’s poisonous!!! Several asked if they could plant it. Well, the climate where I am from is just a tad bit different from yours. We have snow! Plus, it’s just not a good idea…. And some asked to use it in a necklace. Of course!
Our final night in the village featured a baile tipico (traditional dance) by the women. Waorani women old and young interlocked arms to form a long line where they sang and chanted their traditional songs. Each painted her faces with achiote and donned their traditional dress for fiestas: pasacuerpos, corteza skirts, woven brazaletas with feathers and jangly leg bands tied tautly around their calves. To the untrained ear (mine) the songs sound more like chants by which the same phrase is repeated over and over and over. But when my counterpart translated for me, the songs were transformed into elaborate stories woven with war, revenge, love, family, travel and adventure. I leaned in, straining to pick out the different words in their songs. Then a loud blast of raggaeton was suddenly and shrilly blasted from a hugonic boom box. Jovenes (teenagers) evidently decided to change the tune, rudely cutting off the traditional dance. The noise reverberated through the forest. They turned the music up another notch, possibly to drown out the diesel generator that was providing power to the stereo. So, in just seconds, the muddy dance floor cleared of the women celebrating their unique culture and ancient traditions and was replaced with jeans-clad Waorani youth doing the campo shuffle to the tired cumbia songs that are heard on every bus in South America.
I decided to go back to my tent.
∞
Okay, so I’m about 15 pages into this sordid tale and I am running out of steam. There are a few other mini stories I could tell about my time in this village, but I am ready to get back to Puyo in my storytelling as much as I was in real life.
So, our exit from the village was more or less uneventful, thankfully. We actually left on time (a little early, incredibly). I let one of the women, Obe, sit on my bag in front of me, as there wasn’t anywhere else to sit in the canoe. There was something strangely elegant about Obe. Not in an ostentatious way. Quite the opposite. She was very timid. But focused. I watched as she doted over her baby, who was tucked in a sheet slung across her shoulder. She seemed oblivious to what was going on around her, as she cooed and clucked and told stories to the wide eyed, smiling baby.
I was glad to be in the first canoe that pulled out, as I was hoping to get good views of wildlife before they’re scared off. But, the first canoe also happened to be the slowest canoe. We were quickly passed by the smaller, less loaded down canoes. Our return trip was quite a bit slower, as we were going against the current. The rains had made the river rise enough that it felt less like an obstacle course of avoiding logs. We passed two groups of loggers. This time my counterpart started snapping photos, so I figured it was ok for me to, too. We passed a boat full of other indigenous people, Kichwa maybe. We also passed a couple gringo kayakers followed by a monster floatie boat loaded down with their gear. The river is most definitely the highway through this region.
The sky was getting dark and I was worried that we were going to get drenched. Then our canoe got snagged on some branches from a partially submerged fallen tree. I was scared for a moment, but no one else seemed to be fazed by it, so I took it as a sign that I should not panic yet. After some maneuvering back and forth we finally got unstuck and pulled up to the bridge, just as it started to sprinkle. I was worried that we would get to the bridge and the bus wouldn’t be there, but my fears were unfounded. My next bigger fear was that the rumor that we were going to drop some people off in Tiwino—a two our round trip—might be true. I wasn’t sure I could tame my temper if the bus started driving in the opposite direction of where we needed to go. That fear, too, was unwarranted. Ahhh…my luck must be changing. I sat back and started to zone out in preparation for the long ride back to Puyo.
About 20 minutes into the trip, however, the bus stops. I look up and notice that the road is blocked by angry men who are on strike against one of the oil companies. You have GOT to be kidding!!! I cannot win! Thankfully, it was a peaceful protest, and one of the Waorani got off and negotiated our passage through the blockade. They moved the chains and we rumbled past. The orange soda distributor on the other side of the strike was not so lucky.
Another 20 minutes pass and the bus stops again. A dozen people get off and run up a hill. With their cellphones. It was the first place between the bridge and Coca where they could catch a signal, and I guess a lot of the Waorani had urgent business to attend to. I sat and stewed.
Three hours later, we pull into Coca. We stop in front of the same chicken broaster place and we all pile out and take over the restaurant once again. I help rotate people to the tables to eat. Thank god for fixed lunches. No menus, no protracted decisionmaking. You get lunch. Period. You get…chicken.
Noemi and I decided to avoid the 5 hour detour to drop off the women in Menepare and got off the bus in the city of Tena. It was well worth paying our own way back in order to catch a direct bus to Puyo. Several other people decided to do the same. We entered the bus station around 8:00 in the evening only to learn that the next bus to leave (at 9:00) “esta danada” damaged. Meaning out of service. Argh! Adding to our frustration was that we suspected that nothing was wrong with the bus; the company just didn’t have enough passengers to make it financially lucrative enough. Or maybe it was because guy at the ticket counter was afraid of the old Waorani man that had joined our group somewhere along the way. He was definitely old school and very intimidating looking. Long, stretched out perforated earlobes. Despite his age, his skin was still taut over his very pronounced muscles. He was shirtless and shoeless and you could tell by the splayed toes on his barefeet that he clearly came from the jungle. Oh, and he was carrying a spear that was at least 10 feet long.
We debated whether or not we should try to catch a passing bus that would be coming through town from Coca on the way to Quito. The problem however, was that it would be unlikely that there would be any seats and we would be forced to stand the whole way. Even though I had been sitting on my arse for so many hours, the prospect of standing might have been inviting were it not for the fact that I would be forced to stand while driving on THAT road. There wasn’t another bus until 11. I thought about calling one of the other volunteers in town to ask if I could crash at her pad and catch a bus back to Puyo in the a.m. But all I wanted was to sleep in my own bed. So the seven of us stood around debating what to do. Some cabbie overheard our discussion and offered to take us to Puyo in his 4-door pickup for $40. It wasn’t going to be worth it unless we all agreed to go and split the cost. Finally, everyone agreed and we piled in the truck. Women in the cab. Men and spears in the truckbed.
It was almost a 2 ½ hour ride back to Puyo. Noemi and I crammed in the front with the cabbie. At the halfway point, we switched seats so that I got to straddle the gearshift and get a little too close to the driver. The conversation on the way back centered on the need for better accountability and leadership on the part of the Waorani political body (all men). They told some pretty unflattering tales of mismanagement of funds, wasted opportunities and promises not kept.
Around 11:00 we pull into the north part of Puyo, and one of the guys in the back pounds on the roof of the cab, signalling the driver to stop there. One of the guys starts to unload their stuff and then hands the driver $5…so then everyone starts to pay. I pulled out $6, but all the Waorani pull out $5. Woah guys, 40 divided by 7 does not $5 make… One person said that they only had five bucks. The driver then get’s ticked off and starts going off. “I didn’t drive all the way to Puyo for a sightseeing trip. You agreed to pay $40.” The arguing went on for a few minutes with my crew saying that they will only pay $5 a person. Then…and I hesitate whether or not to publish this or not…I guess I won’t name names, but one of the women I work with says, “I only agreed to pay $5. I’m only paying $5. Come on Susan, grab your backpack. Let’s go.” I stood there in stunned silence. Then all the Waorani scattered. They totally left me and Noemi standing in the dark street with this really angry dude. The cabbie, fearing that I would also bolt, grabbed my backpack from the truckbed and threw it in the cab, as hostage, then threatened to call the cops. Noemi and I looked at each other, incredulous to what had just happened. We ended up fishing in our purses for the remainder of the cash to give the guy. Thankfully we had it. I was exhausted and embarrassed. But mostly I felt betrayed.
I walked into the apartment and Jer was waiting up for me on the couch. I was so glad to be back. I opened a beer, flopped in the chair and the tears just started to flow as I began to tell him about what all had happened. We stayed up pretty late talking. I was pretty wound up. The fact that our water was out again almost put me over the edge. I wanted—and needed—a shower sooo bad. I didn’t even care that it would be ice cold. Thankfully Jer had boiled some water earlier in the night that was still warm and I took a short bucket bath before crashing out. Hard.
∞
I took my time getting up and getting ready the next morning. It was only Tuesday and the weekend seemed like an eternity away. I was sipping my coffee and towling my hair dry after taking another shower/bucket bath—this one really hot—when my cellphone rings. I groan and looked at the caller ID. It was Noemi. I pick up. “Alo.”
“Where are you?”
“At the house. What’s up?”
She was talking crazy fast, even more so than usual, and all I could make out was that something happened to the bus after we got off and that some of the women were hurt.
“The woman that was sitting across the aisle from us was hurt pretty bad—you remember, the one with the little baby. I’m headed to the hospital with Manuela.”
Click.
I stared at my phone in disbelief. Oh my god. Oh my god. I was flooded with emotions. Guilt. Relief. Guilt again. Then fear. Then a dreaded realization that the woman sitting across from us was Obe. The elegant Obe. Oh no…oh no.
I rushed into town and saw a group of Waorani women standing outside the store. I approached them and asked if they had any more details of what happened.
They said that they were on their way back from dropping off the dozen or so women from Menepare and the brakes on the bus went out and they went off the road and crashed into some trees…or maybe the bus rolled (this part was unclear). Obe was sitting in the front row of the passenger seats and was suffered a severe head wound.
One of the women said “she was dead for four hours!” What!?!?!
“No, no, she was unconscious,” another woman corrected her.
“There was blood everywhere,” someone else added. “And we were really far from everything. There was no cell signal, no light, nothing nearby. Someone had to run really far down the road to find somebody to help us and to call a different bus.”
“What time did this happen?” I ask.
“Around 11:00. And we didn’t get back to Puyo until 7:30 this morning.”
My heart sank. If Obe had a head injury and was unconscious for so many hours, would she make it…could she make it? If I had still on the bus, would I have made it? My mind was racing.
I went up to the Women’s Association office where some of the women were lingering. I got to hear three other versions of the same story. As if to prove what happened, one of them showed me her bag, which was stained with blood. I felt sick. I choked back tears, then tried to go about figuring out what I could do to help.
After hours of waiting for news, my counterpart called to tell me that Obe was going to be ok. She was at the Shell missionary hospital with her baby, who was not injured. I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
The next day and a half were consumed with a flurry of phone calls and faxes and discussions about arranging for paying for Obe’s hospitalization, providing transport of the women back to their communities, and finding funds to feed them while they waited. I felt bad that I didn’t have hardly any food in the house to give them or cook for them. I ended up going to a bakery and buying a big bag of empanadas and bread to hold them over. The women’s association had arranged flights back for a few of the women, but of course they were delayed several times. One of the flights was thrown for a loop when Obe had to remain in the hospital. We couldn’t afford two flights, so we delayed the charter and the women who were going to be on the same flight as her would have to wait until she got out of the hospital.
On the day that Obe was to be released from the hospital, I was asked to go to the hospital and pick her up. One of the other women and I called the cab driver that has a contract with the Association and we head to Shell. Once at the hospital, no one could explain to us what the procedure was to check her out. We just kept getting sent from one window, to another, then back to the first window. We asked someone passing in the hall that looked like they might know what was going on. We were told to wait. And so we waited. Frustrated and fearful that we were running up a pretty hefty cab fare, we pressed one of the women for an answer. It turns out that we couldn’t get Obe until her bill was paid. This was supposedly already taken care of, but the woman behind the counter shook her head and said, no, sorry. She owes $187.56. Ugh.
Ecuadorian hospitals literally do not let you leave until you pay your entire bill. I told the cabbie that this was quite a different system that I was used to. In the U.S., they kick you out of the hospital the moment you are stitched up, give birth or come to. Then they bill you out the wazoo. “Yeah, that wouldn’t exactly work here. These people would leave the hospital and go hide in the forest,” the cabbie said. “Imagine trying to track down some of these people that live adentro to try to get them to pay their bill.” Ok, good point.
Sylvia and I went to visit Obe to break the bad news to her, that she would have to stay until we could get the bill figured out. The hospital could have been the set for a movie in the 1970’s. Everything looked dated. Clean, but very 1970’s - ish. I think it was the tiles and the old school beds. Obe sat serenely holding her baby. Her 14 year old daughter sat quietly on a chair by the bed. Obe had a large laceration held together by quite a few stitches that started somewhere in her scalp and went down the middle of her forehead. Not nearly as bad as I had feared. I asked her if she was feeling all right. Sylvia translated and said she was. They chatted for a while in Wao Terero. Thoughts of springing her out of her raced through my head. It wouldn’t be that hard to sneak her out. But that would be uncool I guess. I asked her if she had her clothes. Sylvia translated. Obe reached over to the table by the side of her bed and grabbed a red piece of material—what was left of the shirt that had been cut off of her after the accident. She held it up and gave me a soft smile. “Hummm…well, we are going to have to find you some clothes, aren’t we?”
I went to the nurse’s desk and asked if they had any clothes that they could give to her, as hers were cut off of her. Without looking up from the chart she was reading form, the nurse said rather dispassionately, “No, sorry, the gowns have to stay here. You’ll have to find her something else to wear.”
As we were walking past the payment window, one of the women asked me if my name was Susan. Yes, yes it is, I said, startled. You have a phone call. What? I pick up the phone. It was my counterpart. She said that she had arranged for Obe’s bill to be paid. This is great, I say. But you need to tell the hospital, not me! I handed the phone back to the payment ladies and they jotted down a bunch of numbers and then hung up. “Ok, she’s free to go.” I have no idea what my counterpart did to settle the bill. Credit cards are not commonly used. Probably best not to ask. I just wanted to get out of there. But we still hadn’t figured out the clothing dilemma. Sylvia and I went out to the parking lot and woke up the cabbie and told him that we could spring her loose, but she didn’t have any clothes. I asked if he by chance had any extra shirts stashed somewhere in the truck. He looked at me, like I must be kidding. “So, give me your shirt then,” I said, playfully. “I mean, I know she is Waorani, but we can’t ask her to walk out of the hospital naked!” I said.
Before he reply, Sylvia blurted out, “I know a missionary in town, I can ask her to let us borrow some clothes. Let’s go!” So we drove to the other side of town and pulled up before a pastel painted concrete house surrounded by a tall iron fence and a mean looking german shepherd prowling the perimeter. Sylvia disappeared inside the house. As we waited, the cabbie started complaining about how the women’s association wasn’t organized. He grumbled about wasting half his day running them around. Don’t get me started, I thought. “And I haven’t been paid for months!” he exclaimed. Finally Sylvia comes dashing out of the house with a bag, jumps in the cab and then we headed back to the hospital. We marched into Obe’s room and handed her the bag. In it was a double breasted sky blue polyester dress. A definite church lady dress. Obe struggled to get it on, and I ended up having to button it for her, and flip down the wide collar. I was glad Sylvia had chosen a dress, because Obe didn’t seem to have pants or underwear either. Or shoes. But that was a minor detail at this point. As we gather up what little other possessions they had there, Obe told Sylvia that she couldn’t find the sheet that she used to carry the baby. I went out to the nurses’ station to ask about it. The nurse poked around a couple cubby holes in a storage closet, wandered off down the hall, then eventually came back empty handed. She said it was probably in the laundry. “She can get it when she comes back in a week to get her stitches out.” Oh, right. Stitches out. Didn’t think about that. Guess we need to delay the flight again. Crap. I thought.
We followed Obe as she walked silently and gingerly down the hall, out the door and to
I walked back to the house. Our Peace Corps Volunteer friend Katie and Jeremy were at the house. Jer was making dinner. Katie was making Pisco Sours. She handed me one as I flopped on the couch to recant the emotionally draining day. After a few pisco sours, Katie and I started in on a bottle of wine. Later that night I started going through my meager wardrobe to pick out clothes to give to Obe. Fuelled by the booze, I kept piling more and more clothes until I had filled a pretty big bag. I didn’t need them, anyway. Unfortunately my feet are hugonic, otherwise I would have given her a bunch of my shoes, too. Then maybe Jer would stop harassing me about my shoe collection.
∞
Last Saturday, Jer and I went with some friends to the nearby town of Mera to check out a competition of traditional games between the various indigenous nations. The flyers advertised spear throwing and blowgun competitions, among other interesting events. After a lot of waiting around for our friends to assemble (this is getting tiring, isn’t it?) we show up to see a competition where guys have to walk on a slippery bamboo log that was tied up at water level. It was kind of fun watching these really ripped guys walk try to walk across. Another competition involves something underwater. The objective was not clear. Maybe holding their breath, maybe looking for something. Don’t know. We also got to watch the blowgun competition where guys aimed their darts at a melon. After each round, they had to back up another 20 feet or so and aim again. It was pretty cool, actually. As we were leaving the competition, I see the bus driver who took us on that hellish recent trip adentro. I did a double take. There was the same flipping bus!
Oh my gawd! Taped to the front of the windshield was a sign, “For Sale. As Is.”
∞
So, about an hour and a half into our 3 hour trip down the Via Auca (the road carved by the oil companies into what once was primary rainforest and part of the ancestral Waorani hunting grounds) Noemi leans over to me and asks, “Where are the chickens? I don’t smell them.”
“I was in the store with you, remember, when we were paying for them. I didn’t see the drivers load them,” I replied. We start looking around the bus. No chickens. “Oh, I saw them load them,” one woman said casually. “They’re in the storage area underneath the bus.”
Noemi and I looked at each other in disbelief. The whole reason we went through all the trouble of trying to find and buy live chickens in Coca, rather than Puyo, was so that the chickens would be ALIVE by the time we got to the community. Even putting them in boxes and bags with air holes in the passenger area of the bus was no guarantee that they’d make it. But putting them in the dark, suffocating airless compartments below was a cruel death sentence. She yelled for the drivers to stop the bus. She and the driver got off the bus to survey the damage. I decided to stay in my seat. I didn’t want to be part of the discussion or the discovery of what I could only imagine was chicken misery.
Incredibly, four of the chickens lived. They were re-loaded on the bus in such a way so that they had a chance of surviving the rest of the brutal bus ride. Not 10 minutes later, we all smelled the chickens…
About an hour an a half later, we arrived at the bridge over the Shiripuno River.
We were all relieved to finally get off the bus. I suppose we would have stampeded each other to get off were we not so weary from the long trip which by that point had lasted over 24 hours.
It was a cloudless, brilliant blue sky, which meant the sun was beating down on us with a stifling intensity. We all crowded in what little shade was available while transferring our backpacks and food into black plastic garbage bags…just in case. There was a steep embankment down to the shore of the river where the three large canoes were waiting. Women hefted the big bulky bags of rice and flour on their shoulders, and gracefully descended the bank. Me, on the other hand, not so graceful. I about wiped out twice. Before loading my stuff, I dug into my bag to grab one of my travel wipes (aka baby wipes) and my sunscreen. Before lathering every centimeter of exposed skin with the sunscreen/bug repellent combo, I washed my face with the wet wipe---which quickly turned brown from all the dirt and dust I had accumulated. I also dug out my Peace Corps issued PFD and put it on. I wasn’t taking any chances. Unlike the ubiquitous big, bulky orange life vests, this was a sailing vest that was small and snug and would inflate instantly with the tug of the emergency cord. It also had a manual inflation tube tucked away behind thick strips of red Velcro. I hoped and prayed that I would not need to use either. For one thing, the instruction booklet for the damn thing was a freaking book. By the time you read through the damn thing you’d be dead anyway. The booklet did come in useful, however. I used it to shield the intense sun from my forehead as we sat and baked while we waited for the other to load up.
Noemi started freaking out when the first canoe, which was packed to the gills with supplies and backpacks—including hers—took off toward the village. She had hoped to ride in that canoe with her stuff (which included a wad of cash to buy artesania) but there was no room for her. So we tried to find a place to sit in another canoe, which for me turned out to be the two inch wide wooden cross bar. Just what my arse needed after that hellish bus ride.
After five women got out of the canoe to push it out of the sandy bank, we finally made our way downstream. It was so relieving…both for the fresh, moving air it provided and for the fact that we were no longer on the dreadful bus. I was actually looking forward to this leg of the trip because I was hoping to see some cool wildlife and a view of the territory from the river. At first, however, it was a little scary because we had to maneuver through an obstacle course of iron bridge posts. Given the canoe was so long, it required a fair amount of navigational skill to make sharp S turns---essentially half of tight figure eight. For the novice passenger, it made for some scary moments because it requires the canoe to be aimed directly at the iron posts. There were a couple white knuckle moments where I was fought the urge to grab the pfd rip cord.
The banks of the river ranged from lush dense foliage where the trees on either side met in the middle, creating luxurious shade on the river…to grassy, deforested patches where colonos had abandoned their attempt to eke out an existence raising scrawny cattle. Sadly, there was too much of the latter and not enough of the former.
Over the din of the outboard motor, we did hear the chatter of a flock of parakeets flying overheard. We also saw a turtle sunning himself on a log before we startled it and it slid off the log into the chocolatey river. There were a lot of interesting birds cruising around us and I regretted not digging my binoculars out of my bag. Evidently, the first two canoes saw more wildlife—including a caiman—but everything had been scared off by the time our canoe passed. At one point, I looked down and noticed that the chickens that had survived the ride from Coca were huddled in the shade that my shadow cast. Poor, stressed little critters.
The women at the front of the canoe passed around chunks of a tart citrus fruit and plastic cups of warm generic cola. Tiyane, one of the Women’s Association officers, was sitting on the edge of the canoe and was supposed to be watching out for submerged logs, but she was more often than not chitchatting with the other women. We definitely had a few close calls with some logs. My pulse was racing on more than one occasion. My fear was heightened by the fact that one of the women decided today would be a good day to let her teenage son command the boat. Of course he wanted to drive really fast. Meanwhile, his mom kept barking at him, “despacito, despacito!” Slow! Slow!
The only other boat we passed on the river was a large canoe loaded down with wood, undoubtedly illegally logged from area. We cruised by the two men in the boat in silence.
Someone had told me it would take around three hours to get to the village, so I was surprised when we got to the village in less than an hour and a half. This never happens! We scrambled up the steep, muddy bank with our stuff. Noemi slid twice and sported a big streak of mud on her leg and butt. The mud shlurped my Croc right off my foot. Our lack of grace was all very entertaining to the Waorani.
Once reunited with her stuff, Noemi and I went scouting for a place to set up our camp. We were invited to stay in a two story wooden building. We chose a small second story room to set up my big tent. The room was probably no bigger than 10ft x 10 ft, so trying to thread the long tent poles in this cramped space was challenging. We worked up quite a sweat doing it. We got our stuff arranged and then went to find some place to bathe. A young girl directed us to a “well” which was mainly a 5 ft x 8 ft hole that was fed by a spring. A woman was there beating her clothes clean with a flat wooden paddle. To bathe, we basically dipped a big bowl into the water and then poured it over our head. It was primitive, but refreshing. Unfortunately, the clean feeling lasted less than an hour, because it was just so flipping hot, that you worked up a sweat just breathing.
We helped some of the other women prepare dinner in the kitchen house. It was a small, one story, ground level building that once served as a school. Like many of the other “public” buildings in all the villages I’d seen so far, the lower half of the walls were wood, the upper half had a type of chicken wire. The roof was corrugated metal Two steps inside the building is a big fire pit, that, if you are not careful, or don’t have enough light at night, would be easy to step into. I helped rinse off the bowls before we used them. I say rinse, because there wasn’t any soap. So I basically dunked the bowls in a bucket of cold water, swished them around, then stacked them on a grungy wooden table.
There was a big controversy brewing because some of the supplies and food were missing. I found the list we used to place the order and read it off to Noemi while she rummaged around the storeroom trying to locate the food and other supplies. Kintal (100 pounds) of rice? Check. Case of crackers? Check. 9 bags of noodles? Check. And so on. What we were unable to find, however, was the sardines, salt, candles, the Yupi, the powdered drink mix that the Waorani love, and a couple other things. Everyone had their theories about what happened. Some thought the store where we bought the stuff shorted us. Some thought we might have missed a box loading onto the canoes. Others thought someone had lifted them. We never did find out what happened, but I have my theories. Nonetheless, it put a damper on our moods. We started to worry if we would have enough food for the entire workshop. I was grateful I had brought a small bag of my own food, including a couple PB&J’s, some crackers, nuts, raisins and a couple Take 5 candy bars that were melting. I decided to ration those, just in case we did run low on food.
That night everyone went to bed pretty early. I hadn’t really slept the night before, so I was ready to crash out as soon as it got dark…which was 6:30. I read about ¾ of a page in my book and then passed out.
The next three days of the workshop went fairly smoothly, all things considered. At the start of the workshop, my counterpart spoke for quite awhile but I have no idea about what, because it was all in Wao terero. She gave me the opportunity to talk a little bit. I briefed the women on the increase in sales at the store and the importance of making high quality artesania. I had made a list of suggestions of ways to improve the quality and went over them with them—most of it pretty basic stuff…like making sure the clasps on the bracelets and necklaces are not too big or too small. They seemed receptive. I tried to make it funny, but I’m not sure some of it translated very well.
We then divided up into different groups so the women could work on a variety of different types of handicrafts. My friend Noemi was teaching the women to make some really cool macramé belts using their traditional chambira palm and seeds. My counterpart was leading a session on traditional weaving, plus she showed some women how to make traditional combs. There were a lot of options. I was pleased that so many women wanted to join my earring workshop. We squeezed into the tiny school desks arranged in a circle and got to work. I handed each of the women a small bag containing 10 pairs of the silver earring posts, some nail clippers to trim the string, and a few other supplies. I had also made some sketches of some simple earring designs using the most commonly available seeds and handed those out. It was kind of cool seeing them diligently following the different examples I made, then branching out to make some of their own designs.
The first day of the workshop, I felt like all I did was drill holes in beads. At one point I was sweating so much I was worried that my hand would slip and I’d put a hole in my finger, rather than the bead. I kept wiping my sweaty palms on my pants in an effort to improve my grip on the tiniest of seeds. We broke a lot of drill bits throughout the day. Thankfully, this time I brought a big supply. At the previous workshop we had a serious drill bit crisis when half of the drill bits broke within the first four hours of the three day workshop. The other half were actually too small to fit in the drills, so we couldn’t use them at all. Really sucked considering that we needed seeds with holes in them in order to make our jewelry. But this time, we brought almost 100 drill bits. I walked around and kept handing them out to the women. Most of the breakages happened when using the manual drills. It was easy to slip off the seed and drill the floor or the vice press, thus snapping the really thin drill bit. There is an incredible amount of labor that goes into each and every bag and piece of jewelry—from the twisting of the palm string, to the drilling of holes in the seeds…not to mention the collection of the seeds and the palm leaves before we even get to that point, or the weaving afterwards.
That night, Noemi and I went to the one of the few houses that had a generator in order to see if we could charge the drills there. It was interesting to see that one part of the tiny village had light, and the other part was completely dark. Stepping inside the building it was clear that this was not your typical Waorani house. They had a stainless steel oven and stove, a large screen t.v., a stereo, two mattresses, a dresser, lots of pots and pans…and the kicker: a full sized refrigerator. I wondered what was the point of having a refrigerator if you could only power the generator a few hours each day… I wondered how the heck they got all this stuff to this village (trying to picture loading a mattress in a canoe)… I wondered how the heck they paid for it all…and then I was reminded of the fact that this was the house of the guy who has been negotiating with the illegal loggers. Ahh…yes. Now it makes sense I guess. But, wow, what a contrast between the other houses. As we waited for the drills to charge, Noemi chatted with a Waorani woman holding a newborn baby. The baby was cranky, so they wrapped the baby in a little blanket, pinning one of her arms inside the blanket. Noemi said that if you wrapped one or both arms inside the blanket, that babies sleep better. As their discussing this, I shift my weight, and narrowly miss the blades of a fan that were spinning rapidly without any protective cage. It was just a strange scene. Naked boy conked out on a mattress next to his baby sister who is wrapped with lots of layers on and her arm pinned to her side…largescreen t.v. blasting some really violent American movie…fan blades spinning…generator running…oh, and some random birds that looked like baby chickens in a box in the kitchen.
The sky that night was incredible. It was so amazing being able to see so many stars without any light pollution to impede the view.
The second day of the workshop was not unlike the first. Everyone kept working diligently on their projects. There weren’t enough school desks, so most of the women sat on the dusty wooden floors—the same ones they had slept on the night before—to continue their weaving. At one point there was some commotion outside and everyone ran to see what was going on. Not wanting to miss out, I too went to see what all the excitement was about. It turns out, one of the men in the village went hunting with his son and brought back 5 wancanas…which the Waorani described as wild pigs. The man had a shotgun propped on one shoulder, while dragging a small wancano with the other hand. The women were very excited, as it meant that they would eat well tonight…and tomorrow as it turned out. I went back to working on my project, and not 10 minutes later my counterpart starts yelling at me to come with her. I had a feeling I knew where this was going. Sure enough, she wanted to show me the butchering process of the wancana. I steeled myself and entered the kitchen house. Three women were standing over the carcass of the pig, which was splayed out on the concrete floor of the building, its sausage-like intestines placed on the floor beside it. I actually did fine with all of this. I thought I would be grossed out, but strangely, I wasn’t. So, the poker face that I maintained actually wasn’t forced. I acted very non-plussed about the whole scene, which may have surprised or maybe even disappointed my counterpart. She told me to take some pictures, which I did, and then moseyed back to the schoolhouse to work with my earring group.
We wound up our workshop around 5 that day and everyone went to the river to bathe. I stripped down to my sports bra and my wick dry shorts and waded in the water. There were at least a dozen other women in this small section of river; some rubbing their heads with bars of soap, others scrubbing and slapping their clothes on a board in the river. One of the women directed me to a section of the river where the river was flowing—where they said the water was cleaner. I shampood my hair slowly, rinsed it out, then sort of stood there for a while trying to figure out what to do next. I had already soaped my body with my hotel-sized bar twice, almost releasing all the sand and grit that had stuck to it after dropping it on the bank. Natural loofah, right? I was starting to get eaten alive, so I decided to go back to the tent to change. As I dried off, I noticed that one of the women was standing in the river cutting and washing some of the meat, just a few feet where others were bathing.
I walked back with my new little friend Vilma, who was about 8, I’d guess (she didn’t know either). She shadowed me around for most of the next day. I actually enjoyed her companionship. The other kids were either shy, or outright scared of me. I later learned, as a mother explained apologetically. that the reason her daughter literally ran away from me was because she thought I was a doctor and that they thought I was going to give her a shot. Oh.
At dusk, there was a fantastic lightning storm off in the distance. It lit up the sky with brilliant flashes of pink. Noemi didn’t know what it was and didn’t believe me that it was lightning. She thought it was some sort of explosion. It made me second guess my explanation. It was unusual in the fact that we never heard any thunder…and that it stayed in just one part of the low skyline…
I wasn’t really hungry that night, and contemplated not even going to dinner, but knew that someone would track me down and drag me there anyway. It was well after dark by the time dinner was served. The kitchen house was lit only by a two small candles and Jer’s headlamp, which I lent to Laura so she could see what she was serving out of the big aluminium pots. I guess it was best that wasn’t able to look closely at what was in the bowl I was handed. All I knew was that it was a big piece of the wancano meat---about the size of a fat man’s fist. It was just huge. I know that the women were trying to be nice about serving me a lot of meat, but yikes. I felt guilty looking around at what I could see in the other women’s bowls…which had more rice than meat. Crap. I started to sweat, and not just because it was 100 degrees in the kitchen. There is no WAY I can eat all of this, even if I was A) a meat lover; B) hungry; or ) confident that it wasn’t the heart or some other organ. But, it would have been really disrespectful to refuse it. Adding to my agony was the fact that there were no utensils left, so I had to pick up the steaming piece of meat with one hand and feebly gnaw on it. My counterpart started to tease me about not eating meat, which made me annoyed and that more determined to prove her wrong…because in fact I WAS eating it. Just not much of it. She is still oblivious to the irony in her teases, as I have still not told her I was a real, live vegetarian for almost 15 years. Oh well, lucky for me the meat was actually ok. I wouldn’t go as far as saying that it was delicious and I definitely didn’t devour it. It was a red meat that definitely had a beefy-taste to it. When a spoon was finally freed up, I asked for a little rice and added it to the substantial amount of broth in the bowl—which I admit was pretty tasty. After working on the chunk of meat for what seemed like an eternity, I casually walked near the door and flipped the rest into the darkness of the night, knowing that one of the many skinny dogs roaming the village would devour it long before the sun would rise again.
That night Noemi and I chatted for hours in the tent before going to sleep. We were like pre-teens at a sleepover. Our conversation ranged from the philosophical---comparing the differences in the crappy healthcare systems of our respective countries---to the gossipy---.she told me crazy stories of some of the Waorani parties she had attended over the years. I confessed my recent anxieties about my period skipping two months. She talked of her challenges of being a single mom. When our conversation tapered off, I started reading my book, Running the Amazon by Joe Kane (also the author of Savages). She asked what the book was about. I started to tell her about the first expedition to run the entire Amazon river from the source of its longest tributary in the mountains of southern Peru to the Atlantic. I kept talking and talking about, what I thought was a fascinating voyage, the motley crew of kayakers, their rough start in Peru. I later asked her if she had ever been to Peru. Noemi? She was sound asleep. I stifled a giggle, then went back to reading my book.
About 11 a.m. on the third day of the workshop, the sky suddenly got dark and then opened up and rained with a violent intensity. It was as if a hundred little hands were pounding on the corrugated metal roof. The cacophony made casual conversation impossible. Not unlike a scene at a punk rock concert, we had to cup our hands and literally yell into the other person’s ear to communicate. About 40 minutes later, the rain stopped as suddenly as it started, leaving a lake-sized puddle outside the school building.
That afternoon, my counterpart invited me to take a break and to come visit one of her friends. We shlepped up and down a muddy path to a narrow log over a big pool of water. I thought I would just walk through the water rather than risk slipping and falling off the log. It didn’t look very deep, anyway. Well, on my first step, I sunk into muck almost to my knee. It was all I could do to get my foot, much less my Croc extricated from the slime. So, guess the log was there for a good reason. Once again, I was the source of entertainment for all.
The woman’s house we visited was made of the traditional thatch, but was open at both ends, creating what felt more like a big V-shaped shelter than a house. She had a veritable zoo hanging around her place. There was what I think might have been a juvenile crested eagle tied to a post, a green macaw hopping around, a squirrel monkey (or was it a capuchin) tied to a grate, a sloth (two toed, maybe?) cradling its baby on a cross beam, a baby wancana (like last nights dinner) dragging a chain, and a mean mama wancana tied up out back.
Another attraction was the gleaming white new toilet located about 30 feet behind the house. No walls, no roof, just an al fresco white crapper connected to a pipe that ran to the edge of the river bank and then stopped abruptly. Supposedly this was all part of the new water system that the company installed that week…. …
We sat around chatting and goofing around and eating freshly cooked ungurawa nuts that turned our teeth black before heading back to the workshop. It was a nice little break. I am glad I got to see some wildlife, but sad that they weren’t in their more natural state…
As a cultural exchange moment, I gave each of the women at the workshop an Ohio buckeye as a small gift and good luck token. I explained that its name in English means the eye of a deer (actually, I said ‘large animal in the forest’ because I totally blanked out on what the word for deer was in Spanish. Argh!!!) and that it was so important to my ‘culture’ that big sports teams and organizations were named after it. I told them that every Christmas my mom and I would make peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate that looked just like the buckeye…and were called buckeyes. I went on to explain, that where I am from we also make jewelry out of them. I ended with telling them that people from our state (province, as people here don’t understand the concept of states) give them to friends for good luck. As I handed one to each woman, I said, “good luck.” I got some really appreciative thank you’s from some of the women. Others just stared at me blankly. Some asked if they could eat it. NO!!! It’s poisonous!!! Several asked if they could plant it. Well, the climate where I am from is just a tad bit different from yours. We have snow! Plus, it’s just not a good idea…. And some asked to use it in a necklace. Of course!
Our final night in the village featured a baile tipico (traditional dance) by the women. Waorani women old and young interlocked arms to form a long line where they sang and chanted their traditional songs. Each painted her faces with achiote and donned their traditional dress for fiestas: pasacuerpos, corteza skirts, woven brazaletas with feathers and jangly leg bands tied tautly around their calves. To the untrained ear (mine) the songs sound more like chants by which the same phrase is repeated over and over and over. But when my counterpart translated for me, the songs were transformed into elaborate stories woven with war, revenge, love, family, travel and adventure. I leaned in, straining to pick out the different words in their songs. Then a loud blast of raggaeton was suddenly and shrilly blasted from a hugonic boom box. Jovenes (teenagers) evidently decided to change the tune, rudely cutting off the traditional dance. The noise reverberated through the forest. They turned the music up another notch, possibly to drown out the diesel generator that was providing power to the stereo. So, in just seconds, the muddy dance floor cleared of the women celebrating their unique culture and ancient traditions and was replaced with jeans-clad Waorani youth doing the campo shuffle to the tired cumbia songs that are heard on every bus in South America.
I decided to go back to my tent.
∞
Okay, so I’m about 15 pages into this sordid tale and I am running out of steam. There are a few other mini stories I could tell about my time in this village, but I am ready to get back to Puyo in my storytelling as much as I was in real life.
So, our exit from the village was more or less uneventful, thankfully. We actually left on time (a little early, incredibly). I let one of the women, Obe, sit on my bag in front of me, as there wasn’t anywhere else to sit in the canoe. There was something strangely elegant about Obe. Not in an ostentatious way. Quite the opposite. She was very timid. But focused. I watched as she doted over her baby, who was tucked in a sheet slung across her shoulder. She seemed oblivious to what was going on around her, as she cooed and clucked and told stories to the wide eyed, smiling baby.
I was glad to be in the first canoe that pulled out, as I was hoping to get good views of wildlife before they’re scared off. But, the first canoe also happened to be the slowest canoe. We were quickly passed by the smaller, less loaded down canoes. Our return trip was quite a bit slower, as we were going against the current. The rains had made the river rise enough that it felt less like an obstacle course of avoiding logs. We passed two groups of loggers. This time my counterpart started snapping photos, so I figured it was ok for me to, too. We passed a boat full of other indigenous people, Kichwa maybe. We also passed a couple gringo kayakers followed by a monster floatie boat loaded down with their gear. The river is most definitely the highway through this region.
The sky was getting dark and I was worried that we were going to get drenched. Then our canoe got snagged on some branches from a partially submerged fallen tree. I was scared for a moment, but no one else seemed to be fazed by it, so I took it as a sign that I should not panic yet. After some maneuvering back and forth we finally got unstuck and pulled up to the bridge, just as it started to sprinkle. I was worried that we would get to the bridge and the bus wouldn’t be there, but my fears were unfounded. My next bigger fear was that the rumor that we were going to drop some people off in Tiwino—a two our round trip—might be true. I wasn’t sure I could tame my temper if the bus started driving in the opposite direction of where we needed to go. That fear, too, was unwarranted. Ahhh…my luck must be changing. I sat back and started to zone out in preparation for the long ride back to Puyo.
About 20 minutes into the trip, however, the bus stops. I look up and notice that the road is blocked by angry men who are on strike against one of the oil companies. You have GOT to be kidding!!! I cannot win! Thankfully, it was a peaceful protest, and one of the Waorani got off and negotiated our passage through the blockade. They moved the chains and we rumbled past. The orange soda distributor on the other side of the strike was not so lucky.
Another 20 minutes pass and the bus stops again. A dozen people get off and run up a hill. With their cellphones. It was the first place between the bridge and Coca where they could catch a signal, and I guess a lot of the Waorani had urgent business to attend to. I sat and stewed.
Three hours later, we pull into Coca. We stop in front of the same chicken broaster place and we all pile out and take over the restaurant once again. I help rotate people to the tables to eat. Thank god for fixed lunches. No menus, no protracted decisionmaking. You get lunch. Period. You get…chicken.
Noemi and I decided to avoid the 5 hour detour to drop off the women in Menepare and got off the bus in the city of Tena. It was well worth paying our own way back in order to catch a direct bus to Puyo. Several other people decided to do the same. We entered the bus station around 8:00 in the evening only to learn that the next bus to leave (at 9:00) “esta danada” damaged. Meaning out of service. Argh! Adding to our frustration was that we suspected that nothing was wrong with the bus; the company just didn’t have enough passengers to make it financially lucrative enough. Or maybe it was because guy at the ticket counter was afraid of the old Waorani man that had joined our group somewhere along the way. He was definitely old school and very intimidating looking. Long, stretched out perforated earlobes. Despite his age, his skin was still taut over his very pronounced muscles. He was shirtless and shoeless and you could tell by the splayed toes on his barefeet that he clearly came from the jungle. Oh, and he was carrying a spear that was at least 10 feet long.
We debated whether or not we should try to catch a passing bus that would be coming through town from Coca on the way to Quito. The problem however, was that it would be unlikely that there would be any seats and we would be forced to stand the whole way. Even though I had been sitting on my arse for so many hours, the prospect of standing might have been inviting were it not for the fact that I would be forced to stand while driving on THAT road. There wasn’t another bus until 11. I thought about calling one of the other volunteers in town to ask if I could crash at her pad and catch a bus back to Puyo in the a.m. But all I wanted was to sleep in my own bed. So the seven of us stood around debating what to do. Some cabbie overheard our discussion and offered to take us to Puyo in his 4-door pickup for $40. It wasn’t going to be worth it unless we all agreed to go and split the cost. Finally, everyone agreed and we piled in the truck. Women in the cab. Men and spears in the truckbed.
It was almost a 2 ½ hour ride back to Puyo. Noemi and I crammed in the front with the cabbie. At the halfway point, we switched seats so that I got to straddle the gearshift and get a little too close to the driver. The conversation on the way back centered on the need for better accountability and leadership on the part of the Waorani political body (all men). They told some pretty unflattering tales of mismanagement of funds, wasted opportunities and promises not kept.
Around 11:00 we pull into the north part of Puyo, and one of the guys in the back pounds on the roof of the cab, signalling the driver to stop there. One of the guys starts to unload their stuff and then hands the driver $5…so then everyone starts to pay. I pulled out $6, but all the Waorani pull out $5. Woah guys, 40 divided by 7 does not $5 make… One person said that they only had five bucks. The driver then get’s ticked off and starts going off. “I didn’t drive all the way to Puyo for a sightseeing trip. You agreed to pay $40.” The arguing went on for a few minutes with my crew saying that they will only pay $5 a person. Then…and I hesitate whether or not to publish this or not…I guess I won’t name names, but one of the women I work with says, “I only agreed to pay $5. I’m only paying $5. Come on Susan, grab your backpack. Let’s go.” I stood there in stunned silence. Then all the Waorani scattered. They totally left me and Noemi standing in the dark street with this really angry dude. The cabbie, fearing that I would also bolt, grabbed my backpack from the truckbed and threw it in the cab, as hostage, then threatened to call the cops. Noemi and I looked at each other, incredulous to what had just happened. We ended up fishing in our purses for the remainder of the cash to give the guy. Thankfully we had it. I was exhausted and embarrassed. But mostly I felt betrayed.
I walked into the apartment and Jer was waiting up for me on the couch. I was so glad to be back. I opened a beer, flopped in the chair and the tears just started to flow as I began to tell him about what all had happened. We stayed up pretty late talking. I was pretty wound up. The fact that our water was out again almost put me over the edge. I wanted—and needed—a shower sooo bad. I didn’t even care that it would be ice cold. Thankfully Jer had boiled some water earlier in the night that was still warm and I took a short bucket bath before crashing out. Hard.
∞
I took my time getting up and getting ready the next morning. It was only Tuesday and the weekend seemed like an eternity away. I was sipping my coffee and towling my hair dry after taking another shower/bucket bath—this one really hot—when my cellphone rings. I groan and looked at the caller ID. It was Noemi. I pick up. “Alo.”
“Where are you?”
“At the house. What’s up?”
She was talking crazy fast, even more so than usual, and all I could make out was that something happened to the bus after we got off and that some of the women were hurt.
“The woman that was sitting across the aisle from us was hurt pretty bad—you remember, the one with the little baby. I’m headed to the hospital with Manuela.”
Click.
I stared at my phone in disbelief. Oh my god. Oh my god. I was flooded with emotions. Guilt. Relief. Guilt again. Then fear. Then a dreaded realization that the woman sitting across from us was Obe. The elegant Obe. Oh no…oh no.
I rushed into town and saw a group of Waorani women standing outside the store. I approached them and asked if they had any more details of what happened.
They said that they were on their way back from dropping off the dozen or so women from Menepare and the brakes on the bus went out and they went off the road and crashed into some trees…or maybe the bus rolled (this part was unclear). Obe was sitting in the front row of the passenger seats and was suffered a severe head wound.
One of the women said “she was dead for four hours!” What!?!?!
“No, no, she was unconscious,” another woman corrected her.
“There was blood everywhere,” someone else added. “And we were really far from everything. There was no cell signal, no light, nothing nearby. Someone had to run really far down the road to find somebody to help us and to call a different bus.”
“What time did this happen?” I ask.
“Around 11:00. And we didn’t get back to Puyo until 7:30 this morning.”
My heart sank. If Obe had a head injury and was unconscious for so many hours, would she make it…could she make it? If I had still on the bus, would I have made it? My mind was racing.
I went up to the Women’s Association office where some of the women were lingering. I got to hear three other versions of the same story. As if to prove what happened, one of them showed me her bag, which was stained with blood. I felt sick. I choked back tears, then tried to go about figuring out what I could do to help.
After hours of waiting for news, my counterpart called to tell me that Obe was going to be ok. She was at the Shell missionary hospital with her baby, who was not injured. I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
The next day and a half were consumed with a flurry of phone calls and faxes and discussions about arranging for paying for Obe’s hospitalization, providing transport of the women back to their communities, and finding funds to feed them while they waited. I felt bad that I didn’t have hardly any food in the house to give them or cook for them. I ended up going to a bakery and buying a big bag of empanadas and bread to hold them over. The women’s association had arranged flights back for a few of the women, but of course they were delayed several times. One of the flights was thrown for a loop when Obe had to remain in the hospital. We couldn’t afford two flights, so we delayed the charter and the women who were going to be on the same flight as her would have to wait until she got out of the hospital.
On the day that Obe was to be released from the hospital, I was asked to go to the hospital and pick her up. One of the other women and I called the cab driver that has a contract with the Association and we head to Shell. Once at the hospital, no one could explain to us what the procedure was to check her out. We just kept getting sent from one window, to another, then back to the first window. We asked someone passing in the hall that looked like they might know what was going on. We were told to wait. And so we waited. Frustrated and fearful that we were running up a pretty hefty cab fare, we pressed one of the women for an answer. It turns out that we couldn’t get Obe until her bill was paid. This was supposedly already taken care of, but the woman behind the counter shook her head and said, no, sorry. She owes $187.56. Ugh.
Ecuadorian hospitals literally do not let you leave until you pay your entire bill. I told the cabbie that this was quite a different system that I was used to. In the U.S., they kick you out of the hospital the moment you are stitched up, give birth or come to. Then they bill you out the wazoo. “Yeah, that wouldn’t exactly work here. These people would leave the hospital and go hide in the forest,” the cabbie said. “Imagine trying to track down some of these people that live adentro to try to get them to pay their bill.” Ok, good point.
Sylvia and I went to visit Obe to break the bad news to her, that she would have to stay until we could get the bill figured out. The hospital could have been the set for a movie in the 1970’s. Everything looked dated. Clean, but very 1970’s - ish. I think it was the tiles and the old school beds. Obe sat serenely holding her baby. Her 14 year old daughter sat quietly on a chair by the bed. Obe had a large laceration held together by quite a few stitches that started somewhere in her scalp and went down the middle of her forehead. Not nearly as bad as I had feared. I asked her if she was feeling all right. Sylvia translated and said she was. They chatted for a while in Wao Terero. Thoughts of springing her out of her raced through my head. It wouldn’t be that hard to sneak her out. But that would be uncool I guess. I asked her if she had her clothes. Sylvia translated. Obe reached over to the table by the side of her bed and grabbed a red piece of material—what was left of the shirt that had been cut off of her after the accident. She held it up and gave me a soft smile. “Hummm…well, we are going to have to find you some clothes, aren’t we?”
I went to the nurse’s desk and asked if they had any clothes that they could give to her, as hers were cut off of her. Without looking up from the chart she was reading form, the nurse said rather dispassionately, “No, sorry, the gowns have to stay here. You’ll have to find her something else to wear.”
As we were walking past the payment window, one of the women asked me if my name was Susan. Yes, yes it is, I said, startled. You have a phone call. What? I pick up the phone. It was my counterpart. She said that she had arranged for Obe’s bill to be paid. This is great, I say. But you need to tell the hospital, not me! I handed the phone back to the payment ladies and they jotted down a bunch of numbers and then hung up. “Ok, she’s free to go.” I have no idea what my counterpart did to settle the bill. Credit cards are not commonly used. Probably best not to ask. I just wanted to get out of there. But we still hadn’t figured out the clothing dilemma. Sylvia and I went out to the parking lot and woke up the cabbie and told him that we could spring her loose, but she didn’t have any clothes. I asked if he by chance had any extra shirts stashed somewhere in the truck. He looked at me, like I must be kidding. “So, give me your shirt then,” I said, playfully. “I mean, I know she is Waorani, but we can’t ask her to walk out of the hospital naked!” I said.
Before he reply, Sylvia blurted out, “I know a missionary in town, I can ask her to let us borrow some clothes. Let’s go!” So we drove to the other side of town and pulled up before a pastel painted concrete house surrounded by a tall iron fence and a mean looking german shepherd prowling the perimeter. Sylvia disappeared inside the house. As we waited, the cabbie started complaining about how the women’s association wasn’t organized. He grumbled about wasting half his day running them around. Don’t get me started, I thought. “And I haven’t been paid for months!” he exclaimed. Finally Sylvia comes dashing out of the house with a bag, jumps in the cab and then we headed back to the hospital. We marched into Obe’s room and handed her the bag. In it was a double breasted sky blue polyester dress. A definite church lady dress. Obe struggled to get it on, and I ended up having to button it for her, and flip down the wide collar. I was glad Sylvia had chosen a dress, because Obe didn’t seem to have pants or underwear either. Or shoes. But that was a minor detail at this point. As we gather up what little other possessions they had there, Obe told Sylvia that she couldn’t find the sheet that she used to carry the baby. I went out to the nurses’ station to ask about it. The nurse poked around a couple cubby holes in a storage closet, wandered off down the hall, then eventually came back empty handed. She said it was probably in the laundry. “She can get it when she comes back in a week to get her stitches out.” Oh, right. Stitches out. Didn’t think about that. Guess we need to delay the flight again. Crap. I thought.
We followed Obe as she walked silently and gingerly down the hall, out the door and to
I walked back to the house. Our Peace Corps Volunteer friend Katie and Jeremy were at the house. Jer was making dinner. Katie was making Pisco Sours. She handed me one as I flopped on the couch to recant the emotionally draining day. After a few pisco sours, Katie and I started in on a bottle of wine. Later that night I started going through my meager wardrobe to pick out clothes to give to Obe. Fuelled by the booze, I kept piling more and more clothes until I had filled a pretty big bag. I didn’t need them, anyway. Unfortunately my feet are hugonic, otherwise I would have given her a bunch of my shoes, too. Then maybe Jer would stop harassing me about my shoe collection.
∞
Last Saturday, Jer and I went with some friends to the nearby town of Mera to check out a competition of traditional games between the various indigenous nations. The flyers advertised spear throwing and blowgun competitions, among other interesting events. After a lot of waiting around for our friends to assemble (this is getting tiring, isn’t it?) we show up to see a competition where guys have to walk on a slippery bamboo log that was tied up at water level. It was kind of fun watching these really ripped guys walk try to walk across. Another competition involves something underwater. The objective was not clear. Maybe holding their breath, maybe looking for something. Don’t know. We also got to watch the blowgun competition where guys aimed their darts at a melon. After each round, they had to back up another 20 feet or so and aim again. It was pretty cool, actually. As we were leaving the competition, I see the bus driver who took us on that hellish recent trip adentro. I did a double take. There was the same flipping bus!
Oh my gawd! Taped to the front of the windshield was a sign, “For Sale. As Is.”
∞
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2 comments:
Another riveting entry Susan! We are so glad you weren't a part of the accident, and are relieved that Obe is relatively OK too.
I had wondered, and am I'm glad to know y'all have a good supply of tiny drill bits. (I just broke two yesterday while making a rope ladder for Gabby).
Looking forward to more fascinating stories (with happy endings), and hope you feel better soon.
: )
Rick and Mel
So whats with these chickens? are you opening a BW3's? If so, I'm there sarah can handle baby dylemma just fine without me.
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