Returning to the Rain Forest

I am back. The lagoon is still here, the cacique birds are just as noisy as before, the people are all familiar and by now I know whose children at the Lodge I am teaching at the High School. 

Cacique bird

I dragged back 30 small size dictionaries and some bigger ones hoping that staff at the Lodge will fall in love with the phonetic transcription system: some of them are already getting hooked.

Jungle classroom

Can I have some more?

”This is like breast feeding on demand,” I am muttering to myself with the secret pride of a mother watching her baby grow by the day when yet another staff member declares that the only time he can make it for English is at 12:30, that is right after lunch and before the resident manager wants his at 13:00 to be followed by the barman at 14:00 (by when I have done 3-4 other sessions in the morning). All this under the blazing rain forest sun where my skin feels like the inside of a freshly washed and never drying plastic bag.

So I teach whenever and wherever: in the hammock house, by the river, in the hut for English classes (when they are not watching DVDs there) the one for the wayusa tea ceremony (when they are), the staff canteen and the bar as well as while walking back to my cabin on the raised boardwalk to consolidate greetings and saying thanks. Am I complaining? Not really.

The language program has actually entered its second phase. I have started recording some of the dialogues I wrote up before, my favourite handyman, Julio is listening to his cassette with me every evening. I am hoping to get a new radio cassette player from the Quito office and it might just happen that I will have my own printer. I have spent Oliver’s money but got some more from my Masters students after they have seen the images from the jungle and spent a whole session comparing my classroom in the rain forest and theirs at the university as an observation exercise. Some of them actually decided that they preferred mine overlooking the river with only three students...

I even managed to get all of Daniela’s donations down here courtesy of the Quito office: loads of coloured paper, plasticine and sheets of coloured foam for artwork. I hope to use them to brighten up the classrooms with the posters and pictures we might create. I printed the photos of my students and will put them in plastic pockets before they go up on the wall.

A day out

This week has been quiet, the staff of the high school are away on training, so there are no classes. On Sunday people from the Lodge went over to Kusutkau for a minga*: they were joining forces to clear a jungle trail and repair the boat landing. It was the ideal time to get away for a day as there were only two guests around: a San Francisco based Indian couple, Rucha and Sai. And, of course, the world is small. Sai is originally from the state of Kerala that we know very well thanks to Arundhati Roy, the Goddess of Small Things. And Rucha is from Pune (Poona), where Alem went to school, in fact they might have even known each other as they belong to the same generation.

We went to the clay lick, a mud wall on the riverbank: birds and macaws eat a lot of fruits, seeds and flowers that contain natural toxins. The clay that the birds consume at the colpa contains chemicals that neutralize these harmful materials. I have no binoculars, but I could still spot the birds with their bright green and red feathers among the leaves. We were watching them from the motor boat for quite some time before starting on our walk to a lagoon.

Hoatzins

Wildlife is amazing around this remote spot in the rain forest. We saw loads of hoatzins (my favourites, because they are so peculiar with their prehistoric shape and the crown on their heads), as well as birds whose name I cannot care to remember, a family of capivaris, the biggest rodents in the world (they are like overgrown hamsters) and at least three caimans that looked exactly like pieces of logs thrown in the pond except they had eyes.

Capivari family

In the afternoon we visited one of the Achuar communities and stayed at the house of the village chief, who happens to be our resident manager’s father. As is the custom, we entered the oval, palm-thatched house and sat down in silence at a distance from Guido, who used to be a guide at Kapawi Lodge. The Achuar guide who was with us for the day is married to one of Guido’s daughters. They started chatting while Guido’s wife brought chicha for us to drink. This was the second or third time I tried the fermented manioc beer, and even though it’s an acquired taste, I am beginning to like the milky beverage that resembles yoghurt on the brink of going off. I presume in time I will miss it just as I have been missing injera, the Ethiopian sour pancake.

We all introduced ourselves to the head of the family. I said I have a special connection with his family since his son is my boss and his daughter, Maria is my student. Rucha and Sai talked about their work in San Francisco and then it was Guido’s turn. He said he was the community chief, but he was also the pastor holding mass on Saturdays and Sundays for those converted to the Catholic faith. Sai spotted some small crosses dug in the dirt floor of the house. ”We bury our dead in the house,” explained Guido, ”these are the children we lost.” I counted four. Altogether they had eleven.

One of our Achuar guides, Celestino

We were encouraged to ask questions and Sai wanted to know how life changed after the arrival of the missionaries. What is it that he misses from the old way of life? ”I can’t remember too well,” said Guido,”my father was killed when I was four, so he couldn’t teach me a lot of things that children learn from their fathers. But the missionaries told us to cultivate our language and treasure our traditions.”

Guido also asked us questions and they were by far not trivial. How do I see the future of my Achuar students? ”I am not British and I am not a native speaker of English, but all I can say is that education is a matter of life and death for the Achuar children,” I responded. ”I don’t know what will happen in twenty years’ time, but I want to prepare them for the best and the worst. Whether they manage to preserve their way of life or not, English will be useful for them.”

”How did your grandfather die?” I asked Angel the following day. ”He was a shaman and word got around that he was a bad shaman who harmed people. One day when he was alone in the jungle, someone followed him and shot him dead.”

People in the Achuar communities are still in awe of their shamans and believe that they are able to kill someone without physical contact. However, once a shaman is held responsible for an otherwise unexplained death, his own life will be in danger and killing him will be seen as justified.

I am walking down the raised boardwalk to look for our boat driver, Mauro. ”Teacher, I am sorry. I just heard that my wife is unwell. I need to go and tell her that tomorrow afternoon we are going to see the shaman.”

Over my forty years of teaching I have been given numerous reasons for cancelling a class. Having to go to the shaman is a first.

Good night.

*kaláka 

At the Lodge outside the bar