A visit to the shaman

Hello all. How was the weekend? I had a very strange Saturday. I^ll go so far as saying the strangest Saturday Ive ever had. I think I need to share it with someone. I finally got that jungle tribal voodoo rain dance Ive been ranting on about for years....

So I was sitting in a shitty little town, called Aguas Verdes on the Ecuadorian border as I needed to renew my visa wondering what I should do next. Ecuador is supposed to be beautiful but theres still so much of Peru I havnt seen yet. A voice told me I should go back. I turned around to the toothless man behind me
"What did you say?"
No it was a voice in my head saying go back. I had decided I was going to go down to Pisco to work for a month where last Augusts earthquake was as theyre looking for all sorts of people to lend a hand and with all this free time I dont know what to do with myself. Right, time to find a bus. There was a bus right beside me. Piura? the bus man shouts at me. That might be good I thought and the bus working guy seeing that I showed the slightest bit of interest tries to grab my bag and herd me and some others on to the bus like we were cattle. I was feeling a bit stressed and flustered at this time having missed breakfast aswell...
"Im not a cow" I told him. I dont have udders, dont sleep standing up and I dont mooo. Well sometimes I do but only when I know the person well. Yet not thinking straight I got on the bus which had no seats left and made the seven hour bus ride to Piura standing up. Comfy.

Now Pisco is a longs long way away from where I was so I thought I might break the journey up somewhat. I had read an interesting article and also met someone who had partaken in a shamanistic ceremony in this area in the mountains of the north known as Huancabamba where many shamans, brujos or curanderos are said to live. The shimbe lakes in the region are said also to have curative powers. Right said Fred, vamos. But it was a bit out of the way. What made me decide to take the ten hour, incredibly scary might I add, bus ride up windy narrow mountain roads covered in mist with drops of several feet to one side. I dont know, why did the chicken cross the road? Well because he was a curious little chicken. And curiousity killed the cat not the chicken my friends. So while our feline friend is sprawled flat out dead in the middle of the road, the little chicken was left to paint his face, drink strange brew from a tin can and dance around the campfire. True story. That, and the chickens mother had been making regular trips to India in her mid forties and is currently in the process of converting their garage in Wicklow into a meditation centre and had been ranting on about shamanism for a while, I, I mean the chicken wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

This place certainly was off the beaten track. You dont usually get called gringo too much when travelling round Peru. Sometimes. Its not offensive or anything. It just means you get sunburned more easily than most, have a tendency to get robbed and cant dance. Somewhere in the middle of the long bus ride, the bus stops for a short break and about 15 kids, each with a bag of about a kilo of mangos, hop aboard and starts unleashing salesman hell in an attempt to get rid of all their mangos.
"Gringo, mangos", one shouts.
"Gringo!, mangos!", another girl squeals putting the bag right in my face.
"Gringo!!, mangos!!", as one sneaks up from behind.
I tried to tell them they were waisting their breath as Im much more of a meat fan, and I couldnt possibly eat all those mangos, but they were relentless in their efforts untill the driver started the engine again and began to pull away with the kids finally giving up. Bless their cotton socks.

When I arrived ar the bus terminal in Huancabamba there was a list of the 96 registered shamans who live in the area and how to get in contact with them. Too much choice. What does one want from a shaman? I was quite green in these affairs and being rather tired picked one at random and organised with a taxi driver to pick me up the following day to make the two hour trek up higher to the lake district.

A knock came at my hotel room door at 4am the following morning. Bah humbug!, says I. It was the taxi driver. It was necessary to leave at 4am as the day would involve a lot apparently. We climbed up to about 4000m till we reached the house of the shaman. Various people, mostly Peruvians come to these shamans, or maestros as theyre more commonly called here to get treated for serious cases of bad luck, or for matters of love and money. The ceremony itself is said to cleanse the soul. Interesting. The maestro, a tall man, asked me why I came here. I didnt think my soul was particularly dirty. After 24 years of use it could probably do with an old polish....I made something up. Im not sure he understood me in my broken spanish anyway.

After breakfast we headed for the lakes on horseback. It was cold, oh so cold. I had forgotten how to drive a horse but he seemed to know where he was going so I sat back and enjoyed the scenery, of which I could see nothing because of the dense mist. With us there was a father, mother and daughter who had made the pilgrimage from wiliabamba in the jungle and another business man from the same area. They looked at me in a funny way as to say what the hell are you doing here.
"Que tal, gringo", the old man says laughing, not wanting to use the name that I had previously given him.
"Bien", I replied. Things however were about to get muy raro quickly. Dios mio.

When we arrived at the lake it was even colder than before. Get me off this feckin horse por favor. Bare with me, heres when things start getting wierd. The meastros helper had put a selection of swords in the ground beside the lake and various ornaments and perfumes on a mat nearby. We stood in a line and were called up to the maestros helper one by one. I was the first. He began chanting in strange tongue then stopped to say quickly
"Cual es tu nombre, gringo?"
"Mi nombre es Ron"
He started chanting again.
"De donde eres?"
"Soy de Brittas Bay, county wicklow.......Irlanda"
He began chanting away again at a savage pace. I couldnt understand most of what he was saying but picked out the odd setence or two about having good luck with work, love, family, friends etc. etc. Fair enough, can always do with a helping hand. He then finished his chant, took the bottle of perfume or whatever it was he was carrying, put it in his mouth, then spat it out all over me. Well I wasnt expecting that.

We were done apparently and it was someone elses turn to be spat at. Well are you happy now son, a voice in my head said, youre in the middle of nowhere with a load of lunatics, freezing your ass off, who are all a bit sceptical of you, getting spat at.
"Shut up you pussie", another voice said. "This could be fun".
Before I knew it we were all standing in a line holding seashells in our left hands while the maestros helper poured tobacco juice into them. What now I thought. I looked to my left and right and it looked like the others were whispering their wishes and desires into the sea shells.
"I wish for a tasty steak" I told the seashell.
"Take this seriously", the other voice said. And I shared the little wishes I have in this world with the seashell. Meanwhile the maestros helper was dancing and chanting around us spraying, not spitting this time more perfume at us. I was starting to smell like a beautiful woman. When he finished chanting he ordered us to snort the tobacco juice from the seashell into our left nostril. Ive done some silly things with salt, lemon and tequilla before but wasnt sure if I was up for this. Meanwhile the others were getting stuck in. Fuck it. This isnt so bad I thought. OH GOD IT STINGS SO BAD!!. And I had only managed to get a bit into my nose. I finished the rest. Slowly. This was repeated with the right nostril. Maybe I should have done some research into this I thought, with the other voice in my head loving every minute of the wierdness.

Its only ten in the morning at this stage. The real ceremony would not begin untill ten that night. The others were then stripping off their clothes and jumping into the lake. I couldnt believe it, even though I had heard about this part and had brought my mickey mouse towel with me, I still couldnt believe it. It must have been about 2 degrees above zero, with the water being well below zero. Minus silly degrees at least. Still I found myself stripping down to my undies and jumping in for all of fifteen seconds. We were told we had to do dunk our bodies in three times. When I got out of the lake I started to dry myself.
"No seca, no seca", he tells me, apparently wanting me to put my clothes on straight away.
"You are nuts my friend", I told him in my first language.

The others seemed to be a little less sceptical of me at this stage, and the dad of the family came and gave me a big wet hug and told me that he loved gringos. Then they started being quite friendly to me and asking me lots of questions. On the return journey I was shivering my ass off and was very worried about getting hypothermia or something as we rode horseback two hours back to the maestros
house. The dad offered me some incredibly strong drink from a plastic bottle which automatically started warming me up. I drank some more.
"Dont drink too much, its dangerous", he says.
"What the hell is it", I asked.
He laughed.

When we got back to the house we all went for a rest and nothing much happened for the rest of the day untill the ceremony at ten. Time for some real madness. We went in to the maestros den, which was dimly lit and sat around in a circle. The maestro had prepared some San Pedro strange brew which we all had a cup of
and then sat in silence for half an hour. Waiting.
Is he snoring? I asked myself.
The maestro had his head down, and I could hear that he was definitely snoring. Loudly. I looked around at everyone else, all of whom had their heads down to the ground. He suddenly came out of his coma and began chanting so quickly and strongly it scared the life out of me. Well what can I say, the ceremony went on for about 4 hours or so involving lots of tribal like dancing....at one stage we were all dancing around in a circle each carrying a sword over our heads while the meastro poured more of that perfume on us. At times I certainly got into. Got quite into it actually. The other part of me holding back quite a bit, thinking wow this is definitely the wierdest thing youve ever done. Bravo. Quite the experience. So this is what youve been up to mother, these trips to India, new hobbies. I should have known.

Im back in Piura now. And treating myself to all manner of creature comforts like Pizza hut and fancy hotel rooms. The whole experience has left me rather tired. That and when on the bus I really did feel the onset of pnemonia setting in. The small price to pay for a clean soul I thought. Two minutes later I was thinking otherwise as every bone in my body started to ache and my forehead was burning up. This is what happens when you swim in freezing cold lakes with strange people man. I didnt have any money either as there are no ATMs in Huancabamba. Luckily I had met a young doctor at the bus station who offered to lend me money for a bus ticket till we got to Piura. And when we stopped he went into the pharmacy and bought me all manner of painkillers, antibiotics and rehydrating salts. Sound man. Glad I met him.

Well thats it for now. Apologies for the length of this one. I got carried away. Still feeling a bit under the weather so gonna rest up here for a day or two. Next stop, Pisco. The very place where the drink of the same name comes from. Mmmm tasty. Talk at you later my friends. Take care of yourselves and dont swim with strangers.

Hasta luego

El Ron

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