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Travel E-Logs: Amazon Rain Forest
Travel E-Logs #5: Limoncocha and Communities Around - Traditions and Cultures
Dear
Students:
Alituta (good evening) from Limoncocha. This week, Lilia, Teresa and I are
visiting schools in and around Limoncocha. We are visiting 7th through 11th
grade classes in the colegio in Limoncocha and K-6 schools in three nearby
communities, Rio Jivino, Pompeya Chicta and Yamanunca.
Rio Jivino and Pompeya are Quichua communities and Yamanunca
is a Shuar community.
In this report, I’ll tell you about traditional Quichua weddings and
funerals, follow up on the Pobrecita Yeseña story from the last
report, tell you about one of our school visits and include more guess-who
poems, answers to your questions and another math puzzler.
A Time
for Celebration: A Traditional Quichua Wedding
Last week, Lilia and I attended a traditional Quichua boda (wedding)
in 
Limoncocha.
It was quite different from other weddings we’ve been to. Early in the
morning, thirty family members and friends of the groom gathered to prepare
a giant meal, one that would feed the whole community. By eleven in the morning,
a brother of the groom began to play a drum, summoning other family members
and friends to gather. As they entered the groom’s parent’s home,
the sister-in-laws of the groom served them chicha, a traditional Quichua
drink made of fermented cassava. Once everyone had gathered, the groom sat
in a chair in the middle of the main room and everyone circled around him.
The groom’s compadres (a couple whose daughter is the goddaughter
of the groom) took the groom’s old clothes off (down to his skivvies),
then dressed him in traditional Quichua clothing, featuring two red and white
ponchos and a straw cowboy hat. Once dressed, the groom and the compadre marched
hand in hand out the door and towards the bride’s family’s house,
followed by the groom’s extended family and friends.
At the bride’s house, the bride’s extended family and friends
had already gathered. The groom’s compadre led him through the
crowd to the bride’s parents. There, in front of everyone, the groom
knelt down and asked the bride’s parents for their daughter. They agreed
to give their daughter away – and called for her to come. When she arrived,
her sisters and female friends gathered around her, took off her old clothes
and put a red wedding dress on her. They also, put make-up on her face and
put a red band around her head. Then, the groom took the bride’s hand
and walked with her away from the bride’s house, with the crowd following
and one of the groom’s brothers playing a drum.
Next, the whole crowd and other community members gathered at the casa
comunal
(the community house), where first the couple and the compadres and then
all of the members of both families performed a traditional wedding dance
that lasted several hours. In the dance, performed to drum and violin music,
the women line up on one side with the men facing them on the other side.
The men step towards the women to the beat of the drum and the women step
back; then the women step towards the men and the men step back. In between
all the dancing, the family members of the groom served food and chicha to
all of the guests. By evening time, when the traditional dancing ended, everyone
circled around the bride and groom. Two people laid a blanket on the ground
and the bride and groom lay down on the blanket. Then, two other people laid
another blanket on top of the bride and groom. Under the blanket, the couple
hugged, and then emerged – to a loud cheer – a brand new married
couple!
Changing Traditions
The people
referred to the wedding as ‘traditional,’ but, according to an
elderly couple we spoke with in Limoncocha, many things we saw were different
from weddings in ‘the old days.’ For one, in the old days, the
bride and groom wore clothes made of palm leaves and decorated themselves
with bird feathers and seed jewelry. In the wedding we attended, the bride
and groom wore modern clothes typically worn by Quichua people from the mountains
of Ecuador, not from the rain forest. Also, where the bride wore modern make-up
in the wedding we witnessed, in the old days women would paint the face of
the bride – and men would paint the body of the groom – with a
red dye taken from the seeds of a tree called achiote.
The elderly women we spoke with told us she got married when she was only
eleven years old – and her parents and her husband’s parents were
the ones who decided who she would marry. When she got married, she wore a
veil throughout the ceremony, so the groom could not see her face. After her
wedding, her family took her back to her own house and didn’t let her
go to her husband’s house for a whole year afterwards – and she
didn’t have children till she was sixteen. Nowadays, rain forest Quichua
people still marry at a young age, but not that young – usually between
16 and 20 years old. Also, the people more often choose their own wife or
husband and the women do not wear veils during the marriage ceremony. Also,
we were told, the wedding celebration could last for several days, not just
one – and huge amounts of food and chicha would be prepared. In the
wedding we attended, the main food was chicken soup with noodles and vegetables,
beef, rice, plantains and cassava. In the old days, the meal would have included
meat of wild animals, like monkey, tapir, capybara, agouti and armadillo,
lots of fish, and cassava.
Note: We are including two photos from the wedding: people preparing for the
feast and two men playing traditional Quichua music.
A Time
for Mourning: A Traditional Wake
On Monday of this week, Lilia, Teresa and I went to visit La Escuela Rio Amazonas
again and, to our surprise, discovered that there were no classes. Instead,
students were gathering a whole bunch of flowers (see the attached photo).
A teacher told us that a forty-one year old man from the village, named Francisco,
died on Saturday and students from the escuela would present the flowers to
his family. (Three of Francisco’s sons attend the escuela and another
one attends the colegio. He and his wife had seven children in all.)
The teacher told us that the man died of brujeria or witchcraft. Because the
man was healthy then suddenly got sick and was vomiting blood and died three
days later, the teacher, like many other people in the village, believed that
a shaman was hired to send an evil spirit to make the man sick. Later, a woman
from the village who works in the community health center told us the man
died of malaria.
Last year when Lilia and I were visiting Limoncocha, a boy from the colegio
died under mysterious circumstances, too; and then, like now, people gave
different reasons for his death. Nine years ago when I lived in Limoncocha,
a small boy died of malaria and I attended his funeral. Below are two flashbacks,
one from last year and one from nine years ago.
Flashback: Life and Death in the Amazon
Just before we left Limoncocha, something very sad happened. Tragically, a bright, respectful high school student who Lilia and I both formerly taught, named Marco, died. The cause of his death was not exactly clear, since there were two stories circulating around town about how it happened. In the first, corroborated by the village’s clinic doctor, Marco had an appendix operation about a week ago and, instead of giving the wound time to heal, went hunting and played soccer soon after. The wound tore open and got infected which caused Marco to bleed internally and vomit blood. In the second story, corroborated by most people in town, Marco went hunting and came across a dead rat. When he went to move the rat out of his path with a stick, some force, explained to be sort of like a chemical or electric current, ran up the stick and all through Marco’s body. By the time he got home, he was throwing up blood. His family took him to a local healer, but the healer said it was too late for him to do anything: a bad shaman had set a trap for someone else and Marco accidentally got in the way of the shaman’s medicine.
All of the students and teachers at the high school attended the wake. Lilia and I did not, however, since we had to leave for Quito. But I remember back to the time I first taught in Limoncocha, eight years ago, when I did attend a traditional Quichua wake. It wasn’t exactly what I expected. Here’s the story:
Flashback: An Unusual Time for Play
Last week,
I received some very sad news from students in my fourth grade
class. Their classmate, Filomena, was absent because her three year old brother
died the night before. I did not know the boy since he was too young to go
to school and his family lived outside the village center. But since I knew
his sister, my student, I decided that I would attend the wake which would
be held that night in the village hall.
Later in
the day, my high school students told me about the Quichua casket closing
ceremony, which would occur in the afternoon before the wake. I had witnessed
this ceremony once - on the very first day I arrived in Limoncocha. On that
day, as a teacher was giving me a tour of the village, we stopped in at the
village hall. Many people were gathered around a large table in the center
of the hall. The body of an old man who had died the day before lay on the
table, wrapped in a cloth sack. Candles burned all around the body and, in
one corner of the building, several men were building a wooden casket. When
the casket was finished, they put it on the table next to the man. Shortly
after, a community leader said a few words and some people began to cry and
chant. Then the wife and the daughter of the dead man took a bag filled with
clothes that belonged to the man wheng he was alive. They lay the clothes,
one piece at a t! ime, inside the casket. When the bottom of the casket was
covered with a layer of clothes, a few men lifted the body and placed it in
the casket on top of the clothes. Then, the women put another layer of clothes
over the body. When they placed the last article of clothing over the body,
they could no longer contain their strong emotions, and the broke into sobs
and wailing. Then, a few men came forward and nailed the lid on the coffin
- and the ceremony ended.
That was several months ago. This time, since I had to teach my classes, 
I
couldn't attend the casket closing ceremony of Filomena's brother. But in
the evening, as it was getting dark, I walked into the village to attend the
wake. I met some people as I was walking and they told me that it was customary
to bring some food or useful items for the bereaved family. So, before going
to the village hall, I stopped at a shop and bought a kilo of sugar, two packages
of candles, a few cans of tunafish and a bottle of cooking oil.
When I entered the hall, the casket lay closed on a table in the center of the building. About thirty or more candles were burning on top of and around the casket. People sat on benches and chairs or stood around the table, with the family of the boy sitting in a line on one side. I greeted the family, shaking all of their hands - and saying hello to Filomena - then gave them my gifts. Filomena's parents thanked me for the food and candles and put them on the table with the other gifts they had received.
Shortly afterwards, a man named Mario, who was also a member of my English class for adults, led everyone in a few prayers. Then, the church musicians played music and led everyone in a few songs. The words of the prayers and the songs were in Quichua, of course, so I was very surprised when, after the music, Mario spoke to me - with everyone listening - in English. But, I was even more surprised by what I thought I heard him say, "Paul, the ceremony is finished, we would like to ask you if you would stay to play with the children and teach them some American games." Mario was a very good English student, but I thought that he must have made a mistake. To me, playing at a wake didn't seem to fit. So, a bit confused, I walked over and asked him about his request.
He explained to me that it was a Quichua custom for children to stay up all night after a wake. To keep the children cheerful and awake, and safe from evil forces aroused by death, it became customary for them to play games until the next dawn. Mario knew that I often played basketball and other games with the children. He figured I could help keep the children awake. So, even though we were at a wake, and at first it didn't seem to me to be a time for playing, I agreed to his request - and, in a way, I felt honored.
Soon the hall became festive with play. I joined in on several traditional games and taught the children, including Filomena, how to play Simon Says, Spoons and Red Rover. We played until morning - and then we went to school.
Flashback:
Pobrecita Yeseña
(Here’s another flashback to last year, following up on the story of
Yeseña.)
In the last report, I told you about Yeseña and her dislocated elbow
ordeal: so here’s an update. She’s doing better, but we found
out through a teacher that her suffering didn’t end with all that tugging
and pulling on her arm - and, oddly enough, she wasn’t the only girl
in town to dislocate her elbow and get it reset by Don Niconor last week.
The teacher told us, to our shock, that Yeseña received a sound spanking
after she got home from Don Niconor’s house. We asked why and she just
said that some parents do that. But later in the week, we got a clearer answer.
Dislocated elbows are not common injuries in Limoncocha, but last week, Cinthia,
a third grader, joined the club after falling off her bicycle. She also went
to see Don Niconor and had much better luck than Yeseña. Her bones
popped back into their socket with one tug and she was walking around afterwards,
without a cast, playing as if nothing ever happened.
We were talking with Cinthia’s father, Don Gervacio, later that day
and he told us that it was a Quichua tradition to give a serious spanking
to a child who had such an accident, to teach them to be more careful so it
won’t happen again. He said if the accident were completely unavoidable,
like a tree branch falling on a child, the child would not be punished, but
if the accident happened as a result of the child’s carelessness, like
falling of a chair or a bicycle, a spanking would most likely ensue. In the
old days, he said, the most common infraction was falling out of a tree, since
children often climbed trees for fun and for fruit. He explained that, as
a child, he received such a spanking from his own father after falling out
of tree and, as a parent, gave one to one of his sons after the son fell out
of a tree - even though the son had broken his arm. In Cinthia’s case,
though, since she is his youngest of ten children and the only girl, her parents
no longer felt compelled to follow tradition, hoping she would learn from
the pain she endured from the accident alone. 
During the conversation, Don Gervacio, told us about a few other traditional
rain forest Quichua punishments. He said that when he was young, some children
would steal eggs from other families. If they got caught, their own parent
would wrap their hand in a leaf and put it in a fire for a few seconds, administering
a painful lesson that hands are not for stealing. In other cases when a child
stole something, the parent would shave the child’s head so his or her
baldness would serve as a warning to other people that a thief was in their
presence. (Hmm, that makes me recall that one of the students at the school
in Limoncocha had his head shaved this week. I wonder if he stole something
or it’s just a modern haircut.) Sometimes, to add emphasis and embarrassment,
a parent would tie a diaper around the child’s bald head.
Don Gervacio also mentioned that, when he was young, people were only supposed
to have children after they were married. If a young woman became pregnant
before she was married, the parents would give her to an old widowed man,
to be his wife (while the man responsible would only be counseled). We were
shocked about that one, too, but Don Gervacio explained that while some Quichua
people still follow these traditions, many no longer do.
A School on the Napo River
On Tuesday,
while Lilia visited the colegio in Limoncocha, Teresa and I visited
a school on the Napo River. Actually the school, called La Escuela Mariono
Jipa in a village called Pompeya Chicta, is located on a branch
of the Napo River. (Chicta, sometimes spelled chikta, means river branch in
Quichua.) The branch breaks off the main Napo River, and then circles back
to it, forming a giant island. Teresa and I got a ride in a Jeep from a friend
to the river. Then we had to holler across to the other side for a canoe ride.
A man who had children in the escuela guided a large canoe with a long pole
over to our side of the river and then gave us a ride to the other side. We
walked for twenty minutes along the river to the school.
The school consists of two classrooms, a dining hall and a soccer field. Next
to one of the classrooms, the community is constructing a traditional house
– built on stilts and with a roof made of huge palm leaves. The house
is for Digner and Melida Cerda, a married couple and friends
of ours from Limonchocha, who are the schools only teachers. The school has
36 students in grades 1-6. Melida teaches grades 1-3 and Digner teachers grades
4-6. 
We spent the morning watching videos, taking pictures and drawing. Despite
the heat (under the tin roofs of the classrooms), the students seemed happy
to see children from different parts of the world, to have a chance to draw
and color, and to share some of their own culture and lives. Teresa and I
spoke Spanish to the students, but in many cases, Digner and Melida would
translate what we said into Quichua. Unlike in Limoncocha where the students
speak Spanish more than Quichua, in Pompeya Chicta, like in many smaller
communities along the Napo River, the students speak more Quichua than Spanish.
At 1:00 the school day ended (as it does in most Amazon elementary schools
since the midday heat is not conducive to learning) and Teresa and I headed
back to Limoncocha – but not before a quick dip in the warm, muddy waters
of the Napo.
Guess Who
Here are two poems from Amazin' Amazon Mystery Animals featuring animals that, if you were unlucky, you might encounter in a rain forest lake or river. I'll tell you the answers in my next report.
Charming Fellow
Jaws -- I got 'em.
Pain -- I deal it.
Claws -- Don't need 'em.
Brain? -- I eat it!!
Quickness -- Got plenty.
Tooths -- Got many.
Manners -- What are they?
Couth! -- Forget it!
Meat -- Now you're talkin'.
Bones -- I swarm 'em.
Feet? -- What good's walkin'?
Smile -- Oh, you noticed, heh-heh ...
Now ain't I charmin'?
Guess who.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Today's Specialty: You!
I'm slithering through the river
Time to quiver
Time to shiver
I'm figuring on you for my dinner
I've carefully reviewed the menu's specialties
Capybaras are sweet
And caiman are a treat
But I've settled on you to be my main squeeze
Just like I like you, juicy and plump
With a ripple and a lunge
You'll take the great plunge
Down my sluice, reduced to a lump
Then, sated, to my hollow, I'll slop for a rest
Cool and clumpy
Coiled and comfy
I'll chill for a while until you digest.
Guess who.
I’ll put the answers in the next report. The last report’s animals were a black and red butterfly and a blue morpho butterfly. You can find all twenty-one Amazin’ Amazon Mystery Animal poems with photos and facts here.
Math Puzzler
Here's another math puzzler, posed by Otis Reedy in
The Song of the Harpy Eagle,
"OK, fellow brain-benders, here are the circumstances in which we find
ourselves: our goal is to reach the moon; our method is climbing trees. We'll
cut down and stack however many trees it takes to get there. If the average
large rain forest tree is 80 feet tall (24 meters), how many will we need
to cut down and stack up in order to reach the moon, given that the average
distance between the earth and the moon is approximately 240,000 miles (385,000
kilometers)? Quite simple, you say? Well, how about this: some scientists
estimate that 40 million acres (16 million hectares) of rain forest are destroyed
every year around the world. If there are 500 large trees per acre (1250 per
hectare), how many acres would we have to cut down to fulfill our quest, and,
rounding this figure up to the nearest thousand, what percentage of the total
number of acres felled in one year would this be? So, how many times could
we reach the moon and back if we used all the rain forest trees that were
cut down in one year? How many total miles could we travel? What other heavenly
bodies could we reach if we stacked all those trees? Have fun figuring it
out!"
Here's the answer to the puzzler in the last report:
"At its widest, the Amazon rain forest is about 3000 miles across. How
many hours would it take you to cross it in a small airplane that traveled
100 miles an hour on average? Sloths move at 1/3 of a mile per hour. At that
rate, how many hours would it take a sloth on one side of the rain forest
to reach a cecropia leaf on the other side? How many days is that? How many
years?"
A. 3000 (miles) divided by 100 (m.p.h) = 30 hours or one day and six hours.
B. If sloths can travel 1/3 mile in one hour, they can travel one mile in
three hours. 3000 (miles) X 3 (hours per mile) = 9000 hours. (Or 1/3 goes
into 3000, 9000 times; or 3000 divided by 1/3 = 9000.) 9000 divided by 24
(hours in one day) = 375 days which is one year and 10 days.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
This year, we are sending the answers to your questions directly to your teachers. Here are questions posed to and answered by rain forest students from previous year’s.
These answers were given by a group of 40 students in grades 1-6 at the Amazon River Elementary School in Limoncocha.
Are you afraid of snakes? Of 40, 39 said 'yes' and 1 said 'no' (but most didn't believe the one who said no).
Has anyone in your class been to Quito (the capital of Ecuador)? Yes, 10 of 40.
Do you have
turtles in your lakes? Yes, black turtles and large
spotted ones that we call charapas. We like to eat charapa lulu (turtle eggs)
– and charapas themselves, if we can match them.
Do you speak a bit of English? A few of us speak a bit.
How do you cook your food? In boiling water, fried, smoked, grilled or in maito (rolled up in a special leaf and cooked on an open fire).
Do snakes get in your houses? 17 of 40 have had snakes in their homes (as far as they know).
Do you have VCR's and videos? 10 of 40 do.
Do you have video games? No. A few students in the high school do.
Do you have telephones in your homes? 3 of 40 students have cell phones in their homes. (Note: This has changed since two years ago when this question was posed. Now, the number is double that.)
What do you use to fish? Mostly fishing poles with lines and hooks, and fishing nets. Sometimes adults use spears. When we fish with nets, we also use long poles to place the nets on. We usually take a machete with us when we go fishing. We either go along the lakeshore or we go with a canoe and an oar. For bait we use worms, grubs, ripe plantains, snails, meat (for piranha) or pieces of fish. We use a shigra (a string bag) to carry the fish we catch.
What kinds of toys do you play with? Dolls, cars, marbles, airplanes, stuffed animals and balls are the most popular.
What kinds of chores do you do? Mostly collecting water, working with the machete or harvesting crops in the garden/farm, watching younger brothers and sisters, making chicha or other food, fishing, hunting, sweeping the floor, making a fire, washing and hanging clothes, washing dishes and collecting fruit from trees.
Is it hard to live in the rain forest? No, it's not hard. We like it.
Is it cool and fun to live in the rain forest? It's chevere (cool) but not frio (cool) and we think it's very fun to live here.
Do you sleep on the floor and does that hurt? We sleep on beds.
Have you
ever heard of Chicago? No, we hadn't. But, now we have!
We know in Panama they use coconuts for bowls. What kind of bowls do you use in the rain forest? What are your bowls made out of? We mostly have bowls made of plastic and glass that we buy at the market or in a larger town about an hour away. Sometimes we use bowls made from a large fruit that comes from a tree called a calabash tree. We clean out the fruit, which is not edible, and cut the hard outer shell in half to make the bowls. Sometimes we carve designs in the bowls to decorate them. Sometimes we also make bowls out of clay that we get from nearby rivers.
My classmates and I looked in a book and we saw people with paint on their bodies. Why do they put paint on their bodies? Does everyone in the rain forest do this? Most people who live around our part of the rain forest do not put paint on their bodies. But, almost all of the different rain forest nationalities that live in our region used to paint their bodies. We mainly used to use a red dye from the seeds of the achiote flower, but sometimes we would use clay and other natural dyes or colors. People put dye on their bodies for different reasons: for decoration, to protect them from spirits, to frighten their enemies, for good luck (when hunting, fishing or planting crops) and to repel insects. Nowadays, most people in our area only paint their bodies when we have a festival or a dance that celebrates our traditional culture. We have learned that in other parts of the Amazon, some people still paint their bodies.
My classmates and I looked in a book and we saw land that was so dry it was full of cracks. How does the land get so dry when there is so much rain? We don't have any land near us with cracks, but each year there is usually a period of time when it doesn't rain for a while. This year, it has hardly rained since New Year's Day. It just began raining again this week. During this time, the sun can get very hot and the roads get very dusty. A lot of people catch colds during this time of year.
What language do you speak in the rain forest? We speak Quichua and Spanish, but other nationalities have their own languages. In our region, Shuar, Huaorani and Secoya are also spoken.
Is it dangerous in the rain forest? There are dangers, but it's not very dangerous day to day.
Do you have an alphabet like we do? Does your alphabet have 26 letters? Quichua was a spoken language until recently. Spanish has 28 letters.
THAT’S ALL FOR NOW
Well, that’s
all for this report. Till next time, learn lots! Samashun. (Goodbye.)
Paul, Lilia and Teresa
=======================
FOR TEACHERS
Go here to visit The Amazon River Elementary School and learn about its students.
Here are a few more rain forest related Web sites your class might enjoy visiting:
Orinoco Online (for older students--a tour of the Venuzuelan Amazon and an
introduction to people who live there) -- www.orinoco.org
Rain Forest Activities from the Science Museum of Minnesota -- www.sci.mus.mn.us/greatestplaces/book_pages/amazon2.htm
Go here to access
all of OneWorld Classrooms' Amazon Classroom Travel Resources.
Here are some activities (taken from the Curriculum Connections Pages of Amazin'
Amazon Mystery Animal which you might wish to use with the blue morpho
butterfly poem in the previous report.
Blue Morpho Butterfly
Language Arts Connection: This poem makes use of an 'extended metaphor.' The
blue morpho butterfly is compared to the moon - but the comparison isn't a
one shot deal like metaphors often are; instead the metaphor stretches or
'extends' throughout the poem, acting as a central theme: the butterfly shines
through the branches of the trees; it waxes and wanes; sometimes it's bright
and easy to see and sometimes it's invisible even though it's still there;
and it's rare and blue, like a blue moon.
Group Writing Activity: Have your class choose a rain forest animal. Ask them
what they could compare this animal to (besides another animal), then brainstorm
(using a bubble chart, if you like) to explore the various ways this animal
could be said to resemble the thing they chose to compare it to. Allow imaginative,
tangential and humorous ideas as long as students can back up their connections
with reasonable explanations. Choose some of the ideas and write a poem extending
the metaphor all the way through. [Examples: jaguar - race car; sloth - shag
rug; anteater - vacuum cleaner; leafcutter ant - wheat farmer...]
Science Connection: Another central theme in the poem is the blue morpho's
fascinating survival technique known as 'flash and dazzle' (see the Amazin'
Amazon Mystery Animal Answer Page for more information about this). Considering
this, the author might also have chosen a comet to compare it to in an extended
metaphor, or a splendidly costumed ballet dancer who goes on and off the stage.
What other peculiar survival techniques do rain forest animals employ?
Creative Writing Activity: Have students compare these animals to something
else considering their survival strategy. Extend the metaphor and write more
poems.
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| E-Travel Log #1: Introduction to the Project and the Adventure Team |
| E-Travel Log #2: Quito, Banos and Flashbacks of Christmas Celebrations in Limoncocha |
| E-Travel Log #3: Banos - Where the Rain Forest Begins |
| E-Travel Log #4: Limoncocha - A Quichua Community |
| E-Travel Log #5: Limoncocha and Communities Around - Traditions and Cultures |
| E-Travel Log #6: Getting Ready to Leave for Cuyabeno |
| E-Travel Log #7: Rain Forest Animals |
| E-Travel Log #8: Rain Forest Stories and the Mysterious Black Lake |
| E-Travel Log #9: Trip to Playas de Cuyabeno |
| E-Travel Log #10: Trip to San Pablo - a Secoya Community |