The Marriage of the Sun and the Moon: Dispatches from the Frontiers of Consciousness by Andrew Weil

Author:Andrew Weil [Weil, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Published: 1981-09-28T16:00:00+00:00

Firsthand reports about Indian uses of coca usually emphasize that regular chewing of the leaf is consistent with good health, high social productivity, and long life. Moreover, much of the literature on coca talks about the therapeutic virtues of the leaf: Not only is it not harmful, it is said to provide nourishment for the body and to be useful in the treatment of many kinds of illnesses. On the other hand, some authorities who have no direct knowledge of Indians condemn coca chewing as a destructive habit.

To get more information on coca, I decided to visit some Indians who use it regularly. I also decided not to do that in the Andes, where cocaine has become so prominent. On the advice of a Colombian botanist friend, I flew from Bogotá to Mitú, the tiny administrative capital of the huge Territory of Vaupés, a stretch of the Amazon basin that borders on Brazil. Mitú’s main street runs a few blocks, from the unpaved airstrip at one edge of town to the bank of the broad Rio Vaupés at the other. In Mitú I found two Cubeo Indian boys who took me in a motored canoe up the Vaupés to the Rio Cuduyarí, one of its tributaries, and then several hours up the Cuduyarí to a tiny village of Cúbeos. I was assured that the Cúbeos use coca constantly and are amenable to visits.

I arrived near midday on a brilliantly sunny Saturday in January 1974 in the midst of Amazonian “summer”—the dry, hot season when the rivers are low and clear and tranquil. It was a steep climb up the river bank to the village, a rectangular layout of ten thatched houses surrounded by forest. No one was outside; the sun was too intense. I had a note of introduction from the Catholic priest at Mitú to the schoolteacher of the village, but when I found his house, he was out fishing, and his wife spoke only a few words of Spanish. The boys explained who I was, and she indicated that I was welcome to wait. She offered me a large gourd of chicha, a natural, fermented beer made from yuca (tapioca root), and a large chunk of casave, the bread made from the same root. There was a gourd of fiery hot sauce, made from chili peppers and fish, for dipping the casave. As I ate and drank, the schoolteacher’s wife went back to the cooking area and resumed her work of grating bitter yuca tubers—one step of the long process needed to remove their poisonous juices.

The house was spacious, dark, and unfurnished except for one table, a hammock, and a number of low, carved stools. An open fire burned low in one corner. I sat on one of the stools, looking out the door, relaxed by the rhythmic sound of grating. Outside, the sun was blazing. A few scruffy dogs lay in patches of shade, gnawing on fish bones. In the middle of the rectangular “plaza” of the village was an unfinished structure, the largest building of all, built of sturdy beams.

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