Uyantza

Overpowering.

So close you can feel it thrumming beneath your skin, rushing through your veins.

Hypnotizing.

Making its way in, out, up and around the innermost parts of your mind.

gone. gone. gone.

Grounding.

Confirmation that there is a life to be had. a life to be lived. a life to be enjoyed.

Husbands. Fathers. Brothers. Friends.

They are almost here.

They are here.

In a world where the people are strong but (if you can believe it) the drinks are stronger, stands a tradition long kept but never hidden away.

The air is crisp and your senses are sharp as you feel the anticipation all around you.

So persistent, so tangible as it cloaks you in its overwhelming embrace.

There is no choice but to go forward.

go. go. go.

This year, February 24th marks the beginning of a 3-day festivity.

Though if we’re being honest, the celebration has long been underway because every three years for 15 days, the men and women of Sarayaku make preparations for this specific moment.

This is the culmination of all their hardwork.

A showcasing of skill, gratitude and companionship.

For 15 days, those men willing to take on the task of living, learning and surviving alongside our Pachamama, go out into her wilderness and greet her face-to-face.

For 15 days, the women mold, craft and design mocawas of all shapes and sizes while harvesting yuca and other goods to be used for the real star of the show: chicha. (like manna from heaven!)

The sun is wide awake now and, it seems, well aware of the events taking place down below because for the first time since I’ve been here it has made its presence known, burning with a fury incomparable to the heat back home.

Which is of course why my grandma has decided that today we will be walking to our next stop on this celebratory train instead of floating peacefully down the rivers stream alongside the other canoe-goers.

Every visit is the same as we go from one house to the next, following the men who have adorned themselves from head to toe with their earnings

as the women guide them with their dance, sweeping their floor-length hair this way and that.

Maybe it’s the sun who seems keen on maintaining me in its warm embrace or maybe it’s the never-ending supply of chicha flowing through my bloodstream but there’s something so heartwarming about people’s ability to come together in this way.

Their ability to temporarily forget about all other matters except the one taking place before them.

The second day goes about the same except for one minor twist.

Those who wish to visit the hunters in their designated homes, must meet some requirements first:

If you don’t meet these requirements well... nothing happens.

But if you do meet these requirements well... get ready.

It isn’t until the first stream of visitors arrive that I realize why my grandma very conveniently didn’t remind me to bring my own share of flowers.

#1. The women who visit must bring flowers. #2. The men who visit must bring palm branches.

The scene is chaos.

As the women run to fill their mocawas with so much chicha that most of it has spilled over by the time they receive the men and their offerings.

And if the women are making mess, then the men are much less graceful as they slip and slide through the dirt turned mud. Breaking mocawas, dropping drums and losing shoes as they race to shower the women and their flowers.

I can’t help the smile on my face or the laughs that escape past my lips as I watch the scene unfold before me.

Is this what it means to live?

Because if so, this might just be a life worth living.

e feast!

And o

rd day, w n the thi

Dressed to impress in our Sunday best with empty stomachs and a creeping hunger,

today is the day we finally get to indulge in the many prizes earned after a long and tiring hunt.

It’s time.

The table is laid and the food is ready.

The kitchens are alive and bustling with action as the elders prep and clean all kinds of meat to be consumed later in the day.

Monkeys, fish, birds and just about everything else you’d never imagine sacrificed for a greater good: our insatiable appetite.

Eagerly awaiting whoever chooses to visit and claim their seat.

ashka pakrachu Sarayaku ayllullakta thank you Sarayaku