BLOG

Previously:
Part 1, in which I give more background info than you want, and decide to go to Peru. >>
Part 2, in which I finally get to Lima and am a crybaby. >>
Part 3, in which I arrive in Iquitos in a dreamlike state. >>
Part 4, in which we journey into the jungle and I am afraid of water. >>
Part 5, in which I take forever to finally describe drinking ayahuasca. >>
Part 6, in which, yes, I am finally drugged. >>

Also, I’ve been updating my Tumblr account as I’ve been writing, if you’re a completist. >>

I was still very drugged. I didn’t understand how all of these people were walking around unaffected. Things weren’t quite as deep as they had been but my sense of the passage of time was still pretty messed up. Seconds and minutes seemed to expand and retract to suit their own whims. The room itself seemed to sway between well lit and still dark. And my nausea was still extremely real. I lay on the mat, with my stomach full of earthquake pills, only occasionally shifting position and trying not to make anything internal angry with me. Finally, my brain made a decision. Get up. It’s time. Get in the bathroom.

I stood up as slowly as possible and tried to get my reality legs under me. I made my way to one of the stalls in back and sat down. The stall was nothing more than a toilet with tile walls close enough to touch without extending my arms. I felt exhausted and drained, I think I would have been perfectly happy spending the rest of the night sitting there. I could hear the random conversations still going on in the main room. As I sat there, my nausea would come and go, talking of Michelangelo. Barely a flicker of the light from the lamp made its way to this section of the building, so it was dark.

It was really, really, very dark.

It was darker than it should be.

The tiny bit of light from the outer room that had been faintly reflected in the tiles was gone. I couldn’t even sense the closeness of the walls. Worse, it was hot. Even though I was in the middle of the jungle, throughout the ceremony I’d been surprised by how comfortable it had been, even cold at times. But now I was covered with an absolutely oppressive heat, a thick, unbreathable mass. I could still hear people talking, and somewhere inside I thought, I’ve gone blind. Somewhere else inside I thought that would almost be a relief. I couldn’t make my arms move to try and feel for the walls. Some sort of saline dam had opened its locks and sweat was pouring down my face. The walls were gone and I was in a pitch black nothing. A void. This wasn’t blindness. I was in hell. I was in hell and there was no song, no one was singing any more and there was no way to find a path back.

I sat there, too terrified to move, for hours. Hours that were really only a few minutes. I can’t remember how I broke the spell of the moment, I just remember that somehow I saw light again, the tiniest amount, and managed to prod my neurons just enough to start moving, to finally stand back up. I shuffled my way back to my spot on the floor.

The moment was completely gone now, like I’d been misdiagnosed with minutes to live. Oh, sorry, never mind that bit, you’re fine. I was shaken and confused, still covered with sweat and newly freezing. And still nauseous. Sarah lay next to me on her mat, still well under the influence, too, and we stayed in the ceremony building, along with a number of other people, until dawn. When the sun started to come up we decided to risk standing up again and trying to walk back to our bungalow. There I slept, if it can be called that, fitfully for about two hours before I woke to the sound of a large drum being beaten in the distance. It was time for breakfast.

Before breakfast we were offered the opportunity to help prepare the ayahuasca we’d be using the next two nights. This would be a really good moment for me to describe the process and how helping to ready the ingredients for their day-long brewing was a way in which to further connect with the spirits that we were interacting with. But I hadn’t had any real sleep in days, hadn’t eaten since noon the previous day, my back was hurting down into my leg and I was still a little nauseous, so all I can really say is I sat where they pointed and pounded ayahuasca vine with a heavy mallet for twenty minutes or so. I ate breakfast. I slept. I ate lunch.

After lunch we went back to the open shed where the ayahuasca continued to steep in a series of large pots. Don Alberto, with the help of a translator, was answering questions. As we sat there it started to rain, a heavy rain that still managed to be peaceful. A girl from South Africa talked obliquely about her experience the night before and wondered if, since it had gone so well, she needed to participate in another ceremony. As he listened through the translator, Don Alberto smiled, the kind of amused smile that only comes from having heard a question more times than you can count. Yes, he replied, there is more to learn.

I went to our room to lay back down and think about what I was going to do that night. After the first ceremony we had the option to not participate in the others. I’d had a really amazing experience the night before and was glad I’d done it. But it hadn’t felt life-changing. It had been more like an extremely strong LSD trip; the hallucinations, the distortion of time, it all had that same feeling, though with a bit more direction to it, maybe. I’d also had enough time for the jaded, cynical part of me to start working over the doubts. There was a back door to the kitchen with a light over the outside, just across from the ceremony hut, and it didn’t take much imagination to see how my DMT-affected brain could have turned that into a face. They were just hallucinations from a strong chemical, mixed with an exotic location, an unfamiliar culture, a lack of sleep and a neurotic brain that was never very good at dealing with most of those. The result was interesting to say the least, even fun, but I wasn’t sure it was worth feeling nauseous and debilitated.

I debated and slept, I walked to the common area and talked with a couple of people and the remaining hours passed more quickly than I would have thought. By the time we were back in the ceremony hut, as the sun began to set, I remained unsure of whether I was going to participate, right up until I took the cup from Hamilton’s hands and drank it.

Next: I sit here and try and think of some way to describe the second night, and we all see if I succeed.

Previously:
Part 1, in which I give more background info than you want, and decide to go to Peru. >>
Part 2, in which I finally get to Lima and am a crybaby. >>
Part 3, in which I arrive in Iquitos in a dreamlike state. >>
Part 4, in which we journey into the jungle and I am afraid of water. >>
Part 5, in which I take forever to finally describe drinking ayahuasca. >>

Also, you can see photos on my Tumblr account >>

I rinsed my mouth out with a little of the water from my cup and spit it into the pan that I assumed I would become intimately familiar with soon. Once the last person received their dose, the sole kerosene lamp lighting the room was doused, revealing it was now night outside. The room was silent as Don Alberto began to softly shake the chacapa, a sort of traditional rattle of dried leaves, and sing in both Spanish and Quechua. Not that I knew the difference or was able to understand either, but it didn’t matter. Soon both Hamilton and Malcolm joined in the singing as well, though it still remained quiet enough to hear how much noise continued outside in the jungle. The room was nearly pitch black, though I knew that would change as the drug kicked in and my eyes became extra sensitive to light. I lay back on the mat and waited.

When I made the decision that I was going to go to Peru, I had tried to avoid reading too much about the experiences of others. I knew a little already about DMT (the active ingredient of the ayahuasca mixture, it’s been a while since I said that), that it was a lot like LSD in many respects, but more potent and less time consuming. One of my main complaints about LSD was that it was amazing for a few hours and then it was another four hours or so of sitting around and thinking, “Okay, enough already.” But something even more intriguing about DMT to me was that so many people described very similar visions. The cynical part of me, of course, just assumed that was an effect of people reading about other experiences and their subconscious seizing on that. So I decided I’d try to go into it with as uncolored a view of it as I could.

Still, I did have the knowledge of what I’d read initially that had encouraged me to try ayahuasca myself, so I thought I had at least a vague idea of what it would be like. The National Geographic article in particular had described the experience as both wonderful and terrifying, and in particular had described the purging aspect of it as not just physical but spiritual, as ribbons of dark, evil energy were being pulled from her being. I may not have been sure of the reality of her experience but I trusted in the import of it, at a minimum. This was work, with dark, emotional stuff. Worse, I knew I was going in with a depression that revolved around an extremely strong self-hatred, one I definitely felt I had earned. So I felt like I had valid reasons for thinking this could be, at least initially, a horrible ordeal.

I tried to think about some of the things we’d been told in preparation for the ceremony. The main one was to go into it with an intent; something you wanted to achieve, a question, a concern or a concept; and focus on it as you entered the mareación, as this would help to direct your journey somewhat. If things got rough it helped to listen for the icaros as it was also there to help direct the ceremony, as well as offer protection. We had actually been cautioned against trying to help others who seemed to be struggling, that a shaman or apprentice would come and assist. It was important that we gave everyone in the room the space to have their own experience, including ourselves. In general for me this meant trying not to interact with Sarah, and vice versa, which we did a fairly good job of, overall. Still, it was her voice that was my first inkling that things were about to happen.

“Paul, do you see all those people walking around outside with green flashlights?”

I lifted my head and watched through the screen for a minute. Finally, I lay back, “There’s no one outside.”

“Oh.”

I was so amused that it didn’t register that I was able to see clearly in the darkness now.

I don’t know exactly when I realized the aya was in control. Sarah says at some point I told her I was beginning to see things in the ceiling; movement and colors; but I don’t remember that. I think I felt the nausea before anything else. The voices of the shamans were louder now, their icaros calling in the plant spirits from the jungle. Around me, some people were already beginning to purge and the sound had a strange lilt to it, as if it were slowly building in time with the music. I turned my head and looked back out the screened window where a face was staring back at me. Except it wasn’t exactly a face so much as it was as if a collection of wide neon strips, glowing bright white, had decided to get together and approximate a face. I tried to make sense of it, even as the face continued to float there, tried to find the trick that was being played, some guy in a mask, maybe, this is all just part of a show they put on. But the music was growing louder and the same thought kept coming back to me, over and over: They’re here. They’re ready to come inside now.

My memory of the rest of the ceremony itself is a jumble. At some point my body told me it was time to purge. I sat up and experienced two of the most perfunctory bouts of vomiting I’ve ever had. One. Two. I paused and waited but my body told me that was it, lay back down. I hadn’t really tried to focus on any kind of “intent,” just a mind as open as I could make it and a request that whatever this was would show me whatever it was it had to show me. With closed eyes I saw swirls of color and geometric shapes, alternating with visions of vaguely Hindu design. Out in the dark jungle, a nocturnal bird called over and over. Its voice sounded exactly like a warm, affectionate but mocking laugh. The singing of the shamans would swell, the timbre of their voices rising while the sound of purging around the room matched it in volume, and then ebb until Don Alberto’s soft whistling would seem to blow in to cover the room in a blanket, like a breeze filled with the scent of something familiar. We would seem to hover there, thirty or so people, seemingly connected, catching their breath at once, before we plunged back in and it all started again.

The thing is… we were all connected. At least, it seemed that way to me. Lying there, my guts and my brain carrying on what seemed like an endless debate about just how imperative it was that I get up and go to the bathroom, I felt linked to everyone else’s distress. It was as if the purging was something coherent that was moving throughout the room, and if I focused on it I could take it into myself. I would feel my own nausea rise and the room’s emotional cloud would seem lessened. At other times the feeling would be too much and I would be on the verge of finally trying to stand and somehow stumble towards a toilet, when suddenly I would hear the sound of someone else expelling god knows what and the feeling would pass.

Look, I’m not trying to work my way through the thesaurus listing for “purge,” and it’s not like the ceremony was exclusively about vomiting and shitting. But there were more than thirty people in the room and we all had some kind of physical exorcism (made that one up myself, Merriam-Webster, so screw you) at least twice, so the sound was pretty common and there’s no sense pretending otherwise. But it also didn’t quite register as what it was. It was just a sound, representing something, in a room full of sounds. Occasionally, things would go quiet, the songs would pause, and Hamilton would offer encouragement. “You guys are doing great, you guys are my rockstars.” “Just a little ayahuasca. Be glad it’s not a little more.” I lay on my mat, deep in the ebb and flow of the room, feeling as psychedelic as is humanly possible. My body felt as if it were no longer hampered by petty concerns like musculature or physics. I would start to yawn and the sensation would work its way from my chest to my head, twisting my anatomy like a whip in slow motion, until appearing from my mouth, a sigh inside a word balloon, both of us adorned with colorful curls and spirals as if we’d been drawn by Brendan McCarthy.

And then, it was over. The lamp was re-lit, Don Alberto left the building to a scattering of “Gracias, Maestro,” and people began to slowly move about. Those who’d done this before talked quietly and compared thoughts; the first-timers looked about, blinking, trying to process. In the flickering glow of kerosene, reality seemed to creep its way warily back inside.

Except.

Except I was still laying there. I was still in the mareación.

Next: Seriously this time, I have a literal dark night of the soul in the bathroom.

Previously:
Part 1, in which I give more background info than you want, and decide to go to Peru. >>
Part 2, in which I finally get to Lima and am a crybaby. >>
Part 3, in which I arrive in Iquitos in a dreamlike state. >>
Part 4, in which we journey into the jungle and I am afraid of water. >>

Also, you can see photos on my Tumblr account >>

So, I feel like it would be fair to say up front that there’s an awful lot about the ceremonies I don’t remember.

I’ll wait in case anyone wants to storm off at this point.

Okay.

It’s not that I blacked out or anything, but what comes to you in those few hours is really an overload of… information? Images? Emotions? Yes. All of those. I took a notebook with me to try and write while I was in Peru, but by the time I was there my emotional state was so bad and then the experiences themselves so draining that I never wrote anything. And like a really powerful dream the further you get from it, the less you can recall most of the surrounding detail, and just the big images stick out. It becomes, like everything, a memory of a memory.

More importantly, I’m not entirely sure how to describe a good portion of what happened. I’m actually just sort of writing as I go and hoping by the time I get there I’ll be able to get something intelligible out. The funny aspect of how I’ve been handling trying to describe all of this is really kind of immersing myself in every bit of it that I’m able, to try and recreate as much of that mindset as I can. On my computer screen as I write I have Sarah’s posts that she had written shortly after the trip, along with an excellent piece written by a friend we made while in Peru (who was also there for the first time) and my fairly voluminous Flickr set from the trip. As I write I stop to reread a lot of what they wrote as well as re-researching a lot of things, all in an effort to feel connected to the whole affair rather than just describing it dispassionately from a distance. If only because I don’t think that kind of ‘view from above’ would help me convey it in any way. My point is, wish me luck.

As I said, the ceremony building (“building” describing a structure that seems too large to actually apply, but “hut” being similarly too small-sounding) was a large screened-in circular affair with a conical roof. Inside there was no central support pillar, instead the thatch roof was held up by criss-crossing beams. During the day, Mayan-style hammocks hung from the main horizontal beams but for the ceremonies these were wrapped up out of the way. The bathrooms (we made sure to note) were hidden behind a half wall in the back. Most of the rest of the floor was taken up with with sleeping mats, each of which came with a pillow, a blanket, a metal cup of water, a hospital pan and a roll of toilet paper. Around the outer ring of the room were fifteen or so lounge chairs, in the middle of which were three large office chairs and a small rug. On the rug was an enormous collection of various religious idols, Buddhas, crystals, marble spheres, a Lucky Cat or two and even a small statue of Yoda.

I know, and I’ll explain.

Part of what Hamilton is trying to teach at Blue Morpho is what he calls “Universal Philosophy.”

“It states that each human being IS the infinite universe, the one universe and each individual universe is the same, whole. In universality we are the same. You already know everything. You are already whole. You are already enlightened. You just have not thought it or experienced it yet.”
- Hamilton Souther

He makes himself available at times during the day to talk about his beliefs and some of the return visitors seem to follow these talks closely. But while in many ways it’s central to how he leads the ceremonies, it’s not an aspect he tries to push on visitors. As such, I’m not really going to get into it here since it wasn’t my focus. However, one aspect of the philosophy is the idea that all religions and cultural ideas are valid that are based on Love, and you can worship or focus on any belief that works for you, because in the end they’re all the same, hence the collection sitting on the rug.

The lounge chairs were meant for return visitors and the mats for newbies, since ayahuasca has such a strong effect they feel it’s safer if the first-timers are already on the ground, so we chose our spots. Slowly the rest of the group trickled in and the same nervous energy that seemed to infuse everything so far began to build a little higher. We’d already learned what the extra items were for… The blanket for the sudden extremes in temperature we might feel during the ceremony. The metal cup with a small amount of water was there to rinse out your mouth, if needed, but not to drink. The round hospital pan and the toilet paper were there for more or less the same reason: an inevitable part of the process called the “purge” which is exactly what it sounds like. How it decides to vacate your body depends on the individual, and some will be able to calmly be assisted to the bathrooms, while others might have a more misplaced faith in the efficacy of their digestive systems. Around us would be several native helpers with dim red lights in their hands, ready to assist anyone’s plaintive cry, “Baño… Baño, por favor…”

Through the screens I could see dusk was settling outside. Finally, Hamilton entered, followed by the shaman who had trained him, an older, smaller Quechua Indian called Don Alberto. For every bit of California charm that Hamilton exuded, it was surpassed by his mentor’s aura of vitality and wisdom. You knew he knew things, things you could never understand, or at least that’s how it seemed to me. They sat in the two largest chairs on either side of the small rug and pulled out two large bottles containing a viscous brown sludge, the ayahuasca, and set them upon the floor. Hamilton spoke briefly about the ceremony as the light outside continued to dim.

He and Don Alberto lit their mapachos, cigarettes made from an extremely potent South American tobacco, and began blowing the smoke over themselves as a means of cleansing before doing the same with both bottles. Mixed in with the smoke were the first stirrings of the icaros, the medicine songs sung by the shamans in order to call forth the plant spirits, to clear the room of dark energy and to bring on the mareación, the actual visionary journey we were all there for. The icaros at this point were not much more than a soft, whispery whistle, blown into the bottle of ayahuasca, and in the expectant silence of the room it was a compelling and soothing sound. Each shaman had a small tin cup he filled with the thick liquid and began the same process of blowing tobacco smoke and whistling into the cup before eventually drinking. Hamilton joked that Don Alberto had taken a “jungle dose,” a nearly full cup.

One by one, the process was repeated as each person in the outer ring of seats came and sat in front of one of the shamans to receive their dose. The maestro, a word they were using interchangeably with shaman, would pour an amount either requested by or which they felt sufficient for the person, blow mapacho smoke into the cup and whistle a soft icaros intended for that individual. The woman from the bus with the friendly face was one of the first to drink and as she received the cup she held it aloft and toasted, “Salut!” All of us responded.

Watching was like sitting in a roller coaster just as it leaves the station, and as each person toasted “Salut!” and drank you saw their car latch onto the chain taking them up the first big drop. Eventually, everyone on the outer ring was done and it was time for the first-timers on the mats to begin. Because of where I was sitting, that meant me. I went up and knelt in front of Hamilton as he poured about a quarter of the way up the tin cup, the amount he recommended for those who’d never tried it before. He blew the smoke and whistled and I closed my eyes and tried to sink myself into the moment, which was pretty impossible given the amount of expectation I felt. I accepted the cup and held it momentarily, looking down into the deep brown liquid, the acrid smell hitting my nostrils for the first time. Drink it or you never will, you idiot! I toasted the room and downed the cup, and a taste somewhere between bitter chocolate, dirt and battery acid went speeding down my throat.

I went and sat back down on my mat. My car had latched onto the chain and I waited for the floor to drop out from under me.

Next: Next, I experience something amazing and have a literal dark night of the soul in the bathroom.

Previously:
Part 1, in which I give more background info than you want, and decide to go to Peru. >>
Part 2, in which I finally get to Lima and am a crybaby. >>
Part 3, in which I arrive in Iquitos in a dreamlike state. >>

Also, you can see photos on my Tumblr account >>

We woke early the next day. Outside the window various divisions of the Peruvian military marched around the square and performed a flag-raising ceremony and I watched for a bit before getting my things together. When I was in high school I had discovered Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares so I had a weird sort of quasi-romantic image of… well, Argentina, really, but South America in general. Looking out at the skyline of the square as the troops moved in formation I felt nostalgia for something I really had no experience with, something that was about as real a memory as a Francesca Fiore/Bruno Puntz Jones sketch, but still, there it was. I suppose being in a perpetual state of semi-sleep-deprivation will do that to you.

We left the hotel and found a mototaxi to take us to the Blue Morpho office. Twenty minutes of spinal-adjustments and hanging on to our bags on the luggage rack through the back of the canopy later we arrived. The office really wasn’t much more than an open-air garage space holding two of the ubiquitous wooden buses and a separate room full of chairs and couches that currently held about thirty people. I sat on one of the couches while Sarah chatted with some of the others. I couldn’t really sort out whatever it was I was feeling… apprehension, impatience, a soul-crushing existential weariness? It was something in-between those. The room was friendly but guarded since everyone had their own personal reasons for being there, after all, though there was a certain survivors’ camaraderie you could sense between the repeat visitors. Eventually, forms filled out and money exchanged, we all clambered onto one of the two buses for the hour and a half drive into the jungle.

The woman sitting in front of me had the kind of face that said she’d chosen at some point to love people by default, and I realized I had known people like that before and for some reason always been wary of them. She turned around early in the ride and asked me where I was from and if I’d done this before. I answered and her face lit up, she’d come from Colorado but had lived briefly in Atlanta, so I answered a few questions about the city. She explained she was a frequent visitor to Blue Morpho but that this was her first time back in a few years, and then she lightly broached the subject of why I’d come. I gave her my ultra-slim “extreme depression” answer and she seemed genuinely excited for me to experience my first ceremony.

As we hit the edges of Iquitos our bus pulled off to the side of the road. The driver pulled out a wrench and I wondered if my daydream of being stranded and driving a mototaxi for the rest of my life was about to come true. Another man hopped on board with a large container of gasoline, though, and we were quickly moving again. It was a lonely road bordered by jungle and the occasional thatched roof. The air felt light and different and every now and again rain would fall into the windowless bus. My mood was no better but I understood, even so, that this was something new. I looked around at the others, the ones engaged in quiet, extended conversations and the ones who, like me, either stared out the window or occasionally glanced about. From behind me a guy leaned forward and made a quick remark, I laughed softly in response. Friendly, but guarded. I realized how badly those of us who’d never done this before stood out.

Finally, we turned left off the Iquitos-Nauta road onto a sloping dirt road, past a small lake and into the trees before coming to a stop on a concrete platform. In front of us was a small collection of thatched-roof bungalows tightly surrounded by the jungle forest and we were directed towards the largest and closest of them. Inside, an Australian named Malcolm gave us an overview of the rules and the upcoming schedule and let us know that lunch would be served soon. It was nearly noon and it would be our last meal until breakfast the next morning. Sarah and I went to our room, a small space divided off from a larger bungalow, with some shelves, a small table, and two single-sized mats inside a mosquito net tent. Tellingly, there were two round hospital pans next to the mats. The bungalow itself held three other rooms like this, as well as a sink and mirror, a shower and a toilet. We unpacked and headed back to the main building to eat.

Lunch was plain chicken with pasta, flavored with a mild spice that seemed to be in every single meal I had while I was in Peru. Still, it was more flavorful than I expected with the dietary restrictions we were under. Afterwards, Hamilton, a tall, blond, ex-Californian who was the owner of Blue Morpho and one of the two shamans who’d be presiding over the three ceremonies we’d be taking in total, came in. He settled into one of the lounge chairs and explained what we could expect over the next three days and answered some questions before eventually holding court with a smaller group of people who seemed to clearly be regular visitors. That left the newer among us to get back to the important work of nervously looking at each other without looking too hard, and asking questions that didn’t probe too deeply.

Sarah and I decided to head back up the dirt road to the small lake we passed, a spring-fed body of water that we’d been told was safe to swim in. Before we got there a small, skinny black and white dog came hopping towards us. There seemed to be dogs running loose everywhere in Peru so it was no shock to see one now, but she reminded me of my own dog at home. Worse, she made a pitiful sight in the heat, panting hard and her rips showing through her narrow chest. Sarah remembered a packet of beef jerky in her bag from the flight (and we weren’t going to be allowed to eat it for at least a week) so we sat for a little while and fed her before continuing on to the lake.

Ever since I was young I’ve had a weird aversion to swimming in anything other than artificial pools, from some combination of living creatures darting between my legs, the sensation of my feet sinking into mud (or not finding the bottom at all) and the fact that I nearly drowned in the ocean once. Deep down I think the thing that disturbs me the most is not being able to see below the surface of the water. So, while Sarah wasted no time getting in I just sat at the edge of the covered dock and dangled my feet.

The first ceremony would be taking place at 6pm inside, appropriately, the ceremony building, a large circular affair with a conical roof. It had been suggested that we make ourselves familiar with the layout, in particular how to get to the bathrooms available in the back, before the ceremony began since we’d be in no shape at that point to figure that sort of thing out. So after drying ourselves off in our room we made our way towards the ceremony building… AND DESTINY!

Too much?

Next: Finally, the first ceremony.