Journey to Chinkian entza

Back on land, the colonists’ attitude (the majority of the population of Taisha) towards the natives seems hostile. For this reason we lost an hour in the settlement whose mayor, Celestino Wisum, has a development idea based on the opening of roads and the introduction of motorized vehicles for vessels navigating the Morona and Yaupi Rivers.

Guillermo searched futilely for a shipment he’d sent on a morning flight. “Look son, it’s been long since I quit being a layabout, so go look for your stuff elsewhere”, answered with irony the colonist owner of a liquor shop, next to the runway in Taisha.

Worried at the coming night, Guillermo chose to leave his shipment and find a truck to take us to Macuma, the last place settled by colonizers, before entering Shuar territory.

Seven pm. I make a new entry in my field diary the moment we start our walk over an unfinished bridge over Macuma River. We entered a trail filled with almost round stones and we soon set foot on the enormous carpet of leaves, accrued throughout hundreds, maybe thousands of years of winters and summers, the only two seasons on this side of the world.

We are there to tell of how man and forest coexist. Perhaps the idea of cohabitation is at risk, not only from mayor Wisum’s roads, but also from the coming of an ill understood development.

The green concert

The backlit watch indicates 20h15 when we make our first stop. Minutes before, the profuse foliage that blocked out the sky ended and, suddenly, we were out on a clear field that allowed us to view the milky way in all its splendor. It is a spongy sky, with millions of fireflies piercing the darkness and allowing us to see the silhouettes of the crowns of very tall trees.

I don’t remember ever seeing such a bright night. Though I am not a ‘digital native’, I belong to the television generation; and so my nocturnal lighting in the last 40 years has been artificial.

Guillermo, who I now realize is a complete stranger with whom I’m sharing the forest, says we’ve crossed a clearing used as an emergency runway by the Shuar, and that when we enter the jungle once again, at the end of the track, we will be in Achuar territory. In other words, there will be no return.

Now under the canopy, the green concert resumes. Hundreds of bird calls, invitations from animals in the mating season, minute whispers from insects, howls from scurrying mammals, thousands and thousands of voices that invade the auditory senses in the Amazonian night.

It is the same wave of sounds that’s accompanied us since we landed on Taisha, in a serenade that doesn’t miss a beat even in the moon’s absence, or from the passage of strangers.

Second necessary stop: before me, a few meters ahead, there is an enormous fallen tree over the Wichimi River disappearing into the enveloping darkness. Sensing danger, I give Guillermo all my electronic gear and start to cross the tributary with short calculated steps.

The last moment that I recall from my crossing of the tree bridge is the light from Guillermo’s lantern moving to the opposing margin. Immediately after the dark waters of the Wichimi surrounded me, as my feet touched the sandy bottom.

Back to the surface, Guillermo calls out to me: Swim over here, brother!! And so I did with all my strength. Now out of the water, the green concert is able to calm me once more as I jot down in my diary: 21h30.

It’s the wet welcome to the equatorial forest.



“Wetai ikiam”

It is ampakai (as Tuesdays are called in Achuar) of the month of yankuam(December). It’s not even 7 am and the great humidity present in the air wets our clothes.

Pedro Chinkim, chief of the Chikian entza community, listens intently to Guillermo translating the reason for the visit of this mestizo from the Andes who came unannounced and with no prior authorization. He then pronounces a word that relaxes everyone: penker taume (welcome).

Surrounded by his daughters and wife, Pedro starts on a long monologue about the motives for their fearing the ingress of certain companies considered to be “vehicles of development”.

He’s referring with special emphasis to oil companies. Despite the isolation, in Chinkian entza, where some 250 live scattered over the Achuar territory, news of the project to protect the Yasuní from oil exploration have arrived in a timely fashion. As a Nai Federation, they hold close ties with the Cofán nation of Ecuador, an Eastern indigenous movement that managed to declare about 400 thousand hectares of foggy, mountainous and moist tropical forests as protected land.

Pedro Chinkim invites us with a “watai ikiam” (let us go to the woods). And, on the second day of our visit, we talk for several hours through a trail that takes us east, next to the frontier with Peru. Through our trek, the scent of cinnamon trees enticed our senses.

In a shrub of this same species, two recently born chicks await for their parents. At our feet, a giant river otter swims downstream on its back while gobbling up a fish. For lunch we collect from the jungle guavas, palm tree fruits, sweetsop, papaya...

The environment is healthy. Just like when their nomad grandfathers who came from Peru settled their people here three generations ago, opening up the village clearing with stone axes. It is an often repeated story: they came from Peru; killed their rivals; were evangelized and now seek development.

The third night comes with a steady downpour. The falling drops create an immense watery mesh that is almost impossible to see through. The drops hitting the green foliage create an echo that seems to have no source or end. Lantern in hand, I count 207 insect bites only on my right forearm. My legs and torso and in the same shape.

The rain is so relentless that it is part of an ecosystem that resembles megafauna. The roots of some tree species, such as those of the tseika, form giant wings around their trunks. The natives have developed a natural repellent and are free from the insects.

While these areas remain far away from development, they will remain thus: healthy.

All this surface area was made up of alluvial deposits left during the formation process of the Andes, millions of years ago. Lands peopled by natives who escaped more than 500 years ago from the terrible colonization that drove Amazonian migration.

Today, evangelization plays its part and leaves its marks.

Even far away from the region of the Yasuní ITT project, the natives defend their intent of preserving it. “Ikia nakitiaji nunca machari juka”, says the chief of the communities and Guillermo translates it: “we don’t want the oil companies”.

In Achuar territory, no oil reserves were reported to be found, and neither is it protected land. But his position is firm in relation to oil exploration. “Our food will be affected”, says Guillermo, after explaining how they obtain sustenance from the forest, without harming it. They utilize the waters of the Yankutz River. Isolation from the developmental intentions of mayor Wisum is what protects them.

What happens with Yasuní will be premonitory to peoples such as these in Chinkian entza.

While I fly back to “civilization”, the Shuar and the Achuar hope that it never arrives to drill their land. To extract the black gold. To leave them bereft of hope.