The cosmic serpent

Jornal Infinito presents Jeremy Narby Ph.D, anthropologist.

Jeremy Narby was Born in Switzerland and was raised in his homeland and then Canada. He studied History at the University of Canterbury and got his Ph.D in anthropology at the University of Stanford. Narby lived for two years among the Ashaninka Indians, in the Peruvian Amazon, where he studied their methods for exploring the abundant natural resources of the Great Forest. Narby has worked for Nouvelle Planète, a Swiss non-profit organization.
See in "INTERVIEWS" an exclusive interview with Jeremy Narby for Jornal Infinito. Narby is the author of the book after which this series was named.

The Television in the Forest

At 25, Jeremy Narby went to the Peruvian Amazon to live among the Ashaninka tribe (and study them). The anthropologist task was to obtain necessary information for his doctorate in Anthropology: to listen to the stories told by the Indians, to learn how they think, about their beliefs, food, in summary, how was their daily lives and, more important, where do their vast KNOWLEDGE come from, as they aptly tapped into the forest natural resources to perform miraculous cures and to produce a unique and sophisticated pharmacopoeia.

There was another important issue to be dealt with: the Pichis-Palcazu Special Project had spent $86 million in the area development. The tribe, disappointed and frustrated, could not release their products in the marketplace because they do not know how to do it. They only wanted to keep their children in schools, to have plenty of food and nice housing. They wanted money enough to keep a decent and dignified life standard, something every human being deserves. Their luxuries? Portable lights, a few more efficient work tools, a radio, things like that.
In return, they would share with the project their invaluable KNOWLEDGE financially speaking.

When Narby arrived, he asked a native where was the SOURCE OF KNOWLEDGE, the source of the perfect knowledge of the Amazon forest potential. He got a succinct answer: "In the use, by the shamans, of the Ayahuasca." Jeremy Narby thought the native was playing a joke on him.

As time passed by, already acquainted with the local culture, the anthropologist found how the reserved shamanic world worked, of those people who acquired their knowledge by means of powerful hallucinogens, the "Ayahuasca" and the "Tobacco".

The shamans had a quite Spartan way of life and were known as "ayahuasqueros" (ayahuasca drinkers) or "tabaqueros" (tobacco smokers), and when they used both hallucinogens, they were called "ayahuasqueros-tabaqueros". Their daily meals were practically reduced to bananas and fish, which are food particularly rich in serotonin, another evidence of the knowledge they have somehow acquired.

Ruperto Gómez was the Indian who first initiated Jeremy Narby in the secrets of the Amazon and offered him the controls to the "television in the forest."

The anthropologist had read Carlos Castañeda and in his mind he thought the shaman was similar to the old Indian Don Juan, Castañeda's mentor. Ruperto Gómez, in no wise, had the looks of a traditional old wise Indian.
However, when questioned by Narby - How have you learned all this? -- Ruperto Gómez answered with great confidence: "You know, brother Jeremy, to understand what you are interested in you will have to drink ayahuasca... Some say it is connected to the hidden, which is true, but it is not malignant. In fact, Ayahuasca is the "Television in the Forest".

The Experiment

Ruperto Gómez warned Jeremy Narby: "I'll be back on Saturday, prepare yourself the day before, don't eat salt, nor fat; just a little piece of manioc, boiled or grilled."
Narby, skeptical, did not comply with the instructions because he did not believe them. He found all that stuff superstitious, thus, he ate some smoked deer meat with fried manioc on the day he was supposed to practically fast.

At the settled time, along with another four persons, Narby sat down to have his first experience with Ayahuasca and to watch the "Television in the Forest."
Ruperto came closer and lit a cigarette rolled in paper, saying: "This is 'toe'" - and passed it over to all participants. The humble "toe" was in fact a kind of thorn apple, and had Narby knew that, as he declared later, he would never had inhaled that smoke considered highly toxic by "the civilized people". Then, he drank his dose of Ayahuasca. The anthropologist compared its taste to the grapefruit's, contrasting with the sweetness of the "toe" smoke. Ruperto started to sing a fascinating song, which made Jeremy Narby's mind dizzy.

The "Television" started its show with a kaleidoscope of leading stars in between the images of a rodent and a woman, an erotic figure having 20 breasts, and other creatures. There were two most beautiful serpents, shining, scintillating and multicolored. Very soon they were replaced by two huge boas constrictors, which scared the anthropologist with their enormity. They were surrounded by a world of dreams, a spectacular glittering world.

The two serpents started a mental dialogue with Jeremy Narby. They explained to him he was "a mere human being". In that moment, the anthropologist mind was "broken" and
Narby could realize his arrogance in having that status: the status of a human being. He realized that arrogance of his prevented him from knowing the true REALITY. Jeremy Narby, intimately, felt like he was crying with the extension of those revelations and found that self-pity was one of the weapons used by his arrogance. He then felt ashamed in a way he had never felt his entire life. For the second time, he felt sick and threw up. But the huge serpents waited while he paid for the sin of greed and disobedience of Ruperto Gómez's instructions. After the experience was over, Narby asked them to forgive him for his arrogance and self-pity.

In the notes he made afterwards, the anthropologist confessed to never having felt so humble and said his written words did not live up to the grandiosity of those moments he experienced, even though he went through them among vomiting spasms (Kamarampi, from kamarak - to vomit, is one of the nicknames of Ayahuasca).
The last words of the two serpents were: "Wretched human being, feeling he lost his speech and taking pity on himself!"

Narby could see all things in red, including the inside of his own body. When he threw up, he expelled colors and red electric rays. At his left side he saw a dark shadow emerging and at his right side he saw a light. And that light began to command him, the words seemed to come from outside him: "Stop vomiting, it is time to spit and breath through your nose, to wash your mouth with water without drinking it." Narby was atrociously thirsty, but his body had forbid him to drink water... An Ashaninka woman, in fancy outfits, hovered before him… "Are you nauseous?," he heard Ruperto Gómez asking. "Have they told you what to do?" - he went on.

Then, Ruperto offered him another beautiful song, full of vibratos and staccatos. The music gave him wings to FLY, FLY beyond the planet, travel across the universe, softly landing back when it stopped. A few exotic ideas, already fuzzy, still pursued him. Ruperto restarted his song and the "Television in the Forest" showed a suggestive program: a green leaf and its veins, followed by a human hand and its veins. And after that message, it went "off