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c h a p t e r 6 Tales of Amazonia Personal Narratives of Healing by Yumbos Salasaca, July 4, 2002, 10:30 a.m. radio broadcast. The announcer this morning informed people that in the city of Riobamba were two shamans from the Amazonian Napo Province: “two shamans [chamanes] from the Association of Shamans of Napo Province will be attending to people. They are M. Shuango and Juan Vargas, cousin of the presidential candidate Antonio Vargas.” The announcer then interviewed Juan Vargas, and emphasized again that the shamans were from Napo Province. In answer to one of the interview questions, Juan Vargas said, “I learned to heal from my grandfather when I was thirteen years old.” He went on to announce that he and his colleague would be at a community center in Riobamba to treat people starting on Saturday and continuing for fifteen days, from 8 a.m. until 9 p.m., and then that the two resident medical doctors would also be approved to attend to people in the community. Mariano and Anita listened to the same radio station every morning because the announcer would state the time every five minutes. This was a necessary tool for getting the kids off to school on time in a house that lacked clocks. The station also broadcast regional news, such as the announcement just quoted. The radio announcement alerting highlanders that they could take advantage of the presence of two Amazonian shamans who were visiting the Andes continued a long tradition of Andean desire for Amazonian spiritual powers. Although there are shamans throughout Ecuador, those from certain regions are believed to be especially powerful. In fact, the radio announcer stated that one of the shamans was the cousin of then presidential candidate Antonio Vargas, whose grandfather was known as a very powerful shaman from Puyo in Pastaza Province (D. S. Whitten 2003:259). In this chapter I analyze personal testimonies of people who were healed by lowland shamans to show how they perpetuate an old Andean tradition that attributes spiritual powers to Amazonian and 108   c h a p t e r 6 other lowland shamans. This is the first of three chapters that show how cultural and historical patterns (in this case, a shamanic regional network) are lived out by individuals. Modern Landscapes, Ancient Knowledge One view of the people from the Amazonian tropical forest is that they possess ancient knowledge that has been lost by modern Andeans. According to a Salasacan man named Raúl, the elders used to tell him old tales about the Incas. He told me that the Incas had a network of underground tunnels connecting the mountains of the Andes, and that they were powerful, sorcerer-like beings who could “go to the moon, only with their thoughts.” In discussing modernday sorcery, Raúl compared the yumbos, here meaning indigenous Canelos people of Pastaza Province, to the ancient shamans: “Those who ensorcel go to the Canelos, the back/ east region [huashaorienteladomu]. They ensorcel by cleansing with a candle. When they die, their souls, they say, also die. The old shamans were really fierce. [They were] yumbos. They’re indigenous people. They speak like us but with a different tone.” In comparing the Incas to powerful sorcerers, and the fierce shamans of olden times to modernday yumbos, Raúl expresses the idea that the modern people of the tropical forest have retained a lost art. When plowing fields, people occasionally find material manifestations of past civilizations, such as ancient sherds, bones, and other objects. An old folk tale tells of how the Incas burrowed underground to avoid being baptized by the Spanish, and of how they took their treasures with them. Occasionally, these treasures reveal themselves to individuals through dreams. An individual who dreams of treasures or of fire burning in a particular place should get up in the middle of the night and go to that spot to start digging. Dreams, according to Raymond Firth (1973), link private and public symbolism. In dreams that reveal Inca treasure in specific locations, historical and cultural images impinge on private consciousness and find expression in the experience of dreams. A few people told me they had had such dreams but were too afraid to undertake the search for Inca treasure alone, in the middle of the night. One night in the summer of 2005, some people came from the town of Guaranda looking Personal Narratives of Healing    109 for Mariano, an old Salasacan shaman. They said...

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