Latinalicious: The South America Diaries (21 page)

I experienced strong emotions along with these visions that had me laughing and falling internally to my knees. I heard a voice … whether that was Mother Ayahuasca or my Higher Self, I don’t know … telling me to relax. Then, ‘Listen,’ something told me. ‘Listen.’

So I did. And once I’d vomited again into my bucket, I flew. A powerful energy seemed to be coursing through me. I felt calm and blissfully happy and, while I was always very aware of my own body, I was able to flow with wherever the ayahuasca sent me. It occurred to me at one point that maybe if I let my ego go, stopped trying to understand that which is simply not in our realm of understanding, I might reach an even higher level … but even though I heard a resounding ‘Yes!’ from somewhere, I still couldn’t see what that might be. And as the world got stranger I felt myself holding back.

Visions were colliding behind my eyes. I saw green and felt red and heard yellow as my senses warped and tricked me. The enormity of space between each life-affirming thought was so wide and deep I was almost a bit scared of falling into the abyss and never coming back.

I stopped trying to think so much and almost instantly understood, somehow, that people who experience God are simply experiencing their own true selves, minus the ego and social conditioning that’s always done nothing but mislead them. I tried to keep a hold of this thought but felt it slipping away with other revelations. Thought after thought after thought crashed in from the stratosphere and split, like someone driving a truck through the fragile strands of a spider’s web. I was pure energy. I was the girl travelling the world, and the world, travelling through the girl. I was in a magical, metaphysical paradise, knowing I was God, that
everything
was God, but I was also in hell knowing I’ve lived so much of my life without really knowing anything at all. (Is this what it was like to live in the acid-riddled 60s?!)

For a moment, it all felt like a colossal waste of time — this constant struggle to
know
everything. And then I saw what Gary had meant when he said, ‘Here, where time matters, all we have to do is love each other’, because nothing else
does
matter. I saw it then. I felt it, too. Nothing else matters. Not even time. When we die, we live on. We simply float off into the cosmos and become part of it all again, this beautiful, infinite, timeless swirl of energy, and nothing we can do in our human forms will ever compare to the bliss we will feel when we finally let go.

‘Listen,’ the voice said again. And the world as I knew it exploded into stars.

The hum of the cicadas and crickets outside blended into a monotonous, high-pitched frequency as I buzzed; it was like a dentist’s drill driving to my skull, setting every nerve ending alight. This was really intense for the first hour or so. I wonder now, as memories from the trip weave back together in my mind, whether this sound could be the reason for so many people seeing and feeling aliens and alien technology working on their brains during ayahuasca sessions in the jungle. Or are these aliens simply our own selves appearing in a form that has long gone unacknowledged?

After a while, things got weirder. I swear I saw three tribesmen towering over me when I opened my eyes, all with long hair, all carrying spears and wearing those over the shoulder warrior vest-things, like shields strapped on, if that makes sense? I know that sounds bizarre, but that’s what I saw. They didn’t worry me; I felt a calming energy around them as they studied me. But there were a few other creepy shadows in the
maloca
that didn’t feel very nice.

At one point, I saw Don Lucho heading for the door, along with someone else. In spite of my trippy state (although I was coming down a bit by then), I did think it was odd that they were leaving so quickly mid-ceremony, but at the meeting this morning Jeannie explained that Don Lucho had ordered a demon outside, a pretty nasty one apparently, that was threatening to attach itself to his wife. Our shaman had actually left alone, but I wasn’t the only one who saw two figures moving through the
maloca
and out the door. I also wasn’t the only one who saw and felt some pretty dark energies around us as we all slowly returned from another realm.

Also, last night, the people who came here with the most issues (drug abuse and physical abuse from their childhoods) were the ones who purged the loudest and the most into their buckets. They’re also the ones displaying decidedly brighter energies around the retreat today.

There’s definitely some magic at work around here. I can’t deny that any more than I can deny the stench wafting out from some of my new friends’ armpits. It’s just a shame that shamans and ayahuasca can’t banish the sand flies like they can the evil demons in people. I’m itching so badly right now I’m in danger of scratching my own limbs off.

3/12

On the third night at Kapitari there was no ayahuasca ceremony, but weird things were happening all over the place. After the dark energy force that tried to attach itself to Don Lucho’s wife, Jeannie saw clearly what most of us were feeling: a number of spirits hanging around, both good and bad, which apparently is quite typical when people are healing. All the negativity comes out and it’s the shaman’s job to get rid of it once and for all … another reason why you should never do ayahuasca with a phoney shaman!

Still, it really threw the balance off at ‘ayahuasca camp’, as did the bizarre behaviour of one guy I’ll call Ryan.

Ryan’s the kind of guy who always has to be centre of attention, the kind who talks over everyone else and, more often than not, talks for the sake of making a noise. He’s in his thirties but has this macho, bad-boy arrogance about him that, in a close environment like this, can tend to do your head in. Most people, including myself, have been trying to stay away from him, and Don Lucho, sensing without being told that Ryan has had some, shall we say, issues with addictive substances in the past, put him on a strict plant diet, including tobacco.

To accelerate the expulsion of his demons, Ryan’s been having to drink a jug of tobacco every day, which is basically like drinking the contents of a giant ashtray mixed with water. It’s highly toxic. The sound of his vomiting can probably be heard for miles. It hasn’t stopped him smoking, however. Most people at Kapitari have been chain smoking since they arrived. I find it quite bizarre that such spiritual, health-conscious people insist on inhaling such repugnant filth. I’ve spent more time passive smoking on this jungle retreat than breathing fresh air.

On the fourth afternoon, Ryan got a few harsh words from those he’s been pissing off. Things were weird, tension was high. Everyone was hot, bothered, bitten to shreds and hungry. I felt like I was trapped in an episode of
Survivor
and there was no way I was going into the
maloca
feeling so negative, so I passed on the ceremony. But while I was reading my Kindle in my cabin, I had the strongest urge to sleep, and some five minutes later — I swear I’m not making this up — I felt myself about to be dragged off my mattress!

You might call it sleep paralysis — you know, when your mind wakes up before your body and you can’t move? But it felt so real and when I flung open my eyes I’m a hundred per cent positive I saw a dark shadow over me subside and then disappear. I freaked out, as you can imagine. But there was nowhere I could go, because literally everyone else was in the
maloca
, tripping.

Weirdly, the next morning at the meeting, Jeannie said she’d felt the exact same thing happen to her as she lay on her mattress in the
maloca
, and she’d felt it at the same time as I had. Another dark spirit was apparently trying to make its mark.

Jeannie, as I’ve mentioned, has been seeing spirits since she was five years old. She’s also been able to detect illnesses in other people and, sometimes, cure them. As a teenager in Sydney, Jeannie detected terminal cancer in a woman and later healed her but, not knowing back then how to dispel it afterwards, she contracted it herself. Given months to live, with an untreatable type of lymphatic cancer known as lymphangioma sarcoma growing up her arm, Jeannie asked her dad to take her camping so she could finally see her favourite animals, crocodiles.

Ever since she was small, Jeannie has been visited in her dreams by a middle-aged Indian man in a feathered headdress who would often show her crocodiles and tell her never to fear them. As her dad slept in their tent just outside of Kakadu National Park, the teenage Jeannie wandered off into the lake, where logic went out the window and she decided to go swimming. She touched several crocs before anything happened, but finally one grabbed her, performed the death roll and promptly chomped off her right arm.

When she awoke four days later in the hospital, having lost over two pints of blood, Jeannie’s dad told her she’d shown up back at the tent, bloodied and bewildered, asking where the Indian man who’d saved her had gone. He’d appeared to her once again at the bottom of the lake and, once again, told her not to be afraid of crocodiles.

Amazingly, with the disappearance of her arm, the terminal cancer completely vanished, leaving no trace. Could it be that the crocodiles were supposed to save her all along? And isn’t that the most extraordinary story you’ve ever heard? Seriously, someone should make a movie of this lady’s life.

Jeannie finally made it to the Amazon years later and knew instantly that this was her home. She now lives in a small village near Iquitos called Padre Coche and, while she hasn’t formally followed the shamanic path, she does use her gifts to help people and does a whole lot of great stuff for the local community, including paying for all the kids to get hot chocolate and cookies at Christmas. I’ve loved getting to know her, actually.

Anyway, with my time at Camp Crazy coming to an end, I decided to participate in the fourth ayahuasca ceremony. Ryan puked more than anyone, which didn’t surprise any of us, but as far as my own ‘healing’ is concerned, Mother Ayahuasca decided to make an award-winning appearance, perhaps even better than the last time.

To begin with, I saw the face of a jaguar right up close, practically stamped on the back of my eyelids. I later recalled that the jaguar is considered a protective animal, as are crickets and praying mantises when they appear in your visions, apparently. Snakes are a symbol of rebirth, and I saw many, many snakes this time, too.

I felt a buzzing current through my body like before, but this time the visions were intense and much clearer, sometimes almost cartoon-like. I saw animals I can’t describe and creatures you’d usually only see in fantasy films running through the jungle, leading me to distant shores. But every vision was ephemeral and catapulted into the next. It was almost as though the ayahuasca knew she only had me for a limited time and wanted me to see as much as possible.

I saw people from my past, and people who I’ve never seen before in my life, including a dark-haired man who I can’t picture now, but I remember he had the most beautiful smile. I saw Ryan across the room floating in mid-air with his legs crossed as though he was praying in a monastery (and later learned he used to do just that all the time, in Japan). And
then
I was shown the entire plot of a book. I even saw the cover being waved in front of me by a pair of invisible hands, which were actually more like beams of light. I’m not going to tell you what it was about, but it sounds quite exciting. If I ever get round to writing it, I’ll probably have to lie a bit about how I got the inspiration. ‘I was lying on a mattress in the Amazon rainforest, tripping my tits off when it struck me,’ probably wouldn’t make the most satisfactory explanation for some.

I still didn’t see any aliens as such, but again I felt the sense of being everything and nothing, at one with nature and the world. At one point, I became aware of an almost uncomfortable heat in my right ear. I vaguely remember shifting positions and ‘seeing’ a glow around it. And you know what? Afterwards, I wasn’t deaf in that ear anymore. I swear to God, the ear that’s been troubling me on and off since the salt flats tour in Bolivia was suddenly completely fixed.

I think it was the most powerful ceremony yet for all of us, actually. Another guy here said he’s been walking with a slightly twisted foot for years and, during
his
fourth session, he saw a giant lotus flower open up above his head and two alien beings emerge, one of which emitted a beam of light that lifted his leg into the air and sent a high frequency pulsing through it. The next morning, his foot, just like my ear, was absolutely fine. He literally walked out of the jungle with zero trouble. It can’t just have been the high-pitched hum of the cicadas in the trees and our DMT influenced minds that did all that, can it?

I’m aware now that I may have lost you several paragraphs ago. Do I sound crazy? Do I sound like a hippy who’s about to say, ‘Sod the world, I’m going to grow my armpit hair really long and move to Peru, where I will live in a hut and practise astral travel with my new invisible jaguar?’

Well, I’m not going to do that, and I’m not crazy. I don’t think. But wow, that was a weird, weird, weeeeeeird experience. Way weirder than anything I ever did in Bali. I can’t deny the things I saw and felt any more than I can explain them without sounding like a looney. Some things just
are
, I suppose.

Back to Ryan. We knew from the start he had a troubled and disruptive spirit but now that I’m back in Iquitos I’ve since learned he went a bit mad at Jeannie’s house last night and ran off into the jungle. He must have got hold of some drugs somehow and slipped back into his old ways, which is sad. I guess for ayahuasca to help you heal, a part of you has to want to change.

You’re supposed to go into every session with an intention, or a question, and pretty much everyone else who went to Kapitari has come away with the answers they were looking for. Gary, the ex-army guy who saw the aliens on the first night, labelled it as the most profound and life-changing experience he’s ever had. For someone who’s been in the army, that’s pretty huge, and he had come wanting something to make him ‘feel’ again. Another girl, a beautiful, bubbly Southern girl called Jennifer, also admitted she’ll view things differently after vomiting up negative thoughts about broken friendships and people from her past. She felt a lot of love from the people who’ve stayed in her life, which has reassured her that it’s OK to let the others go.

I personally asked for direction, seeing as I never bloody know where I’m going next. I feel as though I was told that I’m doing the right thing just living in the moment. The here and now is all that exists. Tomorrow isn’t even real.

When you switch off the mobile phones, laptops, thoughts of money, shopping, work, cars, all the other stuff that clouds and crowds our heads and hearts, this
is
all we have, I guess. The earth. The trees, the sky, each other. At the end of the day, when you consider everything we still don’t know about this universe, it isn’t really so hard to believe that plant spirits exist and can actually help us channel our higher, better selves; or that they’ve actually been talking to those who care to listen for centuries in the world’s most incomprehensible yet open pharmacy.

Sitting back in the Karma Cafe tonight, reflecting on what has surely been the most bizarre, enlightening experience of my life, I looked down and saw a giant green cricket perching on the arm of my chair, just watching me, like Jiminy about to break into song. There were no plants for miles, nothing but madness and
motocarros
outside. I have no idea where he came from. Perhaps he was a final gift from Mother Ayahuasca, seeing as a jaguar wouldn’t have been appropriate for a busy cafe?

I’ll never forget my ayahuasca experience, or Don Lucho and his tireless work at Kapitari. Or Andy, or Gary, or Ryan, or the others who’ve all shared their incredible experiences and time this week. Oh, and if you want to go and stay in the wonderful Jeannie’s house in the jungle when
your
turn comes for enlightenment in Iquitos, you are also more than welcome. She opens her home to open-hearted people and, who knows, she might even be able to help you heal, along with your shaman. Get in touch, get some mozzie repellant (for God’s sake, get a ton of the stuff, I look like a leper right now) and get ready to go a little bit hippy on the world.

6/12