Trail of Feathers (6 page)

On the jetty I made out the familiar outline of Ariadne. She was standing against the railing in her trademark Afghan sheepskin coat. I smiled, but secretly I wished she would leave me alone. She handed me a turquoise slip of paper, and pointed to a clinker-built launch. The craft was low in the water, skulking down like an Alsatian on all fours. Its captain had taken the cowling away from the engine and was huddled at the stern. First he threatened the delicate machinery with a claw hammer, then struck it six times. The blows were accompanied by a string of Quechua s wear-words. Miraculously, the engine was running three minutes later, urging us into the cloisonné-blue waters of Titicaca.

As we pushed away from the shore, towards the centre of the lake, I threw back my head. Cumulus clouds hung above us like floating islands. Huddling in the bow of the boat, a family from Taquile were getting a free ride home. The father was holding a baby llama to his chest furled in a blanket.

Ariadne lit a clove cigarette, pushed her sunglasses onto her head, and foraged in a buckram holdall by her feet.

‘I went shopping,’ she said, through the corner of her mouth.

‘Souvenirs?’

She squinted until her eyes disappeared.

‘Love potions’ she sniffed, pulling out a tatty plastic bag. It contained an indistinct object, wrapped in bandages like an Egyptian mummy. As Ariadne held the object between her knees, unwinding the cloth, I caught a whiff of what smelled like rotting meat. It reminded me of a Pakistani morgue in which I had once had breakfast. I gagged into the collar of my shirt.

It was a dried llama foetus. Ariadne cupped the trophy in her hands, bent her head down, and touched her lips to it in a kiss.

‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ she asked.

The father from Taquile looked over, and clutched his llama foal closer. ‘What’s it for?’ ‘An aphrodisiac, of course’ 

‘How do you prepare it?’

The Frenchwoman turned to give me a poisoned stare. ‘Are you knowing anything?’ she said. ‘You make
un potage
, a soup.’

I wondered silently why humans feel it necessary to do such strange things with their time. All over the world people are at it: eating fish intestines, mealy grubs and monkey brains, dissecting tarantulas and breeding worms, bungee-jumping, bear-baiting and extracting healthy, unborn llamas from unsuspecting wombs.

I explained to Ariadne that, to most of us, the very idea of swilling down a dried llama bisque was deplorable.

She wrapped up her aphrodisiac, ensuring the legs weren’t poking out.

‘What’s wrong with eating foetus?’ she said. I squirmed.

‘Surely you have heard of Shenzhen?’
‘

Shen…?’

‘In China,’ she said, puffing at her cigarette, ‘across from Hong Kong.’

The family from Taquile and I exchanged a troubled glance. ‘Soup made from aborted foetuses … it’s an ancient remedy.’ I squirmed again. 

‘It’s delicious,’ said Ariadne.

‘You’ve tried it… you’ve actually drunk foetus soup?’

‘Oh, so many times,’ she said whimsically, ‘when I lived in Hong Kong. It’s good for the liver and the kidneys,’ she said, tucking the dried llama foetus back in her bag. ‘And of course,’ she added, ‘there’s nothing like it for a hangover.’

The villagers of Taquile cluster around when they spot a launch arriving. Few tourists journey out to their island. Those that do are offered reed toys and whistles, alpaca tooth charms, and gaudy blankets embroidered with local scenes. Some locals invite the travellers to watch traditional dances, to go fishing, or to stay in their homes. Keeping change at bay, Taquile has resisted the temptation of building hotels or proper restaurants.

Once he had stepped ashore, I asked the man with the llama foal if he knew of any weavers. At first he was wary, something to do with Ariadne’s fixation for dried foetuses, no doubt. I lied, saying she was a vet, with an interest in medical specimens. Then I explained my own interest - Taquile’s textiles.

The man passed the foal to his wife. I looked at his face closely, taking in the ridge of his nose, his chapped lips and the trace of whiskers at the corners of his mouth.

‘Are you a believer?’ he asked, cryptically.

I nodded.

Then you can come with me’ he said. ‘Hector, my grandfather, will be waiting’

We tramped a mile or two inland, breaching low stone walls and jumping ditches, cutting a path across the burnt sienna farmland. Before I knew it, we had almost crossed the island, which only measures four kilometres by two.

A few tourists might have found Taquile, but very little has changed there in the last three hundred years. The island is still divided into six agricultural sections, called
suyos;
 each of which has been administered by the same family for centuries. The crops grown on Taquile would have been familiar to the Incas - a long potato called
oca
, broad beans, maize, wheat and
quinua
, a staple grain rich in protein.

The Spanish treated the island as a great
hacienda
, where guests could feast on the lake’s inimitable supply of trout. In the years after Peru’s independence in 1821, Taquile served as a penal colony. Now that they are again left to their own devices, the islanders spend their time tilling the dusty fields, weaving, and preparing for the calendar of festivals.

In the shadow of a doorway, propped up against a low wall, or sitting on a clump of rocks, every man and woman is busy making cloth, or precious fragments of regalia. Most of the islanders have three or four separate costumes - for working, festivities, weddings and daily life. Cloth is a sacred material on Taquile, as it was to the Incas, and the civilisations which preceded them. The colours are blazing: reds and scarlets, peacock greens and brilliant blues.

As I took in the array of women’s attire, flowing skirts dyed with cochineal, and jet-black shawls, I was struck by the similarity with the Kalash tribal dress of Northern Pakistan. The costumes of Taquile and of the Kalash - former inhabitants of Nuristan - were both born of a fierce rugged landscape.

Hector was sitting on a rounded step outside his ancestral home. From the condition of his fine clothing I could tell that he was a man of status. His white muslin shirt, black trousers and two-tone waistcoat were impeccably kept. But then, the sleeves of the shirt were neatly rolled up, exposing his dark, muscular forearms. Around his abundant waist was tied a
chumpi
, a woven belt, not unlike a Japanese
obi
. On Taquile Island belts have been important for centuries, embroidered with information about the agricultural and social calendar for the year to come. And on his head, Hector wore a tomato-red
pinta-chullo
hat, its point flopped down like a jester’s crown, the sign of a married man.

Spread before him was a
wak’a
loom, upon it a half-finished poncho. The old man stood up when he heard us approaching. He kicked on his rubber-tyre sandals, wiped his nose with the side of his hand, and ducked his head low in respect.

‘Que camine con fuerza y derecho todo su vida -
may you walk tall and be strong your whole life’ he said, pressing his hand into mine. ‘You must sit on my right.’

As I thanked him, I studied Hector’s face. It was a sea of elephant skin, wrinkled and heavy, with a crag of a nose running down the centre like an outcrop of granite. His lips were plum-red, his cheeks scattered with grey stubble. Both eyes were frosted with cataracts. Hector was blind.

Ariadne stepped up to be introduced. The old man drew the lids across his opaque eyes, and held his breath. His expression seemed to sour.

‘This is an acquaintance from France’ I said.

‘Mal de ojo’
whispered the ancient. ‘Please tell her to leave us. She has
mal de
o/o, the Evil Eye.’ Ariadne began to laugh.

‘He can’t even see me’ she said. ‘Poor old man!’

Hector’s grandson stepped in.

‘Grandfather, she has come from so far.’

The old man stared at Ariadne, his blind gaze unflinching.

‘Her eyes are dangerous’ he said.

Unable to take the humiliation, Ariadne grabbed her holdall, and set off towards the dock. I didn’t try to stop her. But as I watched her stomp back through the fields, I reflected on Hector’s comment. The Evil Eye was brought to the New World by the Spanish, who had adopted the custom from the Arabs centuries before. In an ultra-superstitious society like Peru, it fits in very well. Across much of the Latin continent, I’ve seen people warding it away. No one remembers that like smallpox, influenza or measles, it’s not native to the continent. As in any North African village or Middle Eastern town, Peruvian children are given amulets to protect them. Everyone is on the lookout for misfortune, ill-health - the signs that
mal de ojo
is watching them.

Hector told his grandson to put away the weaving.

‘Now the sun has passed the highest point,’ he said, ‘we must not work, but drink.’

A bottle of
chicha
was brought out by Hector’s daughter, a woman with a soft, innocent face.

‘Respected Senor’ I said, as Hector downed his third glass of the cloudy liquid. ‘I have come to your island, drawn by my fascination for
los tejidos antiguos.’

The old man put down his glass and sniffed the air.

‘The ancient textiles
… all
handmade textiles, have strength,’ he said.

Hector leaned back, slapped my knee with his hand, and urged me to drink some
chicha
. 

‘This will make you strong’ he said. ‘Strong like the condor.’ I declined the offer.

‘Now, we make the fabric for the wrong reasons’ he mumbled. ‘These ponchos which we weave are made to be sold.’ Hector paused to sip his glass. ‘To be sold to people like you’ he said. ‘But when I was a child we understood that this cloth was sacred. We used to sacrifice it to the spirits.’

‘Did you burn it… like the Incas did?’

‘Yes, yes! We would light a sacred fire,’ said the old man, ‘and throw upon it our most valued work.’

The Spanish invaders documented well how the Inca himself would wear new robes each day. The previous day’s costume would be committed to the flames. I gave thought to the Incas and their ancestors, for whom cloth was a cornerstone of culture. The link between ancient flight and textiles was as unlikely a link as I could imagine. But then, in my travels, I have found that the true answer often lies behind the most improbable door.

Hector tugged at my arm.

‘We no longer make such sacrifices,’ he said. ‘That is why we are so poor.’

‘Estimado Se
ñ
or,’
I said, ‘could I buy a piece of cloth for us to sacrifice?’

The old man’s blind eyes seemed to light up for a moment. 

‘A sacrifice’ he said gently. ‘To rid us of
mal de ojo
.’

An hour later Hector was weighing a fine, hand-woven
chumpi
, a traditional belt, in his hands. Made from llama hair, dyed claret-red, and about six inches in width, it was embroidered with vertical stripes. A central band of hexagonal motifs ran down the length of the belt. I had paid one of Hector’s neighbours an exorbitant sum for the item, and was beginning to regret the decision to burn it.

‘It’s a fine one,’ remarked Hector, kindling a fire with some dry leaves and a knob of butter. ‘The sacrifice will bring us good fortune.’

Once the flames were licking the sticks like serpents’ tongues, Hector began to sing. It was a solemn song. His daughter opened the windows of the two-room shack, perhaps so that his words could waft into the home. The neighbour’s children watched from a distance as Hector, still singing, laid the
chumpi
on the flames.

Harsh, asphyxiating smoke rose from the fire.

‘Breathe it,’ said Hector, inhaling.

I took a deep breath, and coughed violently, until I tasted blood at the back of my throat. The colours of the
chumpi
were washed by the flames - golden yellows and aurora reds.

‘The textiles from Taquile have special strength,’ said Hector. ‘They can make a man invisible.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Breathe it… taste what is secret.’

Again I breathed in, filling my chest with the llama hair smoke. ‘Once more … breathe it once more…’ 

I was soon reeling, light-headed, my mind floating. 

Hector poured a few drops of
chicha
on the flames. More smoke spiralled upward, choking us.
‘Nuestros antepasados podian volar
- our ancestors flew,’ he said. 

I turned sharply to look at Hector. 

‘They flew?’

‘They used the magic of the textiles to fly.’

‘Howl?

‘They wove wings, covered in stork feathers … then they flew to the gods - they were messengers.’

As we sat in the cloud of llama hair smoke, the
chumpi
still burning ferociously, I tried to make sense of the old man’s words. I thought of the Volador ceremony: of men striving to be airborne, to be in the realm of their gods. I thought, too, of the man I’d met at the top of Huayna Picchu. He had also spoken of messengers. Then I thought of William Deiches with his blueprints for a flying carpet, and about the bloodied feather with its triangular notches.

The smoke seemed to be getting denser.

‘Did your ancestors run out of their houses and simply flap their wings to fly? Can you tell me about the Birdmen, Senor?’

Hector poured a little more
chicha
onto the fire, before wetting his lips with the bottle’s rim. He shook his head from side to side.

‘No, no, they never flew here,’ he said. ‘Isla Taquile is too sacred a place. It was here that mankind was born.’

‘Then where did they fly?’

‘They journeyed onto the mainland,’ he replied.

‘At Puno, did they fly at Puno?’

Again, Hector shook his head.

‘From the towers, they flew from the towers.’

‘Which towers? Where?’

The old man stirred the flames with his cane.

‘They flew from the towers at Sillustani,’ he said.