This Is Not How The Story Ends

Ayahuasca (pronounced something like "eye-a-what-scar") has two interpretations.  It means both "vine of souls" and "vine of the dead".  The growing tourism industry in the Amazon favours the first translation.  Either way, this vine grows roots that reach to unfathomable depths.  This is not just another flavour for the recreational trip.  There's purging work to be done and bile evacuation may be the easier part.  In our meat-suit realm it's not pretty, but on another level, a blissful, fractal design is revealed.

DMT is the main active ingredient of this brew.  This mysterious, naturally occurring chemical is already present in our bodies and widely found in nature.  Rick Strassman refers to DMT as "The Spirit Molecule" in his book and documentary of the same name.  He writes:

While chemically simple, this "spirit" molecule provides our consciousness access to the most amazing and unexpected visions, thoughts and feelings.  It throws open the door to worlds beyond imagination.

When deep in a dream, it IS reality.  There's nothing more real at the time.  But when we awaken, it gets a new perspective.  The waking world is revealed as THE reality and the dream is something else of less actionable consequence.

When passing through a higher consciousness, waking life is downgraded as less real.  After returning to the bump-your-head-and-oww-fuck world, the hierarchy persists.  Feet planted squarely back on planet Earth, there remains an insight into another tier of existence.  The people who don't dismiss it as hallucination are the ones who have been there.  This is part of the reason why the "visions" of holy texts have left a door-knocking legacy of annoyance.

The psychedelic experience is a strange fusion between the two worlds we frequent each day and night.  With ayahuasca at least, it's the ability to go fully conscious into the dream state.  The takeaway understanding is fleeting - at best we get to fill up a cup from a tidal wave - yet the importance is persistent.

These last few blog entries are my alternative to recommending the enlightening entrail eruptions of ayahuasca.  I don't feel I have the authority.  Besides, individuals can exercise the often atrophied muscle of free will.  My written words only graze the surface because there are known unknowns I can't access to remember.  That said, these sentences still hold a better foundation to the shapeless-something than the fading strength of a few conversation sound bites.

I blazed through several books in my last days at the retreat.  "The Psychotropic Mind" relates this particular plant medicine to a car crash.  The experience is dramatic and close to death.  Your life flashes before your eyes.  You feel shocked, ill and dazed.  The key difference is that a car accident lasts 3 seconds, whereas ayahuasca lasts over 3 hours.


You can witness the "flash" of your existence with clarity, but it's not a passive observation.  It turns you upside down, folds you inside out and leaves a mess in a bucket.

That's a good summary of the inner journey during my maiden voyage.   There's also the privileged glimpse into awe where mental photography is not permitted and an abstract flavour of infinity is temporarily revealed.  Professor Alan Watts described these DMT effects as:

"Load universe into cannon.  Aim at brain.  Fire."

It was during this I encountered an entity - maybe an inter-dimensional being, maybe a construct of my own mind.  Either way, it commanded my full attention and peered inside my forehead.  Trying to make sense of the communication now just scrambles the transmission.

During the 2nd ceremony, I was exposed as an insect of insignificant - and that was the highlight.  On this night the enchanting icaros was punctuated by many an "urraaht!" of exiting spew.  Hoping for the divine, I instead received a stockpile of puny mortal.

The 3rd time left me with a vague but persistent sense of direction.  If I don't know what I want, then what I want is clarity.  Compelled to write, I didn't have any destination revealed, but it was revealed that didn't matter.  The answers to someone else's career-planning questionnaire were a barrier that had stopped me from beginning.  No more.

The 4th session revealed a step-by-step plan for the immediate terrain.  "A knowledge of the path cannot be substituted for putting one foot in front of the other."  This wasn't simply motivation, as motivation doesn't last and is just another hurdle if it's a requirement to get started.  This was about a disciplined allocation of time and trust into the process.

The 5th and last ceremony was a bumpy ride.  My molecules were put on a spin-cycle of relentless shaking to pry free the anaconda's clutch.

On the leaving day of the retreat, I was up early again.  Increasingly less sleep was needed and more energy was available.  My brain was blotting paper for the info in books, so I read and wrote more.  As the day heated up in the final hour, I sat under a tree's protective shade with members of the group and local family.  The language barrier didn't prevent light-hearted humour.  It softened the small death of an impending goodbye.

During the return to Iquitos, there was a boat transfer mix-up.  At our rendezvous spot on the Amazon, there weren't enough places on the speedboat for the passengers on the longboat.  This caused a few hours of delay.  I didn't have a chance for agitation before I saw that feeling rise in others.  I took this as a warning as we returned to the world of civilization's schedules.

When a new speedboat finally arrived, the driver pulled down a flat screen tv facing the passenger seats.  This was hooked up to custom stereo system.  We took off and were blasted with cheese-heavy, Peruvian pop music.  The skipper thought it was "the shit", but that's about half true.  This unrelenting assault on the senses for the hours of boat ride felt like rendition.  I could already feel the lure of previous modes of cynicism.

Out of this group of 13, I'd safely say that most of us had our orientation in matter recalibrated.  Whether or not we all stay on that new course or navigate back towards the old one remains to be seen.  Resistance of change is not to be underestimated. 
Transformation requires vigilance.

The next day in in fast-paced Iquitos, several of us met at the Dawn of the Amazon Cafe.  After a leisurely breakfast, we wandered through the city markets.  This wasn't to order the fresh chicken being chopped up in the hot streets.  Instead, a few of us sought physical reminders of what we'd experienced.  The variety of local handicrafts seemed to cover all bases.  Pumas, snakes, owls and jaguars all made their way into artwork.  Shiva, Buddha and other holy references made their cameos too, with varied degrees of personal relevance.

While I did encounter a hard-to-explain intelligence, I invoke no deity as an explanation.
It's an accessible mystery, a parallel consciousness.  I understand the temptation is to fill this void with the "god of the gaps", or alien putty, or cult Q&A.  The thing these "answers" all have in common is a human middleman.  That makes for an unacceptable filter when you've directly chanced upon the source.

A mind, once expanded by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions. -- Oliver Wendell Holmes

Ayahuasca is not an acquired taste.  It's a taste that eludes acquisition like a crude-oil-coated eel.  The dark liquid slithers into the flesh which begrudgingly accepts it as a trick of gravity.  It snakes its way into the mind, body and spirit lands within.  When it exits, there is a lifting to the flesh burden.

I have temporarily cleared my infestation.

My hovercraft is no longer full of eels.




At least, that would have been a neat, final sentence if this was a happily-ever-after story.  I didn't kill any demons - at best I bulldozed their internal headquarters.  It's been several months since I ceased my traveller's momentum and I know they're rebuilding.

In this time I've enforced daily habits that support sketched blueprints with far horizons.  I've enhanced important relationships while the pathway to others remains clouded.
Many times my actions fall short of my intentions.  I'm not sure if greater awareness of this counts as progress.  These missed opportunities of the moment now seem more painful.

There's not much I can say with certainty.  I'm different.  I don't know exactly how.

Just a wee bit of human sacrifice

The fourth and last day of the Inca trail began during the night. It was a classic case of "hurry up and wait". We gathered our gear then made a short walk in the darkness to a closed checkpoint where the crowd kept increasing. The reason for this zombified early start is not to catch Machu Picchu at dawn as suggested by the itinerary. The checkpoint wouldn't open in time for that. Instead, it was so the porters could catch one of the two daily local trains. That reasoning was fair enough, but the extended period of time in an unmoving line seemed a bit pointless.

The sun rose, and the gate had yet to open. Finally the crowd started to shuffle through as paperwork was stamped. The trail quickly resumed its beauty. Part of it was on the edge of a steep mountain. The pole-assisted walkers funnelled into single file, like a shopping sale rush with zimmer frames.



The steepest part of the whole trail is the accent to the Gateway of the Sun. From here I caught my first glimpse of the destination and it was a powerful sight. The group rejoined here, spent a bit of time taking in the view and then carried on.



From this point we were heading back to a merge with airport-stupor tourists. As the bus loads of gawkers poured in, I had the impression of ants hollowing out a dead bird. The ruined city had a hard time sharing its magic as a theme park without any rides.

We tiredly entered the official boundary of Machu Picchu and our energy raised in anticipation of exploration. That feeling was quickly snuffed by our self-absorbed tour leader. He had the group sit down on a cold rock wall while delivering a lengthy and somewhat rambling monologue. He turned a facinating topic into haemeroids.

I'd noticed that he wasn't entertaining any questions either. His avoidance method was to just start talking over the top of the question about something else. That made me determined to pin some good ones on him and make him earn his peanuts. We were near the King's chair and an altar. He had exhausted his next rant and we were about to move on. It took a couple of goes but I got to ask "Did the Inca practice human sacrifice? ".

He said "the Inca sacrificed guinea pigs, llamas and", he held two fingers apart to indicate something really small, "some human sacrifice."

"So that would have happened right here?" I pointed to the altar before us.

He gave a single nod of the affirmative "Sí", he replied. Wow! How was he going to miss that juicey detail?

Before we were finally let loose in the ruins my phone battery flat lined, putting an end to my pics for the day. I hadn't really appreciated the size of this former capital of the Incan Empire until I started exploring.



The city was abandoned in 1572 when the Spanish were kicking arse in these lands. It would have made an excellent defensive position due to its strategic location. Add some medieval tactics to the mix and an invading force would have quite a boggle. But not so.

The leading theory for the purpose of this place was its religious significance. It also contains carved stones aligned to the compass points and solstice, used as an astronomic clock and observatory. After self-exile, this mountaintop city remained lost until its rediscovery in 1911.

From the Machu Picchu ruins, I caught a bus that zig-zaged down the mountain to the town of Machu Picchu, otherwise known as Aguas Calientes. This allowed the comforts of a shower, massage and meal. We regrouped here then caught a late train back to Cusco.

That left an extra day and a bit to re-re-revisit Greens cafe, explore some more and have some good conversations with a couple of friends from the group. Cusco now felt like a different place - like a city on a fuse.

The last scheduled tour group activity was a flight back to Lima. At the airport, I waited near the mouse maze while others lined up to check in their luggage. It took until the first person reached the front of the que to realise the spanner in the plan. The plane had already begun boarding and it was too late to check luggage. A futile arguement ensued. With my web check-in in hand, I wasn't prepared to go down with this ship. My journey still had an important mission and no buffer time to compromise. I said some quick goodbyes and rushed to the gate.

"You're late." At the boarding gate, my check-in printout scanned with a red light and disapproving beep. I was unfazed. "You're late" she repeated.

"How can I be late if I'm standing right here?" There were at least 20 people for the same flight in the que behind me. I wasn't going to miss this flight by association. I was an independent once again with no more flexibility left in my travel schedule.

It took them a while and an extended phonecall wait, but I was eventually let through. The others unfortunately made no appearance before the wheels left the tarmac. Another payoff for travelling light.

Lima airport again... such an interesting place...

I arrived in Iquitos at night. Deep in the jungle, on the shores of the Amazon river this city has the distinction of being the largest in the world that can't be reached by road.

My first (and lasting) impression was that this place is wild. Leaving the airport I entered a "mototaxi" - a modified motorcycle rickshaw with a passenger cabin on the back. There's a Mad Max element to public transport. Motorbikes and mototaxis rule the roads in a river of swerving chaos. Optional road safety extras such as helmets, indication and attention to lanes are all absent. Phonecalls, text messaging and even breast feeding were all shown to be possible with one hand on the handlebars. It was time to hold on and enjoy the ride.

A light turned red and there was a pause in the swarm. A couple of gringo hippie chicks ran out in front of the stationary vehicles for some impromptu performance art. The lights changed and they stood narrow while bikes raced past them.

I arrived at my accomodation, explored just enough to get some dinner, then crashed fully clothed on top of my bed for a handful of hours before an early start the next morning.

A unique phase of my journey was about to begin.