Ayahuasca is declared cultural patrimony of Perú

This is old news by now, but very important news. The Peruvian government has declared Traditional Ayahuasca use as part of the national cultural heritage.
It really is a cause to celebrate, for it is an official recognition of the highest degree. From now on any legal discussion about Ayahuasca use that takes place in other countries will have to take this into account. It no longer is a matter of the activities of a few groups of individuals more or less underground. Ayahuasca now has official recognition at the national level.

I am including a translation of the entire official text but those with short attention span can jump directly to the paragraphs in bold.

DESIGNATION AS CULTURAL PATRIMONY OF THE NATION EXTENDED TO THE KNOWLEDGE AND TRADITIONAL USES OF AYAHUASCA AS PRACTICED BY NATIVE AMAZON COMMUNITIES.


National directorial resolution

Number 836/INC


Lima, June 24 2008-07-14


Having read Report No. 056-2008-DRECP/INC dated May 29, 2008, prepared by the Directorate of Registration and Study of Contemporary Culture in Peru:


CONSIDERING:


That Article 21 of the Political Constitution of Peru indicates that it is the function of the State to protect the Cultural Patrimony of the Nation.


That part 1, Article 2 of the Convention for the Preservation of Non-material Cultural Patrimony of the UNESCO, establishes that “it is understood that ‘Cultural Patrimony is defined as the uses, representations, expressions, knowledge and techniques—together with instruments, objects, artifacts, and cultural spaces that are inherent to them---that the communities, groups, and in some cases individuals, recognize as an integral part of their cultural patrimony’. This non-material cultural patrimony, which is transmitted from generation to generation, is constantly re-created by communities and groups, by means of their location, their interaction with nature and their history, inducing a feeling of identity and continuity and therefore contributing to promote respect toward cultural diversity and human creativity”.


That Article VII of the Preliminary Title to Law NO. 28296


- General Law on Cultural Patrimony of the Nation disposes that the National Institute of Culture is charged to register, declare and protect the Cultural Patrimony of the Nation within the confines of its responsibility;


- That part 2) of Article 1 of Title 1 of the above mentioned Law establishes that part of the Cultural Patrimony of the Nation consists of the creations of a cultural community, based upon traditions, to be expressed by individuals unilaterally or in groups, and that consensually respond to community expectations, as an expression of cultural and social identity, in addition to the values transmitted orally, such as autochthonous languages, tongues and dialects, traditional knowledge and wisdom, be it artistic, gastronomic, medicinal, technologic, folkloric or religious, the collective knowledge of peoples, and other expressions or cultural manifestations, which jointly comprise our cultural diversity;


- That National Directorial Resolution No. 1207/INC dated November 10, 2004, approved Directive No. 002-2004-INC “Recognition and declarations of active cultural manifestations as Cultural Patrimony of the Nation”;


- That it behooves the National Institute of Culture, in order to carry out its function as assigned by law, with the active participation of the community, to conduct a permanent identification of such traditional manifestations of the country that should be declared as Cultural Patrimony of the Nation;


- That by means of the proper document, the Directorate of Study and Registration of Culture in Contemporary Peru requests a declaration as Cultural Patrimony of the Nation the knowledge and traditional uses associated with Ayahuasca, and practiced by native Amazon communities, according to the Report prepared by Dona Rosa A. Giove Nakazawa, of the Takiwasi Center-Tarapoto and submitted by the Regional Office of Economic Development of the Regional Government of San Martin to the Regional Directorate of Culture of San Martin;

- That the Ayahuasca plant—Banisteriopsis caapi—is a vegetable species which garners an extraordinary cultural history, by virtue of its psychotropic properties, used in a beverage associated with a plant known as Chacruna-Psychotria viridis;

- That such plant is known by the indigenous Amazon world as a wisdom plant or plant teacher, showings initiates the very fundaments of the world and its components. Consumption of it constitutes the gateway to the spiritual world and its secrets, which is why traditional Amazon medicine has been structured around the Ayahuasca ritual at some point in their lives, indispensable to those who assume the function of privileged carriers of these cultures, be they those charged with communication with the spiritual world, or those who express it artistically.

- That the effects produced by ayahuasca, extensively studied because of their complexity, are different from those produced by hallucinogens. A part of this difference consists in the ritual that accompanies its consumption, leading to diverse effects, but always within the confines of a culturally determined boundary, with religious, therapeutic and culturally affirmative purposes.


- That available information sustains the fact that the practice of ritual ayahuasca sessions constitutes one of the basic pillars of the identity of the Amazon peoples, and that the ancestral use in traditional rituals, warranting cultural continuity, is closely connected with the therapeutic attributes of the plant;

- That what is sought is the protection of traditional use and sacred character of the ayahuasca ritual, differentiating it from Western uses out of context, consumerist, and with commercial objectives;

- That the Manager, the Director of Registration and Study of Culture in Contemporary Peru, and the Director of the Office of Legal Affairs, being cognizant of the above information;

- In conformity with the dispositions of Law No. 28296, “General Law of the Cultural Patrimony of the Nation” and Supreme Decree No. 017-2003-ED, which approves the By-Laws of the Organization and Operation of the National Institute of Culture.

ITS IS RESOLVED:

Sole Article.


To declare as CULTURAL PATRIMONY OF THE NATION, the knowledge and traditional uses of Ayahuasca practiced by the native Amazon communities, as a warranty of cultural continuity.

Be it registered, communicated, and published.

JAVIER UGAZ VILLACORTA

Manager of the National Directorate

National Institute of Culture

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The Devil's Doctor

"The superstitious and sometimes harmful credulity of religious tradition can certainly be considered a poison. But for many of us moderns, hurtling towards a chilly posthumanism, a draught of the poetic and cosmic imagination that feeds religious credulity can wipe away the pain. And even, potentially, heal it. For though skepticism and empirical reason have cleared away many cobwebs of theological error, we are all swimming in the toxic sludge these cultural solvents have left in their wake. The alchemist can envision the gold growing in the sludge; the realist only marvels at the mess we've made, and turns up the collar of his coat."

Erik Davis here talking about this book



Why this post? It has everything to do with everything

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The Chacra Diaries Pt 5

Posted part 5 of the chacra diaries, read it here


That was my toilet




Palos and toés

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Ayahuasca tourism vs. traditional uses, and an online collaborative documentary

When I was invited last year to give a talk a the 3rd Amazonian Shamanism Conference I had no idea what I'd talk about. I had been invited because Jimmy Weiskopf recommened me to Alan Shoemaker, and he had liked some of the chacra diaries so I figured I'd talk a bit about amazonian dietas, a bit about the documentary project, and I'd use the chance to see if I could find people who'd like to help in a collaborative online documentary we've been thinking about for some time. Kind of like Echo chamber project, but different.

The project

The problem we have is that: 1- We have picked a huge topic (which keeps on growing! entheogens, traditional medicine, the link between health and spirituality, the colonization of the Americas and the new cultures that resulted form it, etc etc) and 2- The idea of trying to compress all that material into a standard-size 45-minute documentary, full of soundbite-size statements runs a real danger of over-simplification. You can't explain uses/misuses/abuses of ayahuasca, mention the churches, delve a bit into traditional medicine, what is happening to curanderos and what that says about western culture (and the failings of scientific medicine!) biopiracy, cultural appropriation... and of course reflect a bit on the part of us that actually gets touched by ayahuasca, and what that says about what it means to be human.

See? It doesn't fit in 1 hour, not without making a joke of everything.

So we started playing with a different idea, a sort of gigantic online video archive where we would dump all the tapes, and people could consult at their own pace, without middle men.

But how would people navigate around hours of video?

We needed: an indexing system, a tagging system, and a navigational interface.

Basically all the interviews would be transcribed (word by word), and all videos indexed/tagged (by topic). It would be just like the index at the back of a book, where you can find where certain topics are mentioned and jump to that page. I imagined an interactive index of all the videos, so that people interested on a certain topic could find all the interviews/parts where that topic was mentioned and go there. The interface could even queue the video segments for viewing one after another.

Once you have that built, you have a system to generate movies automatically. You are doing what an editor does with the raw video material (well, almost), but dynamically, on-the-fly. Any path can be transversed though the set of raw materials. So why not predefine a few? We could make a couple of documentaries (the one hour version, the five hour version, etc) and leave them as preset "paths" through the archive, also as starting points. Did you like what someone said during the doc? Would you like to hear the rest? You could jump out of the path, see as much as you wanted of the original interview, and then return. Would you like to see who else talked about that topic just mentioned? You could, etc.


That is more or less the new plan, it's a long project, but I am in no hurry. I see this pretty much as a life-long project. And I believe someone will program a platform that does exactly this sooner or later. It doesn't seem too complicated, basically it's a database that has tape numbers, and uses timecodes to mark in and out for transcribed text (word by word, very good for subtitles later) and in and out time codes for topic and/or tags. It should be fairly easy to give those time codes to a player (quicktime etc) and it would queue them for you. If no one gets around to do it I guess we will.

Sounds interesting? I am looking for volunteer programmers, designers, and very importantly transcribers. I need people to help me put into writing the dozens of hours of interviews I have with some of the most interesting people in the ayahuasca world. Including Benny Shanon, Johnatan Ott, Jacques Mabit, Luis Eduardo Luna, Ralph Metzner, Richard Yensen, Antonio Escohotado, Josep Maria Fericgla, dozens of curanderos, mestres and members of the 3 main Brazilian Ayahuasca churches, psychologists who use the brew to get people off drugs, former drug addicts, and a host of people from all walks of life whose lives have been touched by their encounter ayahuasca, plus rituals, masses, preparations, healing sessions, seminars, detox centers... the list goes on and on.

If you are interested in ayahuasca and you can type fast and you will probably enjoy the work, the interviews are really well worth it.



Back to the talk

That was more on less on my mind for the talk. At the Conference I met some very good people, but in Iquitos there is also a side of Ayahuasca that I actively try to avoid: Cunning locals looking for a quick buck (chamán + charlatán = charlamán) and/or sincere but (in my opinion) misguided westerners of new age-ish leanings.

Now, if you are interested entheogens chances are you too have what others would describe as new age-ish leanings, I certainly do, but some people are just more new age than others, I guess, and some people are just too new age for me. Which is normal, everybody knows somebody who they think "goes too far" into whatever. In life you'll always meet people you click with and people you can´t get along with. Attitudes you approve and attitudes you disapprove. It is perfectly normal (actually it is unavoidable) it happens in any field of human activity. There is no way out of it.

...And certainly in this world everybody should be able to pursue their own individual bliss as they see fit.

But that week in Iquitos I saw people that in my opinion were not properly prepared, make a farce, a theater play, out of something I respect and love very much, the work and practices of Amazonian curanderismo. All in order to feel better about themselves in front of people who didn't know any better (and get some of their money.) It wasn't necessarily in the conference, there was plenty of worthwhile people there, but some of it was around it, and that mix of the good and the bad is certainly an integral part of Iquitos ayahuasca scene.

So when the time came for my talk I though I'd try to clarify a few misconceptions that seemed rampant in the western-ayahuasca-seekers world (of which I am undeniably part of) Not to tell people what to think, but just communicate a few facts I found useful when facing "amazonian shamanism". Basically I wanted to:

1-Talk about how our western interest (read money) in shamanism is changing it from what it was, to what we would like to be.

2-Put shamans/curanderos first in their proper context:
a) As traditional doctors who practice a form of *medicine*, neither saints (they can be very flawed) nor proper gurus or spiritual guides (that is a different job, from a different culture) and
b) as *professionals* of their field, the result of years of training, not a few weeks or month long "courses" (This weekend-course format is perhaps the most defining factor of all things new age: they all seem to take place in the form of "courses")

3-Ask for some help with the doc project.

Below is a short reduction of the talk



the full talk can be seen here.

You be the judge as to how well I managed to get points 1 and 2 across. As to point 3 I was almost a complete failure. Only Susan offered help (thanks Susan!) She's helped me quite a bit already and I don't like to bother volunteers in excess. So, if you'd like to help with the project write to





If you wouldn't like to help but are interested on the topic of the appropriation of indigenous knowledge I recommend

Plastic Shamans and Astroturf Sun Dances

Selling Native Spirituality

We do not have shamans

Declaration of War Against Exploiters of Lakota Spirituality

Newagefrauds has some updated forums full of denunciations, they take a very hard line and their positions are controversial even among some Native Americans. Indeed the whole topic is full of heated arguments Here used to be another popular forum, but the person who was running got tired of all the threats she received and decided to shut it down. Some of her parting words were:

"Let me make my position clear - I am not against non-Indians participating in ceremony. I know that puts me at odds with a probably rather large portion of the Native community. But if you are going to participate - do it in a safe and respectful manner. Please - wait until you've been invited by a member from a legitimate community. Don't pay, and look out for a few simple things that will let you know if you supposed Medicine Man/Woman is genuine or not. Do they speak the language of the people they claim to be from? Do they do these ceremonies back home for the people they claim to be from? Do they ask for money upfront - either as a "love offering" or any other "suggested donation."

I guess she meant something like this crap $90 down and $5 a month will get you adopted as a "Native American Medicine Man or Woman"

Utterly shameless (or shameon)

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Ceu do Mapiá: Medicina da floresta, Casa de Cura, and Benki Ashaninka

When we visited the Daime community (almost the Vatican of the Daime) in Ceu de Mapia in 2004 we were taken to Medicina Da Floresta, a botanical garden and plant laboratory where Maria Alice Campos Freire grew and prepared all of the medicinal plants used by the community. It was beautiful place, with a mandala-shaped multi-level garden, and a small lab for extractions

When she saw the camera she said "I don't like those machines"
They'd just had a bad experience with Brazilian journalist (from Penthouse, I believe) who essentially staged pictures to make them look bad.

We turned off the camera and she sat down to talk to us. She was a very interesting person, with a very no-nonsense practical outlook, among other things she'd developed a natural method to fasten the reforestation of the jungle (a painfully slow process otherwise) She'd been disappointed many times trying to start big projects "I am now a barefoot worker" she said.

Just today I found some videos of her in YouTube, they even have a YouTube group

I am glad to see she's still keeping strong.



She says: I don't have much to say. For me it's few words, a good amount of feeling, and a LOT of action ... all of the old traditions teach the same: to preserve.. the creation, through ACTION, not talk so much, but to do..

The kid in the next video says "We are here to learn. To learn to care for the forest, to learn to make remedies to treat illnesses. To learn to help" He is twelve. It always struck me about children in Mapiá, children who have grown up into an Ayahuasca since birth how secure and mature for their age they seem.



The other half of Ceu de Mapia's health care system is the Casa de Cura, the hospital, ran by Clara Shinobu Iura, were most of the medicines get applied. Here's a very nice mini doc, in English about it.



Our guide back then lamented Maria Alice´s daughter wasn't there when we visited. He said she was very beautiful and had a friend who was an indigenous shaman. This could be them (but I could be wrong)



He is Benki Ashaninka, a very interesting man, who received a human rights awards in 2004 for his continuing labor to protect the rights and land of his people. He keeps a blog discussing, among other things recent invasions by Peruvian loggers who illegally cross the border into Brazil to extract wood. There are some very interesting aerial pictures of illegal logging in action. These illegal loggers are probably coming into contact with recently discovered uncontacted indigenous groups. The blog also talks about the kinds of problems that arise when one indigenous community signs an agreement with a logging company while their neighbors don't, and other very real issues that Amazonian indigenous communities face daily.

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The chacra diaries pt 4: The problems begin

Posted chapter 4 at ayahuasca.com

The spider

Merc

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Someone at Google is drinking Ayahuasca..

...That's what I thought when I read between the lines of the description of Google Gulp, Google's 2005 Hoax (more on Google Hoaxes), in it you will find a just thinly veiled allusion to ayahuasca. Amazon jungle botanical extracts? Monoamine oxidase inhibitors? These stories sound very familiar.

See if you agree with me...

From forest to freezer: A Google Gulp history

It is estimated that nearly half of Planet Earth's plant and animal species live in tropical rain forests, the vast majority of them undiscovered by humans and therefore not yet subjected to commercial exploitation. For Google, this cornucopia of undigitized data represented an irresistible acquisition target. So, for the past two years, as his 20% project, VP of operations Urs Hoelzle has spent one day a week collecting flora samples in several Bolivian sub-equatorial rain forests. For the most part, the compounds he returned with were nothing special – the usual grab-bag of future steroids, muscle relaxants, skin care appliqués and long-shot cancer drugs.

But on July 11th, 2003, while gathering epiphyte samples in the upper canopy of a kapok tree in the forbidding Cordillera Apolobamba range on the Bolivian/Peruvian border, Hoelzle snagged a leaf from what turned out to be a previously unknown species of strangler fig. Back in the Google Labs, early DNA sequencing and protein synthesis revealed that the compound – informally dubbed Ursa Major within the Googleplex – had certain remarkable biochemical capabilities. Eighteen months' worth of patent applications, trademark inquiries, budget prioritization and Phase II trials later, Hoelzle's intrepid adventuring finds fulfillment in a beverage aisle near you.

1. How does Google Gulp work?

Well, to comprehend the long version of this answer, you'd need a PhD (from Stanford, natch). The short version is, our brains process data by sending electrical impulses called neurotransmitters between billions of neurons via axons running between synapses, much the way buses travel between stations, or MP3 files travel between felonious suburban teenagers. The molecular compound that fuels Google Gulp speeds up this process by, among various startling feats of neurochemical legerdemain, limiting the activity of the enzyme monoamine oxidase. You think faster – and feel better.

Sero-Tonic Water – Just try to stay down once your synapses get a blast of this bubbly concoction whose refreshing blend of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors is perfect for those moments when all your other beverage options just seem soooo depressing.

What do you think? I think they went as far as they could without getting in trouble (maybe if they'd called it Google Brew?). No one unfamiliar with Ayahuasca would put Amazon plants and MAO inhibitors in the same sentence. And yet I looked "google gulp ayahuasca" in google (of course) and found no references... apparently no one else picked up on it (either that or they tricked the search algorithm to hide it!)

Anyway, it's good to see some of the smartest employees in the world are also partaking of the brew....

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Ayahuasca feels something like this...

by joel harris

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The Chacra Diaries Pt 3: The Good Days

I've posted an exciting new chapter here

Fancy some Mukura?

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Chemical sensitivity and Post-dieta

Surfing the web I found this documentary, about people with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity and their struggles to find a place to live that isn't toxic for them.

Interestingly their situation reminded me very much to the state of extreme sensibility one finds oneself after a long Amazonian dieta. Many of the substances that they have to avoid (perfumes, car exhausts, etc.) are the same as the things that will "cross" (cutipar) a dieta.

¿Could the two situations be somewhat related? One (the dieta) being a voluntary and eventually reversible descent into a physiologically similar area, while the other (the sickness) being involuntary and apparently irreversible process?

Some food for through there.

If you are wondering what the city feels like after coming out of a long dieta it's definitely worth watching the trailer

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