Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes (7 page)

She pointed upriver and said, “Up there at Pau Queimado they may know where the place you’re looking for is.”

“But I just came from upriver and I didn’t see any settlement.”

She clarified, “It’s in the first inlet off the river on your left.”

I thanked her and ran back to the boat. It was hot and I was red with sunburn. So was everyone in my family. As I was getting back in the canoe, I took another look at this woman’s house, seeing for the first time how her family lived. The house was whitewashed—that could not have been easy or cheap for a family living at subsistence level. Why did they want to do that? To reflect the heat? No, they wanted their house to be attractive, even though it was in the jungle, where new people rarely came. There were
jambu
trees, producing red, succulent, sweet, applelike fruits. There were papaya plants. A field of manioc, sugarcane, sweet potatoes, and
cará
was close by, visible down the path from the house. The area around the house was clear and clean, some parts with green, machete-trimmed grass, other parts sandy soil. The house was made of boards hand-hewn, no doubt, by her husband. Near my canoe, I saw a string of live yellow-spotted Amazon River turtles tied to a stick at the house’s dock in shallow water. These turtles are a favorite item of food and trade for Amazonian
caboclos
(as Portuguese speaking residents of the Brazilian interior are known). I thought as I untied the canoe and pointed it upriver that it must be hard to make a living catching turtles.

Life for these people is not easy. Yet they live as though it were, greeting people with grace, good humor, and helpfulness. I had so much more than they, and yet as I looked at my behavior more closely I realized that I was more tense, less welcoming, less hospitable than these people. And I was a missionary. I had a lot to learn.

But I would have to learn it later. Right then I had to get help. I started the motor. Another thought prayer: “God, I have come to the Amazon for You. I came with my family to serve You and to help people. Why are You letting me get lost? I am almost out of gasoline, God. What good will it do if my wife dies because I am out of gas and lost? C’mon, God. Help me.”

I looked again at the beauty around me. From the river I could see Ipê trees, towering more than forty yards above the river, at least a yard in diameter, their bright yellow and purple flowers highlighted against the surrounding green. Brazilians of the region call the Ipê the
passar bem
(get well) tree. I half hoped that the sight of them would bring good luck. The sun was bright, the breeze cool. The forest was green, and today it seemed welcoming. The terrain here just up from the mouth of the Marmelos River was hilly, with steep banks on all sides and numerous inlets, which my novice eyes had a hard time distinguishing at times from the main river.

Farther in the distance, I could even see mighty Brazil nut trees towering over the forest. I looked at it all in a new way. Is nature beautiful if your family dies in it without help? I determined that the beauty in nature is really the beauty of our perception of it. No, it wouldn’t be beautiful without humans to declare it so. But, my God, it was beautiful. Whatever the source, the breeze-blown ripples on the water, the swaying branches of the trees, the pale blue sky, the health and strength in my arms, the clearness of my eyes, the determination in my heart—these were beautiful things and I felt one with nature in the ubiquitous struggle for life.

I eventually saw the inlet to Pau Queimado and directed my shiny canoe into it. After a minute or so, as the steep banks of this miniature fjord surrounded us, I saw a clearing, a field of manioc, and a thatch-roofed hut. The bank was at about a 60 percent incline, more than forty yards up. It was a rich brown color, with some grass near the top. Brazilians along the rivers keep clean homes and village areas and are impressively industrious, valuing cleanliness and order around their houses. I sprinted up the steps the owners had carved in the bank, each step framed by wood about three inches thick. I reached the top panting and looked around. There were several people sitting on the floor of the hut, apparently having a meal.

“Do you know how to get to Santa Loo-CHEE-a?” I blurted out, not bothering with the normal caboclo niceties of introduction, calm small talk, and way-smoothing for any request.

A mother was nursing a baby boy in the corner. A man sat stirring a gruel of fish and farinha (manioc meal) in a hollowed gourd. Hammocks were neatly wrapped around crossbeams in the low roof. In spite of its height above the river, the hut was raised on eighteen-inch stilts, with a board floor, board walls, and board shutters. Caboclos close up their homes tight at night, in spite of the heat, out of fear of animals, spirits, and thieves.

“Não existe por aqui nenhum lugar por esse nome”
(There is no place around here by that name), a man replied, as they all stared at me, this red-skinned, wild-eyed foreigner.

“But Vicenzo, the guy who works with Padre José—you know Padre José?—said there was a path at Santa Loo-CHEE-a from the Marmelos to the Madeira,” I attempted to clarify.

A woman in the background suggested, “He must mean Santa Loo-ZIa. There is a path there.”

“Oh, sure, that’s it,” the others replied in unison.

Some hope! They told me it was about thirty minutes downriver, just past the little house with the turtles. They said that a finger of land parallel to the river obscured the settlement’s location to people going downriver but that I would see it if I kept looking leftward. I yelled back
“Muito obrigado!”
(Much obliged) as I ran back down the steps. Kristene and Caleb were still sitting quietly in the canoe, talking to each other. Shannon complained that she was burning up. Keren said she was going to jump in the river to relieve her fever. I started off at full speed, the 6.5-horsepower engine leaving a pathetically feeble wake behind us.

In thirty minutes I looked to the port side and thought I could see an inlet. I almost passed it but then there it was, a clearing at the top of another steep bank, this one more like sixty yards high, with the same carved steps. I stopped and moored the canoe at the bottom of the steps. I picked up Kristene in one arm and Caleb in the other. I told Shannon and Keren I’d be right back for them. I ran to the top, heart pounding, and looked for an adult.

The small settlement was also very clean and orderly, with broad paths and well-swept clearings around the brightly painted houses. A church building sat in the middle of the small cluster of six houses along the shore of the Marmelos. Hand-hewn benches of thick board were built under a couple of the trees. The Marmelos was more than three hundred yards across here, bluish black from this angle. There was a light breeze, and with the shade the benches would have made for a comfortable place to rest, but there was no time.

I saw some women talking under a shade tree about fifty yards away and walked briskly toward them. They were already looking in my direction and were no doubt discussing the arrival of these gringos from upriver—a location we could have only flown into, since to get to the Pirahãs by boat, it is necessary to pass in front of Santa Luzia. Again, I wasted no time with pleasantries, asking my question immediately as I got into hearing distance.

“É aqui que tem um varador para o Rio Madeira?”
(Is it here that there is a path to the Madeira River?)

“Sim tem um caminho logo ali”
(Yes, there is a path right over there), a woman responded.

I told her that I had two very ill people in the canoe and asked if I could get some help to carry them to the Madeira. She sent a little girl to tell her father. I ran down and carried Shannon up in my arms. When I got to the top of the bank again I saw the most beautiful sight. Men coming in a line down the path, men with strong backs and arms, men coming to help me, a hopelessly inept gringo who had never done a thing for them in his life. But clearly a man with a family in need. I learned then that caboclos will always come to the aid of someone in need, even to their own hurt.

Before I could say anything, though, we all heard a loud splash and a woman yelled,
“O meu Deus! Ela pulou na agua!”
(Oh my God! She jumped in the river!)

Keren was in the river, trying to pull herself back into the canoe. I ran down to her.

She said, “The water is so cool. I was too hot.”

I picked her up in my arms and ran up the bank for the third time. Keren had sounded coherent just then. Maybe she was thinking clearly now, I thought as I sat her down under the shade tree with Shannon, Kris, and Caleb.

As she sat on the log underneath this beautiful mango tree, Keren said in Portuguese to the people standing around, “I remember this place. There are elephants over there and lions over that way. My daddy used to bring me here when I was a little girl.”

All the Brazilians looked at her, then at me. They realized she was delusional. No one said anything except
“Pobrezinha”
(Poor little thing).

Men went into the forest and came back in a few minutes with two six-inch-thick logs, each about eight feet long. From each one of these they suspended a hammock. We put Keren in one and Shannon in the other. Four men took off with them, two to a hammock, down the path. I strapped on all our baggage and asked another man to take care of Vicenzo’s boat (someone at Santa Luzia used his boat without mixing oil in the gas and ruined his motor before I returned). I asked them to tell Padre José that Vicenzo wanted a boat sent to bring him out of the village. My bags weighed about fifty pounds. I then picked up Caleb and told Kristene to follow. We set off down the path after the men.

Kristene slowed us down a bit as she picked jungle flowers along the path, skipping and singing to herself “Jesus Loves Me.” Her hair was still partially in the little buns that Keren had put it into days before. She wore shorts, a small T-shirt, and tennis shoes. She smelled the flowers and smiled with delight at their fragrance. Even though my arms were burning with exhaustion at the weight of carrying Caleb and the bags, I could not help smiling. I always called Kris the sunshine of my life and that day her sunshine kept me from despair. Caleb was asking where the men were taking his mother and sister. Caleb was and is a sensitive person, and his mother has always been the most important person in his life.

After forty-five minutes walking down the cool, leaf-canopied jungle path to the Madeira, we came to a clearing. I could see dozens of painted wooden houses on stilts, a large church, which the locals referred to as “the cathedral,” small stores, and broad dirt avenues laid out parallel to one another. This was the Auxiliadora, a small town, not merely a village just beginning. The men asked me where to put Keren and Shannon. This little settlement was obviously too small to have rooms to rent. I told the men to set them down in the shade and I went to inquire. I located the very modest home of Maici River trader Godofredo Monteiro and his wife, Cesária. I knew that they lived here because on a trip up the Maici just after we arrived they had asked us to visit them at their home in the Auxiliadora. Their house reflected their prosperity. It had the common board walls and floor typical of caboclo homes, but it also had very clean wooden steps and a partially thatched, partially aluminum roof. It was painted white with green trim; the phrase
Casa Monteiro
(Monteiro House) was painted in green block letters on the front. There was an outhouse in the backyard, visible from the front, which indicated an above-average concern with that aspect of hygiene, since most in the area used the jungle as their bathroom.

Godo and Cesária welcomed us to their small home, so I had the

men carry Keren and Shannon there. Since it was evening and we were clearly very tired, Cesária asked if she could help me hang my family’s hammocks.

“Hammocks?” I asked, confused. I guess I had thought we would sleep in beds or on the floor.

“We only sleep in hammocks here, Mr. Daniel, even the priest. People here don’t use beds,” Cesária answered. She went on to explain to me how everyone, even people traveling in boats on the rivers, slept in hammocks.

“We have no hammocks.” I was growing more depressed with the situation and my lack of planning. The hammocks that Shannon and Keren had been carried in belonged to people, I didn’t even know who, from Santa Luzia.

Cesária left immediately and came back in about half an hour with five hammocks borrowed from neighbors. She started dinner and told me she’d watch Keren while I took the children to bathe in the Madeira. Now, the Madeira is not like the small, clear Maici. It is a muddy behemoth, rivaling the Mississippi, perhaps more than a mile across at the Auxiliadora at high water. The riverbank was some three hundred yards from Godofredo’s house and the bank was roughly sixty yards high, the highest of any settlement I had seen. I waded in to knee depth and washed off. I didn’t care that there were alligators (black caimans) in it and that you could not see them in the river’s muddy water. I didn’t care that there were candirus, tiny fish that would swim up any bodily orifice. I didn’t even care that there were piranhas, anacondas, stingrays, electric eels, and other denizens of the murky Madeira, because I was dirty. But in recognition of the potential danger, I washed Caleb and Kristene by pouring water over them and soaping them up and then dipping them quickly in and out of the river. We were somewhat clean at the end of this, but got muddy and sweaty as we walked back up the steep bank and then to the house. It was nearly dark. Unlike the Maici, the banks of the Madeira swarm with mosquitoes. They were buzzing throughout Godo’s home. We had no bug repellent, no long pants, nothing to protect us. Cesária borrowed a room-size mosquito net for us, though, and put it up in her living room, so we could sit inside this netting (which made the room much hotter because it cut out all breezes) and avoid the mosquitoes. But I couldn’t avail myself of this protection, because Godo wanted to talk. We sat on his steps and talked, I trying to appear unconcerned and at ease. I was slapping at biting mosquitoes without stop, my skin welting up under every bite.