Singing to the Plants: A Guide to Mestizo Shamanism in the Upper Amazon (52 page)

Scopolamine overdose is recognized as a cause of acute paranoid hallucinatory psychoses, of a state of delirium like that associated with a very high
fever, and of acute toxic psychosis, including confusion, agitation, rambling
speech, hallucinations, paranoid behaviors, and delusions .21 The hallucinations induced by scopolamine "are not of an agreeable, but on the contrary, of
a terrifying and distressful kind. 1129

Here are two examples, both from the same emergency room.3° A young
man who had ingested Datura straemonium, rich in scopolamine, was admitted with agitation, delirium with persecutory ideation, and frightening hallucinations of being assaulted by animals. Similarly, a young woman who had
ingested the same plant was agitated, with delirium, anxiety, auditory hallucinations, and frightening visual and tactile hallucination of green turtles walking on her. In both cases, the patients were restrained and treated with the
antipsychotic drug cyamemazine, and both returned to normal after thirty-six
and forty hours, respectively.

Similarly, the Centers for Disease Control have described an outbreak of
heroin laced with scopolamine in several cities and the resulting "paranoia,
hallucinations, and agitation" seen in emergency room patients.31 It has been
described as "a wild, crazed state, total disorientation, delirium, foaming at
the mouth, a wicked thirst, terrifying visions that fuse into a dreamless sleep,
followed by complete amnesia"; oscillating between extreme agitation and
unconsciousness; "a loss of senses, visual disturbances, drying of the throat
and mouth, visions (sometimes of a frightening character) and occasionally
violent reactions requiring restraint. 1131

Don Agustin Rivas describes his first experience with toe as follows: "Five
minutes after I drank toe, my body started to jerk all over, with my arms
twitching and jerking.... My head ached, and I began to see demons, colors, strange men, animals, and aggressive snakes that wanted to bite me. I
tried to remain still but it was impossible."33 The Canelos Quichua say that wanduj makes one see distant things as if they were near and near things as if
they were distant; the drinker sees the world of spirits, the dead, the future,
souls; he stumbles and falls and crashes, frightening people, laughing when
he should say aiya6w134

One highland shaman told anthropologist Michael Taussig that when one
drinks toe, one races around screaming, ripping off clothes, urinating all
over the place, robbing things, without realizing what one is doing, like in
a dream. "It's really awful," the shaman said, "not like yage. It's as if your
clothes come off. Your throat becomes dry, dry ... and then this passes and
you forget." The flower, he said, is "sweet like honey, but strong! Thus! Boom!
Crash to the floor. Remember nothing. Nothing. '135

The Shuar consider maikua, the raw juice of the green bark of the stem, to
be the most dangerous and powerful hallucinogen. The effects begin within
three or four minutes; the drinker is accompanied by an adult to hold him
down if necessary when the drinker becomes delirious and tends to run off
into the jungle. The vision can consist of two gigantic animals-often jaguars
or boas-fighting each other, or a disembodied human head, or a ball of fire.
When the vision gets near, the drinker must be brave enough to run forward
and touch it, whereupon it instantly explodes and disappears.36

The visions given by toe are dark and frightening. Animals and humans
that might in an ayahuasca vision appear to be potential allies appear in a toe
vision to be menacing or terrifying. That is why toe is so powerful: it demands
great courage; if you can survive the toe vision, the spirit world can hold few
terrors. Thus toe hardens the body, makes it a cuerpo cerrado or cuerpo sellado, a body that is closed or sealed, makes one resistant to attack by sorcerers.37

THE QUESTION OF PSYCHOACTIVITY

A mestizo shaman has dieted with scores-perhaps hundreds-of plants,
each of which has its own range of effects. Each plant becomes an ally in its
own particular way. Some plants are powerful, grab you and shake you; some
insinuate themselves gently into your dreams and thoughts. We often have
very little information about the constituents of these plants; often there is
uncertainty, as with camalonga, even about their identity in a given area of
the Upper Amazon. And it must be confessed that there is similar uncertainty
about the term psychoactive, especially as the plants are used by shamans during la dieta, because it is difficult to disentangle complex plant actions and to
distinguish physical from psychological effects.

Chiricsanango

Here is an example. Chiricsanango causes chills and tingling and is therefore
considered a cold plant, used to treat hot conditions-fever, diarrhea, wounds,
and inflammations. 38 The medicine is made as a decoction of the leaves or
bark or as an infusion of the roots.39 The plant contains an alkaloid named
scopoletin, but the effects of scopoletin are very different from those of the
scopolamine in toe. The effect of ingesting chiricsanango can be dramatic-a
tingling and vibrating sensation in the extremities, moving inward toward the
head with ever increasing intensity, periodic waves of cold, tremors, electric vibrations penetrating the chest and back, stomach cramps, nausea, dizziness,
vertigo, loss of coordination.4° It is not at all clear to me whether chiricsanango has an independent psychoactive effect or whether altered consciousness
is a result of its powerful physical effects; scopoletin is not itself known to be
psychoactive.41 But there is no question that chiricsanango is a very powerful
ally, a healer, a strong protector, once it has shaken your bones.

FIGURE ii. Don Roberto with chiricsanango.

Catahua

In the same way, catahua is a very strong-even dangerous-teacher. Poet
Cesar Calvo says that catahua "is the worst of all: it makes your body rot, it
burns you from the inside. 1142 This is not an exaggeration. The latex contains
toxic diterpene esters that can cause immediate skin inflammation, with
edematous swellings and blisters; eye exposure can lead to temporary blindness; internally, the latex can cause debilitating intestinal cramps, vomiting,
intestinal bloating, and diarrhea, followed by rapid heartbeat and impaired vision.43 Where chiricsanango sends shivers to your bones, catahua puts knots
in your intestines.

Catahua latex is traditionally used as a laxative and purgative-and as a fish
poison.44 Don Emilio Andrade Gomez whistles the icaro de la catahua before
entering a dangerous lake; he throws a mixture of catahua, the toxic patiquina, and the pucunucho pepper into the water to drive away the yacuruna, the
water people.45 The medicine is learned by drinking a little bit of its latex after
heating it in a water bath, or bringing it carefully to a boil, while the maestro
ayahuasquero sings appropriate songs over it; a strict diet of several months is
required.46 Like other powerful plants with strong effects, catahua is considered a protector. "Catahua is always protecting me," says don Agustin Rivas,
"and no malicious intent can affect me."47 The physical effect is immediate;
but the sense of protection-the opening of the mind and intuition-comes
gradually.48

Ajo Sacha

On the other hand, ajo sacha, wild garlic, works slowly and gently. It is a warm
plant, used to treat cold conditions such as arthritis and rheumatism; for this
purpose, scrapings of the bark are mixed in water or aguardiente and drunk.
Most often, ajo sacha is added to a limpia, bath, as a treatment for sore muscles, cramps, fatigue, aches, or flu and especially for saladera, bad luck caused
by sorcery.49 Ajo sacha contains several of the same sulfur compounds-primarily alliin and various allyl sulfides-as are found in garlic, none of which
is considered psychoactive.s° When dieting, it is ingested by drinking a macerate of the fresh scraped root. It tastes very much like garlic water, which some
find to be unpleasant. Hunters drink ajo sacha to disguise their human scent;
fishermen purify their bodies, tools, and canoes with ajo sacha to assure a
good catch. 5,

Ajo sacha is considered a subtle ally, who influences the nature of dreams
on following nights, making them peculiarly auditory; it is thus a source of icaros, magical songs, for all sorts of purposes.51 Don Francisco Shuna dieted with ajo sacha while still a young boy; the first night after drinking it, he
dreamed of a queen with a golden crown, her hands made of tree branches,
telling him not to be afraid as a song entered into him like a spiral through
the crown of his head. On a subsequent night the queen whistled the melody
of an icaro so the boy could learn it.53 Ajo sacha also enhances auditory perception in general; slowly and subtly, the jungle sounds become clearer, more
meaningful; and in dreams the plants begin to sing.

Camalonga

The plant called camalonga provides an example of ongoing uncertainty about
the identity and effects of a shamanic plant. The name camalonga or cabalonga
is shared by two different plants, the first term being more common in Peru and
the second, in Colombia. The first of these two plants, sometimes distinguished
as camalonga negra, may be any of several species in the genus Strychnos, including some that are used in the manufacture of the arrow poison curare. The
second, sometimes distinguished as camalonga blanca, is pretty clearly Thevetia peruviana, the yellow oleander, which is the plant used by don Roberto
in making his camalonga drink-two yellow oleander seeds, one male and one
female, white onion or garlic, and camphor mixed into aguardiente, distilled fermented sugarcane juice.

In Spanish generally, the word caba(onga refers to the almond-like seeds of
the tree Strychnos ignatii, native to the Philippine Islands and China, which are
popularly called haba de San Ignacio, St. Ignatius beans. In some parts of Peru,
these imported seeds are worn as amulets, as they are in the Philippines, and
are distinguished from the indigenous Amazonian caba(onga de (a se(va, jungle
cabalonga., Imported cabalonga is apparently highly valued. The dried pearshaped fruits containing these seeds are rare and, according to ethnobotanist
Christian Ratsch, are sold under the table at herb markets for exorbitant prices,
with counterfeits sometimes substituted for the unwary.

Apparently, Colombian shamans prefer to use seeds of plants of the Strychnos genus, while Peruvian shamans prefer to use the seeds of Thevetia peruviana. Although it is sometimes said that camalonga seeds may be added to
the ayahuasca mixture, I have not found evidence that this is the case. In Peru,
camalongueros are shamanic practitioners who specialize in the use of this camalonga drink.

I do not understand why the two camalongas are given the same name. The
plants do not look even remotely similar, and the seeds-the part most often
used by shamans-look as dissimilar as the plants. Moreover, the plants contain
very different alkaloids, with very different physiological effects.

The yellow oleander, Thevetia peruviana, contains the powerful cardiac glycosides thevetin, thevetoxin, peruvoside, ruvoside, and nerifolin, which are
found throughout the plant but are concentrated in the seeds. Ingesting yellow
oleander seeds can cause abdominal pain; vomiting and diarrhea; dilated pupils; increased blood pressure, dizziness; stimulation of the smooth muscles of
the intestine, bladder, uterus, and blood vessels; and a variety of arrhythmias,
which can be fatal. Chewing the seed causes a drying, numbing, or burning sensation in the mouth and throat. The sap of the plant can cause skin irritation,
sometimes blistering, and the plant has been used as a fish poison .3

On the other hand, the primary effects of plants of the Strychnos genus are
muscular and neurological. The active constituent of these plants is strychnine,
which increases the reflex irritability of the spinal cord, resulting in a loss of
normal inhibition of the body's motor cells, in turn causing severe contractions
of the muscles. Signs and symptoms of strychnine overdose include agitation,
apprehension, fear, heightened startle reflex, restlessness, dart( urine, muscle
pain and soreness, and difficulty breathing, which can progress to rigid arms and
legs, jaw tightness, painful muscle spasms, and finally uncontrollable arching of the neck and back, respiratory failure, and brain death. Death is usually due
to asphyxiation resulting from continuous spasms of the respiratory muscles.4
At very low doses, strychnine may give a sense of alertness, sensory acuity, and
wakefulness; at one time it was widely prescribed in England as a tonics

I have seen only scant anecdotal evidence that strychnine ingestion causes
prodromal dizziness or light-headedness. I am not sure what to make of the
claim that true cabalonga can be identified by putting a tiny piece under your
tongue and experiencing sensations of dizziness within a few moments.6

None of the constituents of either type of camalonga has been reported to be
psychoactive. Neither appears to be widely used medicinally. Strychnos guianensis is used primarily as an ingredient in arrow poisons? At Takiwasi, a center
in Tarapoto devoted to the treatment of addictions using traditional Amazonian
medicine, camalonga-specifically identified as the seed ofa plant in the Strychnos genus-is reportedly administered to newly admitted patients for ten days,
combined with a sugar-free diet, in a program to detoxify certain unspecified
"energy disorders."8