One of the more interesting aspects of watching how Jatun Sacha operates is seeing the organization's interaction with local Quichua communities. Quichua communities are indigenous communities that speak Quichua, a language brought to the area by the Inca Empire a long, long time ago. The communities live essentially out of the forest, growing their food on the land, using the rivers for water and transport, trees for dugout canoes (an entire canoe dug out of one tree), etc. They are simultaneously isolated from 'mainstream' culture, but being influenced by it more and more as time goes along. One of Jatun Sacha's goals is to work with the local people to teach sustainable agriculture practices and help the local children learn English so that there is less of a disconnect between the modern world and the Quichua communities. In an effort to accomplish that goal, Jatun Sacha has been trying to match volunteers with weekly projects in the community. Until yesterday, none of those projects have actually happened because of the unavailability of a canoe to transport volunteers across the river (upstream) to the community. Hopefully this illustrates just how isolated this community is - you can get there by car (when one is around..) but even that would take about 2 hours of traveling.
Yesterday, the project to dig irrigation lanes to help a community bring river water to their village finally came through. Two by two, the volunteers were paddled across the Napo River, upstream, in a dugout canoe by a single paddler. I went in the canoe with an American guy named Thad, who is a junior at Haverford. He is a funny guy, and when we got in the canoe causing it to 'sink' about 3 inches above water level, I knew that we were going to have a hilarious and entertaining ride. We sure did. I couldn't believe we didn't sink!
Once across the river, Thad and I decided to get walking rather than wait for the rest of the group to cross. With about 12 total volunteers, and 10 minutes per pair of transport time, we calculated that we'd be waiting 2 hours for everyone to cross if we sat patiently. So instead of doing that, I set out on an adventure to locate the community and get to work. Basically, we bushwacked (yes, bushwacked) our way through the vegetation near the river to an area of cleared land where an entire family of about 10 people was working a farm. (This was another one of those moments when I grinned to myself and thought Am I really here doing this right now?) Thad asked how to find the community that was working on the irrigation project and the father of the family offered to have his daughter (who looked about 8 years old!) walk us to where the community was. He spoke Spanish, so I gathered that we were walking 800 meters, ascending a montagne and then walking "more" until we came to the community. After following the little girl for about 20 minutes, we arrived at the beginning of a trench in the middle of a community. The entire village seemed deserted, so we all we could do was follow the trench.. Shortly after we continued walking, we heard the sounds of tools breaking up dirt and people rushing around chattering together and before long we came upon the entire community at work. The women were carrying around a white liquid in metal bowls to the men, who were hard at work with spades, shovels and pick axes, all in an effort to dig a trench about 12 inches deep and 12 inches wide, for the irrigation tubes. We were graciously welcomed by the men, who introduced themselves, and the women, who offered us sips of the white milky drink. Knowing that it's never proper to turn down a gift, I took a sip and found that the white milky stuff tasted disgusting with a capital D!!! I later found out that it's fermented yucca milk (yucca is like a sweet potato). You make it by chewing yucca, spitting it out, adding water, letting it sit for a few hours, and then straining the chewed yucca out of the bowl. When it ferments, turns a bit alcoholic (maybe that's why the working men were guzzling the stuff!). We were drinking it at eight thirty in the morning.
Talk about hard work. Digging into wet, clay-ish ground, to create a ditch is really difficult! The tools are heavy, and not always the most efficient; sometimes I found myself using my hands to clear dirt out of the ditch rather than the heavy shovels. There was something about getting my hands in the dirt that was pretty cool. Sometimes I feel like it's man (or woman, in my case) versus wild, and it's really a toss up as to who will win! Usually it ends in a tie...with a project complete, my body completely exhausted from the process and my psyche encouraged by what I am capable of doing if I put my mind to it. This work was absolutely the hardest, but also the most rewarding we have done yet. Working alongside community members was really cool, and being with all of the volunteers at once on a single project (not like the work we usually do in groups of 3 or 4) was incredible as well. The common goal and motivation of the group was almost palpable, and after we finished, everyone applauded and the community cooked us a traditional Ecuadorian lunch which we ate with our hands on palm leaves. Really, really great day.
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