Dispatches from the Amazon II: Ayahuasca Diaries
Traveling up the "Vine of Souls"
Admittedly, there are already far too many online essays about backpackers’ brushes with shamanism in exotic locales: ayahuasca in Peru, San Pedro in Bolivia, Peyote in Mexico, God knows what in India, Africa, Southeast Asia… Alas, here is another psychotropic travelogue. For years I was reluctant to write about my experiences with ayahuasca, but I now feel ready to try to put to pen an experience that profoundly transformed me. Having stumbled across her throughout South America, from the jungles to large cities, I offer my reflections on the Vine of the Souls and my humble advice for those curious about taking it.
My first encounter with ayahuasca was in a beach town in Brazil, in an idyllic fishing village where I had fled to sort out a quarter-life crisis. In a Kerouacian fantasy, I sold my possessions, erased myself from social media, cobbled together my meager savings, and bought a one-way ticket to Fortaleza, a languid city in Brazil’s northeastern backwaters. From Fortaleza, I traveled an entire day by bus on dirt roads and broken highways to Jericoacoara, a frozen-in-time fishing village wedged between the sea and the desert.
I had just graduated from Harvard, and this decision to declare “fuck it” and live as a beach bum did not go over well with my kith and kin. But for a golden chapter in my early twenties, I could say that I was living exactly the way I wanted to: residing in paradise, reading great books, and approaching every day as an adventure to unfold. The gods of love were beneficent, and I earned enough money as a cook and English teacher to keep the fantasy going.
Days, weeks, and months flowed by as serenely as the sea breeze through the village’s palm tree groves. My body, heart, and mind relished the blessings of the sunny coast of Ceará: the joyful beats of forró and capoeira; sunsets dripping pink, gold, and blue; the perfume of tropical flowers and sea as I walked to the bakery each morning; women with green eyes and curly black hair. The most beautiful part, and the reason I fell in love with this region, was the revelation that life could be so wonderfully rich with almost nothing. Every earthly possession I owned fit within my backpack, and I slept in a hammock in a rented room. My simple diet of fried fish, rice, and bananas—supplemented by sunshine and pleasant work—left me fit and healthy. The celestial visions from my first ayahuasca trip seemed an extension of this wave of renewal I was already riding.
It began when I met two women on the beach visiting from Fortaleza who were members of an ayahuasca church. Their church, called Barquinho, was ostensibly Catholic: parishioners gathered each Sunday in a small chapel to read the liturgy, listen to a sermon, and sing hymns. Except, the eucharist was not bread and wine. The sacred host, the Blood of God, was a cup of ayahusaca.
The women had brought a bottle of ayahuasca to Jericoacoara and were planning to hold a ceremony that coming Sunday in their rented house. They had come to the village with their mestre from Fortaleza. Analogous to a priest, he administered the psychedelic host and led the parishioners in prayer while they were under the influence of the DMT-laden potion.
We had coffee, and the women answered my questions about daime (one of the Brazilian terms for ayahuasca). They encouraged me to participate in their ceremony a few days later. I was hesitant, but they suggested I start fasting in case I decided to partake. The fast, they explained, would purify my body and spirit, allowing me more intense visions. I recalled the hagiography of St. Anthony the Great and countless other anchorites who fasted in the desert to facilitate mystical communion.
On Sunday morning, I woke up at dawn with my mind made up: I would take ayahuasca. It was my first time taking psychedelics, and my adrenaline was pumping in anticipation. Wending through Jericoacoara’s sandy roads in the early morning light, I arrived at the girls’ house. The mestre, a man in his fifties with a warm and jocular demeanor, came to the door to greet me. Originally from the Amazon, he went back to the jungle each year to produce ayahuasca for his church. His wife, their small child, and the women I had met were also present. I took reassurance in the fact that the mestre and his family radiated sattvic energy of simplicity, kindness, and wholesomeness.
After coffee and breakfast on the patio, the mestre went inside to procure a large soda bottle full of a brown, muddy liquid. He led us in saying a series of the Lord’s Prayer and Hail Mary before pouring the brew into small cups. He offered the host to the women first before handing me a cup. The smell was overpowering, an odor I can only describe as rancid liquid wood. The taste was even worse—liquified compost with a sickly sweet aftertaste and syrupy consistency. Years have passed, and I still cringe thinking about that awful taste.
The mestre drank last, and then we reclined in the hammocks in his patio. An hour passed, and I felt nothing. The mestre’s wife came to my hammock and asked me if I was feeling anything. I told her I noticed no difference, and she left my side to fetch another cup for me to drink. Half an hour after the second dosage, my hearing became strangely acute. A 4×4 passed by on the sandy road outside the patio, and the sound of the engine was unbearable. Next, my body grew heavy and relaxed within my hammock. Still firmly planted in normal consciousness, I braced myself for the blast-off.
Some experience dream-like visions on ayahuasca, for example epiphanies of the Mother of God, Christ, or angels. I did not have any such mirações, but memories, insights, and emotions flooded my mind. I was struck with an overwhelming sense of the Sublime. The unspeakable beauty of creation seemed so keen that I wanted to weep—and I did at one point. I understood the sacredness of human life, why we are beloved by our Creator. I felt the sense of wonder I knew as a child but had long forgotten as I grew up and my heart calloused. I felt waves of love and gratefulness for family and friends. The feelings are difficult to describe, and my limitations as a writer do not allow me to do them justice.
Ayahuasca has a strong association with death, and the name comes from the Quechua for ‘Vine of the Dead’ or ‘Vine of the Souls’. According to Indigenous lore in the Upper Amazon, the Creator instructed human souls how to make ayahuasca before giving them physical bodies. God told the soon-to-be-incarnated souls to drink ayahuasca when they inevitably forgot their heavenly origins. Ayahuasca was the lifeline back to the Original Place, where our souls reside before birth and where we return after death. Something in my own experience resonated with this myth, an intuition that some part of me was far older than my 23-year-old body. Finally, there was the visceral acknowledgment of impending death, a deep recognition that it was really going to happen one day.
Ayahuasca reminded me that existence is complex, beautiful, terrifying, and miraculous beyond comprehension. She convinced me that there is far more than can be observed, that there is a spiritual realm that envelops and passes through our waking and dreaming lives. I understood that my mind is as mysterious as the depths of the cosmos. The most important insight, which I strive to hold on to, was that we are here, in bodies, to feel as keenly as possible. The highest purpose of life was to tip back back the cup of pathos and drink with courage—to fully feel joy, agony, compassion, pain, triumph, and the whole range of human emotions. Yes, this was why we were here in the realm of fleshly form. Under the influence of DMT, I realized that that we made an intentional choice to be born in physical bodies. As souls in heaven, we made a bargain: to accept the agony of physicality in exchange for its ecstasy.
My curiosity about ayahuasca eventually led me to depart the Brazilian coast for the Amazon Rainforest. In the depths of the jungle, I saw the good, the bad, and the ugly of this strange brew. Hitchhiking up the river on cargo ships, I stumbled into an ayahuasca commune deep in the forest off an obscure tributary of the Rio Negro. Visitors to the commune participated in ceremonies in exchange for farm work and a nominal fee for room and board.
Later, I crossed the border into Peru and learned about an entire tourist industry built around ayahuasca and other jungle entheogens. In jungle towns like Iquitos, armies of dubious ‘shamans’ sold foreign tourists psychedelic travel packages. I met a tech bro from Austin on PTO who had spent thousands on airfare, drivers, hotels, and shamanic instruction. I met a German raver with dim, lifeless eyes from years of drug use who described ayahuasca as the “MDMA of the Amazon.”
Eventually, my wanderings took me to a Colombian oil-town on the northern edge of the jungle. From there, I bid adieu to the Amazon and took an overnight bus up the Andes. I found a job working in a hotel in Colombia’s coffee region and once again met a woman who led me to an ayahuasca community. Colombian ayahuasca was weaker than in Brazil, and the ceremony, led by a shaman from Colombia’s Putumayo region, also involved snorting rapé, powdered tobacco blended with chili peppers and unknown herbs. A few days after that ceremony, my kidneys failed. I found myself in a Colombian emergency room, thankful I was alive.
Ayahuasca changed me for the better, but I can’t say if I would ever take it again. I resonate with Timothy Leary’s quip after he took LSD for the last time: “When you get the message, hang up the phone.” I learned what I needed to learn from ayahuasca, and I see no reason to dive back into the deep end. Now in my thirties, I am less philosophically inclined than I was in my twenties. Life is busier, and work, dating, and adult responsibilities keep my feet firmly planted in the world. Playing the game of life is more appealing than plumbing its deepest mysteries.
It might have been St. Thomas Aquinas who advised the masses against contemplating metaphysical mysteries. Sure, there are some rare, searching souls who burn so ardently for Truth that they can only live as monks and hermits. But most us should keep our heads down and strive to be good spouses, professionals, and citizens. Anyway, the deepest mysteries are revealed after death, so just be patient.
At the risk of sounding cliché or cheesy, the best advice that I can offer to those interested in taking ayahuasca is to wait for it to find you. The best experiences with it seem to happen by chance when it falls naturally into your path. For example, I recall talking to an older friend, years before taking ayahuasca myself, about his experience with it. He recounted how he took it with a group of Andean Indians he met while trekking in Peru. They unexpectedly offered it to him, and he had also had a transformative experience that marked his psyche even 40 years later. Be wary of unscrupulous shamans or communities that seem primarily interested in money. Likewise, avoid people and groups that treat ayahuasca as a recreational drug. Finally, fast and withdraw yourself for the days leading up to taking it. Disconnect from civilization as much as you can beforehand.