Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
for how contact survivors interpreted the “human hunts” some twenty
years later.
What was I to make of a quiet consensus that the outcome of being
captured was deeply ambiguous? To be sure, most people refused to dis-
cuss their contact experiences in any depth with me. They were deeply
distressing memories, often reduced to an oblique image or partial allegory
or quickly covered up. I heard enough fragments to know that the transi-
tion was acutely painful. I was told that a shockingly large number of To-
tobiegosode had died of “sadness” afterward, by refusing to eat or drink.
Edó was at the center of the most complete story I ever heard about
these events. She was a
daijné
shaman married to Yoteuoi and was Dasua's
mother. Yoteuoi told me she had a vision a month before the contact
and knew that enemies were coming. She took various precautions and
she stressed to all that a black
Kiyakiyai
bird would appear in the middle
of the village before the attack and it would lead them to safety. No one
should touch it or scare it away. If the people did as she said they would
survive. The bird came and landed where a warrior was building the de-
fenses. Without thinking, he scared it away. The bird took flight, and
there Yoteuoi's story ended. Edó, pregnant at the time, starved herself
and died on February 17, less than two months after her capture.
Because of such arresting images and the drama they implied, I ini-
tially presumed we all agreed that the conditions of the present were
much worse than those of the past. Like many outsiders, I was constantly
searching for a Totobiegosode critique of the
immorality
of what had been
done to them. But this was not forthcoming from contact survivors. In
fact, many people subtly but firmly rejected my framing. It was hard for
me to accept that we did not agree even on this. I struggled to understand
how Totobiegosode survivors made sense of being hunted down and cap-
tured, years after the events.
Aasi, the leader of the 1986 group, was Jochade's brother and Dasua's
husband. He took the unprecedented step of renouncing his status as a
dacasute
after being captured and was widely known as an
ayaajingaque
,
or peacemaker. He was a slight man who rarely spoke but who radiated
a calm strength. It was hard earned. He had killed enemies and jaguars
alone with a spear. He often told the story of the time he fell from the
top of a tall honey tree onto his face, breaking several ribs, bleeding inter-
nally, and losing consciousness. Eventually he crawled back to the camp,
only to discover that everyone had decided to move that day. He did not
wish them to wait on his behalf and so he said nothing about his injuries.
He told them to go ahead and without a single word of complaint he
picked up his heavy bag and followed as best as he could, stopping only
