Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Jochade: that is how it is. it is good what you say and that you are praying there for
them. No one knows the place where they may be walking. Only god knows where
they are. he has more power than us and he knows everything. cambio.
ajnocai: that is how it is, that is how it is. i say to you that we are all healthy here and
that we never met you there. i hope that one day i will have the chance to arrive in
your village. cambio.
Jochade: that is how it is, ajnocai. we are all healthy here, my brother and i and all of
us. ajnocai, i say to you that i never forget you all there, either, and my sister who is
your wife. that is why i will buy something for you all too. i will buy something next
tuesday and send it to you because i am thinking about you all a lot.
ajnocai: that is how it is. i am always thinking about you, and if a trip comes we hope
to arrive there too. there are many words now because we have learned new
things about the word of god, and i will now tell you all there too. i will tell you
because we want this news to arrive to all of the ayoreo people that are in paraguay.
cambio.
Jochade: i understand, i understand what you are saying and it is good. You should
pray to god that some of the forest will be left over, even if it is just a little bit for
our relatives to live in. You should pray to god always for our health as well. You
should pray that our relatives in the forest can be in a place that is calm, even if it is
very small [
ore uja ca yatique
]. cambio.
ajnocai: that is how it is. it would be very good in my opinion if they come to live with
the
Cojñone
too. i say this because we lived in the forest before and many bad things
happened to us there. we always had to run away from the people who were killing
us. we were very bad before. we were full of sin and we did not know anything.
But now the
Cojñone
taught us the word of god and we have learned many things.
Now our
ayipie
is new. it is the
ayipie
of god. that is how it is, that is how it is. i say
this to you now because they are surely close to where you are. cambio
eee
.
Jochade: that is how it is, ajnocai. this how it is. You should ask the believers of god
there to pray for us because we never know when we may have problems here. i
am happy to talk to you and here my words end.
After four months, I had gotten no further and my efforts to puzzle
through Jochade's statement ground to a frustrating halt. It was obvious
that through radio exchanges, Ayoreo were evoking a collective sense of
belonging. Moreover, this sense of belonging was based on a consensus
that contact meant a rupture with the past and the wholescale transfor-
mation of humanity. But such basic observations raised more questions
than they answered. Why were people talking so much on the radio if the
contents were so restricted, formulaic, and predictable? Surely, the pro-
duction of a sentimental community through recognizable scripts was a
