Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
away. Eager to escape from the monotony and heat and relentless brinks-
manship, I was usually happy to oblige. I especially looked forward to
baaque , one- or two-day hunting trips. They meant strenuous exercise
and the possibility of meat or honey to give away. Moreover, hunting
meant a chance to talk privately with Siquei, Emi, Asôre, and my hunting
partner, Cutai.
Invariably, these hunting trips were aimed at the same lands the Men-
nonite bulldozers targeted. Often the sounds of growling chains and
exploding trunks grew louder as we neared and parked. At such times,
my grim-faced companions spread out silently in pairs and disappeared
into the soon to be flattened brush. It was hunting without restraint, an
orgy of killing and extraction before the great machines arrived to crush
the ancient tortoises in their sandy dens, to frighten away the peccaries,
to pulverize the secreted honeycombs, to spill the rainwater trapped in
the hollows of the najuane leaves. Once we ran alongside the fearsome
machine itself, close enough to feel its heat and almost close enough to
touch, four abreast completely concealed not fifteen meters from where
it was ripping the forest a new edge like invisible spirits of destruction
stalking and grabbing and racing to dig up turtles and cut out hives be-
fore the bulldozer could grind out another inexorable turn. We dripped
sweat and blood from a thousand scratches and our ears rang from the
noise and afterward there was no sense of pride and nothing to say
at all.
During this time a religious fervor gripped Chaidi that was extreme
even by Ayoreo standards. Performances of Christian faith soon domi-
nated public sociality in the village. The change was spurred in part by
Bobby, who had waited years for the next first contact. In the beginning
he tried to keep his visits to Chaidi a secret and he wouldn't come if I was
there. But by February 2007, he was visiting openly, every two or three
days, his SUV loaded with oranges for the children, each visit followed
by a short peccary hunt. Backed by Bobby's influence, the aspiring
preacher Achinguirai organized a faction of people to oppose the author-
ity of Dejai, the more secular leader of the village. Achinguirai encour-
aged daily discussions of evangelical doctrine aimed mostly at the New
People, and began to flaunt his power. Bobby overlooked such earthly
power plays and even paid for the construction of Chaidi's first church
building. It took the ambiguous form of an open-sided tin awning be-
cause, as he explained, Ayoreo Christianity could only succeed if it were
hidden from the NGO and visiting anthropologists.
Under this awning or at Achinguirai's hearth, the growing Christian
faction held religious services twice a day. The New People, in particu-
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