Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
me out and proposed that we hunt down and capture a forest band to-
gether. Invariably, such confrontations left me shaken. It was less the
irony of being mistaken for an Indian hunter and more how these mo-
ments revealed a yawning gap between the reasons that I thought justi-
fied my presence there in the first place and the sensibilities of my closest
companions.
Christian Ayoreo on both sides of the border exerted a constant pres-
sure on the more settled Totobiegosode to contact their relatives remain-
ing in the forest. It seemed that subjecting others was the only way their
transformation into New People could be complete. Siquei and Jotai were
especially targeted by Christian Ayoreo and missionaries like Bobby, until
Jotai himself began to argue for the need to track down and contact his
father's band.
For the Totobiegosode in Arocojnadi, this was a fraught proposition.
In 1986, Jochade had given in to such pressure and guided the Campo
Loro group to the forest camp. Although his role in that contact ulti-
mately led to the move away from subordination on the missions, others
like Dejai and Ducubaide saw it as a deep betrayal. It was a profoundly
traumatic event for Jochade. Since then, he was the leader most strongly
opposed to any attempt at hunting down the forest bands.
I remember sitting around the fire one cool evening in Arocojnadi
when all at once out of nowhere a shiver seemed to run through the older
people like an electric shock or a sudden wind that only they could feel.
They flinched in synch as if by collective instinct. As if summoned by
a terrible puppeteer that had been waiting all this time. Bodies strange
and rigid, they tilted away from the firelight, lurched up, murmured half-
words, hushed the children. Everyone grew silent, we listened intently
to the darkness. I heard nothing, felt nothing but the nervous tension
palpable and building. I looked at Dasua, her finger floating in the air,
vaguely pointed northwest, where the edge of the forest loomed black
and formless.
After ten or fifteen frozen minutes, she barked at the children to go
inside, lie down, and be quiet. In the same curt tones, she told me to go
sleep right then in the school building and not to come out until dawn.
The next morning everything was back to normal. They later said the
forest people were close by that night, although no one would say how
exactly they knew.
Even during such moments, Jochade never permitted any talk of cap-
turing them to gain momentum. He asked Yoteuoi, the former daijnai
shaman, to place a carved message stick in the direction where the for-
est people were thought to be camping, so they would know there were
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