Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Tarinu then explained verbally the reasoning behind his calculations:
Antonio wanted to buy 20 arrows, but we would only sell him 7, since we
need arrows to hunt and fish with and he doesn't. Antonio wants to make more
money, selling arrows to white men in Brasília. We know that he sells arrows
for much more than he buys them from us, so instead of selling them for 2
cruzeiros, we wanted to sell them for 5 cruzeiros each. So that would be 7
times 5 equals 35. But Antonio owes us money for the 6 clay pans he bought
last month and didn't pay us for. That's 12 for each pan; so 6 times 12 equals
72. He also owes us 18 cruzeiros for the deer we killed for him last week,
which he feasted on for days. That is, 35 plus 72 plus 18 equals 125. But
Antonio did not accept the price, since he is a greedy and selfish man, who
only thinks about getting rich on our backs. So he didn't pay us the 125. That
is, 125 minus 125 equals 0. [February 1982]
“What did Antonio want to pay?” asked Tarinu's classmates. “He wanted to buy 20
arrows for 40 cruzeiros, that is, 2 cruzeiros per arrow. I told him that only 7 arrows
were for sale, so he wanted to give me 14,” answered Tarinu. “Why only 2 cruzeiros per
arrow?” they inquired. “Well,” said Tarinu, “he thinks he could buy them cheap because
he's had so many malarias, and because he's pacified lots of Indians in his life, the kind
of story whites like to tell.
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But I know that what he really wants is to make money.”
Figure 1.8. Tarinu Juruna. Meeting between a White man and an Indigenous man in the
Xingu Indigenous Park, 1984.
