Snapshots of Mamore, Bolivia (2 of 5)

My aversion to the food on the barge became directly proportionate to the duration of the journey. And to think that I have always bragged about having a stomach made of stones and gorging on ethnic munches or murky goodies found with the street vendors. To be more precise, I did not fall ill or get food-poisoning. Sometimes, though, I wish I had had digestion problems instead of being subject to the most debilitating monotony of our daily meals. Once a pig was slaughtered (the first mate just swung his axe casually, slicing the pig’s neck as the rest of the passengers watched on), it was processed and preserved. The meat was washed in the river, cut up in chunks and spread out on deck in the scorching sun. From then on, the meat constituted the basis of our daily diet on the river. Breakfast was no different from lunch, and, by the same token, lunch was no different from dinner.

I could definitely tell between two types of diet on the barge. The first was lacra – a local specialty made of white rice, chunks of meat, too much salt, and water from the river. Normally, when prepared with love and care, lacra can be a delicious and filling meal; however, the boat version caused me nightmares. Another delicacy found on the boat was a hodgepodge of fried pieces of meat mixed with mashed boiled platens, and flushed with terribly sweet coffee. I was surprised at how little fruit was served on the boat even though this tropical region of Bolivia abounded with many sorts previously unknown to me. At one point I bummed a couple of bananas from one of the passengers. Damn, did I have a party!

Initially I eagerly ascended to the galley because my first meals were an obvious novelty to me. I was invited to sit at the table with the owner, his two sons, and their guest, Roberto, a military man working in Guayaramerín. As I was growing fed up with the uniform diet I found it increasingly more difficult to appear excited at the table. I began to evade the galley, picking and choosing mainly rice and scarce vegetables. If it hadn’t been for the bananas that the crew purchased during one of its brief stopovers along the river, I would have felt the symptoms of starvation. On several occasions I did not even bother showing up in the galley, choosing comfort of my hammock to the food that I could guess beforehand. My moments of culinary pleasures consisted of preparing hot tea or coffee in the morning and evening. I had brought along six bottles of purified water, which I rationed carefully. When asked why I did not drink water from the river, I would answer honestly that I simply wasn’t used to it. The men would laugh and shake their heads, their happy eyes saying, and “Que estranjero raro!”

Silentium Ilusorium

Moments of blissful monotony on the river can often mean an omen of change. El Parabero wedged slowly into the dense pampas on the way to the cattle ranch. The day had begun with a spectacular sunrise, piranha fishing, and bird hunting. Don Carlos was teaching his boys to fish. Holding long rods with chunks of meat thrust on the hooks, his boys bore an air of premature seriousness. The net tangled up around the many fixtures on deck and in the end no one caught a thing. Roberto told me a story about Don Carlos while we watched the three fish.

Don Carlos had built up his fortune by hunting one of the most precious birds of the Amazon – the very parabero. This particular species is coveted in the US where collectioneers will pay dearly for them. Roberto couldn’t tell me exactly how legal this business was. Don Carlos might as well have been a poacher back then. A great deal of his old behavior (characterized by the lack of respect and understanding toward nature) remained with him. I had a difficult time watching him aim and shoot at the birds in his sons’ presence. I found it to be a foul example.

The ranch was located somewhere behind a narrow and intricate network of natural channels, swamps and low forest. The barge with its add-ons and cargo turned out to be too broad to move efficiently through such a natural network. The crew gradually had to detach the side barges one by one as the convoy waded deeper into the forest that now seemed self-imposing. Its deep and dense aroma penetrated my senses to the verge of dizziness. The air felt unbearably hot. I hung around the bridge, observing the surroundings with deep curiosity.

Read all five parts!

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