Travel story that ponders the new wave of travelle
I placed my right hand over my kidney to attempt to soften the beating that it was receiving from the central bar in the jeep. The vehicle lurched constantly from side to side, climbing in and out of metre deep holes dug in the road to put the Colombians off landing their planes on the jungle roads to pick up barrels of coca paste. Unfortunately, this combined with heavy rain had made the road torturous and the parts of my body next to the bar were starting to feel it after five hours.
As the darkness closed around us that evening I began to feel less of a hero. I was an hours walk into the jungle, across three rivers and my head felt full of smoke and lethargic from the deep humidity. Even my cigarettes were destroyed in what could only be called a freak rampage by the chickens and turkeys. The thick dark air was humming, popping and growling with bugs and I was dreaming of the easy things in life: sofa, TV, toasted cheese sandwiches.
The punishment sustained during the journey had caught up with me and I couldn’t lie on one side; the fact that the beds were simply wooden with no mattress didn’t help. I watched the fireflies flicker in the black and I knew that this was one of those times that you remember. I could not say that I was enjoying myself, I wasn’t. I would have left at the earliest opportunity but for my pride, which was keeping me there for a week. However, I knew deep down that beneath all the physical and mental exhaustion, somewhere deep inside, I was loving it.
The question of why the new breed of traveller seems to find pleasure in physically and mentally pushing himself or herself to the edge and often into danger is an interesting one. “Backpacking” is now such a commercial, popular culture pursuit that to do something that has never been achieved or to go somewhere that has never been explored by a westerner is increasingly hard. That is why we find travellers popping up in wariness, illegally crossing into private reserves and finding themselves in rioting groups without really knowing how to look after themselves.
Everyone wants a “story to tell the grandchildren” and saying “I hitched across Europe” or even “drove to Kathmandu” is not original. So why? Why do we feel that we have to prove ourselves? Why do we need to feel special? Is it fear of death within our non-religious cultures that drive us to these extremes? Possibly. Or is it that in these days of conspicuous consumption an “experience” is worth more than a dollar? Probably.
Whatever the reason, as I lay on the porch of the Yanesha Indian house, the smell of snakes fat that had been massaged into my bruises mixed with cheap Peruvian tobacco and armadillo boiling in the pot. The sound of the Indians stories combining with the sound of blood pumping in my head and the occasional shotgun blast from the hunter in the hills and a blanket of blackness over my eyes sent me to sleep. A long, deep, proud sleep for a satisfied explorer….until the first bullet of rain hit me in the face.
To receive information on volunteering or simply living with the Yanesha community in Central Peru email: montague@amauta.rcp.net.pe
You will not regret it.