My trip to the Amazon jungle (3)

Entering the Kingdom

of the "Warrior Amazonians"

**A native Amazonian girl**
**Credit: Squarespace**

Spanish adventurer didn’t find gold but a "golden legend.“

A British Colonel "evaporated" in jungle in 1925!

I timed my travel to the Amazon forest a day after the arrival of the Amazon Indians delegation to the “Earth Symposium” in Flamengo Park in Rio de Janeiro. I booked into the “Tropical Hotel” In Manaus, the capital of the Amazon state. They told me it is one of the most luxurious hotels in Brazil, I was surprised that such a place existed in the middle of the jungle. I considered this description to be an exaggeration, but I remembered that Brazil is a country of contradictions, in which everything happens by accident or by mistake. It was discovered by mistake, hosted, in a historical error, the throne of the emperor who occupied it; then, it turned itself into an empire by chance; a mistake in the eyes of the opponents and a coincidence for its people. In all countries of the world, politicians rule and businessmen win. In Brazil, businessmen rule and politicians lose. All over the world, military coups are bloody, in Brazil, generals jump to power to prevent bloodshed.

Everything in Brazil is the antithesis of the ordinary. So why isn't a luxury hotel in the middle of the wildest and most mysterious jungles of the universe...and the poorest of the population?

Tropical Hotel

I booked into the “Tropical Hotel” In Manaus, the capital of the Amazon state. They told me that it is one of the most luxurious hotels in Brazil, so I was surprised that such a place existed in the middle of the jungle, and I considered this description to be an exaggeration, but I remembered that Brazil is a country of contradictions,

**Picture: Tropical Hotel**

There was an amazonian scandals waiting me In Flamingo Park.

The delegation of the Amazon Indians was there, but the one who attracted the attention of those present was their leader, Mario Girona, chief of the Zavantes tribe and former member of Parliament. He was surrounded by heavy security, a large-bodied man resembling a heavyweight boxer, and from the outset, the symposium supervisors informed the attendees that photography and press interviews were prohibited. Everyone was grumpy except him, who was so relaxed and so natural. What caught my attention was the skin of a spotted leopard hanging on the wall, next to which was sitting the Girona chief, whom he had killed near his home in the western state of Mato Grosso. And there was a piece of paper attached to the side of the leather, which was its price. So the skin of this rare animal is for sale for six hundred dollars, and the one who brought it from the jungle to sell it at the Environment Conference is a leader from the Amazon Indians! A person, apparently not a Brazilian, approached him and tried to take a picture of him, but his guards pushed him with brutal violence, and confusion spread among those present while the Indian leader was repeating, "I am a warrior... I am a warrior..."

A logical argument

Gradually the protest against his behaviour and that of his companions intensified; First, towards the person he tried to photograph, who was treated with humiliating cruelty, then his refusal to speak to journalists and his endless arrogance.

It seems that his companions finally convinced him of the need to speak to those present, especially since the disapproval was evident in people's faces towards his behaviour, and he offered a rare tiger skin for sale at a conference attended by environmentalists from all over the world to defend the Amazon forests.

He said in a sarcastic, questioning tone: I want to know why an Indian living in the middle of the jungle has no right to sell the skin of a tiger or other animal. This is a natural right of the Indian, and no one can take it away from him. Indians kill wild animals because they are strong and ferocious and may kill or injure people. We use the meat of these animals to survive. I ask those who have come here to insult me for this leopard skin, what do you want me to do when I face a tiger? What should the Indians do? To let a tiger eat him to make foreigners happy? I'll tell you the truth, I don't want to sell this skin for $600, but if I did, it shouldn't be a problem. I do this as a protest, and it's a very effective protest.

**An Amazon spotted Tiger**
**Credit: Squarespace**

Then Girona started shouting in an agitated voice: I want all those who care about the environment to defend human life more than they defend the life of forest animals. Humans are more important than the animals they want, nothing more than decoration objects in their luxurious homes. It seems they do not realise that the human being is more important than the tiger. Those from all over the world do not have any sincere feelings. They don't like living things, they only like money, and that's why they have no right to blame me. In front of them, I defend human rights, not the rights of snakes. We are nothing more than cinema and clowns to the developed world, but this does not concern us. We do not want to live like animals in the jungle, but we want homes and salaries. This conference

Confrance or Carnaval?

you are attending today will not achieve anything, it is just a carnival, and we are its clowns. The capitalists come to argue with us in our country and to hold a festival at the expense of the poor Brazilians. I don't think this summit will achieve anything.

The meeting ended, the Indian delegation withdrew, and the attendees remained stunned for some time; then, we dispersed each to the event he wanted to follow up.

I was thinking about the logic that Girona used to defend himself in front of his critics. He was somewhat correct in his position. The Amazon Indians lived for centuries in the forest their shelter, clothing and food source. It is the environment in which they are born, live and die. If we ask them to stop killing forest animals, reaping their fruits and using wood... How can we expect them to continue their lives? And what do we want the Amazon to do if he finds himself face to face with a predatory tiger in the depths of the jungle, and his life depends on the speed of his action? Either he kills the animal quickly, or he kills it between its fangs and nails. Then if he had killed the animal, what would be the harm in selling its skin? We hereby demand from the Amazon Indians that they be merely a subject of research and study for anthropologists and the environment, and we completely forget that they are human beings with their living demands and that this forest, which we claim we came here to agree on a set of steps to preserve, has embraced them and secured their lives for ages and ages without To disappear or even lose something of her presence with them. But the ones who started inflicting deep wounds on it and destroying it little by little and eliminating its plant, animal and human beings are us, who come from the world of civilisation with all our complex concepts, machines and tools. Millions of years. And he kills to live, while we who deplore this behaviour practice killing forest animals and destroying their plants, either for entertainment or for purely material benefits.

So I left the topic to the evening when I will meet the family of Jorge Klache at the dinner table, and I made my way to the bus station to the official conference headquarters in Rio Centro to prepare today's report for my newspaper.

**Mrs Lourda and Mr Georgie Klache are among generations of children and grandchildren**
**Picture: courtesy of Dr. Alex Clache**

“Fujoada” dinner with Clache family

In the evening, I went to Klache's house on the Copacabana beacht. At the dinner table were Georgie, his wife Lourda, and their daughter Elizabeth. Mrs Lourda said she cooked for me "Fujoada", Brazilian national food, because restaurants in Rio de Janeiro do not serve this dish except on Saturdays, and we are now on Monday, so she decided to treat me the famous Brazilian food before I go to the Amazon. Elizabeth said in her weak English while laughing: "maybe my mother thinks you will not return from the Amazon alive!" She added, still laughing: "You must beware of the predators there, especially the snakes. You might be surprised when you were breaking your fast in the morning when a poisonous snake descended on you from the tree." Then she added, "I'm joking, of course!" I told her that coincidence has always engineered my life. If chance had prepared for me to die by the bite of a venomous snake in the Amazon, there was nothing I could do to change the course of fate. Her father commented in Arabic: "Trust in God... nothing will happen." Elizabeth asked me what her father said. I told her he was reassuring me that I would return safely. She said she wished me that too.

Ms Lourda said that "Fujuada" is the food most Brazilians eat every Saturday. It is cooked from dried black beans with beef cuts. The beans are usually soaked with onions, garlic, and bay leaves before cooking and then simmered with the meat for several hours. It is preferable to cook in an earthenware pot. And add to the mixture several different spices as desired, slices of orange, and serve on the table with rice.

It was an enjoyable evening, and the feijoada was delicious, after which I felt I would not be able to eat anything for perhaps a day or two. I bid them farewell and returned to the hotel, determined to track down the Bayacana case.

In the morning, after breakfast, I took a small bag with the necessary clothes and a map of the Amazon, carried the camera and binoculars, and went to the airport to take the plane to Manaus, the capital of the Amazon.

Flying over the forest

**River or a giant snake?**
**Credit: Squarespace**

The distance between Rio de Janeiro and Manaus is four hours by continuous flight. It is a distance that forms part of this vast country. I was staring down from the window of the DC-10 plane at the dark greenery extending to infinity, pierced by crooked rivers like giant snakes in the middle of the forest. Others are like patterns woven on a vast green carpet. There is no road or city but greenery and rivers that number more than a thousand. With the slight shiver of finding myself on a DC-10, the feeling of being above the vastest and wildest forest on earth, and recalling Elizabeth's joke about venomous snakes slithering over you while you were busy with your breakfast, I settled into my seat and began thinking of the Amazon, the green legend.

What did Spanish adventurer Francisco de Orellana feel as he approached the edge of the jungle in the 16th century? I am sure my humble feeling is part of his picking the first fruit from that virgin forest. The feeling of a man confronting the mystery of his bride on the first night. The Spanish adventurer was not looking for substance there; but looking for gold. And the forest did not give him that yellow metal, instead gave him a golden legend.

Orellana's ambition was to reach the "Kingdom of Manoa", which was ruled by a king who covered his naked body daily with gold dust, and the Spanish called him "El Dorado", meaning the golden man. Whether the kingdom of Manoa was a fabric of legend or reality, it possessed the mind of this Spaniard, so he set off from Ecuador in 1540 towards the Amazon and did not emerge from the depths of the jungle until a year later, but not covered with gold dust, rather with wounds and insect stings and a golden legend.

City of myth

**Ruins of a golden city?**
**Credit: Squarespace**

However, despite his hardships, he loved the Amazon Indians and adored the most warrior tribe of them called "Women Who Live Alone". Then he called these women warriors the name "Amazonians", which is similar to the Greek myth about female warriors who cut off their right breasts so that they could use the bow. crossbow. But luck did not help Orellana capture one of these Amazons, but rather an Indian man named Quinco, who described the Amazons' kingdom. Quinco spoke in an accent that one of Orellana's companions could understand. According to Quinco's account, which Orellana mentioned in his report after his return to Spain in 1543, the kingdom of these female warrior is located near the Namunda River, and they are white, tall, and they braid their hair in the form of braids that they wrap around their heads. Each of them is equal to ten men in strength and use of her weapons, they live in houses built of stone and covered with straw. The village is surrounded by high stone walls. As for the rest of the Indians, they live in other nearby villages, but they serve these female warrior who withdraw when night falls to their high-walled town that no one else can enter. And once a year, they hold a festival to which they invite young men from other tribes to spend one night with them, and then they are return to their tribes next day. The fruits of this night of the male children who are born after that, they hand to the tribes of their fathers, as for the females who are born, they keep them and raise them behind their walls to make them warriors like themselves.
Quinco's story is close to Greek mythology about warrior women, but it may also be true. The mystery behind the village walls of these female warriors is only part of the mystery of the Amazon. So why do we rule out that this Quinco was invited in a year to the party of these brave women and spent that magical night with one of them then was expelled in the next morning to where his tribe is after giving them another warrior? Isn't mystery the heart of the forest?

It seems that Orellana himself did not confront any of these brave women, nor did any of the European explorers who penetrated the depths of the jungle after the Spanish adventurer, so the matter was left to Spanish historians and researchers who were unable to provide more explanation except that they called the region the “Amazon”.. But it didn't end there. Orellana's story captured the minds and hearts of many adventurers,q so it turned into a legend that fascinated another adventurer two centuries after Orellana, the Portuguese Francisco Raposo. As he mentioned in his report in 1754, after long wandering in the the jungle, that he had found the remains of a city built of rocks, testifying to an advanced era and an unknown civilization. Among what he and his companions found were stone-paved streets and ornate palaces similar to those dating back to the civilization of the Inca Indians.

But no one could reach this ancient city that Raposo described, although it kept igniting the imagination of historians and adventurers until a British Colonel called Percy Faust, who decided to find it. Faust, by his work as an army officer, moved a lot in Asia and Latin America, so he worked in Hong Kong, Ceylon, Bolivia, Peru and Brazil, and he was obsessed with ancient civilisations. So he penetrated deep into the Amazon, and it seems that he found the remains of an ancient city, as he wrote in 1925 describing what he saw as indeed astonishing traces of ancient cities, antiquities older than Egyptian one, still standing in the depths of the Mato Grosso region in the western Amazon.

Disappearing adventurers

**Amazon captured the magination of historians and adventurers**
**Credit: Squarespace**

Faust was sixty years old when he began his daring journey to the "Lost City" from Coiba, the capital of the state of Mata Grosso, on April 20, 1925, accompanied by his son Jack and several Indian guides. He used to send his reports of what he encountered to an American newspaper. Suddenly, Faust and those with him disappeared after he sent his last letter on May 30, 1925, with one of his guides from the Indians, to his young son, Vibero. The letter does not explain much to us about the lost city.. Whether he found it or not, he warns his son against embarking on any adventure, following his steps, saying that such an adventure is fraught with dangers.

After this mysterious message, Faust disappeared into the forest, and no trace of him was found until today,

What take me out of the lost city of Faust was the voice of the flight attendant telling us to tighten our seatbelts because we will soon land at Manaus airport. I stared out the window, the greenery that began four hours ago was still extending to the end of the horizon, and it seemed darker and denser, with nothing wounding its texture except the crooked rivers in its bowels, which included between their banks a fifth of the world's freshwate,,

As the minutes passed, the forest began to rise little by little, and its details of shadows and light began to emerge more and more until it became at the level of the plane windows before stopping in front of the tunnel that leads us to the airport hall.

Airport in the Jungle

Except for what is imagined about the Amazon, the airport hall does not suggest that you are in the middle of the jungle. A spacious, clean, air-conditioned hall, elegant glass shops are tastefully arranged, and beautiful mulatto girls move about. It contains everything from the factories of Europe, America and Asia; from the lavish perfumes of Paris to the luxurious fashions of London and Rome, from Japan's advanced technology to the miserable American "Hamburger". And Brazil was there too, with brightly coloured rings, birds and animals carved from coloured rocks. As for the Amazon, it was folklore among its family home. it was on postcards, travel books and a few cheap miniature models of Indian spears and shields. Baskets are woven from jungle fibres. Animal tusks, stuffed snakes and tropical birds in blown-coloured rubber.

In the airport hall, the Amazon receives you with a fake face, as if it is ashamed of its natural one as it stands among all these exhibits from around the world. As it is embarrassed that was given this little space to reveal its charms while all that is strange and abnormal occupies its house.

Did I miss the way.. and land at a European airport? but I realised that I was in the middle of the jungle with the first step I took outside the airport hall; a wave of hot moist air greeted me, and with the first inhalation, I felt the weight of moisture in my chest and its stickiness on my skin. The sky was clear blue, and the sun was dazzlingly bright. The forest was a few meters away, I could hear the rustling of its trees and the chirping of its birds. I remembered Elizabeth's snakes and the Girona tiger, so I hurried towards the bus that would take us to the Tropical Hotel.