Legends
Pink Dolphin
The legendary Amazons
Meeting with shaman
(by Artem Yasny)
Pink Dolphin
Rosita was a young indigenous girl of 18, who lived in a house near the banks of the mighty Amazon River. Every day she went to the river to get water to bring back to her family’s home. One evening at dusk while fetching water, she departed from her usual habit and stood on the river bank watching the river current as the sun set, seemingly hypnotized by the moving water.
Reassured by the calm current and the secluded bank, she undressed, taking off her dress and dove into the river for a refreshing swim. The constant stream of the water flowing round her body distracted her and she failed to notice another pair of eyes secretly watching her from the river bank.
Suddenly, she shivered, overcome by the weird feeling that someone was watching her.
. A young man standing on the muddy bank, smiled and stared brazenly at her naked body. She became embarrassed when she saw he was not averting his eyes but looking into her eyes as if they knew each other. Spontaneously, as if controlled by a sinister force, she stood up from the water exposing her naked body and walked towards him. Her feet moved in small, constant steps, pulling her towards the man whose magnetism she could not resist and whose enchantment forced her to fall into his arms, kissing him.
Rosita whispered to the stranger, “Who are you and where are you from?” The man replied, “I am a fisherman from the river,” all the while maintaining eye contact with her. “I would like to be with you always. What is your answer, my beauty?”
“Yes,” she replied as if hypnotized. They spent the night together, in passionate embrace, making love the entire night.
They spent the night together, in passionate embrace, making love the entire night.
From that night forward, they met every evening at sunset, and spent the night together under the shinning stars and in the secrecy of the dark night, making love.
Finally, her father confronted her about where she was at night. Although she was a simple and shy girl, she replied bravely to her father, with the force of a woman in love, “I am in love with a fisherman. We are both in love and we are going to get married.”
The father never seeing his young daughter react in such a way, agreed to meet the fisherman and talk with him. Later that night, the young fisherman came to Rosita's home and asked her father for permission to marry his daughter. Knowing that his daughter was in love with the mysterious fisherman, her father reluctantly agreed and allowed the young fisherman to sleep with his daughter in their hut.
As time when on, the young fisherman slept with Rosita every night, but mysteriously left every morning before first light and returned only after dusk. However one morning, Rosita’s lover did not leave before sunrise as he always had previously and remained sleeping in her bed after sunrise. Rosita awoke that fateful morning, feeling a strange wet body at her side.
She opened her eyes and was shocked at what she saw in her bed and screamed loudly. Her father heard her scream and rushed into the room with his shotgun to help his daughter. Incredibly, there was a pink river dolphin in Rosita's bed and it was trying to get away, but could not. Far from the water, the pink dolphin fell to the floor, helplessly, unable to escape. Shocked, the father reached for his shotgun and shot the pink dolphin in the head, ending the dolphin's life.
After that day, the young fisherman never returned and was never seen again. Rosita was heart-broken that her lover had abandoned her. Worse, she soon realized that he had gotten her pregnant and that she would soon bear the mysterious fisherman's baby.
Tragedy again struck when Rosita died during child birth. Despite her best effort, the midwife that attended Rosita could not save her life. However the baby lived, and to the shock of everyone, the baby was not human, but instead a baby dolphin. It seems that, in reality, the mysterious fisherman was not human, but rather a “Bufeo Colorado,” a pink dolphin who had the ability to transform himself into a human at night and had seduced Rosita.
Native girls be advised! If a mysterious and seductive fisherman appears to you by the river after dusk, do not let yourself be deceived by his appearance. He is the “Bufeo Colorado,” a magical being who can transform himself into a human at night and only wants to steal the heart and soul of an innocent young girl.
The legendary Amazons
The first accounts of the female warriors, later called the Amazons, were found in the works of the Ancient Greek (Hellenic) historiographers. One of them, historian Diodorus of Sicily, wrote that the Amazons located on the fringe of the world (as it was then known to the Greeks). According to his version, the Amazons entirely ruled their society and fought in battles, while men were allowed to perform only those tasks executed in other countries by women. When the children were born, men were the ones in charge of raising them. According to ancient sources, the Amazons participated in the Trojan War, carried out raids into Asia Minor together with Cimmerians (nomads from Crimea and neighboring prairies), made an attempt to invade Attica (the country of Ancient Greek poleis) and lay siege to the Athens.
For example, after the Trojan War a group of Amazons appeared in the Scythian territory. In the course of this war, as reported by Herodotus, some of their women were taken captive, and the Greeks placed them in three ships to take back to their land. But it was not to be. The Amazons revolted, killed the Greek warriors and the ship crews, and, carried by wind and current, landed in the Scythian lands near the lost to time place called Kremna. There they stole Scythian horses, took the arms left from the dead Greeks, and began ravaging the country. Long couldn’t the Scythians make out what happened and where those strange warriors came from, for they couldn’t recognize neither their language and clothes, nor the strangers themselves, since they hadn’t encountered such a tribe before. But they gathered their forces and joined the battle against the Amazons; however their actions had little effect as they didn’t succeed in conquering the enemy. To their astonishment the examination of the dead bodies showed that every single one of them belonged to a woman. Amazed by such a circumstance, they decided to have the women from this tribe as mothers of their children. They made a plan to send a group of young Scythian men, equal in number with Amazons, to their territory, yet not for the purpose of war, but to peacefully settle nearby. The Amazons, assured that the strangers didn’t pose any threat, let them live in peace. But after a while many Amazons engaged themselves in the intimate relationship with young Scythians and even assimilated the Scythian language. The young Scythians asked the Amazons to join their tribe but the latter refused the offer and went on living independent life. Thus a new people, Sauromatians, came into existence in the Scythian territories; they spoke the modified Scythian language. This legend was proven real only recently after the archaeological findings in Scythian kurgans on the neighboring territories of Russia and Kazakhstan. The tombs of warrior maidens together with armor and weapons were also uncovered in that area. The same burials were found in the Caucasus and in the northern region of the Black Sea where the women had been buried together with arms and even horse harness.
The myth about the Amazons coming to the walls of Athens is associated with Theseus, the hero of the Greek mythology. According to Plutarch, Theseus had been on a quest in the Euxine Sea (the Black Sea). After boarding the ship in the Amazons’ land, he was quite openly welcomed by them. Sensing no trouble or malice, the Amazons didn’t even think that this guest might soon turn into their foe. But it happened so that he fell in love with the Amazonian princess Antiope whom he abducted and carried back to Athens. The Amazons attacked Athens in the hope of rescuing the abducted Antiope. After a 4-month siege, a great battle took place by the Acropolis’ walls but neither side won. The peace treaty was signed, and the Amazons left. But they left without Antiope who perished fighting by the side of Theseus. Such were the things back then: the motives of the battleship still remain unclear.
The Amazons attributed their name (“breastless”) long after; it was completely established much later in the
South America. One time the Spanish stepped on the territory that appeared to be controlled by the Amazons, and the locals called their protectors for help. The Amazons fought the Spanish on the firing line and showed unparalleled courage and outstanding art of war. The invaders didn’t manage to take captive a single one of the women whom they wanted to show to the Spanish Catholic Majesties; neither did they succeed in conquering the country. The land was eventually named Amazonia, after the female warriors; and so was the Amazon River. The name “Brazil” appeared later, based on the ancient Celtic legends telling about the mythical island “O'Breasil”, an earthly paradise inhabited by beautiful women.
Meeting with shaman
(by Artem Yasny)
“… The city of Iquitos, located in the Amazonian rainforest, is famed for its mystical and shaman traditions. It’s there that you can find the famous market of magical and medicinal herbs. And if you go to a small village, 100 km from Iquitos (you can get there along the Amazon River on a small high-speed powerboat), in the heart of the jungles untouched by civilization you can meet real shamans and healers.
I can say that right after the first of such meetings my life and my conscience have changed completely…
At first, under the shaman and local guides’ supervision, we built our own hut using only machete, jungles and our hands. Then we learned how to extract crystal-clear drinking water out of the liana stem, find edible fruit and secure ourselves from mosquitoes. Finally, we began preparations for the ayahuasca ritual performed by the shaman.
Ayahuasca is a decoction made of sacred liana worshipped by Amerindians. It’s a traditional remedy of Peruvian, Ecuadorian and Columbian shamans. Peruvian shamans that perform their ceremony with ayahuasca are called ayahuasqueros. The important fact is that their activity is absolutely legal and certified. Every year hundreds of tourists gather at the ayahuasca rituals performed by the shamans in order to deal with their fears and meet their death face to face! The ability to experience your death and come back is truly a grandiose journey. Together with shaman we found a sacred liana in the jungles used for the preparations, and took part in the very process of making the decoction.
It is cooked for about 8 hours. Ayahuasca is used for curing many illnesses and disorders that cannot be treated by the methods of modern medicine, and also for resolving inner psychological personality problems. All Amerindian young men go through the process of initiation by participating in the ayahuasca ritual. Tribe members use it, too, to cure their own maladies. Just imagine: with the help of ayahuasca a shaman can search and find a missing person or object! That’s why there’s no such concept as theft in Amerindian tribes. Shaman will expose the guilty one right away. Sacred liana will help you to find out many things not only about yourself but about other people that you deal with in life, about their thoughts, intentions, and state of health. Some people particularly come to shaman for the ayahuasca ceremony in order to make an important decision in their life. There is a saying that liana knows everything; the main thing is to properly formulate the question. And our experience proves it to be exactly right!
Such ceremonies are performed in a virgin tropical forest, in the camp made with people’s own hands, 100 km away from the nearest city and 5-10 km away from the closest village. Only the sounds of jungles surround you. However there’s no need for any concern. Local guides that by all means escort you were born in that area and are “on close terms” with the nature.
The ceremonies are performed after the sunset within three or five evenings. Briefly they can be divided into three stages: total purification; determination of the individual self; correction and control. In the course of the first ceremony a person undergoes the process of purifying his body and mind, introduction to the sacred world that is opened by ayahuasca. Shaman sings magical Icaro songs. After the ceremony a person falls asleep.
Preparation for the second ceremony is Determination of the individual self. During the second ceremony you somewhat scan your body and the spectrum of your consciousness (by yourself), determining the places that might have different kinds of thrombs, inhomogenuities and alien substances. These are the things that prevent us from acting the way we want; make us think and live by the model that was imposed from outside or that we created ourselves. And you don’t necessarily have to possess any “knowledge” in medical or psychological field. On the contrary, during the ceremony your consciousness perceives everything through its individual images and associations free from any kind of knowledge, i.e. schemes and models. Person sees the origin of all his actions, desires and life experiences that take place around him.
The third ayahuasca ceremony is correction and control. Having learnt to orient in your own (though once hidden) world, as well as having determined your weaknesses, you use your consciousness and your inner energy message, i.e. intention, to work through any found body damages and to cleanse those places with the power of your mind from the energy scums that cause the visible illnesses. Many psychological disorders, such as insomnia, alarm state, nervousness, tiredness and others can be easily treated as well…”
(based on the experiences of Artem Yasny, the traveler)
