This edition has been delayed by about 2 weeks due a combination of travel and technical issues, hopefully these are now fixed. ~ Paul, GT Webmaster.

Hello all,

I think that this is going to be a bumper edition, as not only have I got to catch up with not managing to produce a July eNewsletter, IÂ’ve also got plenty of good material to get through !! So what happened to JulyÂ’s edition you might ask ? Well I ran out of timeÂ…the twin calls of work and then spending three weeks with Tony Annis, undertaking an adventure of life time in Brasil, squashed everything into too short a space ! I will tell you more about Brasil but now I need to move on and let you know about the following:-

July was a notable month for the Globetrotters Club, particularly for the London Branch, on two fronts:-

· Dick Curtis has retired as London Branch organiser and all round good guy ! As you can see from the picture below, courtesy of Dan Bachmann, Dick was completely surprised by the presentation of a signed card and an engraved glass globe ! In fact I think he was speechless for a few seconds whilst he registered what Jacqui and the Committee had organised in commemorationÂ… Many of you can recollect Dick being a constant, as the club changed most of its regular attendees, meeting venues and advanced through its own 60^th birthday. How many of you also noted DickÂ’s passions for Wasps rugby union club, strong English beers and slightly eccentric travel trips to London, the Basque country and beyond. I think for me Dick epitomises what drew me to the club and has kept me coming back for more, in one shape or another. IÂ’m sure we havenÂ’t heard the last of Dick and weÂ’ll get to catch up with him in slightly less busy moments, enjoying the club and its members Â… All the best and thank you for all your efforts Dick – regards from us all!!!

· The new programme of events for September 2008 was announced and as you can see it lists a whole host of interesting and well accomplished travellers – http://www.globetrotters.co.uk/meetings/lon09it1.html. Not only do we have Legacy 2007 winner & club member Katie Fahrland speaking about her once in a lifetime trip to Bamako, we also welcome back regulars Justin Marozzi, Jonny Bealby (GT heartthrob !!), Amar Grover & John Gimlette all before the end of 2008 ! A very strong line up indeed as we head towards the winter months and the start of 2009Â…

ThatÂ’s all for nowÂ…,

The Ant

theant@globetrotters.co.uk

The July meeting was the popular Members Slides, though nowadays digital is beginning to take over and in the first session:-

Liz Cooper took us first to Belize showing us the “Blue hole”, which you reach by a combination of scrambling and swimming, she also showed us examples of the abundant bird life and the native Margay cats.

Rene Richards showed us her trip to Peru , including bodies preserved by the dry atmosphere at high altitude, Rene visited the reed islands on Lake Titicaca, worrying that she would sink through these bouncy constructions, and the spectacular Valley of the Condors.

We headed next to Asia as Sue Baker showed us her 2 month’s working in a school in Darham, Mongolia . As well as helping teach the children and taking them into the hills, Sue also got to experience living in a Ger which can be erected in just an hour (not IKEA then!) and trekking around salt lakes.

Next to the Middle East as David Shamash showed us some old pictures of Jerusalem.

Last up before the interval was Jacqui Trotter, who showed us that Spain is not just for the summer, Jacqui visited Madrid and Sevilla, taking in the Moorish architecture, Sevilla cathedral and photographing some of the ornate doorways and peaking behind them. She also showed us Cordoba cathedral, with its wonderful forest of nearly a 1000 columns from its days as a mosque.

After the break we returned to the following varied set of short journeys:-

Tracey Murray took us down under to the Oodnadatta Track, taking in the delights of Coober Pedy, Lake Eyre and the wonderfully named “Plane Henge” where 2 old aircraft are tethered noses upwards. At Maree Tracey showed us a camel made out of railway sleepers, a monument to the Ghan railway.

Eric Hayman then took us to Lesotho where he worked during the 1970’s helping to build dams on the Orange river, this also involved building an airstrip with some very rudimentary equipment, he must have done a reasonable job as its still there and you can book a flight to it on Expedia, its designation code is PEL!

Jeanie Copland, showed us the trip she did earlier this year with Matt Doughty, walking in Big Bend National Park in Texas, Matt is obviously fitter than he looks 🙂 as some of the walks were quite hard, but worth it for the views.

Dan Bachmann made quite an entrance dressed in his Tunisian headscarf to show us his trip into the dessert, where he camped under the stars and his guide baked their breakfast bread under the ashes of the camp fire. Dan was amazed to find plants growing in a dessert that hasnÂ’t seen rain in decades.

Dick Curtis fittingly brought the meeting to its close, showing us Lyon airport, which is an architectural delight, but completely devoid of any passengers due to its not very well thought out location.

For details of the forth coming meetings of the London branch, September 2008 through to July 2009 – http://www.globetrotters.co.uk/meetings/lon09it1.html.

London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh in September. For more information, contact the Globetrotters Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk.

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact Svatka Hermanek: shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Ontario meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.

It’s the time of year again when I drop a line to Globies about the BBC-Royal Geographical Society “Journey of a Lifetime” award, which is always of great interest to Globies. I’ve been lucky enough to be involved with this since it started eight years ago. Last year’s winner Emily Ainsworth made a cracking programme about touring with a Mexican circus, which will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Friday 29 August at 11.00 am.

If this isn’t too late for your eNewsletter, please could you give the programme a mention? And most importantly, please could you tell Globies how to apply for the 2009 award, for which the deadline is Friday 26 September.

In a nutshell, up to £4,000 is on offer for an original and inspiring journey anywhere in the world. The winner will receive training in radio broadcasting from the BBC and will record their experiences for a BBC Radio 4 documentary. What they want is to inspire an interest in the world and its people and at the same time discover new radio broadcasting talent.

Full details are at: http://www.rgs.org/OurWork/Grants/Journey+of+a+Lifetime.htm

Info about previous programmes (with “Listen Again” links) are at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/journeyofalifetime.shtml

Background

Your Journey of a Lifetime – it’s the territory of imagination and dreams, the lure of the distant horizon and the tug of the unknown. The Royal Geographical Society (with IBG), in partnership with BBC Radio 4, offer you the chance to make that journey and to tell the world about it in a memorable piece of radio documentary-making. Each year the RGS-IBG and the BBC support the best idea for an original, exciting, and exceptional journey. It’s important that the project takes you somewhere fresh, different and original. Therefore it’s a good idea to bear in mind where previous winners have been (such as Mexico in 2008, Kenya in 2007 and Egypt in 2006).

Your journey needs really to matter to you: we need to feel your passion and enthusiasm and Radio 4 listeners need to be fascinated. The BBC already broadcasts a lot of documentaries about faraway places. When developing your idea, make sure it’s the sort of thing journalists rarely have the time to cover. Most reporters can only afford the time and money to make short visits to meet important people and don’t get immersed in the local society.

The programme you’ll be making needs to tell your story – and that of the journey and the place you’ll be visiting – in a graphic and attractive way. Think of all the audio potential in the idea – not just indigenous music and sounds, but how you are going to find interesting sounds within the substance of the journey (by keeping an audio-diary, for example). Radio is very good on atmospherics and imaginative pictures, but you need to think about what your journey and your destination offer to create those pictures.

Eligibility guidelines

* You’ll be travelling between January and July 2009.

* Applicants must be aged 18 or over.

* BBC and RGS-IBG staff and their close relatives are not eligible to apply for grants.

* The BBC will retain editorial control over any programme it may make. It can’t guarantee that any programme it may make will be broadcast.

* Interviews will be held in November 2008 in London. You must be able to attend these interviews in person.

* Applications from small teams rather than solo travellers are accepted, but please make it clear in your application if this is the case.

* The award is for independent travel. We will NOT consider any journey joining a commercial expedition or pre-paid tour, including organised charity fundraising tours.

How to apply

Applications may be submitted by email (in MS Word format) or by post or fax, to arrive by Friday 26 September 2008.

Initial proposal – applying for the Journey of a Lifetime award is easy. We’re only looking for the ‘pitch’ of your idea at this stage – the core idea that makes this your Journey of a Lifetime. Your pitch should be no longer than 550 words and should provide:-

A two-line summary – A very brief description of your planned journey. Think of this as what would appear as your headline in the Radio Times.

A 250-300 word description of the journey in more detail. You don’t have to include everything listed here, but it may help you to consider:

* Why is this a journey of a lifetime?

* Why will it make a good radio broadcast?

* Why is it of interest to the audience?

* How will you achieve the journey?

* What will you get out of it?

* What will the audience get out of it?

* Why you and not somebody else?

Please remember to keep this brief. At this stage we’re not looking for detailed route plans or budgets.

Send your initial proposal by email, post or fax to the RGS-IBG grants officer at the address below to arrive by Friday 26 September 2008. From the initial proposals, up to ten projects will be shortlisted by a panel of judges. Those selected will be asked to prepare a more detailed proposal.

Note: Digital photographs should be in JPEG or TIFF format, A5 size, with a resolution of at least 300dpi.

Enquiries and applications

Grants Officer Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) 1 Kensington Gore, London, SW7 2AR T: 020 7591 3073 F: 020 7591 3031 E: grants@rgs.org W: http://www.rgs.org/grants

This trip of ours to Brasil was brought to life by two men and their visions of what the Amazon Forest means to its indigenous peoples & what it could mean to the wider world, if experienced responsibly. Benki Piyako, respected member of the Ashaninka people, is at 35 years old a possible future of the indigenous peoples interactions with the modern states of South America, he is articulate, educated & has a sense of how his cultural identity can play a positive role. Meanwhile Tony Annis a long time Globetrotter member and established photographer, was raised in Brasil during his school years and has over the years has grown more passionate about what makes Brasil tick and how it should be enjoyed.

We six tourists first met up with Benki & a number of the Ashaninka at Marechal Thaumaturgo’s airstrip (in Brasil’s western most state – Acre), perfectly timed for a step into the unknown. On departure day, four flat, metal hulled motor boats were loaded with our packs, food, umbrellas & guns and iced drinks and after what became the regularly fluid morning chats about what might happen for the day, the word was given and we’re off ! Turn right after the town and up Rio Amonia we went !!

Those umbrellas were vital in this supposed dry season  continuous rain for the first few hours could have easily sapped our keenness before we reached our first stop at Apiwxta (pronounced aputure). Bizarrely it was water that probably got us into enjoying this adventure‚…the boat with John, Trish & I in hit an unseen & very underwater log and our world was instantly turned upside down. Despite the best efforts of Chico our driver, all of our goods were dunked into the brown, muddy & very fast flowing river frantically we grabbed the most precious items – our cameras – and let the following boats rescue everything, including ourselves. Tony was most disappointed that he had not been around to get any pictures of the upset. Adaptable is a byword for getting the most out of their surroundings – everything was stripped down, dried and within an hour or so we were on our way again. I had images of us being marooned over night, but no the Ashaninka soon had us underway.

Apiwxta is so, so different from most places I have ever experienced before. It epitomises the symbiotic relationship the Ashaninka have with the forests buildings, food, clothes and even socialising are derived from materials found within their surroundings. Only functional, hardwearing objects such as machetes, outboard motors and cooking ports come from our outside world. These people only take what they need for their communities at this point and further up river there is little evidence of the destructive practices of forestry that have many up in arms. In fact the rapidly rising & sinking levels of the river have wreaked more damage, as its course varies with the seasonal downpours. We evening’d over a meal of freshly caught fish, manioc, paste & cold, cold beers. This, including the beer, became our staple diet for most of the whole trip along the river though it was sometimes varied by what ever could be hunted by bows & arrows or very ancient rifles sometimes even Benki failed to bring back anything extra ! We also got to experience herbal medicines, as I’d bounced Francesca off a wooden balcony and she had the resulting bloody wound patched up with just honey & plant extracts despite having to wear a large bandage, just in case, she didn’t swear at me once and was most intrigued on what had been applied to her head.

Days two & three had us heading further up towards the Peruvian border  each day was spent bouncing along, dodging fallen trees and attempting to avoid numb bums & sun burn. Each night we slept on a river beach, underneath palm tree lean shelters with our hammocks swung into place & the much needed mosquito nets added ! Swimming in the muddied swirls of the Amonia became the best way to exfoliate the day away. But those damned flies & mosquitoes nearly rubbished all this serene pleasure for us, we had to use industrial quantities of deet, soothing creams & sun protection in an unequal battle to fend off bite after bite even back in Rio de Janeiro week’s later people still remarked on my pock marked legs !

The fourth day found us crossing the border into Peru and up into the village of Sawawo to support our Ashaninka in a football tournament organised to commemorate the country’s independence. Through the heat & mixed of indigenous/state communities we cheered on Benki & his rock of a player brother Bebito, as they defeated all comers to seal the title. The evening’s celebrations descended into a cacophony of Peruvian disco, shuffling dancing and a boatful of fermented manioc & sweet potatoes and Don in particular paid the price for over indulging as we began our return in a haze the next day.

Picture courtesy of The Ant: Tome boat at SawawoÂ…the morning after!!!

Our final leg was particularly poignant, I sat up front on the lead boat on the last day, getting splashed and dodging so many hanging branches, as we left behind the more traditional Ashaninka way of life and navigated our way down past the small homesteads and onto Marechal’s blurred junction of Rios Amonia & Juru. A sense of departure & change pervaded my thoughts, we were heading eastwards towards Brasil and ultimately home, the joy of sharing our unknown was almost over all too quickly.

Want to know more about the Ashaninka and their lives ?

• their cosmology and more –
• about their community at Apiwxta –
• BenkiÂ’s role in environmental & indigenous issues for the Ashaninka and the Brasilians – http://www.ashoka.org/node/3954

We were in El Chalten (there are good campsites and also plenty of hotels around to stay in although February is high season so book pretty early) and we did part of the Fitz Roy circuit that I think takes anything from 4-7 days. We went to El Lago de los tres (which takes you right to the base of the Fitzroy Glacier and is just past the base camp for climbers) and also started the walk into Cerro Torre but the weather was bad. Both the Fitzroy and Cerro Torre circuits are accessible from El Chalten. If I remember I had the Bradt guide to Argentina and Chile and that had some really useful information in it about the circuits and where to get maps etc. In terms of kit etc you can either hire it or buy it in El Chalten, but a word of warning the prices are pretty expensive (even more so now as all the prices have gone up).

While youÂ’re in Patagonia and that far south itÂ’s definitely worth going to the glacier ‘Perito MorenoÂ’ as itÂ’s spectacular. The nearest town to that is El Calafate. Also, if you have time itÂ’s also possible to go to ‘Las Torres del PaineÂ’ in Chile where you can do various circuits of trekking (for example, the ‘wÂ’ route – thereÂ’s more info in Bradt) and is also amazing.

Further up in northern Patagonia there is also Volcan Lanin that is a 2 day trek/climb with crampons. It is in Parque Nacional de Lanin and the nearest place is Junin de los Andes. You need all the kit to be checked by the park rangers (guardaparque) and also to hire a radio to take up with you (you can do this in Junin de los Andes). Again thereÂ’s more info in Bradt and although people will try to sell you a group climb with guides if you have some knowledge of mountains they will let you go alone – however you will need to provide a first aid kit etc to take with you. If you decide to do this itÂ’s worth keeping a few days (4-5) to spare to allow for weather, booking a place in one of the refuges for the 1st night and also to get the kit together.

In terms of transport (assuming youÂ’re flying into Buenos Aires) from Buenos Aires you can get a ‘cochecamaÂ’ – a bus with seats that recline to become a bed (well nearly) to El Chalten, El Calafate, Bariloche and I think Junin de los Andes. If not to Junin de los Andes you can definitely go via Bariloche. Most buses go from Retiro bus station but itÂ’s worth checking. I think the main company that sells tickets is ‘FlechabusÂ’.

Hello all,

summer seems to have finally arrived here in England and like many of you I’m enjoying the light nights that last well into the evening…it makes meeting up with people so much more relaxing 

This month’s eNewsletter features a wide range of material – we feature our regular contributor Mac, reports on the latest London branch meeting, plenty of news & web sites to be explored and three articles that have been sent in recently. Tony & Hal are more seasoned long distance travellers, whilst Benjamin is new to the eNewsletter…enjoy what they have to say and send us your feedback.

As a bonus, the entire text of the eighth edition of Moon Handbooks South Pacific is now accessible on Google Books at http://books.google.com/books?id=EDGapfBX-CAC&printsec=frontcover. You can scroll down through the 1,091 pages or click the Contents button to jump to a specific section. Buttons at the top of the page allow you zoom in, view two pages at a time, or switch to full screen. From the right hand column, you can search inside the book. Moon Handbooks South Pacific is rich in detail and you’ll find specific information on thousands of islands.

Previous contributor & author David Stanley has given Google Books permission to post his book on their website to make its full contents easily accessible to people all over the world. However downloading, copying, saving, or printing out pages from Google Books is restricted as Moon Handbooks South Pacific is still protected copyright.

That’s all for now…enjoy your nights out,

The Ant

theant@globetrotters.co.uk

Neil Rees – The Czech Connection – The Czechoslovak Government in Exile in London and Buckinghamshire

Neil was first introduced to Czechoslovakia when he worked in the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen “within smell of the famous brewery” after the end of Communism in 1990-91. While there he travelled all over the Czech Republic, doing some fantastic hiking in the beautiful countryside and picking a lot of mushrooms, which is something of a national hobby in the country. He also enjoyed the food, although he says dumplings tend to be served with everything !

While on a bus ride in the country he overheard two English women talking and later discovered they had married Czech soldiers during the war and been in the country for 45 years. This piqued Neil’s interest in Anglo-Czech wartime relations, even more when he discovered that several famous Czechoslovak political figures had spent time in London and Buckinghamshire – near his own family home – during the First and Second World Wars.

Tomas Masaryk, who was elected the first President of Czechoslovakia in 1920, lived for a while in England when the First World War broke out to avoid arrest for treason, while President in exile Edvard Benes and his wife spent five years in The Abbey, a country estate, in the picturesque village of Aston Abbots. His cabinet stayed nearby at Wingrave Manor in a local village, while around 100 Czechoslovak soldiers were kept on to protect them. As a gesture of thanks to the area, President Benes had a bus shelter built at Aston Abbots, which cost £148 – a considerable amount at the time – which is now a Grade II listed building.

Neil’s talk was full of humour and fascinating historical facts, and went down very well with members. For more information see on the subject and Neil’s resulting book see http://www.radio.cz/en/article/69301

Sam Manicom – Under Asian Skies

‘Under Asian Skies‘ took up Sam’s story where Africa is left behind, once Sam discovered that he actually liked being on the road…Sam says his mid-life crisis came to him relatively early in life, and at the age of 34 he found himself on a motorcycle at the edge of the Sahara.

He planned to travel for a year but ended up on the road for several years. During this time he was arrested three times and jailed once, shot at, suffered numerous broken bones and almost killed by malaria. After travelling around Africa he went to Australia, getting a lift over on a cargo ship, which he shared with an all-male crew and their collection of “thousands” of porno videos.

While in Australia he worked and had fun, until he had a serious accident. Doctors told him he would never ride a motorcycle again, but after three months he was back in the saddle. From Australia it was a jump into Asia, where in Malaysia he contracted Dengue Fever. Too weak to get help, Sam was in serious trouble until the prostitute living in the hut next to his saved his life by finding him and raising the alarm. Sam said she only came in because she hadn’t seen him for a few days. Doctors told him he had had just a day of life left in him.

Sam visited India, although it took six weeks battling local bureaucracy to get his motorbike off the ship. He showed us images of the millions of people who travel to bathe in the holy waters of the Ganges. When he asked a local man if water that dirty could really be beneficial, he was told the water wasn’t really dirty, it just looked dirty. Although India was hard work, Nepal was more laid-back, said Sam. He rode the fabled Quelta to Taftan road on the border of Iran, which was doubly dangerous, he said, because as Afghanistan was just over nearby hills, his insurance would not have been valid.

The adventures demanded that Sam’s Guardian Angel work overtime in covering what went wrong, what was learnt from the disasters and How many of the dreaded lurgies could he catch? As the story developed we then heard what happens when a solo adventurer decides to take a pillion on board? But most of all…was it about two wheels being the best possible way to see the world? For more info see: http://www.sam-manicom.com

For details of the forth coming meetings of the London branch, April to July 2008 – http://www.globetrotters.co.uk/meetings/lon08it2.html.

London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh in September. For more information, contact the Globetrotters Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk.

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact Svatka Hermanek: shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Ontario meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.

In advance of TonyÂ’s trip to the interior of Brazil later this year, I have dug up the account of his previous adventure, with Mm Mitterand and the Ashaninka. Globetrotters Club members recall Tony presenting an abridged version, but for those who wish to know moreÂ…

The Ant

The small plane lifted of the tarmac, climbed into the sky, banked away from Rio Branco by the border of Brazil and Peru; and at last we were up, up and away on the last part of our journey to visit the Ashaninka near the small town of Marechal Thaumaturgo.

I saw our future and the future was green, not just the sea of green we were flying low over with the occasional break in that verdant mass below, revealing a river with its golden banks meandering through the luxuriant forest. It has been sometime since I had been with a group of VIPs but now instead of doing a sword dance with a Saudi Prince I was in a small twin engined plane flying over the rich green rainforest of the State of Acre in Brazil accompanying Mm Danielle Mitterrand, the widow of a past French President, The Ministra do Meio Ambiente from Brasilia, the Governor of Acre and the usual body guard, TV cameraman etc. which follow VIPs. Last, but not least of all was Joao Fortes the leader of our small group and passionate helper of the Indians for more than twenty years, Cristina MendonÃĤa (expert on carbon credits), Maria Alice, whose expertise was to help the Indians make the right craft goods that would sell in the outside world.

Why was I there? I had been invited by Joao Fortes to write and take pictures of the Ashaninka as I and Adam Baines had twelve years ago about the Yawanawa people. This time instead of going up the river Juria, I was going to take the right fork up the river Amônia towards the border of Peru. Before that though I was to accompany the French delegation and record Mm Mitterrand’s meeting and signing of an agreement between France and the Ashaninka and the State of Acre.

The village greeted the very pleasant widow representing France and it seems in no time at all we were all exchanging views and the Indians were explaining how they had made their people live a sustainable way of life in the rain forest and now wanted to show the rest of the State of Acre how this could be done. This charming lady was told how they had no cattle on their land but planted thousands of trees each year and bees that did not sting but produced a honey, so good, that the gods would come down from the heavens to taste it. They had many different fruits, many types of potatoes, also a great knowledge of over two thousand medicines that the forest provided. They also wanted to publicise the fact that people were invading from Peru, with ‘PistoleirosÂ’, with large machines, that ripped out the trees and then pulled them back to Peru and then said they had been grown under licence there. Also the chemicals that these invaders were using have started to change the taste of the fish in the Rio Amônia. The Ashaninka have started to petition other nations as well as their own government to do something about this problem. The Brazilians have now put in satellite phones in the border villages, so that State forces can be called up to help in case of invasion by these foreign companies.

After Mm Mitterrand had collected some honey, planted a tree, taken a short trip up river, with body guards, TV Cameraman and the rest of the entourage – She was whisked off to Rio Branco to sign documents with all the group, leaving Cristina of carbon credits and myself back at the Ashaninka College.

Benki was a charming remarkable man and from the age of thirteen he had taught himself all about the forest, its over two thousand medicines and how to make the tribe self sufficient and was now the recognisable face of the tribe on TV or in the political circles of Brasilia. His paintings are shown in Rio de Janeiro, his music sells on CD and women fall at his feet – Intelligent, charismatic, good looking and IÂ’m glad to say he is a good friend of mine – I will say, that I would surely like some of his magic to rub off on me! Benki playfully said to me “Tony my friend, you are lucky you were not born in my village – Nobody wears glasses because no one in the tribe is short sighted. No woman would marry me because I would not be able to hunt fish and look after a family”. Survival of the fittest and I certainly wasnÂ’t the fittest either in the rain forests or in cities with their high forests of concrete reaching for the sky. The Ashaninka are very fit, healthy and the only person who wore glasses was one lady in her seventies. The Uruku, the paint on their faces, gives them a very good skin complexion and also acts as a mosquito repellent. Aveda, the makeup company, use it in their lipsticks etc. And buy it from the ‘Yawanawa TribeÂ’.

Cristina and I spent an interesting night at BenkiÂ’s house on the other side of river in Marechal T, built to show the locals that a house can make its small section self sustainable and it certainly was – He reared chickens, grew fruit and vegetables and needed very little to be bought in to his home. He played his guitar, sang and listened to Cristina explaining the ins and outs of Carbon Credits as she was leaving next day to go back to her consultancy in Rio de Janeiro. Sunday, Benki and I hit the beach where the rest of the School and the residents of the small town pretended they lived on the coast and behaved as if they lived by the Atlantic instead of thousands of miles inland – We downed a few cold ones and planned the next part of the trip, basically turning right up the River Amônia and going up river for a few hours until we reached the Ashaninka village.

Picture by Tony Annis : Benki and friends at his home with the Ashaninkas

We reached the village and of course, right in the middle of it was a football pitch – The Ashaninkas are Indians but also Brazilian and all Brazilians love football. We had broken our journey to take some pictures of his family and watch a local tournament and unfortunately watch the tribe lose even though Benki came off the bench to play centre half and shore up the defence. Benki told me, “I am growing ‘The greenest little stadium in the world’ I have cleared the ground and started planting palms to cover the thousand spectators and then I will try to weave in flowers the names of famous European teams, such as Chelsea and Juventus and probably a French one as they are helping us now”.

Benki showed me round the village, the tree plantations, the pond where the turtles were reared, and the ladies making their craft beads, as well as one of them making their homemade beer for a village party. We were going further up river to a waterfall and camping for two or three days but as luck would have it we broke our propeller and one of BenkiÂ’s friends had to fix it by carving a propeller out of wood and all without the help of anything other than a knife and a stone used as a hammer. This coming July I hope to return and complete the journey to the waterfall with a few good friends of mine.

We headed down river back to the College of the Forest, via Cruzeiro du Sul (For Benki to pick up his e-mails). Finally, Rio de Janeiro for Benki and other Brazilian personalities to plant trees live on TV and for Benki do a brilliant live two minute piece to camera and as one of the Politicians said, “If I could only speak as well as that and to time, I would be Governor in the State of Rio by now, instead of being a local Deputy”. All this on my last day and before long the big plane lifted of the tarmac, climbed into the sky, banked away from Rio de Janeiro by the border of Brazil and once again I was up, up and away.