Original subtitles

You will now hear a voice in the left ear of your headphones.

You should now hear my voice in the left ear of your headphones.

You will now hear a voice in the right ear of your headphones.

You should now hear my voice in the right ear of your headphones.

If these voices are in the wrong ears please turn your headphones around.

You will not be able to hear the show if your headphones are not working

properly.

You will now hear a voice in the left ear of your headphones You should now

hear my voice in the left ear of your headphones You will now hear a voice in

the right ear of your headphones You should now hear my voice in the right

ear of your headphones If these voices are in the wrong ears, please turn your

headphones around You will not be able to hear the show if your headphones are

not working properly

Ladies and gents, we're still waiting for some people to come in.

Apparently the bars are more attractive than the theatre.

If you could please, while we're waiting, turn these off.

Because if they are on, they will interfere with the system.

And in fact, someone was discovered with one last night.

So, my daughter, while we're waiting, we're still waiting for somebody to come

in here, while we're waiting. My daughter, who's six,

well, nearly seven,

She objects very much to the fact that I'm not there for story time and doesn't

really believe that I'm in the theatre. So I'm just going to take a photograph

and send it to her. I'm the only one who's allowed to have theirs on, by the

way, so that I can send that. Thank you very much. Yes, you can wave if you

like.

That's good. That's lovely.

I love the way people wave out here when, in fact, that's all I've got in my

hand.

But I was just looking at my photographs here while I was waiting.

for whoever it is to come in from the bar, and I was realising that these are

photographs of my children. There are more photographs here on this thing of

my children than there are of all of my childhood and my adolescence combined.

That's just the last ten days of my children.

It's kind of a responsibility, really.

And I realised there was probably more pictures on one page of this.

of my children than there are of my father in the whole of his childhood.

And there are videos and so on. I don't have any videos. I'm of the age, I see

there's enough white hair here. I'm of the age of Super 8. Do you remember

that? Wonderful sound in the sitting room afterwards.

And unfortunately we lost all our Super 8, although we did find one the other

day. A couple of years ago, I had it transferred to video, and then we lost

the original.

So this is actually a very precious thing to me because it's the only visual

image I have captured of my father walking.

It's not backed up or anything, so I'll show it to you later in the show.

But I mean, the sense of, you know, I mean, this responsibility that I feel

is, you know, that...

You know, they'll look at this later, my children, and they'll go, well, that's

the story of our lives.

Yeah, it's not their lives, it is a story, but I'm worried that they're

going to mistake it for reality, for the real thing. You know, I do tend to go,

you know, breakfast, going out the door, you know.

But then on the other hand, we're always mistaking stories for reality, aren't

we? There's about 600 people here. You've all agreed on the story that

there is something called half past seven and that you arrived here. Well,

most of you. No, still a few.

Few seats that obviously haven't agreed on that.

I mean, it is, you know, the difference between reality and fiction is very

difficult to separate. Two people who don't know each other, for example, can

go away and fight and die for a flag, for a language, because they both

believe in the existence of something called the United Kingdom of Great

Britain. It doesn't exist.

Outside our common imaginations. Two lawyers can go and defend somebody. They

don't know each other, they don't know the defendant, because they all believe

in the existence of law, justice, human rights, but none of these things exist

outside our common imaginations.

And I suppose this gives me, it does worry me. Obviously I can edit their

lives, but also the stories that are happening today are shaping their

future. And they're very young, you know, Jeremy Hunt is giving us stories

that are shaping the future, you know.

But more than that, there's a specific example, but in, you know, the question

of this, of the earth that we live in.

I mean, and I do get, I get passionate, I get, oh God, a typical live stream

disaster.

But then some of you probably realize that's not real either. That's a gag

that I've been practicing for some time.

And the real video, which I will show you, is here.

But we are constantly mistaking what we think to be real and what is in

fact a story. And I am going to tell you a real story tonight, whatever that

means. But stories have a real function.

I remember when I was a little and I lay in bed and my father would read me

stories. That's when I first understood that whatever it is that's going on

inside my head is also going on inside the head of somebody else. This thing

that I call my consciousness.

I would enter into the consciousness of the protagonist and understood that

there are other people. My children, they lie either side of me in bed. I'm

sure many of you have had this experience.

I'm reading them a book, a children's book, and then they look at the pictures

and they say, that's me, that's me.

And so I feel that there is a very powerful relationship between empathy

and proximity.

And I would like to get closer to you now. So if you'll put on your

headphones.

The marvelous thing right now, of course, it means I don't have to shout

anymore. So here I am, somewhere in the middle of your head. instead of shouting

at you. OK, I'm just going to test your headphones, just check them. And Helen's

going to put us in your right ear.

OK, and now I'm going to take a walk across this 2.6 pounds of electrified

pate that we call our brain.

And now I should be somewhere in your left ear. Now, if I'm not in your left

ear, take them off and turn them around so I am in your left ear. otherwise the

whole thing will be back to front. Okay, now we'll come back into the seat of

your consciousness, somewhere behind your frontal lobes. Of course, I'm not

behind your frontal lobes, but you feel as if I am. In fact, my voice is being

broken up into digital bits, it's flying through the air, it's being reassembled,

it's going down the tubes, and air is being moved, and you have the impression

that I really am somewhere in your head. But of course, it is nothing but a

technological trick.

technological tricks. Such as that repetition. I'm not repeating anything.

That's just a looping. Another technological trick right underneath my

desk. I'm just going to use another technological trick by going across onto

this microphone. Now I'm going to change my voice. It's going to go down in

pitch. So having been up at a high tenor, the tenor suddenly is coming all

the way down to here. And for some reason I want to speak with an American

accent. It feels it's not because it's sleazy.

There's no value.

judgment about Americans. My father was American.

But the point is that the protagonist, the man who is at the center of

this story, Lauren McIntyre, this is his voice. The story takes place in 1969.

But as you watch and you listen to the voice, the brain rapidly adjusts. And

now, in fact, you associate this voice with

What you're seeing in front of you, so much so that if I go on the other

microphone, I suddenly sound like Mickey Mouse.

If I go away from the microphone, of course, you can't hear me.

That's because this microphone doesn't register space.

what will happen is you'll suddenly hear me in a different way, because this is a

microphone that registers space.

This is a binaural head. It's made by Sennheiser. That's not product

placement, by the way.

Here it is, and this is your right ear, and that's your left ear, and you can

hear me going from side to side. For you, that's a little bit difficult. I'll

align it. It'll make it a little easier for you. There you go, and now that's

your left ear, and this one is... I'm now walking around you. Now, in order to

really sense what this does, what I would like you... to do and at home if

you're watching please is to shut your eyes it's okay nothing nasty is going to

happen i promise you nothing nasty okay so shut your eyes and now of course you

can hear me somewhere behind your left ear approximately i'm a little thirsty

i'm just going to have something to drink excuse me it's a little too

intimate hang on

And the amazing thing about the brain is the adjustment. It thinks I'm behind

your right ear. That if I were to blow in your right ear, your brain would

imagine or think that I really am blowing and the ear becomes hot because

that's what the brain tells it to do. Listen, try this.

Oh, God, I've got one of your hairs in my mouth and I'm just going to cut it

off. There you go. I'll cut that. I can give you a haircut when I've come round

the back of you.

Snip that a little right over the top of that.

Oh, my God, what's that?

It's a mosquito. I don't believe it. It's a mosquito.

A mosquito in the barbecue. Of course, you open your eyes. It's not a mosquito.

It's a recording.

In fact, it's not even a recording of a mosquito. It's just a comb with some

greaseproof paper. But your mind will give you the image of the fly,

necessarily. That's the way the human brain works.

But, of course, this is nothing but a speaker.

And it looks a little bit like a Budweiser can.

Because it's not a Budweiser. It's a kind of very weird kind of speaker.

But it's... And in fact, I haven't been speaking for some time.

But you have assumed that I have and that I really have been speaking in

front of you. But I have just been miming my words and he's been doing it.

That really annoying sound. So the whole thing is completely artificial.

Can you turn that off? It's really annoying, that poem.

What? Can you turn it off?

You want me to turn it off? Yeah, please, thanks. We've had enough of

that. Okay,

so... Is that better? Yeah, that's a lot better.

Now, he doesn't exist, of course.

Well, of course, I exist.

Well, no, you don't. Well, I'm in the present and you're in the future. No,

I'm in the present and you're in the past, okay?

All right, okay, I'm in the past.

Yeah. Shall we swap?

Exciting. Yeah, we can do that. That's not going to affect causality because

you're in the past, so that's okay.

So what's going on?

Well, it's the Barbican. We're live streaming it tonight.

It's exciting. Are you worried?

No, no, I don't think so.

Everything's fine so far. How many are there? Well, 600, and apparently the

last time we saw about 2,000 online.

Are they enjoying it? Well, yeah, they got a bit hysterical with the ear, but,

you know, other than that, everything seems to be fine.

I mean, what can I say? Well, why don't you shut up, okay?

Why don't you be quiet now, and I will.

What?

Since I'm now clearly somewhere in the past, and I don't really exist.

Well, actually, I do, because I think probably...

your past is more important to you than your present.

Well, yeah, that's true.

I mean, is consciousness possible without memory? I don't think so. We are

the sum total of our past.

And in fact, this is a recording I made about six months ago in my flat. So you

can hear the atmosphere of my flat, the space of it, if you like. My table is in

fact there, but just behind your head, you can hear the music coming in and

out. Behind your right here, over here, I have a little basin.

There you are.

There you are. There's another basin down there. That's it. So this is my

home, yeah?

Who are you talking to? That's my daughter.

Nobody, sweetie.

I'm not talking to anybody. Yes, you are.

Well, yes, I am, in a way. I am, yeah. But there's nobody there.

Oh, that's true. Yeah, that is true. How long is this head going to be in our

house? Well, I'm just recording you while Mama's away, sweetie. I just

wanted to get a few... Where's Mama?

Mama's gone on a Buddhist retreat, sweetie.

What's a Buddhist retreat?

Well, it's quite fun. People do lots of singing and have a lovely time.

And this is actually a recording my daughter I made about, I don't know,

about a year and a half ago when she was five. She's nearly seven now.

And so we're living three times, if you like, this present time, six months ago

when I made that first recording and about a year and a half ago when I made

the other one with my daughter.

But that's surely just a technological trick, you say. But is it? Is it?

Marcus, thanks for waiting.

Do you want a cup of coffee?

I've already had one, thanks. Oh, great. I just wanted to ask you, OK, so are...

A description of our model of time, or the way that we think about time.

So we tend to think of it as one thing happening after another thing, like in

our clock and so on. So I think our classical model of time is sort of a one

-dimensional line.

That's right. That's what I was trying to say. But there are other models of

time where time is sort of two-dimensional.

Oh, blimey. So does that mean you could have parallel times? Are the times

running parallel to ours? Yes, certainly. I think physicists came up

with a model of time where time isn't a sort of infinite line, but actually is a

circle, which means that in some ways you can go...

back to the beginning blimey so i could actually start to maybe to correct

something we have this sense that some you know events in time come one after

the other right actually that is something of an illusion and you're

listening to marcus du sautoy the c mini professor for the dissemination of

scientific knowledge at oxford who I talked to a couple of years ago, really,

about time. He's basically, what he's saying is that time itself is a fiction.

We don't really know what it is. There are so many different ideas as to what

it is, that in fact, oh my God, I'm so sorry, I did say I was the only one who

was allowed to have it on.

I'm sorry, hang on.

Hello? Who is this?

Rebecca, listen, I'm afraid I'm on stage.

And of course, as you've guessed, that's also a recording. But on this, this is

actually a telephone call I made with a woman called Rebecca Spooner who worked

for an organisation called Survival International which agitates for the

rights of indigenous people all over the world. And she's one of a number of

people who actually I have on my phone, the writer Petra Popescu, for example.

is on my phone but the majority of these people that i talk to in terms of making

this piece are in my head they are a reservoir in my head and in fact if you

like they form a kind of cacophony in fact whenever we talk to anybody we have

to reach into this reservoir and draw out of it something which is linear one

event after another in order to make sense of our lives

In two minutes, we're going back, okay?

So where's the village?

What? If this is the area where you saw the village, let's go on as long as we

can. Make sure at least it's still there.

Yeah, but we can't go on for very much longer, okay?

First, find that village.

Climb a little higher and see where we are.

Okay.

Let's do it twice.

Let's do it twice.

I don't see planes before and we'll know we're heading upstream.

They were hurtling along over jungle treetops at a hundred miles an hour in a

Cessna 206 float plane.

The limit of their flying time was nine hours, of which four and a half had

already elapsed. They were looking for somewhere to land.

The river was their runway.

But underneath that surface, there were hidden logs.

It's not, it's not safe!

Not too far. I know, but it's not safe!

Every minute of flight time is a day on foot, remember?

I know, but I can't miss it! Okay!

Alright!

Okay, I'll set up camp there, and then you can pick me up in a few days. Yeah,

here we go!

Okay, hang on tight!

In the heat of water!

He's down.

The pilot helped Lauren McIntyre jump ashore into the shallows, handed him his

waterproofed rubberized sacks, and then the heat enveloped him like a fog.

the drone of the engine faded lauren mcintyre was completely alone 400

miles of amazonian jungle in every direction 400 miles from what he called

civilization the looming forest projected an air of distrust as if it

was watching him he was used to it he'd been photographing in the Amazon rain

forest for more than 25 years. He took out his camera, his film, hung his

hammock between two trees, high enough with his objects that if the river

should rise overnight, everything was safe. Well rehearsed, organized, ritual.

Then turn back and look at the forest.

Mahogany, cedars, palosangres.

Their wood so heavy it refused to float, so red it justified the name of blood

trees.

Huacapas, so hard that nails wouldn't penetrate them. Sumamas and a giant

lapunas tree, eight stories high, known as river lighthouses because boatmen

used them as landmarks. All these and their retinue of parasites, epiphytes,

bromeliads, vines, bark mushrooms, mosses, it all exuded a tense,

febrile stillness, like a beast waiting to ambush its prey.

He washed in the river, prepared a simple meal, and as the light began to

fade, he climbed into his hammock, took out a pen and a notebook, and began to

write in an accurate, slightly slanting hand.

October 20th, 1969.

Somewhere on the eastern bank,

of the Javari River.

I'm here because of the Maioruna, the cat people.

Maioruna, Maioruna, what a mystery there is in names.

How does a tribe come to name itself?

How do words become formed?

How do they think them up, combining certain sounds and not others? How did

they choose what they thought to be real?

and what they played with until habit and general acceptance confirmed them

into the vocabulary.

Mayaruna. In their language, it means people.

People.

He was incredible to be around because he had a million stories that most of

them will not be made into anything.

I mean, he had met people, he had been this, he had been that, he had traveled

extensively. Since he was a kid, he started as a sailor. Then he served in

the U.S. Navy.

Anyway, so he was a fantastic actor. He was charismatic.

In a sort of subtle, moderate way that was not apparent right from the

beginning. He was not making big gestures, he was not always this

anxious.

Oh, sweetie.

I can't sleep.

We've done bedtime, sweetie.

Who's like an American cowboy?

Well, Lauren in Petra's book in the jungle in the Amazons. But you've got to

go... What animals are in the jungle?

I did all this an hour ago, sweetie. You know, the jaguars, the monkeys, the

beautiful macaws, the birds, the insects. What do they sound like?

Okay, you want me to do the noises all over again?

Yes. Yes, okay. And if I do that, will you promise you're going to go to sleep

this time?

Yes, all right. All right, okay.

Now you have to be very quiet.

Very, very quiet. Listen.

Daybreak.

He was awakened as if by a silent clock and he lay there for a moment listening

to the forest singing.

Then he bathed in the river, dressed, cooked himself some oatmeal, slipped a

few rolls of film into his pocket and walked up the beach towards the giant

lapunas tree.

He walked round the back of its enormous roots and then somehow on the screen of

his mind

Hey buddy, you're not alone.

He had the sensation of presence and then almost instantaneously saw a young

man in the forest.

Naked, two plots of red uruku on his cheeks. And beside him was a boy and

then there was another man and a third with a dead red howler monkey on his

back. They carried bows and arrows and spines bristled out of their lips. There

was no question these people were Myruna.

Cat people.

Lauren McIntyre looked at them, they looked at him. His camera, a Minolta,

weighed on his chest.

Okay, I could shoot from the hip, but no, I want a better shot. Let's go

through the viewfinder.

He raised his camera. No reaction. This was the instant things could go either

way, towards friendliness or hostility.

They looked at him, he looked at them.

He knew the Mayruna had never been successfully acculturated. At the turn

of the century, as the rubber boom brought more and more intrusion and

conflict into upper Amazonia, they simply slipped into the forest and

disappeared. But now they were reappearing, undoubtedly carrying

memories of bloodshed, violence, brutality.

They looked at him. He looked at them. They were both absolutely still. And the

moment was wonderful and unrepeatable.

First contact?

Oh my god, what a shot. Look at that.

Ideal first contact.

They stood looking at each other.

And then they turned.

Hey, hang on, fellas.

They were disappearing into the forest. What should he do?

Okay.

Okay, seems okay. I'm gonna follow them.

the path followed a twisting trail deviating right or left practically

every few steps the river which had been just behind him was now lost he didn't

know where it was but he didn't really care great shot look at that

light quick change the roll he was far too busy photographing to break off

twigs and mark his trail besides he was excited and he expected the village to

appear at any moment But then he glanced at his watch. He hardly ever looked at

his watch in the forest. There was no reason to do so.

Five to nine.

He'd been walking for more than an hour.

Okay, I may not be able to retrace my steps.

But I'm sure they're going to give me a guide back.

It'll be okay. The village won't be far.

The truth was that being so excited by the sight of these Majoruna, he'd simply

forgotten to mark his passage, as he normally did. He was now so far in the

jungle, he had no way of getting back.

And time was passing. Five, ten, twenty, forty minutes later, still no village.

Okay, don't panic. Just keep your mind on the pictures. Look at that.

Keep your mind on the pictures.

This could be it.

It'll be your chance. Your chance at...

The big one.

Suddenly, the trees pulled back. Staring in surprise, Lauren stumbled.

A narrow horizon of huts, perhaps six, seven, eight, nine at a glance. It was a

village, but it looked as if they'd just arrived because a provisional air hung

over everything.

Then the man who he'd called Red Cheek suddenly turned and looked at him, his

eyes like black bullets, and the little boy moved towards him, curious.

Dirty! Called the man with red cheeks, was that his name? Was that a warning?

And then suddenly, McIntyre was surrounded by people who showed their

surprise by silence and an almost solemn expression.

They stood all around him.

No reaction.

Strange, as over the years even marginal tribes had borrowed from Portuguese and

Spanish. And then people started to get closer and closer, until suddenly a man

with a conical hat of leaves hurried over, and without being physically

pushed, McIntyre was made to advance along a fallen tree all the way through

the clearing towards a hut, as unassuming as all the rest, in front of

which sat a man on a carved stool with a headdress of white egret feathers.

The headman, if headman it was...

had warts on his knees and ankles resembling barnacles.

He said nothing, he just gazed at Lauren, an arrow in his lap.

The whole community, men, women, children, stood all around.

Hablo espanol.

No? Well, I may as well speak in English.

I came over on a plane. You saw it? Yeah.

Yep.

We came over twice. Yeah.

And then I followed this guy here with red sheets. I followed him into your

village. Okay. And we landed on the water.

Okay. And I need a guide to take me back to my camp. Yep. By the river.

The river.

It was clear that the name of the river was not that for them. And

then the man who had followed into the village, called Red Cheek, started to

speak loudly, urgently, haranguing the chief, pointing at Lauren. He didn't

look or sound particularly welcoming.

And that was a signal for other people to join him.

And everybody seemed to have an opinion, a point of view, talking about the

plane, pointing at Loren, children pulling at his clothes.

But the headman said nothing.

He listened and he looked at Loren.

And then suddenly he smiled, revealing teeth like shards of black obsidian.

And then as quickly as it had started, it seemed to be over, and Loren was made

to walk back along this tree towards the middle of the clearing, where suddenly

he was no longer the center of attention.

The heat was oppressive. He took on water.

He was frustrated with himself and not being able to communicate. He'd never

had that experience in 25 years with indigenous people.

And he was furious with himself for not marking his passage because he had

absolutely no way of getting back.

Ah, that was dumb.

Well, I'm either in a jam or I'm starting a great experience.

But that was the dumbest thing I've done in 25 years.

An hour before dusk, he was adopted by a family of four who offered him the use

of a hammock in their hut.

He stood in the doorway, watching the light fade.

He noticed that they just used the space around the fallen tree. They hadn't

actually cut a clearing in the forest as they would normally. Why was that?

It really feels like they're hiding.

And they're emaciated. They haven't eaten for a long time.

Look tired. Look at her. She is beautiful.

Across the clearing, he could see a girl with strikingly shiny eyes.

And then suddenly she called, Tutti!

And the little boy he'd followed into the village suddenly appeared at her

elbow, and she gave him some beijou, forest bread made from manioc flour, and

he tore into it hungrily.

Tootie, Tootie, so that's his name.

He's hungry.

Hey, Tootie!

Great shot.

I wonder what I'm starting by photographing these people.

I wouldn't want to see them inundated with government agents and

anthropologists. They have no defense against infection.

Certainly wouldn't want to see them become dependent on outsiders as the

saddest effect of acculturation.

Truth is, the best safeguard is not to contact them.

But, well,

I'm here.

Thanks, buddy.

I'm only going to be here for a couple of days, so my affect on them will be

limited and, I hope,

unlasting.

He climbed into his hammock feeling more alone than it is possible to be alone in

a special sense because he was in the middle of a busy human community.

And as the light began to fade even more, he suddenly thought he heard the

voice of the man he called Red Cheeks out in the clearing, angry, arguing.

contacting other young men. It slightly disturbed him, so he closed his eyes to

shut it out.

And then he noticed an obscure murmur, a strange inner hum.

And he realized he'd had this sensation before when he was standing in front of

the headman, the man with barnacles on his legs.

Was it coming from the people?

No, perhaps that was just his imagination, his response to being alone

in their midst.

So he lay back into his unconscious.

Earlier you talked about your child and watching this little consciousness grow.

Of course, the child is not a tabula rasa, it's not a blank sheet. The

consciousness of ourselves, the stories we tell about ourselves, the ways in

which we view the world around us, are so profoundly social and so profoundly

shaped. by culture.

It was difficult to explain. It was something that couldn't be reduced.

But there's talk now of time actually being emergent, that it actually grows

out of our lack of understanding.

One-fifth of the world's fresh water is here.

One-fifth of the world's fresh water is here.

Where does it begin?

Where does it all begin?

Lauren McIntyre was flying, suspended, airborne, hovering above a vision of the

jungle and the mountains like an oversized map.

It was a dream, and in his dream, he knew it.

A vast stretch of jungle spread out beneath him, and to the east, the 200

-mile-wide mouth of the Amazon River and the ocean flowing all the way to the

arctic in Antarctica. He looked up.

Clouds, heavy with water vapor, hung in the air. And as he looked down, the

forest was phosphorescent, as if lit from underneath.

And suddenly he felt the phosphorescence.

It's the forest's rich life forms. It's treasure.

The Christian conquistadors, they were wrong.

All wrong.

Pizarro. Francesco d'Oriana.

Pizarro. Cortez. Francesco d'Oriana. Columbus.

Pizarro. All wrong. All wrong.

And the oil prospectors, the rubber tappers, the missionaries with their

singing faith, they'd all been wrong. They were all looking for the wrong

thing, something else.

But in his dream, McIntyre recognized what it was, although...

it didn't have any words it's the intricacy of the forest is that it is

that the treasure he could feel that something suffused the greenness of the

jungle all fed by a single source hidden somewhere in the mountains it was an

invisible force all interconnected pregnant with a captive message

what is it what is it and then suddenly he was sitting in front of the headman

with the dreams camera lens focusing first on the man's legs before lifting

to his face and then he awoke the heart was shaking so he jumped out of his

hammock got out and then it came down the other hearts right left were also

coming down people were standing around carrying baskets drinking gourds bows

and arrows fishnets and suddenly the chief appeared and walked along the

crowd as if passing it in review and an unspoken command everybody was

moved off into the forest where are they going god damn it they're off where are

they going well he couldn't stay here alone so he rushed to catch them up

where are they going

god damn

it where are they going But he was now part of that, walking swiftly along.

Like a Mayaruna, whose possessions, instead of being bows and arrows,

happened to be a pen, a notebook, and a cabinet.

Half an hour later, he crossed a muddy stream.

He knew it was half an hour because he kept on checking his wristwatch as

though trying to stay in contact with the clock-operated world.

God damn it, we're getting further and further away.

I'm being swallowed by the Amazon growth on its own terms.

And he knew it. He listed the dangers.

Fungi, bacteria, intestinal parasites.

Fungi, bacteria, intestinal parasites. Radical fluctuations in temperature.

No cooked food. No sterilized water.

No sterilized pills.

These things went over and over in his head, repeating and repeating.

Macabre aura surging up from his unconscious like a river. He had to do

something.

Come on. Look at that. Look at that.

Okay. Okay. Just think of the pictures.

The pictures.

That's it. This is your chance. Come on. You're going to get the superlative

shot, the front cover of the geographic.

That's beautiful.

But as he panted behind the head when he suddenly thought, what a ludicrous

ambition.

Photographers, so momentary, so fickle.

trying to fit time into one moment. What lay behind this frenzy, he asked

himself. Fear. Fear of the future, fear of losing the past.

So unlike these people, he thought, as he looked around him, they never think

of the future. They don't store, hoard up belongings.

Time, for them, was an invisible companion, something comfortable and

unseen, like the air.

But for us civilizados, time is a possession.

It's an increasingly more efficient machine.

Late that afternoon they broke into what had once been the most enormous

clearing.

The article stopped making every once stop and a sudden rainstorm lashed down.

There was no protection from the upper canopy in this place and within seconds

McIntyre was wet. And again he felt his panic rising when he thought about the

river's ability to swell.

So he put his mind on watching the people. What were they doing?

They were building another settlement.

So what was the purpose of that?

They'd hardly finished building the last one when they destroyed it, and they

were building this one a little further on. It wasn't clear what it

accomplished. And he noticed again how thin and tired everybody looked. It gave

him a sense of foreboding. And then suddenly he saw the headman sitting on

his carved stool in front of a fire in the middle of the clearing.

His eyes...

were at half-mast, his cheeks were gaunt, but even from a distance,

McIntyre could see that his hands were working with precision.

And because of the acoustic of the clearing, he could hear him, almost as

if he was standing next to him.

He was whittling an arrow.

Now McIntyre knew that if he was to survive he would need help from someone

in authority someone of stature So he thought quickly And then

he picked up several long fronds of palm twine and he tore them

into strips and Then he moved across the clearing Towards the headman

as he did so he tied a knot

in the end and

when he stood beside him the henman didn't even acknowledge him but then he

his fingers started to move slowly at first as if remembering some long

forgotten trade

He was weaving.

An 18-strand belt. It was a trick. He'd learnt it in the Merchant Navy.

It was a way of fighting boredom at sea, but more importantly, a way of

connecting with other men.

And perhaps a way of connecting with this man now.

Loren let himself be carried away by the dance of the fingers.

And as the belt emerged, Barnacle's eyes fluttered in appreciation.

And then moments later, he remembered how Barnacle had told him that some of

the Myruna were friends.

But the headman had not spoken, not in English.

And in fact, not at all.

Some of us are friends.

It felt like a message that the headman had not spoken. McIntyre spoke no

Myruna. Now the Myruna spoke English.

looked at the headman, but the headman didn't acknowledge him at all, so he

leaned closer.

Closer enough to hear him breathing through his nose.

Some of us are friends. Some of us are friends. Was it a reassurance or a

warning? The headman was working on passing.

hairs around the tip of the arrow to make it whistle.

And then whatever it was, this message, it faded.

Maybe it was just being so near to him that explained the sensation with his

mind and unconsciously adding words in English.

But then he had an idea.

And he strained and underpried a focus, not on the words of his next thought,

but on their content.

Instead of thinking, Hey buddy, I'm a friend too.

Trust me.

He tried to fill himself with the feelings of that thought.

And then he waited.

I know.

Somehow appeared in his mind.

Or maybe was it just the feeling of the answer with his own words in English,

hurrying in to illustrate it.

But then suddenly the headman rose and held out the arrow he was working on.

Being offered a gift, he took it.

And when Barnacle was several yards away, he reached into his memory. No, he

had not spoken out loud.

Barnacle understood no English. He strained his ears, remembering

yesterday's buzzing, wondering whether he was...

Simply going insane, he needlessly checked his watch as if that single

piece of Western machinery could somehow counterbalance what he was hearing.

Yeah, it was that unique ambience.

So many things here in their elemental state. Well, why not?

The simplest form of human contact, mind to mind.

No.

What was he thinking?

But surely it had been ratified because he'd been offered this absolutely

beautiful gift.

The rains came again. The adults ran into the huts for shelter, but the

children came out to play.

And then Lauren saw his friend Tutti run across the clearing and stop by himself

panting under a group of leaves right at the edge and begin to watch

raindrops trickle down in separate drops of three.

And for a moment, Lauren put his camera away and just watched.

the Mayaruna boy watching the rain.

He began to pound the ground with his little feet. Lawrence stood and watched.

Early man, he thought, had gained the concept of succession, the earliest

symbol of the passing of time, by observing natural phenomena.

The repeated call of birds, the dripping of water, man's own heartbeat, his first

clues that time existed in a pulsing vein, invisibly uniting all of life.

And from such early rhythms, dance was born to stay with man forever.

Lauren watched Tutti dancing the dance of the rain, devising a game, an

interpretation of reality from three drops.

of rain if you go to the caves at alaska then you see a sequence of 13 dots and

above the 13th dot is this huge great big animal now these 13 dots seem to be

represented in 13 weeks 13 quarters of the moon after the pride is first

emerged to understand time you have to understand something a bit ritualistic

something which is repeated whether that be your five six

Meanwhile, downriver men from Lauren's world were busy elaborating plans that

would deliver Tutti to the world of machinery, televised news, soft drinks,

and government welfare.

Hi, everyone. Meet Timmy. Today, Timmy's going to learn about psychology and

advertising.

Advertising's main functions are to inform, persuade, and influence.

Today, we'll be focusing on persuasion, one of the most widely...

Tutti danced on unsuspectingly.

Some of us are friends.

Some of us are friends.

Every time you go and spend time with a tribe like that, you change them to an

extent. You bring them over to a stage of civilization that they would reach,

perhaps. You bring them over too fast.

On the other hand, you, as the scientists are you gain immensely from

having been immersed in the experience and he said basically it is our game in

the modern people and it is usually their loss if we decide never to contact

tribes anymore we will never find out the deepest most interesting and

controversial about ourselves on the other hand how will they develop

more slowly a

little

while later the fires

were restarted and beijing was cooked and laura noticed that barnacle was the

only one who hadn't eaten he was back making his arrows why hadn't he eaten

And then suddenly he realized he's fasting.

Okay.

Why is he fasting?

Some of us are friends.

Some of us are friends.

No, sweetie, my darling, you can't keep on getting up.

Why have you got your shoes on in the house? What? Oh. We don't want to get

the floor dirty.

Yeah, well, Mama's away. I thought it didn't matter, really.

All right, I'll take them off. You all right? You all right? I'll take them

off.

Now, sweetie, you really must... Can I have something to eat?

I haven't got anything to eat, my heart. Oh, I see. You're looking at my personal

midnight snack.

Alright, that's mine.

You want some of this? Is that it? Is that it?

Mmm, yes please.

I thought so. Alright, you can have one, alright?

But then you're going back to sleep, because I don't want to... Okay?

Alright, my sweetie?

That's it.

Night night, Daddy. Night night, my darling.

Okay.

Off you go. And don't slam the door, sweetie.

I've got a little headache.

for kettles, but there we go.

It being a special night.

What does it say here?

Follow us on Twitter.

How do you follow?

Crisp Package.

He awoke feeling fingers on his left arm. He looked up, his watch was gone,

and people were looking down from his hammock. And a nauseating smell of smoke

and burning rubber was filling his nostrils. He looked over the edge of his

hammock and he realized what it was.

Oh, God, my trainers.

My Adidas trainers. Oh, they're burning my Adidas trainers. God.

He swung out of his hammock and pushed his way through a group of people into

the plaza, and there indeed were his trainers, melting on a fire, and his

watch was already a blackened disc.

Oh, excuse me, fellas. Excuse me. Those are mine.

Okay. Okay,

all right.

You can laugh. No, you don't need shoes. I do.

Holy,

holy. Okay, so you got my shoes. You got my watch. At least I have my camera.

And at that moment, I realized I didn't have my camera. I'd gone to sleep with

it on my hip. It was no longer there. So I walked back into my hut. I looked in

my hammock. It wasn't there.

and suddenly my heart is racing in front of me i go out people are glancing at me

glancing away i want to get hold of them and say where's my camera calm down calm

down they're naked they can't hide a black box anywhere and then suddenly i

see red cheeks he's looking at me his arms folded and then he turns away and

then here comes barnacle

He's, uh, oh, he's clearly innocent of all of this. He's looking to right and

left to see what's going on, and people are avoiding his eyes, and from there,

realize they're hexing me.

Burning personal belongings is almost always a hex in indigenous society.

And I knew I had to act. I had to do something before the moment passed,

because I was being ostracized. They were drifting away.

And Barnacle was looking at me. He was looking irritated.

I didn't know what to do, so I did the first thing.

that came into my head.

I started jogging around the perimeter of the village.

I watched my feet pound on the grass

One lap, two laps. I was in such a panic that I heard my thoughts running ahead

of me.

But running felt good. It felt liberating. I was doing something, you

know.

I passed Red Cheeks, who was yelling at his buddies about something. But they

had hexed me.

i was hexing them i was casting a spell of my own so on i ran

and now people were coming back they were watching and barnacle was scanning

the crowd trying to gauge their reaction so every time i i passed him i broke

into a hammering of fists and feet like a parody of intent i can't think of

anything else to do i've got to get through to you come on now they're

watching

You have to communicate.

We are communicating.

On and on. 8, 9, 10, 11 laps.

I want to survive. I want you to survive as well.

I ran on and on.

The heat was intense.

I pushed myself to the absolute limit. Now everybody was watching. Everybody

was discussing.

18, 19.

20 laps, and on the 20th lap, I slowed to a walk. I walked the last half lap,

and then I stood right in front of Barnacle, dripping with sweat,

breathing.

What was he going to do?

And then he turned and started jogging just the way I had gone, but in the

opposite direction, counterclockwise.

He... was undoing my spell.

And every time he passed me, he did the same thing. He broke into a hammering of

fists and feet.

I don't know if this will work. I don't know if my people will follow.

At that point, I thought I was losing my mind.

Because I felt as if I was literally inside his head, thinking his thoughts.

Look, when I say that, I tell you, I'm absolutely not

psychic. I don't even believe in that shit.

Still, every time he passed me, I received it.

I have no alternative. I have to try to make it worse.

There seems to be some sort of bigger emergency, a threshold of some kind in

the tribe's life.

Other white people have been before they brought death.

White people are trying now to avoid that death.

Yeah, it was very clear.

Barnacle was leading his people somewhere where I didn't know. On he

went. On, on.

He ran until his chest became a mirror of sweat.

He was at the limit of his strength. And remember, he was fasting. And now his

people started to utter cries of encouragement, bending their bodies in

and out of his path as he ran. Red cheeks and his buddies drifted away in

disgust. On he ran.

And now...

The messages were less specific. They kind of dissolved.

They no longer glowed in my mind in the same way. They dissolved into a kind of

residual message, a kind of leftover, and it crystallized into this.

The face of time.

The face of time. What does he mean, the face of time? The face of time. The face

of time. On he went. On and on. What does he mean, the face of time?

18, 19, and on the 20th lap he walked the last half lap and everybody hailed

their chief.

He stopped in front of me, he raised a finger, he said something solemn, and

then everybody drifted away.

Leaving me to look at the space where we had run.

are competing spells the face of time the face of time

what did he mean by that have i heard anything what what had i heard i slipped

my feet into the remains of my jaw grilled adidas

trainers and then i turned towards the forest to compose myself

just look at the jumble of branches. That's a black creeper. That's not a

black creeper.

That's a roll of film. My film.

I'd had two rolls of film. Now I've only got one. I must have dropped one as I

was running.

Who's put it up there? And my camera.

I looked a little higher and I saw who had got both things because there was my

camera in the hands of a woolly monkey.

Yeah, that's a pet of one of the kids.

It's climbing higher.

Hey, hey, buddy.

Why don't you throw it?

What am I doing? I'm talking to a monkey.

I like baseball.

I've got a stick.

And then he caught it. I know that's a bad idea.

Right, no, no, he's poking at the camera. Don't do that. No, no, no, no.

The camera back flies open. Don't. He rips out the film. Spool pops out. No,

just throw it. Now he's got the camera in two hands. And in one movement, these

guys, they're strong.

He ripped it in two.

This is the great show.

Lauren McIntyre's knees gave way. He just sank to the floor and sat there.

Inches from his damaged camera. Useless. Reduced.

Reduced to one roll of film. How could he prove that he'd been there? What was

he going to give to the geographic?

He was reduced to just a body.

Purposeless. He was a tourist now.

Know what? She'd have to live by nature's clock.

He'd have to be like these people.

My uncle indicated we should walk into the forest together.

We passed a group of children, gathered around a shaman. Tutti was there. He was

showing them caterpillars, insects, plants.

School. It's the law of the forest.

Pretty soon they'll be able to survive on their own, day or night.

On we went, and as soon as we were alone, the communication started again.

Now it was smooth, implicit, and even though he was yards away in the

clearing, he communicated to me, you are sad because what was in

the dark should have stayed in the dark.

How could he know about my camera?

He didn't even know what a camera is. Maybe he saw my disappointment.

But for a moment, I couldn't believe he had not spoken, so I said to him,

He was silent and then he frowned and then he leaked into my mind that he did

not understand what I was saying, so I went and stood close to him.

Now, either I had to accept what was happening or else I

had to assume I was hallucinating.

Anyway, Barnacle transmitted. It's something like, here's the forest.

If you want to run away, I'm not going to stop you.

I said nothing. Again, he reiterated that other white people had been here

before me and they'd wrought death.

Now, it is almost impossible to describe the exact nature of this communication.

It was a feeling that became a thought by words clustering to it, but the

clearest description I can give is that it was like a kind of dialogue.

He said, We have been moving around.

So I try to communicate back.

Have you been attacked?

Yes.

By white people who came down from the sky.

So where are you moving to?

The beginning.

What? What was that? The beginning.

What beginning?

The beginning.

We walked back to the village.

And Barnacle stopped and scanned me with his eyes. What they spelled was clear,

no beaming necessary.

What was I going to do?

Was I coming with them?

I turned away because I was asking myself the same question.

What am I going to do?

What am I going to do?

gonna jump on you you may create some controversy regarding whether you

believe that what happened happened but that's not like it's not a case of fraud

or anything i would say yeah we got a comfortable and he was towards the age

to which he wanted to talk about he was towards the age

And you know what I'm thinking inside my head. Of course you need your brain. I

need my brain to think. I need my brain to be conscious.

But it doesn't mean that consciousness is in my brain any more than the fact

that I need my legs to walk means that it's my legs that are doing the walking.

Everything in the world is only known in comparison with everything else that we

know. There isn't a way of getting out of it.

The myth that we're up against nowadays is that there is some abstract

objective.

reality that is beyond our myth-making, beyond our language, beyond metaphor.

I slept

until

I thought I was dreaming of a jaguar and its grunt.

But then I woke.

There was a jaguar in the village.

a jaguar in the village i sat bold upright in the nearest hut children

cried out in panic the noise of the village tripled in volume red cheeks was

calling out

I ran out into the clearing. Six or seven young men brandishing spears and

burning branches were ganged up in the middle of the clearing.

Red Cheeks was there. He gestured for me to follow him. Now, I had always wanted

to see a jaguar hunt. I was just furious I didn't have my camera. Anyway, we

scrambled over the wet grass into a solid wall of fogged up forest

vegetation.

The grunt rang out. The branches went away into the darkness like blares. Come

on, keep up! I'm in my fifties. These guys are in their twenties. The worst

scenario is to get left alone in the forest in the dark. Where are they?

Ah! Hi-yay, cobred cheeks!

Ah-ya! There they are, in front of a thicket, spiny thicket. I hurried

towards it so as not to miss the spectacle.

The beast crawled underneath a group of thorny plants between the roots of a

huge tree. I ran towards it and then...

Red cheeks pushed me, and powered by this and my own momentum, I ran straight

into the middle of the thorn bush.

Red cheeks stamped on his torch and he went out. The other branches disappeared

in the same instant.

Total dark followed.

My thorns are in my arms, my legs, my ass.

Doesn't matter, just get out of here.

Okay, no matter how painful.

Off you go.

Come on, just pull.

Oh God, now get them out of your skin. Come on, pull. Oh God, they keep

breaking. Now my arms are running with blood. I leave them in the air because

I'm trying to coagulate the blood as quick as I can because...

Oh, what's that?

Oh,

no.

Oh, come on. It's a fly.

It's born.

It's born. It's born. It's born.

It's born.

It's born.

What is that?

Oh, my God.

Look at that.

There's four pairs of luminous eyes. What is this? A spider.

Oh, my God.

I look into a palpitating mass of electric fire.

I bring my eyes so close to the spider that its eyes must be reflected in mine.

Oh, my God.

How did he evolve?

What sort of compounds, rare and useful, does he contain?

Has he even got a name?

Yeah. How did he know?

The answer is over time.

And then suddenly, he moves away from me, but I see something coming along.

A branch. It's a snake. Oh, my God. He's crying out. Some kind of distress signal

on the spider frequency.

Oh, he's gobbled. Yeah.

And now we're back in darkness.

Yeah, there's spools.

Light, okay, come on, walk. Now, immediately walk.

Ah,

the trail. Back to the village.

I'm saved. It's okay.

And then I find a second trail.

And the hope withers instantly.

Which one do I take? And then there's a third.

Any of these could lead to life or death, but death is already here in the

wilderness.

You've got to go.

I mean, you know, they might move out of range.

They're going to move. You've got to move. You've just got to make sure you

don't move in a circle.

Okay, before it gets too hot, move as fast as you can and hope for some luck.

Come on. Just keep going.

I keep going.

Then suddenly I see a light.

Humidity. Higher temperature. It's a clearing. There it is. It's a clearing.

I push towards it.

I push in. And it's an enormous clearing full of cut-off, hacked-off, sawn-off

branches.

oh technological man's here oh god hello

Oh, God!

Because of the price of oil, these very remote regions are being opened up to...

Listen, my fellow modern man.

The rapacious developer, as objectionable as he may be, I welcome

his presence. Hello!

Anybody there?

What? Anybody?

No,

I'm just thinking. I'm hoping. It's just my hope that's making it. But look,

here's a cable. Look at that.

It's a cable that can't be fought. And then I realized it's not a cable.

It's a traffic of army ants.

And I followed the procession away from the anthill, and suddenly I find a

watch. And then I understand, and before I can fully articulate the thought, I'm

running along the freeway of ants. I'm running all the way across this gigantic

clearing, and then suddenly...

I find four bodies, four bodies.

They're piled on top of each other, baseball caps, jaws without gums, teeth

stained by tobacco.

They seem to be in some sort of motion. There's just a movement of ants crawling

all over them. There's an arrow, an arrow sticking out of the hulk of a

chest. Will it be a rescue? Seems silly to think so. Maybe if I put my hands in

here. find a wallet I can identify them I can't bring myself to put my hands

inside this mess and then suddenly I see a swelling on my arm and I pull at it

and I pull out a big fat maggot white maggot And I remember its scientific

name. Kalinotroba hominivorax. Kalinotroba hominivorax means devourer

of man. I pop it, and then I have to walk out of that clearing.

Where's the river? Where's the river? Where's the river? I walk for an hour. I

don't find anything. I walk on.

I walk for the second hour. I don't even cross a stream.

Getting dehydrated. One-fifth of the world's fresh water is in the Amazon

basin. I can't find anything.

The heat is intense and suddenly I look up and I see there's a thing that looks

like a cucumber hanging off a vine. I pull it off and I suck on it.

It tastes bitter, but I don't think it's toxic, so I suck on about 30 of these

because I have to.

And then I reach an interesting state of inebriation.

The forest becomes my brain. Brain, brain, the forest.

Yeah, I am moving. Don't talk to me.

No, I have the impression that I'm seeing my thoughts.

And then this slight hallucination changes.

And I suddenly feel my arm groping around the universe has torn open a

corner. And that soon there will be an encounter.

And then I panic.

Why did I tear that corner open? I'm not ready for this. Not like that spider on

his last night with the snake.

And then the thought howls at me savagely.

We were never part of nature.

No, we're not part of nature.

I'm not part of nature.

We are actually part of nature. No.

Come on.

We're not part of nature.

No. And look, we cannot escape from it, just as we cannot escape from the

planet. Then suddenly I jack my forward and fall on my stomach on rotting

leaves.

I order myself to crawl, but my body refuses to obey, and I

remain lying there.

Thinking of what will happen to me when I lose consciousness.

Who's going to eat me first?

It'll be the forest pigs.

Take peers.

And then with an enormous force of will, I raise my head.

And I see a lion warm as that.

It's the smallest of all primates.

observing me from a palm frond with a little humid look in his eye, as if

ready to burst into tears.

But I know he will not weep, because only man weeps.

My last conscious impression is of the marmoset's eyes, death,

is a bank of lights being switched off. It's a vast theater in my head that

grows like a cacophony on and on and on and

then it dims and then...

The Mairuna found him yards from a stream and they carried him back

unconscious to the village and laid him in a hammock where he lay in a fever for

five days under the hands of two shaman who gently turned him over.

and sucked the maggots and thorns from his back and the demons from his

forehead and stood either side of his hammock, chanting, chanting.

He slept, woke, slept again, woke again.

At what point he thought he saw a face in the doorway,

drifting between dream and reality.

When finally he awoke, it was morning. The fever was gone and he was alone. He

swung out of his hammock and staggered tentatively out into the clearing.

And there in the half-light was the entire community, standing, waiting

there. Faces pulled down by an invisible weight, thinner, weary.

What were they waiting for? He tottered past another hut, looked in, and then

stopped as if electrocuted.

Red cheeks.

red cheeks red cheeks red cheeks was looking at him red cheeks what lauren

saw was a body sewn into a funeral basket red cheeks his face could be

glimpsed inside convulsed and his head seemed to be smoking smoldering but as

lauren looked closer it was not smoke it was just a movement of millions of bugs

in and out of his eye sockets he backed out of the hut and turned and across the

clearing he saw barnacle in the shaft of light observing him making him sure

making sure that he witnessed all of this.

You saved my life?

Why?

Barnacle's gaze didn't waver.

Okay, I wanted to resist him so I turned my back but something came into my mind

nonetheless.

They were holding us still.

Still in time. They were holding us still, still in time. What does he mean?

And I turned back.

i get it okay it's a political thing he's put down some political

insurrection that's it okay i get it what we move away what burns

up and then suddenly with incredible violence he said all the huts on fire

red cheeks his body's going up in flames now what's going on okay we're moving

off again into the forest we

walk

Oh, what's happening?

Come on, where are we going?

We've got to keep out, keep going.

After a couple of hours, I just start straining, straining my ears, hoping

against hope for the sound of a plane. I glance up at the little bit of blue sky

in the canopy. I want even to see a vapor trail in the sky. I see nothing.

Come on.

We stop at sundown. There's no evening meal. We sleep on the forest floor.

Nothing to eat the next morning, and it's the same the next.

Today, we drink water.

Somehow, in my anger, I force myself to walk behind Barnacle.

Where are you going?

I communicate to the beginning.

The beginning.

Okay. Well, what are we going to find in your goddamn beginning?

And he walks on inexorably, and suddenly I realize his answer might be death.

Death is awaiting us in the beginning.

I look at the people searching for signs of resistance, but they drift past me as

if I'm invisible.

Day four, day five, the older people are limping. Women break off branches as

they pass with fruit to feed their children who lull vacant-eyed over their

parents' shoulders.

This is madness. We drink water incessantly.

Okay, I'm at the back now.

I'm gonna take leave of Barnacle and his people. I'll follow them to the first

nabable body of water.

I'll use the log as a raft.

Don't listen to my thoughts. Don't hear my thoughts.

Don't hear them. I'll take my chances.

Take my chances. And then suddenly, one morning... Oh,

that's a human saying. It is.

Yeah, it is.

smoke could be decomposing and

then

suddenly a crowd of tribes people stormed through the trees and was

surrounded by another tribe of maya runa that's gone that's emaciated the

children are running hugging jumping playing people greeting each other and

smiling and Barnacle disappears into a group of women and children. They're his

family, and Tootie runs across and hugs the old man, and he throws him up onto

his shoulders. Why have I never guessed?

Tootie is Barnacle's son, and then suddenly somebody offers me some food,

and I'm eating, eating, eating.

Get it down.

Come on, get it down.

Great gobs of food hurt my intestines, but my blood sugar level is rising.

Come on.

I feel drunk with momentary survival.

Drunk with food.

Look at the new member. He's a shaman I haven't seen before. Another conical

hat of leaves, and he's wearing a pair of shorts.

Shorts. Tattered shorts.

He's wearing a pair of tattered shorts. I hold my breath. I hardly dare hope,

and I put my hand on his shoulder. He turns, and I say to him,

Hola.

Mi nombre es Warren.

Warren, huh?

Portuguese? Fala português?

No?

Fala português?

I turn away.

A disappointment bitter, but then suddenly over my shoulder I hear, Laon,

si.

Bienvenido, Laon Cambio.

Speaking to me in Portuguese, he just said, Lauren, welcome, Lauren. And then

cambio, cambio means radio, and over in radio parlance, he's just greeting me

with, welcome, Lauren, over. I want to hug him. And then I want to say, listen,

I got dropped in by plane.

I've been with these people. Calm down.

Calm down. Just ask him something simple. Come on. Come on.

Is this your village?

My village over. So all these people, they're

relatives of yours?

Well, how come you speak Portuguese?

And then his eyes dulled for a moment and he tells me, six years ago, gunmen

came working for a developer.

They attacked his village, shot his wife, his children, and he got away to a

place of safety in a mission.

And there he got work as a servant for a radio operator.

And from him he learned Portuguese over. So, tsunami, what's your name?

They call me over, over.

Smoke hits my eyes.

I turn around.

A vast fire has been built. The two communities are standing rounded, and

others are walking towards it. Oh, they're holding on all their belongings.

Axes, manioc, graters, calabashes, fish hooks, fish nets, and they're putting

them in a pile next to the fire.

Oh, and look at this. Headdresses of egret feathers and bows and arrows and

pot and trophy skulls, things the tribe would never needlessly abandon.

Painstakingly... crafted objects things the tribe needs for its survival and

barnacle is overseeing this all watching it all what's happening can be all a

ceremony over for what yeah we're

returning these things die here so we can return what do you mean

you're going back in time

No, not going back, returning.

Sounds like return tickets. Are you going to destroy all these things,

everything the tribe has?

The spirits are stopping us, he says.

They're jealous.

They stop us. They're jealous.

And then he says, they hold us still,

still in time.

Old is still, still in time. The same words that Barnacle used.

I say to him, Barnacle, listen,

the man here, the headman with the bow on his shoulders, he told me with the

same words about your return to the beginning, except I don't speak my

Aruna, do you understand?

There's a silence.

Maybe he spoke to you in the other language, the old language over. No,

no. He didn't speak to me. I think he spoke to me without words.

Yes.

That is the other language.

The old language. Old language?

What do you mean? It comes from another time?

I mean, how do you learn it? I have so many questions.

No. No, it's not learned.

It's remembered.

The old ones remember it over...

And he looks at me with a newfound respect that I should communicate like

this, but I can feel the barnacle is looking at me He's looking at the back

of my head. I turn and I see him and he has in his hands He is he's looking at

me because in his hands is an arrow and it's the arrow that he gave me and now

he's holding it above his head because He wants me to witness this and in one

movement. He brings it down and snaps it in two

He throws it on the fire and this signals a frenzy of destruction.

People leaping on the pile and stamping on things with their feet. What they

can't break with their feet, they break with their hands. They crush the pots,

grind them and smash the trophy skulls, snap the bowls and arrows. They shatter

the whole pile into bits of wood, bone, husks, feather, loose human teeth,

strung on necklaces. Oh my God, everything that's beautiful and useful

onto the fire and the flames.

leaping up there's no hesitation there's not even a look of regret okay

we're loosening our bonds says cambio we're getting freer

and freer sailing in time well what will happen when you get to your destination

cambia what will happen then

to hell with all this shit he says and he walks away god imagine us burning

our possessions so as not to remain still in time and i close my eyes and i

i picture bonfires like this one along some affluent american street you know

people dragging out their paid for belongings into the front yard you know

appliances furniture toys spraying it with gasoline and then sending light to

it yeah we're bonfire in one front yard and another and another you're not all

down the street oh yeah all through the neighborhood and the next and the next

half a city on fire all of a culture the most materialistic and leisure-minded in

the world up in flames the city in flames where are we washington yeah

washington pennsylvania avenue the white house on fire library of congress on

fire burning the past

Burning it all. You're freeing yourself.

Taking off.

Soaring. Carried by the purifying sacrificial flames.

Carried where? Carried where? Who knows?

Maybe I'll live to find the answer.

Yeah, but okay, that was 1968.

But if we got rid of anything, have we got any fucking shit?

It's all plastic.

Okay, we can smash glass.

Yeah, but can we get rid of this fucking stuff?

Can we?

Jesus Christ.

No.

Can we get rid of our past? I don't know.

Get rid of this motherfucker!

There goes my... Come on!

But I think there's just too much!

There's too much!

My God!

There's too much to get rid of!

Come on!

Come on!

Come on, let's get rid of this fucking shit!

Are you gonna do it?

Hooray, you motherfuckers!

Come on, you'll be so backed up!

It's all in the fucking cloud! Well, fuck that!

Put a fucking hammer through this, mate, eh?

Lucy, go back to bed, sweetie.

I've got the... Why are you always picking on your phone? I'm just working.

So boring.

I know, I'm just working. Hello, who is this?

Can I play on your phone, then?

Well, I'm not playing, sweetie.

Do you want some water?

No fizzy water.

Well, we don't have any fizzy water. Let's go, come on. Let's get some from

the tap.

Drink it up. How long has I been asleep?

My sweetie, I don't know.

Maybe half an hour, something like that. You've got to go to sleep now. You have

to sleep, all right?

I open my eyes.

Cambio's here.

Lauren, Lauren.

I'm going on, Cambio. Now, Lauren, over.

What are you talking about, Cambio? Listen, I...

I just got into my hammock. I've been asleep two minutes.

I've been in Barnacle's hut for hours.

Okay, I swing out of my hammock. I stand. I shiver. It's cold. It's night.

And then he says, The beginning, Lauren, over.

What do you mean?

Well, the ceremony is now. It's going to happen now. Wait, wait, wait.

But Barnacle said it wasn't going to happen for weeks.

You mean the ceremony's happening? Look, cameo.

Listen, what if there is nothing at the beginning, you know? What if the old one

is crazy?

What if we're all gonna die?

Die.

Cameo turns away and then he says, no, no.

There is no other way out. The old belief has to be proven true.

in the dark they've got their cat whiskers in and the community is making

a huge long line all the way across the village agora lauren cameo now lauren

over i know what it means they've painted their bodies with jennipap black

vegetable dye has begun we watch

towards the beginning and suddenly Kampio's pulling me by my arm we have to

step in there's a gap we do one two three to the left two to the right two

back and one one two three one two one two got it okay

one two three one two one two we clap hard and repeat two three

one two one two yeah Over and over.

Come on. Got it. And now we turn. One, one, two, three.

Two, one, two. Ah, it's hypnotic.

And two.

Ah, my mind starts to travel.

How long have I been here?

One, two weeks?

Two months?

I don't know.

I don't know, time has collapsed.

And then suddenly, suddenly I'm back in front of Barnacle's hut the night

before.

Standing in front of the doorway, I duck underneath and I see it's full of men

smoking green cigars.

Okay, Barnacle's there looking at me.

He invites me to sit and I know finally I can talk to him.

through Cambio.

We sit and he says, You have come

here. Why?

Okay.

Silence.

I heard about your people and I wanted to photograph you and show others

that you exist.

Cambio translates.

Okay,

why have you not left us? Why have you not fled? So I have to choose my words

carefully. Well, I wanted to see, I wanted to witness your beginning.

Cambio translates, and then a thought is planted in my mind and Barnacle

beams to me that my staying makes the ceremony good.

And then he begins to talk again through Cambio, and he tells me that the tribe

in all its forms has been moving for some time.

The only way out is the beginning.

And then I panic. Death feels very close.

Cambio, tell him, look, there's enough space in the forest, there's enough

wilderness, nobody's ever going to find you here, okay?

nobody and i can speak to the brazilian government i can speak to funai's

indigenous affairs department basically tell him i can help can't be a

translates bonica looks at me and says no no

they will come they will always come looking for that oil with guns

and planes and alcohol so uh when will we be in the beginning then how do we

know

Haven't you noticed time is already falling off?

He says, yeah, okay, but what if we were to hear a plane right now?

We won't, he says.

Have you?

And suddenly I realize I can't remember the last time I did hear a plane. I even

saw a vapor trail in the sky.

So does that mean we're close, Samuel?

Very close, he said.

You can already feel it and you will see the signs.

Thanks, buddy. Passes me a cigar.

And now they're talking. Oh, between them and Cameo's translation skills are

put to the test.

They're talking about time.

And they're saying that the beginning runs parallel.

who are time, and the ceremony is the door.

I close my eyes.

They have talked a new time into reality.

Why am I here?

I ask this of Barnacle without words. Why am I here?

And then a thought blooms in my mind, and words cluster to it. You will

prove that it is real.

You will prove that it is real.

You will prove that it is real.

You will prove that it is real.

We are here stamping with our feet,

thudding like a giant hand knocking on a door.

The door to the beginning.

We shall step through that door.

We dance all night The

Sun explodes above the horizon a cycle

has ended another one is beginning

2,000 miles away to the east, it's already noon.

But here it's morning.

A morning loaded with events as yet unhappened.

And one of those events... One of those

events might be our death.

We stop.

Our bodies cry with exhaustion.

Barnacle appears, a diadem of white egret feathers on his head. I can just

feel him passing down the line.

I can't be hard. They're getting new names, new names for the beginning.

OK.

Something more to drink. Here comes another one. I'm going to hang on to

this one.

Barnacle repeats their names and with a thumb so red it looks bloodied, he

plants a plot of red uruku on each forehead as he passes.

He imprisons himself and he winks at me.

Now it's my turn. I don't want to lose my name, even if it's just a memory.

McIntyre.

He stamps my forehead and he passes on.

I hope there's no drug in that drink.

There is.

I feel a numbing of my limbs.

My bones are liquefying. It's a liquefaction suggesting a kind of birth.

Very slowly from skeleton heart, they're sort of growing mellower, sort of coming

alive.

Yeah. The air seems to separate into tiny flexible rivulets of oxygen.

I feel I could expand and contract distances at will.

And suddenly I get ahead. I try to stop thinking.

No, thank you. Oh, myself.

Completely to the present moment. And then I get... I feel like there's two of

me. Two of me. Two of me. I get a taste of something. Now I'm in triplicate.

Triplicate. I'm... There's an awareness that's frighteningly immediate and

overfilled with sensorial stimuli.

I try not to... Don't censor it. Don't censor it.

But I... I'm trying.

and then it vanishes cameo wait cameo where are you going oh we're gonna look

at something okay we're going around this hotness almighty croaking of frogs

behind a hot we see all these shaman gathered around a basket of frogs and

that's reaching in with their hands and spooning off the pimples on their backs

a tiny transparent substance and putting it collecting it in little bowls

And then suddenly Cambio reaches in his hand, takes a frog and shoots out a

tongue.

To see the beginning over his... See the beginning, Cambio?

What do you mean?

See the animals in it, okay.

Talk to them.

See the jaguars, converse with them. Okay, okay.

And now other people are taking the frogs and they're licking bags, the

pimples on the bags which are weeping like so many ulcers. And then, oh my

God, this guy's got a...

Chontan, a knife of Chontapal. Now that is as sharp as a piece of glass.

Oh no, I don't want to watch him slice open a frog, so I turn away. When I turn

back, it's not the frog that he's slicing open, it's his forearm.

Oh god, like that, like that, like that. Come on.

The two people, they're opening it out, and they're pouring the liquid right

into his bloodstream. And other people are opening up their arms. They're going

to see the animals now.

Cambio's face is pearled out with sweat. The drug's working in him.

Plants grow inside me, he says. With such conviction, I expect bromeliads to

come out of his chest, go down his leg. Oh, he keels over. You okay, buddy? And

now everybody, ah!

Oh, my God.

Oh, ooh!

Now the whole clearing is full of stumbling, crawling, barking, growling,

shrieking men.

And although I haven't had any of this, I feel like an animal.

In front of me, there's a man imitating a macaw so successfully, it's in total

contradiction with his cat whiskers.

He invites me to look into his eyes, but they're tunnels into some place I'll

never visit.

So I turn away and I shut my eyes and I try to see my version of the beginning.

But I meet no fabulous beasts, no mythical creatures. I see man.

I see man walking, crossing, recrossing.

Trying to communicate.

They're just crossing, coming forward.

In a landscape, fogged up landscape.

No, it's not a landscape. It's territory.

This territory is tied.

Our tie.

And across the front.

Silhouette. Coming towards me.

Barnacle, I open my eyes.

And his shadow seems to reach across the clearing. And it's saying to me that

these things are truly happening. Time is sloughing off.

Well, what am I supposed to do? Why am I here?

I'm supposed to be your authenticator.

No!

I'm not a cell.

I'm not a molecule. I'm not an ant.

Blindly obeying nature, no.

I'm a modern man!

You think time comes in objects like milking mothers?

Do you think waltzing around a hundred square miles of bush is gonna take us

back in time?

Someone's got to denounce this craziness because we're all gonna die.

I'm gonna start a one-man insurrection.

If I'm to survive, I've got to pump out of my psyche a massively self-generated

sense of who I am. So come on. One times one is one. Two times two is four. Three

times three is nine. Four times four is nine.

Say four.

Say twenty-six. Say twenty-six.

To recapture myself, I turn, face the forest.

It's a jumble of trees and leaves, but I see a lapuna. What's its Latin name? You

know perfectly.

Sumama. And then suddenly, a new sensation emerges in me, but it's not

one of sadness or fresh disaster.

I become aware that while I could flee, I have no interest in doing so.

Come on!

Through the forest, down the river, back to your world!

Yeah, but escape from what?

Into what?

Wow, just bad.

What lies ahead is the same river and the same plants, but now it's empty of

modern humankind.

No, come on.

No one like me is out there. Yes, there is. That's us.

But listen, the civilized world hasn't disappeared.

What do you mean?

It's simply not appeared yet. They're not appeared yet.

We are the first humans.

A territory of unnamed, uncounted life forms. A people taken to the beginning

by Barnacle. Don't talk!

And I have gone with them. You!

Not me. You. I have not.

Just go.

Time passes.

A lot of time passes.

over towards me.

He collapses beside me.

Somebody said not to die, not to die.

Not to die, the coping of death has been lifted, but it's still so close, I feel

the hairs pricking up on the back of my neck, anticipating its return.

But then my body seems to lose its solid state, and then I feel a wonderful

easing of pressure.

He walks ahead of me, rolling his shoulders like an old man fighting

stiffness.

Two old men.

stops in front of an enormous curve and reach going on and on, and he says,

Oh, Joey. And I know it means look, and so I do, and he points.

And an invisible change of lenses occurs, and my eyes tumble forward 500

yards, and the sound of the water changes.

And then it's as if my eyes keep on going forward through the trees.

and I sense the rising mountains beyond where the source of the river is

and I seem to be moving towards it at tremendous speed but then

suddenly a message comes from that source that is wordless

but so gigantic that it fills all the space between here and there

inside and outside past future and fuses the source and the beginning

above belong inside outside into one

notion the beginning beams barnacle

and he turns and faces me and he explains still without words that he

cannot let me go not after i've been part of this

I whisper without words.

We know, he says.

And I understand.

Just as Barnacle undid my spell by running counterclockwise, I could be the

crack between here and there.

I could undo their return.

The crack through which another time, our time, might flood.

this narrative he suddenly looks very naked and very tired aged in fact and

vulnerable and he walks away back to the other naked vulnerable people of

the forest till just hours ago i was a modern man

activated by the pressures of my civilization crowded inside its limits

Barnacle and his people were even more pressured by the advance of my

civilization because their only alternative was flight.

Only alternative is flight?

No, now the certainty blooms in every leaf and every blade of grass

that we are alone.

Tired!

He calls me and I nod reassuringly and pad back to

the village Back to captivity While the

song of the forest rises

Gains in

richness and melody

my prison my beautiful prison is

singing singing

singing that night

a storm shook the trees and rain lashed the canopy so violently that liquid

columns of downpour pierced through flashes bathed the treetops in

apocalyptic blue light and the water was rising incredibly fast, whipping with

unexpected strength the trees, swamping their roots, overflowing the forest

floor. It rose with a surge that forced into action all the animals that

couldn't count on the trees for their protection, and so they ran, stampeded,

hurtled, headed for higher ground.

Cachuera Esperanza Ultra Oriental Cordillera.

Dear Juanico, I don't expect this letter to reach you.

And even if it did, you couldn't read it without the help of someone like

Cambial.

Hola, Cambial.

Still, writing it.

makes me feel that you are alive.

McIntyre was almost knocked down by the panic traffic of tribespeople.

He ran into the surrounding trees and found himself in water up to his knees.

He was nearly swept off his feet, and then he was hit in one knee by a

floating object. Two logs lashed together with palm fiber, and he fell

across the raft without thinking of flinging to it.

And the current dragged them both through the screen of low trees and

beyond, and he paddled desperately, trying to steer himself back to his new

family, but then he realized...

He had unconsciously opted for escape.

He was pulled into the main river and the repeated lightning revealed the

frothing, boiling, purple mass of water returned was now implicit.

Still, of all the thoughts that were tumbling through his mind, his most

anxious was about the headman.

Barnacle.

Barnacle.

Barnacle.

Barnacle. Dear Barnacle.

You're a scientist in your way as I am in mine.

But your attitude is that everything around us is alive and therefore

reachable.

Nothing is forbidden.

That is why you can travel in time.

I want to know about time. I want to know about it. I want to know about this

earth.

I want to know about the source of this great river and the natural world it

sustains. But for you, it is less important that you know about all these

things.

What's important is what you do with them.

You're doing something with time, not agonizing about understanding it.

And that's why I know somehow

you're present here and you will somehow be able to learn the contents of

this letter the morning came fast

the grim gray light brought by the rain down onto the frothing

waters he saw mud flat paddled towards it crawled out and sat for a few moments

in the morning light

And then McIntyre knew, with a certainty that allowed no room for hope or doubt,

as if the headman himself was making sure that he had the news, that Barnacle

was gone.

He was dead, drowned.

Barnacle was gone, and yet at the same time he was ineradicably present

in everything that surrounded him.

So close did he feel to him that he felt Barnacle's features were somehow

superimposed on his own, as if they were one person.

Dying, the headman had exited the daily physical sequence of time, entering

instead that space-time mind continuum that McIntyre had experienced.

They were traveling in it together.

And then the fantastic sensation, like others so recently experienced, faded.

He staggered out into the water, fell onto his balsa raft, and

drifted downstream.

with some people that are important. You already know.

But then it becomes even more important to remember them. And I was extremely,

extremely... I said, why was I so foolish not to jump on a plane and go

see him and whatever? I think I was secretly frightened to see him.

I had met him when he was already an older man.

But he was so vivacious and full of energy.

Dear Barnacle, I'm in...

Arlington, Virginia, writing to you.

I sailed down with the flood to return to my territory, but one day I shall

return to your beginning.

Maybe it will only be in my memory, but even there, that will do.

Even there, I will learn certain things about you, and you will learn certain

things about me, and there will be a consequence.

to our association.

Maybe more people will benefit from it.

Or maybe just you and I.

Sitting near a fire, sharing food.

Sharing until our thoughts find a way to...

Sleep. Oh, my darling. What are you doing up? It's way too late.

You tell me a story to help me sleep.

Sweetie, story time was a long, long time ago.

I don't have any stories here, sweetie.

I read the book you're reading. No, that's a grown-up book. That's Petra's

book, sweetie. That's the jungle book. I don't have any stories.

Please read me a story.

Okay, I'll find something in here.

I'll find something in Petru's book, but if I do read it, will you promise me now

you go to sleep?

Yeah? Yes.

Okay. Let me see. I'll find some little bit. Oh, yeah, I know.

Yeah.

There is a bit. Okay. So this is a story.

You remember Petru, don't you, sweetie?

Yes. Yeah, okay. So this is a story about the people, it was told to him by

McIntyre, who met Cambio, who told it to him, and his dada told it to Cambio, and

his dada, and his dada, and it's about how the people that who lived there, how

they began.

It's about their beginning.

You're at the beginning, aren't you, sweetie?

Yes.

Here you go.

Once upon a time, a big river flowed in the sky.

Its whole valley was carried on clouds.

fastened to the clouds with bulky liana ropes.

Many people lived in the valley in the sky in perfect harmony.

But one day, a curious bunch of little children untied one of the

ropes, and that was enough to undo the entire fragile whole.

Rope after rope snapped under the pressure, and the valley crashed onto

the earth.

And thus the big river split into thousands of smaller rivers, and the

sky, sad over the loss, cried its first rain.

Some of us are friends.

Some of us.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much, and for those who are watching

online, thank you for watching.

It's a lie, I'm not alone.

There are many, many different people who are making this performance, but I

would like to acknowledge my sound operators, Ella and Helen, who are not

for me just sound operators, they are musicians, they are characters, and they

play with me.

And the other thing I have been asked to say about a year and a half, a little

bit longer, I was in Te Fé, which is about an hour's jet ride

west of Manaus in the Amazon Basin, and I was with a Mayruna community, very

different to this community, they're acculturated, but still they have very

few visitors.

And when we were welcomed, the first thing that happens is you get welcomed.

It's an important thing. You go to the headman's hut. His name was Lorival, and

then he gave a long speech of welcome. But it all focused down to one single

question, which is, why are you here?

And so then I told him the story of this, the whole book, and this idea of

doing this.

And he listened, and there was a lot more talking.

But he said to me, we are very moved by your story and when you go back and you

tell it to your people, that's it, you, you will please tell them that we,

the Mayruna, exist.

They do. This community and many other indigenous communities are very, very

politically active.

They do a number of things. I'm not going to talk about all the things they

do right now.

But amongst them, of course, we know is they fight for the land that they live

on and therefore the preservation of that forest, which is important to us

all. But I am here specifically being asked to say that they exist. They do.

Thank you so much.