Original subtitles

[Tannoy announcement] Welcome to The Encounter

Please test the headphones on the back of your seat to see that they are working

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

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

Good evening

and welcome to tonight's live stream performance of The Encounter

brought to you from the Barbican Theatre in London directly into your homes

My name is Simon McBurney

I'm going to be actually performing in a few minutes

I'm going to be leaving this auditorium, you'll see me coming on stage left in just a second

but I'm just getting a feel for the place, the people who are here and wanted to welcome you the auditorium

I think particularly in these days we have to be very careful

about believing what we see and hear

because, in fact, this performance was recorded four years ago in March 2016

and it is, in fact, May 2020

it would be illegal to be in this theatre right now, because we are in the middle of a global pandemic

of COVID-19 and we are all, I am, you are, we are all confined at home

isolated

Welcome to my home and wherever you are in your homes

Golly, yeah, different times

It's four years since we created this show

and so much has changed hasn't it

It's incredible and, of course, the show itself did not remain static but became something utterly different

as we performed it in the following years

scenes went in, others came out

however, this is the only recording we have, this is the one we will be watching tonight

even though some of it is not quite as I want it

so, what you are watching is, in a sense, the beginning of the creative process, not what it finally became

and, in a way, that links to where we are now, doesn't it

I mean in this way, because surely in this period of confinement, we're not just asking 'When will it end?'

but also, 'How are we going to begin again?'

In some ways during this time we seem to have gone back in time [door creaks]

I'm very conscious of the fact that

that when I created the show my daughter was five

I wasn't five I was six

and now, she's ten

I'm not ten, I'm eleven

eleven, 'hello'!

And, in a way, while I'm thinking about the beginning I'm thinking about her beginning

'Are you listening to me?'

He's not listening to me

[Door creaks]

I know, unfortunately he's not very good at listening

but, in fact, we are not there for him

'Do you understand what I mean?'

Not really

We're not in his conscious mind, we're in his subconscious

So, we're standing back from the thing that makes him do things

I mean, if we want him to go we can get him to go

So just think go, go, go on go

You see, there he goes

and I think that's quite good because I think that everybody at home actually really wants to see the show

but, before you go, ladies and gentlemen

we're at home, you're at home, but please don't forget

if you haven't got headphones you need to go and get them now

otherwise you won't be able to hear anything

I'm coming onto the stage, we'd better go

the show's about to start, so I'm just coming on stage left, here we go

Ladies and gents, we're just 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 is 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 that's allowed to have theirs on by the way, so I can send that,

thank you very much, yes you can wave if you like

people, anyone, yes, that's lovely, great.

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

I was just looking at my photographs here, when I was waiting for whoever it is to come

in from the bar

and I was realising, these are photographs of my children,

there are more photographs here on this thing of my children then there are of all of my

childhood

and my adolescence combined.

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

It's kind of a responsibility really and yet I realise there's probably more pictures on

one page of this of my children,

than there are of my father and the whole of his childhood and there are videos and

so on.

I don't have any videos, I'm of the age - let's see if there's enough white hair here,

I'm of the age of Super Eight, do you remember that? Wonderful sound in the sitting room

afterwards [fluttering]

Unfortunately we lost all our Super Eight, 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 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, I'll show it you later in the show

but I mean the sense of this responsibility that I feel is, you know that they'll look

at this later, my children

and go that's the story of our lives. It's not their lives. It is a story but I'm worried

they're going to mistake it

for reality, for the real thing. I do tend to do going for 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're all agreed on the story that there is something

called half past seven

and that you arrive here. Well most of you. There's still a few seats that obviously haven't

agreed on that

It is, the difference between reality and fiction is very difficult to separate.

Two people that 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, this does worry me, obviously I can edit their lives

but also the stories that happen today are shaping their future

and they're very young. Jeremy Hunt is giving us stories that are shaping the future.

But more than that, that's a specific example but you know the question of the earth we

live in,

I get passionate, I get worried that. Oh god. The typical live stream disaster.

Some of you probably realise 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 it is 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 little and I lay in bed and my father would read me stories

that's when I first understood that whatever it is that is 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 there are other

people.

My children 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 there is a very powerful relationship between empathy and proximity

and I would like to get closer to you now, so if you will put on your headphones.

The marvellous 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.

Okay, I'm just going to check your headphones and Helen is going to put us in your right

ear.

Now I'm going to take a walk across this 2.6 pounds of electrified pate that we call our

brain.

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

off and turn them round so I am.

Otherwise the whole thing would be back to front.

Okay now we'll come back to 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 little bits, it's flying through the air, it's being

reassembled,

it's going down the tubes, air is being moved

and you have the impression that I really am somewhere in your head.

But of course it's nothing but a technological trick

technological trick [looped]

Such as that repetition. I'm not repeating anything, that's just a looping peddle.

Another technological trick, right underneath my desk.

I'm just going to use another technological trick by going across on to this microphone.

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

So having be up high at a tenor, suddenly it's coming all the way down to here

[American accent] and for some reason I want to speak with an American accent

it feels. It's not because it's sleazy. It's no value judgements about Americans. My father

was American

but the point is the protagonist, the man who is at the centre of this story, Loren

McIntyre,

this is his voice.

The story takes place in 1969 but as you watch and 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

[back to normal accent] 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

but if I walk over here 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, made by Sennheiser. That's not product placement by the way.

Here it is. This is your right ear and this is your left ear and you can hear me going

from side to side.

For you that's a little difficult. I'll align it to make it easier for you.

There you go. Now that's to your left ear and this one. I'm now walking round 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. 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 [drinking sounds]

A little too intimate. Hang on.

And the amazing thing about the brain is the adjustment, it thinks I'm behind your right

ear

but 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 [blows gasps of air into microphone]

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'll give you a haircut [scissors cutting]

Cutting round the back of you. Snip that little, right at the top of that

[buzzing] Oh god what's that? I don't believe it it's a mosquito. It's a mosquito in the

Barbican

and if you open your eyes it's not a mosquito, it's a recording.

In fact it's not even the recording of a mosquito, it's just a comb and some grease proof paper.

But your mind will give you the image of the fly, necessarily, that's how human brains

work.

But of course this is nothing but a speaker

and it looks a little bit like a Budweiser can but it's not, it's a very weird kind of

speaker

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've been miming my words and he's

been doing it.

That really annoying sound. Could you

Recording: So the whole thing is completely artificial.

Simon: Can you turn that off? It's really annoying that comb and grease proof paper.

Recording: What?

Simon: Can you turn it off?

Recording: You want me to turn it off?

Simon: yeah please, thanks, we've had enough

Okay so

Recording: Is that better?

Simon: Yeah that's a lot better

Now, he doesn't exist, of course

Recording: Well of course I exist

Simon: Well, no you don't

Recording: Well I'm in the present and you're in the future

Simon: No I'm in the present and you're in the past, okay?

Recording: Alright, okay I'm in the past. Shall we swap sides?

Simon: Yeah we could do that. That's not going to affect causality because you're in the

past, so that's ok.

Recording: So what's going on?

Simon: Well, it's the Barbican. We're live streaming it tonight. It's exciting.

Recording: Should I be worried?

Simon: Oh no I don't think so, everything is fine so far.

Recording: How many are there?

Simon: Well, 600 and apparently, last time we saw, about 2000 online

Recording: Are they enjoying it?

Simon: Well, yeah, they got a bit hysterical with the ear, but other than that you know everything

seems to be fine

Recording: I mean, what can I say?

Simon: Well why don't you shut up, okay? Why don't you be quiet now and I'll-

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

Well actually I do because I think probably your past is more important to you than your

present

because I am in your past

Simon: That's true. I mean is consciousness possible without memory? I don't think so.

We are the sum total of our pasts

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, just behind your head you can hear the London traffic [sound

of traffic]

and behind your right ear over here I have a little basin [sound of a tap]. That's it.

So this is my home

Noma: Daddy who are you talking to?

Simon: That's my daughter. Nobody sweetie. I'm not talking to anyone

Noma: Yes you are

Simon: Yes I am in a way. I am

Noma: But there's nobody there

Simon: That's true, yeah that is true

Noma: Daddy, how long is this head going to be in our house?

Simon: I'm just recording you, while Mumma's away. I just wanted to get a few

Noma: Where's Mumma?

Simon: Mumma's gone on a Buddhist retreat, sweetie

Noma: What's a Buddhist retreat?

Simon: Well it's quite fun, people do lots of singing and have a lovely time

This is actually a recording me and my daughter made about a year and a half a go

when she was five. She's nearly seven now.

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 recording with my daughter.

That's surely just a technological trick you say. But is it? Marcus thanks for waiting,

do you want a cup of coffee?

Marcus: I've already had one thanks

Simon: I just wanted to ask you, our description of, our model of time, 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

Marcus: So I think our classical model of time, is a one dimensional line that we're

all running along

but there are other models of time where time is sort of two dimensional

Simon: Blimey, does that mean you could have parallel times of the times running parallel

to ours?

Marcus: Yes certainly. I think physicists came up with a model of time where time isn't

a sort of infinite line

But is actually a circle. Which means, that in some ways you can go back to the beginning

Simon: So I could actually start to correct-

Marcus: We have this sense that events in time come one after the other

and actually that is something of an illusion

Simon: And you're listening to Marcus Du Sautoy, the Simonyi professor for the dissemination

of scientific knowledge at Oxford

who I talked to a couple of years ago, really, about time.

Basically what he's saying is 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 [phone ringing]

Oh my god I'm so sorry. I did say I was the only one who was allowed to have it on

Hang on, I'm sorry. I've got. Hello? Who is it?

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

So of course, as you've guessed, that's also a recording.

This is a telephone call I made with a woman called Rebecca Spooner,

who works for an organisation called 'Survival International'

which agitates for the rights of indigenous people all over the world

and she is one of a number of people who actually I have on my phone.

The writer, Petru Popescu, for example, is on my phone.

But the majority of these people that I talked to in terms of making this piece are in my

head

[recorded voices play] they are a reservoir in my head and in fact, if you like, they

form a kind of cacophony.

In fact when we talk to anyone 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 order to tell a story we want

to tell.

[Sound of a plane]

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

Loren: So where's the village? If this is the area you saw the village, let's go on

as long as we can

Make sure it's at least still there

Pilot: We can't go on for very much longer, okay?

Loren: First find that village. Climb a little higher and see where we are

Pilot: Okay

[sound of plane]

Pilot: I can't see it

Oh there it is!

Loren: Let's go over twice. Let's do it twice. They'll have seen planes before and know we're

heading upstream

[Sound of a plane]

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

206 floatplane.

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 the surface there were hidden logs.

Pilot: It’s not safe. I know, but it’s not safe.

Loren: Every minute of flight time is a day on foot remember

Pilot: I know but I can't risk it

Loren: You see that beach down there? Just there.

Pilot: Okay, alright

Loren: I'll set up camp there and you can pick me up in a few days

Pilot: Here we go, okay hang on tight, gonna hit some water

[Sound of water lapping]

Simon: The pilot helped Loren McIntyre jump ashore into the shallows, handed him his waterproofed

rubberised sacks

and then the heat enveloped him like a fog.

[Sound of a plane]

The drone of the engine faded, Loren McIntyre was completely alone.

400 miles of Amazonian jungle in every direction.

400 miles from what he called civilisation.

The looming forest projected an air of distrust as if it was watching him.

He was used to it, he had been photographing in the Amazon rainforest 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 over night everything was safe.

Well rehearsed. Organised. Ritual. Looked back at the forest.

[sound of a camera] Mahoganies. Cedars. Palo sangres [camera]

Their wood so heavy it refused to float,

so red it justified the name of blood trees.

Huacapus – so hard that nails wouldn’t penetrate them.

Sumaumas, and a giant lupunas tree – eight storeys high [camera]

Known as river lighthouses because boatmen used them as landmarks.

All these, and their retinue of parasites, 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

Loren: October 20th, 1969. Somewhere on the eastern bank of the Javari River.

I’m here because of The Mayoruna. The cat people.

Mayoruna. Mayoruna. 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 which one they thought to be real?

What they played with until habit and general acceptance confirmed them into the vocabulary.

Mayoruna. In their language, it means people.

Petru: 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 travelled extensively

since he was a kid.

He was…. He started as a sailor. Then he served in the US navy.

and you know he was a fantastic character

Simon: He was charismatic?

Petru: Oh yes. In a sort of subtle, moderate way that was not apparent right from the beginning.

He was not always making big gestures, he was always taking pictures, he was like an

American cowboy.

[Sound of a door opening] Oh Sweetie

Noma: Can't sleep

Simon: Sweetie, we've done bedtime, sweetie

Noma: Who’s like an American Cowboy?

Simon: Well...Loren in Petru's book, sweetie, in the jungle, the book about the jungle

Noma: What animals are in the jungle?

Simon: I told you, look, you know the jaguars, the birds and the macaws and the monkeys and

the insects

Noma: What do they sound like?

Simon: Okay, you want me to do the sounds of the animals again? Alright

Noma: Yes, alright

Simon: If I do that will you then promise me that you'll go to sleep?

Noma: Yes

Simon: Okay, so now you have to be very quiet

[He makes the sounds of the jungle looping one animal/bird/insect sound over another]

Daybreak, he was awakened as if by a silent clock and lay 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

lupunas tree.

He walked round the back of its enormous roots

and then somehow on the screen of his mind

Loren: Hey buddy, you're not alone

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

man in the forest

naked, two plots of red urucu on his cheeks.

And beside him was a boy, another man and a third, with a dead red howler monkey on

his back.

They carried bows and arrows. Spines bristled out of their lips, and there was no question,

these people were Mayoruna.

Loren: Cat people

Simon: Loren McIntyre looked at them. They looked at him. His camera, a Minolta, weighed

on his chest.

Loren: OK..I could shoot from the hip. No, I want a better shot, let’s get it through

the viewfinder.

Simon: He raised the camera. No reaction.

This was the instant when things could go either way, towards friendliness or hostility.

They looked at him. He looked at them. He knew the Mayoruna had never been successfully

acculturated

at the turn of the century, as the rubber boom brought more intrusion and conflict to

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.

The moment was wonderful and unrepeatable.

[sound of a camera]

Loren: First contact. My god, what a shot. Ideal first contact

Simon: They stood. Looking at each other. [Sound of camera] And then they turned [sound

of camera]

Loren: Hang on fellas

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

Loren: Okay [sound of camera] okay, seems okay, I'm gonna follow them

[Rustling]

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.

[Sound of camera] Loren: Great shot. Look at that. Change the roll.

Simon: 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 glanced at his watch. He hardly ever looked at his watch in the forest, there was

no reason to do so.

[Sound of a watch]

Five to nine, he had been walking for more than an hour.

Loren: 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 wont be far.

Simon: But the truth was, that being so excited by the Mayoruna, he’d simply forgotten to

mark his passage as he normally did.

He was so far in the jungle he had no way of getting back.

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

Loren: Okay, don't panic. Just keep your mind on the pictures. Look at that! [Sound of camera]

Keep your mind on the pictures.

It'll be your chance at the big one [sound of a camera]

Simon: Suddenly the trees pulled back. Staring in surprise, Loren stumbled.

A narrow horizon of huts, perhaps six, seven, eight or nine at a glance, it was a village,

but it looked as if they had just arrived, because a provisional air hung over everything.

Then the man who he’d called Red Cheeks, suddenly turned and looked at him, his eyes

like black bullets.

And the little boy moved towards him. Curious.

"Tutti!" Called the man with red cheeks.

Was that his name? Or was it 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.

Loren: Fala Portuguese? Hablo Espanol?

Simon: 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 a clearing, towards the 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.

Headman, if headman it was, had warts on his knees and ankles resembling barnacles.

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

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

Loren: Bom dia. Mi nombre es Loren. Me llamo Loren. Fala Portuguese? Hablo espanol? No?

Well I may as well speak in English.

I came over on a plane, you saw it yeah, we came over twice, yeah

and then I followed this guy here with the red cheeks. I followed him into your village,

okay?

And we landed on the water, okay and I need a guide to take me back to camp, yeah? By

the river

The river? You call it the Javari. Javari. Javari

Simon: It was clear that the name of the river was not that for them

and then the man who he had followed into the village called Red Cheeks, started to

speak

loudly, urgently, haranguing the chief, pointing at Loren. He didn't look or sound particularly

welcoming.

[Talking]

Simon: and that was the signal for other people to join in

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 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 centre of attention.

The heat was oppressive. He took on water.

He was frustrated with himself for not being able to communicate.

He had 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.

Loren: 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.

Simon: 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.

Loren: God, beautiful light [sound of a camera].

Why is everything half finished? They're not even bothering to complete it.

Simon: He noticed they just used a space around the fallen tree,

they hadn't even cut a clearing in forest as they would normally, why was that?

Loren: It really feels like they're hiding and they're emaciated. Haven't eaten for a

long time.

She's beautiful.

[Sound of a camera]

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

and then suddenly she called - "Tutti!"

And the little boy he had followed into the village, suddenly appeared at her elbow

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

and he tore into it hungrily.

Loren: Tutti, Tutti, so that's his name. He's hungry.

Hey Tutti! [Sound of camera] Great shot.

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 defence against infection.

[sound of camera] Certainly don't want to see them become dependent on outsiders

that’s the saddest affect of acculturation.

Truth is, best safeguard is not to contact them

but well, I'm here [sound of camera] Thanks buddy.

I'm only gonna be here a couple of days, so my affect on them will be limited…and I

hope unlasting.

Simon: He climbed into his hammock feeling more alone than 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 and obscure murmur, a strange inner hum

and he realised he had this sensation before when he was standing before the headman,

the man with barnacles on his legs,

and was it coming from the people.

No no that was just his imagination, his response to being alone in their midst.

So he lay back into his unconscious.

Ian McGilchrist: Earlier you talked about your child, and watching this little consciousness

grow.

And of course the child is not a tabular rasa, it’s not a blank sheet.

Steve Rose: consciousness of ourselves, the stories we tell about ourselves

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

and so profoundly shaped by technology and culture that it’s difficult to think outside it.

Marcus Du Sautoy: but there’s talk now of time actually being an emergent phenomenon…

that grows out of our lack of understanding...

Loren: One fifth of the world's fresh water is here. Fresh flowing into salt, where does

it begin?

Where does it all begin?

Simon: Loren McIntyre was flying, suspended, airborne. Hovering above a vision of the jungle

and 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 and Antarctic.

He looked up. Clouds heavy with water vapour hung in the air and as he looked down,

the forest was phosphorescent as if lit from underneath

and suddenly he felt the phosphorescence the forest lifts

rich life forms. This was its treasure.

Loren: The Christian conquistadors they were wrong, all wrong.

Pizarro, Francisco d’Orellana, Cortez, Columbus,

all wrong, all wrong.

Simon: The oil prospectors, the rubber tappers, the missionaries with their singing faith

had all been wrong.

They were all looking for the wrong things.

Something else. But in his dream McIntyre recognised what it was, although didn't have

any words.

Loren: It's the intricacy of the forest...is that it? Is that the treasure?

Simon: 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.

Loren: What is it?

Simon: And then suddenly he was sitting in front of the headman

with the dream’s camera lens focusing first on the man’s legs, before lifting to his

face.

Loren: Barnacle.

Simon: And then he awoke. The hut was shaking so he jumped out of his hammock and then it

came down.

The other huts right and 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 on unspoken command everybody moved off into the forest.

Loren: Where are they going? Goddammit they're off, where are they going?

Simon: Well he couldn't stay here alone, so he rushed to catch them up.

Loren: Where are they going?

[heavy breathing]

Loren: Goddammit

Simon: He was now part of they, walking swiftly along, like a Mayoruna,

whose possessions, instead of being bows and arrows, happened to be a pen, a notebook,

and a camera.

Half an hour later he crossed a muddy stream.

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

as if trying to stay in contact with the clock operated world.

Loren: goddammit, we're getting further and further away.

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

Simon: And he knew it. He listed the dangers.

Loren: Funghi, bacteria, intestinal parasites.

Radical fluctuations in temperature. No cooked food. No sterilised water.

Simon: These things went over and over in his head. Repeating and repeating.

A macabre aura, surging up from his unconscious, like a river. He had to do something.

Loren: Come on. Look at that. Look at that. Okay, okay, just think of the pictures.

The pictures.

That's it. This is your chance. You're going to get a superlative picture for the front

cover of the Geographic.

That's beautiful.

Simon: As he panted behind the headman , 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 and something comfortable and unseen like the

air

but for us civilizados, time is a possession. An increasingly more efficient machine.

[Sound of a camera]

Late that afternoon they broke in to what had once been the most enormous clearing.

[sound of thunder]

Barnacle stopped, making everyone 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?

[hitting sticks]

They were building another settlement. So what was the purpose of that?

They had hardly finished building the last one when they destroyed it

and they're 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,

who he had now christened Barnacle, sitting on his chair 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 he could see his hands were moving with precision

and because of the acoustic of the clearing he could hear him

as if he was standing next to him.

[carving wood sounds]

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 throngs 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 headman didn't even acknowledge him

but then his fingers started to move, slowly at first as if remembering some long forgotten

trade.

[Rustling]

He was weaving an eighteen strand belt. It was a trick he had learnt in the Merchant

Navy.

A way of fighting boredom at sea, also 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.

Voice: Some of us are friends.

Simon: Moments later he remembered how Barnacle had said that some of the Mayoruna were friends.

But the headman had not spoken. Not in English. And in fact not at all.

Voice: Some of us are friends.

Simon: It felt like a message but the headman had not spoken. McIntyre spoke no Mayoruna.

None of the Mayoruna spoke English.

He looked at the headman but the headman didn't acknowledge him at all.

So he leaned closer.

[Breathing]

Close enough to hear him breathing through his nose.

Voice: Some of us are friends.

Simon: 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 bristle

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

Maybe it was just being so near to him

that explained the sensation that his mind was unconsciously adding words in English

but then he had an idea and he strained and applied a focus not on the words of his next

thought

but on their content and instead of thinking:

Loren: Hey buddy, I'm a friend too, you can trust me.

Simon: He tried to fill himself with the feelings of that thought

and then he waited.

Voice: I know.

Simon: Somehow appeared in his mind,

or maybe was it just a 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.

He was being offered a gift. He took it.

[Rustling]

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 needless piece of western machinery could somehow counterbalance what he was hearing.

[watch ticking]

Yeah it was the 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.

[Rain] The rains came again. The adults ran into the huts for shelter but the children

came out to play.

[camera sounds]

And then Loren 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 Loren put his camera away and just watched the Mayoruna boy watching

the rain.

[Raindrops]

[Tapping]

He pounded the ground with his little feet. Loren stood and watched.

Early man, he thought again, 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.

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

reality,

from three drops of rain.

Marcus Du Sautoy: If you to the caves at Lascaux, then you see a sequence of thirteen dots

and above the thirteenth dot is this huge great big animal.

Now these thirteen dots seem to be representing thirteen weeks, thirteen chords of the moon,

after the pleiades has first emerged.

To understand time, you have to understand something a bit ritualistic, something which

is repeated,

whether that be your heartbeat or...

Noma: Four, five, six, seven, eight...

Simon: Meanwhile, down river, men from Loren's world were busy, elaborating plans that would

deliver Tutti

to the world of machinery, televised news, soft drinks and government welfare.

American Voice: [Jingle] Meet Timmy. Today Timmy's going to learn about psychology and

advertising.

Advertisings main functions are to inform, persuade and influence. Today we'll be focusing

on persuasion...

Simon: Tutti danced on unsuspectingly.

Some of us are friends.

Petru: 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 civilisation that they would reach perhaps, but you bring

them over too fast.

On the other hand you, as the scientist, you gain immensely from having been immersed in

the experience.

Basically it is is our gain, we the modern people, and it is usually their loss.

If we decide never to contact tribes any more, then we will never find out the deepest, most

interesting and controversial things about ourselves.

On the other hand, how will they develop? More slowly, although they have always developed

more slowly.

They will still get to our civilisation at one time or another

and as you said, material progress is unfortunately unavoidable.

Simon: A little while later the fires were restarted and beiju was cooked

and Loren noticed that Barnacle was the only one that hadn't eaten.

He was back making his arrows. Why hadn't he eaten?

And then suddenly he realised

Loren: He's fasting. Okay. Why is he fasting?

Some of us are friends.

[sound of a door]

Noma: Dadda, I'm hungry

Simon: No sweetie pops, my darling, look you can't keep on getting up, okay

Noma: Why have you got your shoes on it the house?

Simon: What? Oh

Noma: You don't want to get the floor dirty

Simon: Well yeah, Mumma's away I thought it didn't matter really

Alright. I'll take them off your right, I'll take them off

Now sweetie, you really must

Noma: Can I have something to eat?

Simon: I haven't got anything to eat, my. Oh I see you're looking my personal midnight snack

That's mine. You want some of this, is that it?

Noma: Mmm yes please

I thought so.

Simon: Alright, you can have one but then you're going back to sleep. Alright my sweetie

[Crunching]

Noma: Night night Daddy, give me a kiss

Simon: Night night my darling

Off you go, and don't slam the door sweetie. Got a little headache. Quiet, quiet

[door slam]

Simon: I've got Walkers again tonight. Hoping for Kettles but there we go. It being a special night

What does it say here?

Follow us on Twitter. How do you follow a crisp packet on Twitter?

[Rustling/crackling]

[sound of fire crackling]

Simon: He awoke feeling fingers on his left arm, he looked up his watch was gone

and people were looking down to him in his hammock and then a nauseating smell of smoke

and burning rubber was filling his nostrils.

He looked over the edge of his hammock and he realised what it was

Loren: Oh god my trainers. My Adidas trainers. They're burning my Adidas trainers. God.

Simon: 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.

Loren: Yeah excuse me fellas, excuse me, those are mine.

Okay, alright. You can laugh. You don't need shoes and I do. Ohhhhhhhh

Owwweeeee

Okay, so you got my shoes, got my watch. At least I've got my camera

and at that moment I realised I didn't have my camera.

I had gone to sleep with it on my hip, it was no longer there.

So I walked back into my hut, I looked at my hammock, it wasn't there. Where is it?

It's nowhere in the hut so they've taken it. And suddenly my heart is racing in front of me.

I go out. People are glancing at me, glancing away, I wanna get hold of them and say:

Where's my fucking camera?!

Calm down, calm down, they're naked, they can't hide a black box anywhere.

And then suddenly I see Red Cheeks who is looking at me his arms folded and then he turns away.

And here comes Barnacle. Oh he's clearly innocent of all this.

He's looking to right and left to see what's going on

and people are avoiding his eyes and suddenly I realise they're hexing me.

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

and I know I have to act, I have to do something before the moment passed.

I was being ostracised, 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.

[running sounds]

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. 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 standing in the crowd

trying to gauge their reactions. So every time 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.

Voice: We have to communicate

Voice: We are communicating

Loren: Eight, nine, ten, eleven laps

Voice: I want to survive, I want you to survive

Loren: I ran on and on. The heat was intense. I pushed myself to the absolute limit.

Everybody was watching, everybody was discussing. Eighteen, nineteen, twenty laps

and on the twentieth lap I slowed to walk the last half lap

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

What was he gonna do?

And then he turned and started jogging just the way I had gone.

[Running sounds]

But in the opposite direction. Counter clockwise.

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.

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

Loren: At that point I thought I was I 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 believe in that shit. But still, I received it every time.

Voice: I have no alternative. I have to try to make it work.

Loren: Okay. So there was some bigger emergency. There's a threshold of some kind in the tribe's life.

That's what I understood.

Voice: Other white people have been before. They brought death.

My people are trying now to avoid that death

Loren: It was very clear. Barnacle was leading his people somewhere, where I didn't know

but on he went. On and on and 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 had drifted away in disgust but on he ran.

And now the messages were not the same. They had sort of dissolved

and they no longer glowed, they sort of dissolved into a residual message

a kind of leftover and it crystalised into this

The face of time. The face of time.

What does he mean? The face of time?

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

Eighteen, nineteen, and on the twentieth lap he walked the last half lap and everybody

hailed their chief.

[Cheering]

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 our competing spells.

The face of time. The face of time. What did he mean by that?

Had I heard anything? What had I heard?

I slipped my feet into the remains of my chargrilled Adidas trainers.

I turned towards the forest and composed myself.

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

That's a roll of film. My film. I had two rolls of film, now I've only got one.

I must have dropped one as I was running Who put it up there? And my camera.

I looked a little higher and I saw what had got both things because there was my camera,

in the hands of a wooly monkey.

Yeah, yeah that's a pet of one of the kids. He's climbing higher. Hey, hey buddy!

Oooo yeah ooo throw it yar, throw...What am I doing? I'm talking to a monkey.

If I get a stick and get that fucker...

and then he caught it. Bad idea.

Oh no, now he's poking at the camera. Don't do that. No no the camera. Bad.

Flies open. He rips out the film, pops out, he throws it. He's got the camera in two hands

and in one movement, these guys are strong, he ripped it in two

[Camera] great shot.

Simon: Loren 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.

No watch. He's have to live by nature's clock.

He'd have to be like these people

Petru: After this, Barnacle, as is described in the book, became extremely friendly

and he started to spend time with him.

And to sort of protect – anyway, Barnacle and, er, McIntyre, became a sort of inseparable item.

And he claims that then the time, by ten days in...

Loren: Barnacle indicated that we should walk into the forest together. We passed a group

of children,

who gathered around a shaman. Tutti was there. He was showing them caterpillars, insects, plants.

School in 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.

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 can he know about my camera? How can he 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

Fala fala portuguese?

He was silent and then he frowned and then he leapt 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 something like

Here's the forest, if you want to run away I'm not gonna stop you.

I said nothing. Again he reiterated that other white people had been here before me and brought 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

but the clearest description I can give is that it was like a kind of dialogue. He said

Voice: We have been moving around

Loren: So I tried to communicate back. Have you been attacked?

Voice: Yes....By white people who came down from the sky

Loren: So where are you moving to?

Voice: We're going to the beginning

Loren: What? What was that? The beginning?

What beginning?

Voice: The beginning

Loren: We walked back to the village and then Barnacle stopped and scanned me with his eyes,

what they spelled was clear, no beaming necessary. What was I gonna do?

Was I coming with them?

I turned away because I was asking myself the same question. What am I gonna do?

Petru: But he kept telling us, how can I say this, the Geographic is going to jump on me?

I said, Loren no one’s going to jump on you, you may create some controversy

about whether what you believe happened, happened

but that's not a case of fraud or anything.

We got him comfortable, and, he was towards the age, to which he wanted to talk about it

Noma: Can you know what I'm thinking inside my head?

Steven Rose: Of course I need my brain. I need my brain to think. I need my brain to

be conscious.

It doesn't mean that consciousness is in my brain any more than the fact that I need my

legs to walk...

Ian McGilchrist: Everything in the world is only known in comparison to everything else

that we know.

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

The myth that we’re up against now is that there’s some kind of abstract, objective

reality

that is beyond our myth making, beyond language, beyond metaphor, which is absolute rather

than relative.

But there is no such thing.

Loren: I slept until I thought I was dreaming of a jaguar and it's grunt [growling]

but then I woke. There was a jaguar in the village. A jaguar in the village!

I sat bolt upright. In the nearest hut, children cried out in panic. The noise of the village

tripled in volume.

[Commotion]

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, always wanted to see a jaguar hunt, I was just furious that I didn't have

my camera.

Anyway, we scrambled over the wet grass into a solid wall of fogged out forest vegetation.

[Branches breaking] the branches went away into the darkness like flares. 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?

Heyay called Red Cheeks.

There they are in front of a thicket, spiny thicket.

I hurried towards it, so as not to miss the spectacle. [Growling]

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 it went out. The other branches disappeared in the

same instant.

Total dark followed.

Okay I'm trapped. Where's the jaguar? Where's the jaguar?

And then I realised there wasn't one.

Red Cheeks had imitated the grunt himself

and now I'm alone in the dark in the jungle. Okay.

I've got to get out of the thorn bush.

Die ten times over before anyone finds you if you don't get out.

The thorns were in my arms, my legs, my arse. Doesn't matter, just get out of here.

Doesn't matter how painful. Off you go. Just pull [branches breaking]

Oh god, now get them out of your skin. Pull them out. Oh they keep breaking.

Now my arms are running with blood. I wave them in the air

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

because I'm a magnet. Formations and formations of gnats, streak through the air towards me

[buzzing]

I scratch an arm; they pucker my face. I’ve got to move, to shake them off

[buzzing]

It's okay, okay, okay.

Whats that? It's okay an animal is more afraid of you than you are of it.

Think of something else. Think of evolution. How does a mosquito know that there's blood here?

Come on think about it. Think of anything. What's that? Oh my god, look.

Something luminous. What is that? Oh my god. Look at that. It's four pairs of luminous eyes.

What is it? It's a spider? Oh my god.

I looked into a palpitating mass of electric fire. I bring my eyes so close to this 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? You know, how did he evolve? 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.

He's gobbled, yeah...and now we're back in darkness.

[scratching] I wake up scratching. The bugs have laid their eggs in the wounds left by the thorns

as I slept standing up.

Light! Okay, come on. Walk now. I need you to.

The trail back to the village. I'm saved.

And then I found a second trail and 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. They might move out of range.

Voice: We're going to the beginning

Loren: They're gonna 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.

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 hacked off, sawn off branches.

[chainsaw] Oh technological man is here! God. Hello! Anybody there?

Rebecca Spooner: And because of the price of oil these very remote regions

are being opened up to that kind of very expensive work.

Loren: I'm close to my fellow modern man.

The rapacious developer, as objectionable as he may be, I welcome his presence…

[Drilling]

I'm just thinking. I'm hoping it's just my hope making me... but look here's cable

and then I realise it's not a cable, it's a traffic of army ants

and I follow them away from the ant hill and then as I follow them, all of a sudden I find

a watch

and then I understand and before I can fully articulate the thought I start running along

the freeway of ants

all the way across the clearing as fast as I can and I find four bodies.

Voice: Other white people have been before and brought death

Loren: 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 but it's just the movement

of ants crawling all over them.

There's an arrow. An arrow sticking out of the hulk of a chest.

Will there be a rescue? Seems silly to think so.

Maybe if I put my hands in here?

I'll find a wallet to identify these guys.

I can't bring myself to put my hand in this mess...and then I see swelling on my arm and

I pull at it

and I pull out a bit fat maggot. White maggot and I remember its scientific name.

Callitroga Hominixvorax. Hominixvorax means devourer of man – I pop it and then I have

to walk.

Where's the river? I walked for an hour, I don't find anything. I walk on.

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

One fifth of the world's fresh water is in the Amazon basin and I can't find anything.

I'm getting very dehydrated now. The heat is intense and suddenly I look up

and see a thing that looks like a cucumber hanging off a vine. I pull it off and I suck

on it.

[Squelching]

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

I have to

and then I reach an interesting state of inebriation. The forest becomes my brain.

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

Now 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. I panic. Why did I tear that

corner open?

I'm not ready for this. No, not like that spider on his way last night with the snake.

And then a thought howls at me sadly.

Voice: Never part of nature

Loren: Yeah we were never part of nature!

No we're not part of nature are we?

I'm not part of nature.

David Farmer: a recognition that we are actually part of nature.

Loren: No. Come on.

David Farmer: part of nature, and we cannot escape from it, just as we cannot escape from

the planet.

Suddenly I jacked knife 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 is going to eat me first? It will be the forest pigs,

tapirs

and then with an enormous force of will I raise my head and I see a lion marmoset, 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 the marmoset’s eyes.

Death is a bank of lights being switched off, a vast theatre in my head.

It grows like a cacophony, on and on and on

and then it dims, and then black.

Noma: Twinkle twinkle little star, How I wonder what you are

Like a diamond in the sky, Twinkle twinkle little star

How I wonder what you are.

[Heavy breathing]

[Humming]

[Singing]

The Mayoruna found him yards from the 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 and slept again and woke again

at one point he thought he saw a face in the doorway.

Loren: Barnacle

Simon: 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,

their 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.

Loren: Red Cheeks. Red Cheeks.

Simon: Red Cheeks was looking at him.

What Loren saw was a body sewn into a funeral basket. Red Cheeks face could be glimpsed

inside convulsed

and his head seemed to be smoking and smouldering but as Loren looked closer

it was not smoke it was just the 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 a shaft of

light

observing him, making sure, making sure that he witnessed all of this.

Loren: You saved my life. Why?

Simon: Barnacle's gaze didn't waiver

Loren: Okay, I wanted to resist him so I turned my back when something came into my mind nonetheless

Voice: They were holding us still, still in time.

Loren: They were holding us still, still in time. What did he mean? 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?

Voice: When they burn up, we move away.

Loren: What burns up? - And then suddenly with incredible violence he set all the huts

on fire.

Red Cheeks body is going up in flames now! What's going on? Okay, we're moving on

into the forest [heavy breathing]

Okay we walk, what's happening? Come on. Push yourself. Where are we going?

We walk all day and all the time I'm straining, hoping to hear a plane, every time I see a

little blue sky

in the canopy, I want to even to see a vapour 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 day.

We drink water.

Somehow in my anger I force myself to walk behind Barnacle. Where are we going? I communicated.

To the beginning?

Voice: The beginning

Loren: Okay. Well what are we going to find in your goddam beginning?

And he walks on inexorably and suddenly I realise 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.

I'm at the back now, I'm gonna take leave of Barnacle and his people.

I'll follow them to the first navigable body of water. I'll use a log as a raft.

Don't listen to my thoughts! Don't hear my thoughts. Don't hear them. I'll take my chances.

And then suddenly one morning...[sniffing] No that's a human scent. It is.

Yeah it is. Smoke. Could it be decomposition

a village, a settlement. Maybe they'll have a boat!

a radio! Come on! Then suddenly a crowd of tribes people stormed through the trees

and we're surrounded by another tribe of Mayoruna

less gaunt, less emaciated. The children are running, hugging and jumping, playing.

People greeting each other and smiling and Barnacle disappears into a group of women

and children.

They're his family and Tutti runs across and hugs the old man and he throws him up on to

his shoulders.

Why have I never guessed, Tutti is Barnacle's son and then suddenly somebody offers me some

food

and I'm eating

[Eating noises]

Loren: Great gobs of food are hurting my intestines

but my blood sugar level it is rising. Come on.

I feel drunk with momentary survival. Drunk with food.

I look at the new members. There's a shaman I haven't seen before, another conical hat

of leaves

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 and he turns and I say to him.

Hola, mi nombre es Loren. Loren. Fala Portuguese? No? Fala Portuguese?

I turn away, disappointment bigger then suddenly over my shoulder I hear.

Cambio: Loren, sim. Bem-vindo, Loren, Cambio

Loren: speaking to me in Portuguese. He says, Welcome, Loren, welcome.

And then Cambio. Cambio means ‘Over’ in radio parlance.

He just greeted me with - Welcome Loren Over - I want to hug him

and then I want to say 'listen I got dropped here by a plane. I've been with these people

and-' Calm down!

Calm down. Ask him something simple. Come on.

Is this your village? é esta a sua aldeia?

Cambio: Sim, minha aldeia, Cambio.

Loren: My village. Over. So all these people they're relatives of yours. Então essas pessoas

são sua família?

Cambio: Meu povo, Cambio

Loren: Well how come you speak Portuguese? Como que você fala português?

[He replies in Portuguese]

Loren: and then he tells me six years ago, gunmen came, working for developers,

they attacked the village. Shot my wife. My children. And I got to a place of safety in

a mission

and I got work as a servant for a radio operator. Over. And from him I learnt Portuguese. Over.

Seu nome? Your name?

Cambio: Eles me chamaram Cambio. Cambio.

Loren: “They call me Over. Over”

Smoke hits my eyes. I turn around a vast fire has been built.

The two communities are standing round it. Others are walking towards it.

They're holding all their belongings. Axes, manioc graters, calabashes, fishhooks, fishnets

and they're putting them in a pile next to the fire.

oh and look at this headdresses eagret feathers and bows and arrows and pots 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.

Loren: What's happening Cambio?

Cambio: A cerimônia , over.

Loren: “A ceremony, over.” For what?

Cambio: Estamos voltando

Loren: "We're returning" - he says

"These things die here so we can return." What do you mean? You're going back in time?

No?

Cambio: Não, não vou viajar no tempo. Vou voltar no tempo, cambio

Loren: "Not going back. Returning" Sounds like return ticket. So you're 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

Cambio: Eles seguram a gente no tempo.Cambio.

Loren: "They hold us still. Still in time" The same words that Barnacle used.

Cambio, listen, the headman here, with the boy on his shoulders. He told me with the

same words

about your return to the beginning, except I don't speak Mayoruna. Do you understand?

There's a silence

Loren: "Maybe he spoke to you in the other language. The old language" No, no he didn't

speak to me. I think he spoke to me without words.

Loren: "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 that Barnacle is looking at me. He's looking at the back of my head.

I turn and I see him. He has in his hands - he's looking at me - in his hands is an

arrow.

It's the arrow that he gave me and now he is 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 bows and arrows.

They shatter the whole pile, the bits of wood, bone, husks, feather, loose human teeth strung

necklaces.

My god. Everything that's beautiful and useful onto the fire.

And the flames are leaping up. There's no hesitation. There's not even a look of regret

Loren: “We are loosening our bonds" says Cambio "Getting freer and freer. Sailing in

time, over.”

Loren: What will happen when you get to your destination Cambio? What will happen then?

Loren: To hell with all this shit! He says and walks away.

God, imagine us burning our possessions so as not to remain still in time!

And I close my eyes and I picture bonfires like this along some affluent American street.

You know, people dragging out there belongings into the front yard,

you know, appliances, toys, spraying it in gasoline and then setting light to it. Yeah.

A bonfire in one front yard, and another and another. All down the street. All through

the neighbourhood

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. A city in flames.

[emergency sirens]

Where are we? Washington! Pennsylvania Avenue, the White House, on fire! Library of Congress,

on fire!

Burning the past! Burning it all. Freeing itself, taking off, soaring,

carried by the vehicle of the sacrificial, purifying flames! Carried where? Who knows?

Maybe I'll live to find the answer!

Have we got rid of anything? Have we got rid of shit!

It's all plastic!

Okay we can smash glass! [glass smashing]

But can we get rid of this fucking stuff? Can we?!

Jesus Christ!

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

Lets get rid of this mutherfucking thing!

Come on! We don't need it. There's just too much. There's too much!

Oh god!

There's too much to get rid of!

Come on!

Come on!

Let's get rid of this fucking shit!

Are we gonna do it? How about this motherfuckers! It's all backed up. It's all in the fucking

Cloud!

Well fuck that. Put a fucking a hammer through this...[phone rings]

Simon: Hello

[door creaks open] Noma: Dadda I had a bad dream

Simon: Oh listen sweetie, go back to bed, I've got a

Noma: Why are you always speaking on your phone?

Simon: I'm just working

Noma: It's so boring

Simon: I know - hello? Who is this? Oh god

Noma: Can I play on your phone then?

Simon: Well, I'm not playing sweetie. Do you want some water?

Noma: No fizzy water

Simon: Well we don't have any fizzy water. Let's go

and get some from the tap

[tap running]

Simon: There you are. Drink it up

Noma: How long have I been asleep?

Simon: My sweetie I don't know. Maybe, half an hour. Something. You've got to go to sleep

now

Loren: I open my eyes, Cambio's here.

Cambio: Loren, Loren

Loren: "No Loren, over"

What are you talking about? Cambio, listen, I just got in to my hammock. I've been asleep

two minutes

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

I swing out of my hammock, I stand, I shiver, it's cold, it's night and then he says

Cambio: O comeco, cambio

Loren: the beginning. What do you mean? The ceremony is now? It's going to happen now?

Wait wait but Barnacle said it wasn't going to happen for weeks. I mean ceremony's happening

Cambio 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?

Cambio turns away and then he says "no, no there is no other way out the old belief has

to be proven true"

Cambio: Agora Lowen, Cambio.

Loren: "Come, come, come" He pulls me by the elbow out. There are tribesmen walking around

in the dark.

They've got there cat whiskers in and the community is making a huge long line all the

way across the village

"Agora Loren" I now know what it means, they've painted their bodies with black vegetable

dye.

It's begun. We watch and they begin to dance.

[clapping and rustling]

Standing behind them, they're moving together. Towards the beginning.

And suddenly Cambio is pulling me by my arm, we step in when there's a gap, we do

one, two, three, three to the left, two to the right, two back [clap]

one, one, two three, one, two, one, two, three [clap].

Okay, one, two, three, one, two [clap]. We clap hard and repeat. One, two, three, one,

two [clap]

Over and over. God. And now return [clap]. One, two, three, one, two [clap].

One two. It's hypnotic. One two. My mind starts to travel. How long have I been here? 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 his

door.

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.

There's a silence.

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

Cambio translates.

Okay, "why have you not left us, why have you not fled?" Okay, so I choose my words

carefully.

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

and 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

that nobody is ever going to find you here. Nobody and I can speak to the Brazilian government.

I can speak to to FUNAI's indigenous affairs department. Basically, tell him. I can help.

Cambio translates. Barnacle looks at me and he says

"No no they will always come looking for that oil with guns and planes and alcohol"

So 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 when we're -

"We won't" he says "have you?" And suddenly I realise I can't remember the last time I

did hear a plane

or even saw a vapour trail in the sky. So does that mean we're close? Cambio?

"Very close" he says. "You can already feel it and you will see the signs".

Thanks buddy. He offers me a cigar and now they're talking all between them

and Cambio's translation skills are put to the test. They're talking about time

and they're saying that the beginning runs parallel to our 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.

Voice: You'll prove that it is real

Loren: 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 stamp through that door.

Rebecca Spooner: The Mayoruna describe the oil underneath the ground as the blood of

the earth

and they’re concerned like other indigenous people that if you suck out that blood,

the oil, the life source, and then the earth will cease to exist.

Ian McGilchrist: Earlier you talked about your child. And watching this little consciousness

grow….

Jess Worth: which is probably the most destructive source of fossil fuels in the world…

Loren: We danced all night. The sun explodes above the horizon.

A cycle has ended, another one is beginning.

2000 miles away to the east it's already noon

but here it is morning.

A morning loaded with events as yet unhappened

and one of those events, one of those events might be our death. Ahhhh [cheers]

We stop. Our bodies cry with exhaustion.

Barnacle appears a diadem of egret feathers on his head. I can just feel him passing down

the line.

I desperately need something to drink otherwise I'm going to keel over

and here comes a bowl of masato beer. I drink it. Take a gulp. It tastes of herbs. I pass

it on.

At the end of the line Barnacle is asking standard questions, which each man replies.

Come on, give me some of that buddy.

I have to pass it on again. What's happening? They're getting new names. New names for the

beginning.

Okay, okay. Here comes another one I'm gonna hang on to this one.

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

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

Now he's coming up to Cambio.

Cambio: Cambio

Loren: My friend christens himself and then he winks at me.

Now it's my turn. I don't want to lose my name. Even though it is just a memory

McIntyre.

He stamps my forehead and he passes on

"Tyre". Tyre. That'll do. That's okay. Just let me drink.

I begin to feel a little more human.

God I hope there's no drug in that drink.

There is.

I feel a numbing in my limbs,

my bones are liquifying, it's a liquefaction suggesting a kind of birth.

Very slowly from skeleton hard, they’re growing mellower, and sort of coming alive.

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

I feel I could expand and contract distances at will.

I try to stop thinking. Come on. No thinking. Open myself completely to the present moment

and then I get, I feel like there's two of me.

I get a taste of something, now I'm in triple here.

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.

And then it vanishes. Cambio!

Wait Cambio. Where are you going? We're going to look at something? Okay.

There's a mighty croaking of frogs behind a hut. We see all these shaman gathered around

a basket of frogs

and they're reaching in with their hands and spooning off the pimples on their backs,

a tiny transparent substance and collecting it in little bowls

and then suddenly Cambio reaches in his hand, takes a frog and shoots out a tongue [licking

[slurping noise]

"To see the beginning. Over" he says. To see the beginning Cambio?

"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 the backs, the pimples

on the backs,

which are weeping like so many ulcers and then oh my god this guy's got a knife of chonta

palm.

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 and when I turn back it's not the frog that he's slicing open it's his forearm.

Oh god. Come on [grunts]

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 up with sweat, the drugs working in him.

"Plants grow inside me!" He says, with such conviction, I expect bromeliads to come out

of his chest.

Oh, he keels over. You okay buddy? And now everybody.

Now the whole clearing is full of stumbling, cawing, barking, growling, shrieking men [shrieks]

and although I haven't had any of this I feel like an animal [his voice turns into an animal

[growl]

[Growling and roaring]

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 walking, crossing, re-crossing,

trying to communicate with, he's crossing, coming forward, in a landscape fogged up.

No it's not a landscape, it's not territory, it's time. Our time.

Across the fog, a silhouette coming towards me. It's Barnacle. I open my eyes.

He's shadow seems to reach across the clearing and he'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.

Voice: You'll prove that it is real

Loren: No! I am not a cell! I am not a molecule! I'm not an ant, blindly obeying nature!

I'm a modern man!

You think that time comes in objects like milk in mothers?

Do you think waltzing around 100 square miles of bush is going to take us back in time?

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

I'm going to 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.

Six. No. Twenty six. No!

To recapture myself, I turn to face the forest. It's a jumble of trees and leaves but I see

a lupuna.

What's its latin name? You know perfectly well. It's su - ma - 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? Well just - back!

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! Us!

But listen, the civilised world hasn’t disappeared - what do you mean? - It's simply not appeared

yet.

We are the first humans in 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? I have not. Just go...

Time passes, a lot of time passes.

Eventually Cambio rubs his hands over his face and lumbers over towards me,

collapses beside me. Hi Buddy.

And although my eyes are shut I know that Barnacle is looking at me and I open them

and his gaze is opaque and sphinx-like, I turn to Cambio and say

translate this Cambio, ask him...

Quando vamos morrer? When are we gonna die?

I just want to know. Okay? I wanna face it.

Cambio translates and then suddenly Barnacle's hand takes my arm and he taps my arm with a touch that's hard,

sure, certain

“Nao morrer.” Nao morrer? Not to die. Not to die.

The cold wing of death has 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.

Barnacle pulls me up.

We walk into the forest.

He walks ahead of me, rolling his shoulders like an old man fighting stiffness.

Two old men. And I can't tell how long it is before we reach the river,

along which we walk, we walk and walk

and then suddenly he stops in front of an enormous curve and reach going on and on and

he says

[Barnacle speaks]

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 that 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, below, inside, outside to one notion.

The beginning - beams Barnacle. 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.

So you heard me at the back of that march. You know I - I whisper without words.

"We know" he says and I understand.

Just as Barnacle undid my spell by running counter-clockwise, I could be the crack between

here and there.

I could undo their return.

The crack through which another time, our time, might flood.

And with this narrative, he suddenly looks very naked and very tired, aged in fact, vulnerable

and he walks away back towards the other naked, vulnerable people in the forest.

Until just hours ago I was a modern man, activated by the pressures of my civilisation

crowded inside its limits. Barnacle and his people were even more pressured by the advance

of my civilisation

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.

"Tyre!" He calls me

and I nod reassuringly.

I pad back to the village

Back to captivity, while the song of the forest rises [insect noises and music]

It gains in richness and melody.

My prison, my beautiful prison is singing, singing.

[Thunder rolls]

Simon: 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

and 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 trees

for their protection

and so they ran, stampeding, hurtling, heading for higher ground.

[Typing] Loren: Caicaque Barnacle. Tribu Matses. Cachoeira Esperanza. Ultra –Orientla Cordeillera.

Dear Barnacle, 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 Cambio (Hola

Cambio).

Still, writing it makes me feel that you are alive.

[Storm breaks]

Simon: McIntyre was almost knocked down by the traffic of tribes people.

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 mashed together with bark fibre and he fell across the raft without thinking of

clinging to it

and the current dragged them both through the stream of low trees and beyond

and he paddled desperately, trying to steer himself back to his new family but then

he realised, he had unconsciously opted for escape.

He was pulled into the main river and the repeated lightening revealed a frothing, boiling

purple mass of water.

Return was now impossible.

Still of all the thoughts tumbling through his mind, his most anxious was about the headman.

Barnacle.

Loren: Dear Barnacle, You are 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’s 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, 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 are doing something with time, not agonising about understanding it.

That’s why I know somehow you are present here and you will somehow be able to learn the

contents of this letter..

Simon: The morning came fast, the grim, grim grey light brought by the rain

down onto the frothing water, he saw a mudflat,

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 McIntyre had experienced.

They were travelling 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.

[Water rushing]

Petru: Loren McIntyre died in 2003. And I did not see him before he died.

And we hadn’t lapsed, it simply so happened that we, as happens in life with 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.

I think I was, er, secretly, frightened to see him weak. I had met him when he was already

an older man

but he was so vivacious and full of energy...

Loren: Dear Barnacle, I’m here, 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 connect.

Noma: I can't sleep

Simon: Oh my darling, what are you doing up? It's way too late.

Noma: Will you tell me a story to help me sleep?

Simon: Sweetie, story time was a long long time ago. I don't have any stories here, sweetie

Noma: One from the book you're reading

Simon: No that's a grownup book, that's Petru's book, that's the jungle book. I don't have

any stories.

Noma: Daddy please read me a story

Simon: I, I, 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 you'll go to sleep?

Noma: Yes

Simon: okay, let me see. I'll find some little bit. Oh yeah. I know

There is a bit. Okay. So this is a story. You remember Petru don't you sweetie?

Noma: Yes

So this is a story, that was told to him by McIntyre, who met Cambio, who told it to him and

his dad told it to Cambio

and his dad and his dad. And it's about how the people that lived there. How they began.

It's about their beginning. You're at the beginning aren't you sweetie?

Noma: Yes

Simon: Here you go. Once upon a time, the 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.

Thus the big river split into thousands of smaller rivers, and the sky, sad over the

loss, cried its first rain.

[sound of Noma breathing asleep]

Some of us are friends [looped]

[applause]

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 just for me sound operators, they are musicians, they are characters and they

play with me.

[Applause]

And the other thing I have been asked to say, about a year and a half ago, little bit longer,

I was about an hours jet ride west of Manaus, in the Amazon Basin

and I was with a Mayoruna 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

but it all focused down to one 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

"your people".

That's you. "You will please tell them that we, the Mayoruna, 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 they fight for the land 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.

[Applause]

To all those of you at home who have watched this far, thank you for watching

The most urgent thing I have to say is that on the Complicité YouTube channel

there is a film by an Amazonian film maker

called Takumã Kuikuro

a close friend of mine

It is called COVID-19 Brazil

and it tells about the current situation in the Amazon

as it currently stands with the pandemic

please watch it.

It's worrying, urgent, necessary and there are ways we can help

In the meantime, please take great care and stay safe.