The Bird Man, Magical Mate, And The Beauty Of Community (hey that rhymes!)

I have decided, to prove to you all that I don't always just sit around dancing with trees and reflecting on the nature of life, to dedicate this blog to something really cool I got to do this past weekend.

The United States shares some things with Chile-the pacific ocean, relative isolation from other countries, McDonalds. It also shares a rather horrific past of indigenous people murdered, forcefully converted, their land taken away, discrimation, and lots of other sad things that humanity can do sometimes. The Mapuche is the main indigenous group of Chile, and it has suffered mightily at the hands of first the Inca and next the Spanish, and then the Chileans.

But don't you worry, this blog isn't about bemoaning the past...it's about celebrating the beauty of the present and the hope of the future! I'm in an agroecology club here, and the club organized a weekend with two Mapuche leaders to hold traditional ceremonies, drink hella mate, and salute the beauty of community and forging a positive future.

---This calls for a brief interlude to discuss the wondrous beauty that is mate. Mate is an herb that is crushed up, dried, and consumed with water in a gourd. It has quite a history in South America, especially places like Paraguay and Argentina. But what attracted me to mate was not it's bitter, at first kind of gross taste, nor the fact that it helps you pass things through your system like you're a human waterslide (it had just been too long since I made a bowel reference). Nope, what attracted me is the communal way in which mate is consumed.

So you sit in a circle, and one person is the cebador (pourer). He/she fills up the gourd with mate and hot water, and passes it to the first person in the circle, who finishes it and passes it back to the pourer, who refills the gourd and passes it to the second person, and on and on in a perfect circle. Sorry bacteria freaks, but you drink out of the same straw, just adding to this communal tradition. You're not just sharing the herb, you're sharing your intimate bacteria. Don't you even think about wiping off that straw! You can betcha if there's one thing I'll be bringing back to the States, it is blessed mate. Prepare yourself, my friends....---

I'll be posting some serious mate pictures soon. Now, back to the main function.

So yes, about 10 of us spent the night in Bonifacio, a 1.5 hour bus ride from Valdivia very close to where I fasted last week. It's about a 1,000 person pueblo with open pastures, pure ocean views, dirt roads, and something very sacred and pure in the air. The house we stayed in was outfitted with all kinds of Mapuche instruments. I sort of learned to play the katruun, a circular tube with a horn at the end (somewhat similar to the Jewish shofar). After each katruun session you turn it upside down and watch all your expended spit drip out. Mmm....

The night was like the rural indigenous childhood I never had. We sat around in a circle, passing the Mate, mostly listening to the two Mapuche elders speaking of things which sounded very very wise. The whole time I was mostly in awe at just how cool this all was. A big theme of the weekend was rebuilding Mapuche self-esteem and learning the Mapuche language, which is nearly going extinct due to racism and discrimation against all things Mapuche. Their language is beatiful, totally based on 19 symbols, of things in nature and things integral to their culture. It occurred to me here just how important a language is to a people's culture, how much of their sacred identity it forms. It made me very thankful that people like these Mapuche leaders exist and fight mightily to maintain their beautiful traditions and culture.

So far I've neglected to reveal the identity of the one of the two Mapuche elders: El Hombre Pajaro (literally, the bird man). In the Mapuche tradition, there is one hombre pajaro every generation, and we were graced with his presence. He has an ability to communicate with the birds, an incredible knowledge of them. His bird calls and chanting blew me away. He's a poet also, and writes poems about all the birds (I bought the book and managed to spill wine on it, but hopefully it'll just flavor the words even more).

El hombre pajaro led us through a Mapuche ceremony in the morning, where several people played Mapuche instruments, and everyone stood facing the sun, directing their prayers that way. After the ceremony we ate an incredible amount of oysters, homemade sopaipillas (like fried bread), and drank a lot more mate.

At the bus stop on the way back, a middle-aged couple struck up a conversation with us, and insisted on giving us their crackers, a simple gesture which just blew me away. So it is with many people here, so generous, without asking for anything in return.

Even after all this time
The sun never says to the earth,
"You owe Me."
Look what happens
with a love like that,
It lights the Whole Sky. --Hafiz

Be well, peoples!

Love,
Ryan

When The Trees Invite You To Dance

That's me, about to be eaten by Valdivian sea lions.
Doing capoeira, martial arts fight/dancing/craziness (explanation to follow in later blog)

Alright so it's not the tree, but it's a nice one.

Maybe it was doing capoeira in the Botanical Gardens today, maybe it was sipping about 6 cups of mate, but I got inspired. And as I was walking down a very nice cobblestone lined pedestrian avenue, I saw a very nice looking tree, leaves bristling in the wind. I thought I'd sit for a minute, and that minute turned into an hour, and when I was done I had written this. I don't have the picture of the tree on here yet, but I'll get it here soon!

Tree

Have you seen how the leaves dance to the wind's beat? The leaves, green and fresh, nod yes, yes, to life. I accept what you offer, I accept where you take me, I will dance to your beat.

This tree remembers. Its rings, circular like this life, show us how it remembers every single year. It remembers when the wind came, a month ago, and itself, so bare. Bare, no leaves to spare. Just an empty hulking figure proudly bearing the cold, beautiful in its vulnerability. It shed that most vibrant part of itself but it did not retract.

It said, "Wind, one day we will dance, bu today we just gently sway."

And then changed the season, as all things change, and it was time to dance. Have you seen how the leaves dance to the wind's beat? I did, one day, when I stopped to rest. The tree invited me and we danced together. He knew what he was, this tree.

And when I asked him why dance, why now in this moment, he said it was windy, and it was time to dance.

He seen sprouted flowers, the tree. He couldn't even contain his leafy dancing joy, so he bloomed life itself, and for a few precious moments he offered the world the vulnerable precious core of his being, his very life essence.

And he danced some more, the dance of life, and the wind fulfilled that most ancient compact to carry him and his offspring where she would, to land in the outstretched hands of Mother Earth and all her children.

I returned again one day, ready to dance the dance of love with the tree, and I found it bare, the vitality of its past rotting at its feet. It started to rain and its barren emptiness didn't even cover me.

"Where is the glory of your past?" I cried out, drenched in this terrible rain. "Where is your dance of love?"

It looked at me with the patience of a tree. "I learned to die so that I may live again," he said. "The former parts of myself I shed to enrich my blood. The rain has come and it is time to rest."

And I realized he was still dancing. How could I love his flowers but not love his death? They were one and the same, one following another in that precious circular rhythm that his rings affirm, that the perfect cycle of the full and new moon dance ever month.

I am a tree, I am the moon, I am the Sun and the Rain and the Wind that invites us to dance. I am not separate, even when I think I've broken off. I am not unwhole even when I only see parts.

The moon shows but a sliver, tonight,
yet its full illuminating
shadow shines through.

I did not realize until tonight,
that though the moon is so rarely full,
it is always present and whole.

So, then, are we.

There's nothing we have to do. We are given this gift and when the wind comes we can dance, when the rain comes we can rest, and in every waking moment we can be awake to that which we are.

"You scour the Earth," says the tree, "and still there you are."

And I say, thank you for inviting me to dance today.

Love,
Ryan

Yom Kippur: Not Just A Poorly Conceived Jewish Diet Strategy

Self portrait in Curinanco today (I swear I'm not a hunchback).



What the pristine view would look like without people in the way.

At a different beach on a different day. This has nothing to do with my blog, but, I feel it's important to show you all everything (no pun intended, really). I'm proving to the world that it's not just Europeans who can get away with speedos ("zunga" in spanish)


If you ask a group of adolescent Jewish children about Yom Kippur, they'll probably tell you it's the worst holiday conceived by mankind. For most of my life, I've been inclined to agree, because Yom Kippur inhibits one of the things I most enjoy doing in life (no, it is not making puns): EATING!

Yep, Yom Kippur (to pronounce correctly, say "yom" like it rhymes with "gnome," "key," and "poor,") is the most holy of the Jewish holidays. The "Day of Atonement," it is a day spent fasting and apologizing for the wrongs you've committed in the last year. Or, better put, a day spent complaining about how damn hungry you are.

But, being in Chile for this year's Yom Kippur, I felt I should really support Chile's Jewish population of approximately 4 people. Also, I was ready for such a day...I reached a serious lowpoint last Thursday night. It was a sort of build-up of a couple months' worth of things not completely aired out; the loneliness of traveling and not being with close friends, not being able to fully express yourself, missing home. All the stuff that tends to come up on a long journey.

And interestingly enough, something incredible happened that Thursday night, at my lowest point: I accepted how I felt. I said, "I'm sad, and that's okay." And it's incredible what accepting my feelings and opening up to them did. Like this wave of relief spreading through my body. I started to realize how hard on myself I had been for, well, 20 years, how much I had expected of myself to be happy, be a certain way, have things go the "right" way.

So I've been thinking about that this week, about making amends for being so hard on myself. And Yom Kippur arrived just in time. I decided to dedicate the day to fast and reflection. I bussed an hour away to Curinanco and spent the day hiking, enjoying nature, staring out on the cliffs, meditation, writing. It was quite a day. And here's what I wrote while up on a high cliff surrounded by sea and forest and myself:


Here I am. At the tip of this pen. Sitting cross-legged, shoeless, on a grassy hill far above the ocean. Here I am staring at nothing but ocean and trees and dirttrails. Here I am in relative peace, gentle breeze on my face, doing something (writing) I love to do.

I came here for different reasons. One is that it's Yom Kippur, and I'm joining Jews around the world in fasting. There's a beauty in joining in on the same shared action, on taking a day not to eat and dealing with those hunger pangs that inevitably come. There's a beauty, too, in finally celebrating this day in a spiritual way, in using it to emotionally and physically purify me. As Senora Carmen told me, when you fast for God, there's no hunger.

And I also came here because it's a good time to come here. A conscious shift in my life. To accept and celebrate who I am, what I'm feeling. To embrace with an open heart.

Atonement. That's the theme of the day. "Day of Atonement." I want to rethink this day. I used to think of fasting as a punishment for our sings. We've done bad, caused suffering. We must fast to punish ourselves, and ask forgiveness and try not to do it again.

Yes, I want to rethink this day. What if instead of a day to atone for the bad we've done, it was a day of acknowledgement and set intentions? Acknowledgement that we all have this pain, acknowledgement that at times the world really gets us down, that we snap at those we love for silly reasons, that we're often not who we want to be, where we want to be, how we want to be. Acknowledgement that we've struggling here, some of us more than others.

I'll be the first to acknowledge it--I have struggled. A week ago today I sank into one of the deepest depressions of my life. "I think I'm depressed," I told my friend. "It's okay if you are," she told me. "I know," I said. "But it doesn't feel okay."

And as I sank to my lowest I received inspiration from the highest. How hard have I been on myself my whole life, demanding more, not being okay with being sad, fearing who I am, what others will think? I have held myself to the highest standard in the world. I will become enlightened. I will always live joyously. I will heal myself and the world.

Oh Lord, it was exhausting. It still is, when I get caught up in that mode. If anything I should probably seek forgiveness from myself, for not accepting and loving myself, for hiding shamefully as Adam and Eve hid from God in the Garden of Eden after eating a Fuji apple.

But I'm not going to seek forgiveness. There is nothing to forgive. There is only to accept and love. Everything I've ever done, as misguided and lost as it's been at times, has been an attempt to love, perhaps to return to that original and innocent and beautiful love that children give out so willingly. Desperate, fearful, painful, grasping, aversion, greed, confusion, sadness, gluttony, all of the yuckiness we see in the world, in our friends, and ourselves.

Oh we're so lost at times, so far from our love and joy, so far from who we are. So often we're lost, but always we can come back to Me, to ourselves, to our breath, to our body. And when we return, if only for a few moments, there's nothing to apologize for, no sheepish grin needed. You went away trying to love and remembered that your love is here, that all those things that hurt and that you fear are love too, just forgotten and misguided.

Instead of forgiving, just hug and love and acept and be whole. Return to the source, again and again. That suffering we cause, that this holy day calls on us to fast and atone for, comes when we lose touch, when we forget and reject that which we are.

I lament there is suffering in this world. I lament having caused some of it. But I did. I unconsciously did. We all unconsciously did. There's nothing to forgive, there's just to acknowledge and let go, and to love.

I don't want to cause any more suffering. I know I will, at times, but I consciously set this intention to be whole, and to not cause myself and others needless suffering.

That's what this day is for me, not a guilt-trip hang-up on my past, it's an acknowledgement and embracing and letting go of what was, an intention to move forward with all parts of myself, not just the parts that are easiest to love. I don't want to just love the sun. The rain and storm are also part of this life. And I want to love life.

As the hunger sets in and weakens me I am thankful for this physical reminder, this physical cleansing, that accompanies my emotional and spiritual cleansing. I am thankful for the ability to spend my day bowing down to myself and this vast ocean, to spend it reflecting and learning to love myself and others and this world better.

So I acknowledge myself, I acknowledge you, I acknowledge and embrace the suffering we cause and our loving attempts to end it. This is life, man. The energy is chirping and sparkling, just let it roll over you like this forever undulating ocean in front of me. And do it with all of you, because it's too painful to live anyway but whole.

Love,
Ryan

4 Month Anniversary=Bob Marley+Large Quantity Of Chilean Honey

Ecuador to Chile: much has changed, including about a 12 pound weight gain (thank you, Chilean pan) and the leaving behind of two good buddies.

It being October 1st, I'd like to wish myself a happy 4 month anniversary in South America. Four months ago today, Max, Gabe and I stood in the airport with clean shaven faces and clean bowels, ready for the blob on the map called Ecuador. 7 weeks later not much was clean, except for our consciences, knowing we had lived it up down South.

And now here I sit, munching on my Senora Carmen homemade bread topped off with too much honey from this Chilean campesino I met who sells his honey by bicycle, listening to Bob Marley (okay, so not everything can be Chilean all the time, all right?) sing "No Woman, No Cry," and then he gets to that part at the end where he says, "Everything's gonna be alright." And it's true. Even with the occassional struggles of being so far from the incredible community I continue to think about, one can't help think, as he listens to Bob Marley's assuring voice with a little bit of sweet Chilean miel (honey) to top it off, that not only is everything gonna be alright, it's gonna be really darn great.

See y'all in 10 months! (If you're thinking about getting pregnant, do me a favor and wait one more month, so I can be there for the birth).

Love,
Ryan