Dear Daughter,
Yesterday I left the Amazon jungle after an amazing week there. Prior to leaving however, I shared with my Achuar indigenous friends a dream I had about you.
You see, the Achuar live in a unique dream culture that believes in a co-created reality and embraces an eternal vision created and shared by the entire community, whose lives are devoted to reclaiming their rights. They awake early each morning to share dreams with family and make decisions according to what has come in sleep. Elders then tell myths to the children, their oral tradition keeping their collective wisdom alive for thousands of years and helping to define their decisions and future.
My dream takes place twenty years from now. In the dream, you and I make a journey similar to what I just did. We fly to Peru and then make our way deep into the rainforest home of the Achuar.
We take several flights within Peru, after which we board a motorized boat heading further up stream. As the river gets smaller, the lush trees of jungle seem to get bigger. We see copious birds of all stripes and neon butterflies fluttering across the clean water.
We marvel at the rainforest around us, which stands mostly as it has for centuries. We realize that the Achuar have been successful in protecting their lands against different threats such as oil companies and loggers as they dreamed.
When we arrive in one of the many riverside communities, the Achuar greet us as they would their own relatives. The elders welcome us in the traditional way, sitting down on hand-crafted stools and asking what news we bring. We are served masato, the fermented yucca drink that forms the basis for the Achuar diet.
Over the course of our visit, we see much evidence that the Achuar Life Plan – the comprehensive blueprint around which they have organized their own development – is in full effect.
We visit a school, in which their children are receiving a bilingual education, in both Spanish and the Achuar language. Girls your age are graduating from high school and able to attend college, learning skills they will bring home for the better of the community.
The Achuar sense of cultural identity is as strong as ever. They have been able to incorporate modern technology as it is useful for them without significantly damaging their surroundings or weakening their traditional culture. The ancestral wisdom of their elders continues to be held in high esteem amongst the community.
At the end of the visit, the Achuar thank us for having partnered with them through the years in support of their Life Plan and the defense of their territory. We thank them for protecting the rainforest and for teaching us about how to live in harmony with our environment.
Having told the Achuar about this dream, I do hope to make it a reality with you one day! In the meantime, I can’t wait to see you back home.
Love, Dad
