North America,  Mexico,  Travel

Ayahuasca Ceremony of Ayahuasca

December 18, 2022 /

When I first came to Oaxaca at the end of October, my sofa owner who is an acupuncture therapist mentioned to me that on December 17th an ayahuasca ceremony would be held in his clinic. I just listened to it at the time, because first, I was not sure whether I would stay in this city until mid-December, and second, I didn’t know much about the ayahuasca ceremony, and I was not interested enough to stay for it to mid-December. But because I met some local friends and liked this city quite a lot, I stayed here for a while before I knew it.

A week ago, the sofa owner sent a message asking me if I was still here and if I wanted to participate in this ayahuasca ceremony. I thought to myself that since the monthly rent of my house is paid on Monday, I will go to another city after that, so I will go here on Saturday. This ayahuasca ceremony originated from the South American Amazon culture, and ayahuasca means "vine of the soul" in the Quechua language of the Amazon natives. Participants in the ceremony drink a drink made from the leaves of the ayahuasca plant and chacruna coffee leaves, which contain hallucinogenic ingredients that cause the drinker to hallucinate. The ritual is a supernatural spiritual experience, and research online says it can even cure depression and anxiety states, among other psychological problems.

I have also met donkey friends who went to the Peruvian Amazon jungle to participate in this ceremony before. But the more authentic understanding of this ceremony mainly comes from Sister Shushu who I met at the Columbia Youth Hostel. I remember she told me that she tried this when she was in Oaxaca, and I also read her personal experience written in her official account. The experiences she described were strange, as if they had taken place in another world. My sofa owner told me that he has done it 14 times before, and each time it feels different, but each time he has more or less changed his life or his perception of ideas.

I feel that I am still a relatively down-to-earth person who does not believe in religion or gods. He is also not addicted to alcohol or tobacco, and has never tasted anything like marijuana, let alone drugs, except once in Colombia. The decision to go to this ceremony was mainly out of curiosity, wanting to try it out and have a new experience. A week ago, when I asked Sister Shushu what to pay attention to before going, her first reaction was "You haven't even tasted hallucinogenic mushrooms, so you went directly to the ayahuasca ceremony?! This is much more powerful than hallucinogenic mushrooms. "It made me nervous when I thought about it a few days before I went. I asked several friends around me, they have all participated, everyone's experience is different, but they all said that vomiting is normal.

The ceremony started at 8:00 p.m., and a friend who had participated in it suggested that I should not eat before I went. I thought so, and I would spit it out after eating, so I went without eating any food after lunch. It is said that one week before participating in the ceremony, one should quit smoking, drinking, meat and caffeine, in order to reduce toxins in the body and clean the body. I didn't worry too much about it. I ate some meat and felt that the impact would not be too great. I arrived just before eight o'clock, and there were only two people in the room, both Mexican-Americans living on the Texas border, who had just flown in here yesterday for this ayahuasca ceremony. One of them had attended before, and then urged his cousin, who had never been, to come with him. His cousin and another participant later turned out to be junior high school classmates with my sofa owner. After that, a few more participants came, some of whom were my acupuncture treatment patients on the sofa, and there were a total of eight participants.

Ayahuasca ceremonies are all carried out under the guidance of a shaman, who needs to preside over the overall situation, control the drinking volume, and ensure everyone's safety. My sofa owner has known this shaman for many years, and has participated in the previous 14 times with him. This shaman is a grandfather in his 60s and 70s. He was an electronic engineer before, and his grandmother was a shaman, so he changed to a shaman 27 years ago. Everyone filled out a questionnaire before starting. The questions in it were mostly about personal emotional trauma experiences: whether they were adopted, how their relationship with their parents was, whether they experienced violence or sexual assault, whether they lost a loved one and could not come out, whether divorced etc. The shaman says these questions help him monitor the reactions of the participants during the ritual so he can control what happens afterwards. The participants who came brought sleeping bags, pillows, cushions, etc. My sofa owner lent me these, and I found a place against the wall and spread the cushions on the floor. After we all filled out the questionnaire, the shaman exorcised us one by one: covered us with a white cloth, said mantras and prayers in his mouth, poured a lemon juice-like drink into his mouth, and then sipped Spray it on us, swirl it around, and spray it again. Back in the house, everyone sat on their mats. The shaman asked us to do some breathing exercises, shake our bodies to relax with the music, and let everyone take a vitamin C tablet, saying that it would help the ayahuasca after absorb. The shaman also gave each person a tiny plastic cup, some toilet paper, and a large plastic bag (in case of vomiting).

With all this in place, the ayahuasca drink was finally distributed. Guess where the drinks he makes are bottled? Haha, of course it’s in a big Coca-Cola bottle! (Mexico is a big Coca-Cola drinking country). The color is also similar to Coca-Cola, but darker. It tastes like some kind of strong boiled traditional Chinese medicine, which is unpalatable for sure. The sofa owner said that this shaman is more "benevolent". He will give a small dose at first, and then every half hour or 40 minutes if there is no response, he will give another dose. I saw that some of the people around me were sitting, and some were lying directly on the mats.

I'm curious as an observer, and I check my watch every time I drink or start to react. Drink it for the first time at 9:10, drink it for the second time at 9:50, and drink it for the third time at 10:25. The only thing on the body is that the stomach and intestines start to peristalsis anyway, and there is gas discharge. It is said that this is a normal reaction to clean up toxins in the body. But after being mentally unresponsive for many times, I even began to doubt the authenticity of this ceremony, thinking what would happen if someone drank like this for a night without any reaction? I worry too much, 11:10 is the last drink. After drinking four times, I finally had a reaction around 11:50 in the middle of the night. There are also a few people around me who drank three or four times in a row, and then I don't know if they drank again.

For nearly three hours before I reacted, I was just lying there, and there was an ordinary small portable speaker in the middle of the room playing different music. Some are very ethereal chants, and there are hymn-like music. I still remember hearing the laughter of children, and it was very relaxing during this period. Most of the experiences I heard from other friends were that they saw many strange pictures, people, creatures or their dead relatives. But I really didn't have visual hallucinations, and the reaction was more auditory.

After the fourth dose, I started to feel a bit chilly, the shaman gave me another blanket, and I also felt dry mouth. When I started to really react, I felt that there was no special music from a small speaker that suddenly turned into a stereo surround sound. I was surrounded by 360 degrees without dead ends. At a certain moment, I seemed to see the aborigines all around me in the Amazon jungle. Drumming, but not a clear picture. Apart from this vague visual hallucination, all I remember is that the melody of the music I heard became extremely beautiful, and the abstract melody combined with the light in the room that I could still feel with my eyes closed intertwined, twisted, and swirled together. I remember enjoying the music at one moment and smiling happily when I heard it, but the music suddenly became sad at the next moment, and I couldn’t control myself and started crying. I didn’t think of any sad things at the time, it was just the effect of the music. I still remember when I heard certain music, my legs and hands would shake uncontrollably to the tune of the music. Some very light and quiet music, I feel like someone is whispering in my ear. The funny thing is that every time I open my eyes and look around, everything is normal. You can also hear other people getting up to go to the toilet, snoring, mild vomiting, conversations with shamans, etc.

One of the biggest reasons for me not to drink alcohol or take anything foreign that affects the body is that I don't like being out of control. This time is the same, although I enjoyed the music and relaxed state after the reaction, this state lasted for about two hours, although I would deliberately open my eyes to observe the surrounding situation, but later I realized I didn't want to open my eyes and return to reality. This uncontrollable state made me feel a little panicked, so I forced myself to open my eyes and return to reality. And I just needed to go to the toilet. When I sat up, I saw the shaman helping another girl to go to the toilet. When she came out, I also felt dizzy when I stood up. When I sat on the toilet and stared at the floor tiles, I found a square The straight lines on the tiles began to twist and spin, and it took a while for the spin to stop. After coming out, I lay down and fell asleep slowly. Not long after, I heard someone vomited violently. It lasted for more than half an hour, and I felt that his internal organs were about to be vomited out. Thinking about it, it's a good thing I haven't eaten since noon, and I'm glad I didn't vomit all night. At four o'clock in the morning, the shaman turned off the music, saying that the whole ayahuasca ceremony was over. He is an old man in his 60s and 70s who needs to stay up late to do this ceremony. It is really not easy, and he was specially invited by my sofa owner from Mexico City. After everyone thanked him, most of them continued to sleep again. When we woke up at six or seven in the morning, everyone left one after another.

Went out to exchange feelings with my sofa owner and asked him some questions. He said that the ceremony is usually performed at night because it is not dark enough during the day, and it is affected by sunlight and outdoor noise. He said that our group was relatively quiet, and he had experienced particularly severe reactions before: some made a lot of noise, and some seemed to be possessed by the devil. This time, a girl woke up midway and communicated with the shaman that she saw bad and negative visions. I remember hearing the sound of the shaman spraying him with water to re-exorcise evil spirits. The sofa owner said that the person who vomited badly was his junior high school classmate, and he had experienced several particularly difficult times in his life, which was not easy. Others respond with diarrhea. He said another girl told him she saw her dead grandmother and tried to tell her something. He also said that his previous 14 times had different reactions each time, but it was a process of cleaning and reset. He said that I didn't see many visual hallucinations. It may be because I didn't relax and accept the ceremony. If I try to control the process with reason, I often open my eyes in the middle of the process, which may prevent me from entering a deeper illusion. When I disturbed the room for him, I found that the shaman left half a bottle of "Coca-Cola" for him on purpose. He said the shaman had repeatedly tried to teach him how to be a shaman and how to make the ayahuasca drink. It may be because he feels that he has potential and can continue to pass on this ceremony. Of course, it was out of great trust in him that he left half a bottle of drink for him.

For me, this was an interesting experience. Although it did not reach the point of awakening to the point of "changing their lives" as some people said, I also realized that many things in the world cannot be explained by science. Even the seemingly unbelievable, we should also try to understand.

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