Lost in the Jungle (23 page)

It was almost noon. I was descending a steep hill, and the grass underfoot was wet. I slipped and tumbled, landing on my backside right on a big, dry branch that lay on the ground. My weight snapped the branch in two, and its sharp, broken end penetrated my backside, cut through my underwear, up the anus, and deep inside. I was paralyzed by the pain. I screamed in agony and then raised myself up, groaning. The pain was excruciating. I lay back, writhing on the ground, my eyes brimming with tears. My underwear was drenched with blood. I screamed when I pulled the spear out, then felt around the wound, and tried to stop the bleeding. It was impossible to bandage. I lay there for another half hour, and after the bleeding stopped, I began walking slowly with clenched teeth in anguish and enraged.

I both scolded and consoled myself.
You hurt yourself, you idiot. You weren’t careful enough, jerk. You’re lucky you didn’t break anything. That really would have been the end of you. Oh, Mama, if you could only see me now, how you would weep. Oh, Mama...

The next time I stopped to rest, I ate the other two eggs, which miraculously hadn’t been broken when I fell. I ate the remaining fruit. That was the last of my food, but I was sure that something would turn up before evening.

The trail turned away from the river once again, and I hesitated to follow it. Since the last time had led me astray, I had abandoned the trail whenever I noticed that it was taking me away from the river. I did so this time as well.

Without a cleared trail or even machete slashes to guide me, walking was not easy. I ran into many dead ends, impassable bushes and branches, an impenetrable thicket of bamboo, or a boulder blocking the way. My clothing was again in tatters, the improvised threads holding it together split apart one after another. I came to a thick clump of bushes and bent the branches down to clear my way, disturbing a hornet’s nest. They swarmed upon me in frenzied attack. I was stung on my face countless times. I was stuck in the bushes and couldn’t get away quickly. I could feel my lips puffing up and my eyes swelling shut. After a while I managed to blunder my way out in hysteria and ran, almost blinded, into more branches, stumbling, falling. I went down to the river, drank, and bathed my face. This wasn’t my day. First my lousy ass and now my face. I went on my way, bitter and angry.

Then I picked up the trail again happily and followed it. Evening was gathering, and I suddenly noticed a group of animals not more that five yards ahead of me. I quickly hid behind a tree and peeked out at them. There were six wild boars, four adults and two shoats. They pranced about, wiggling their backsides, heading away from me.

‘If only I had a gun, I would finish them off one by one,’ I muttered to myself.

I was safe as long as they didn’t notice me, didn’t pick up my scent. I watched them getting farther away, and then they stopped and started playing. They chased after one another and frolicked.

‘Get lost, you idiots. I can’t hang around here all day.’

I took off my pack, got out the spoon, and started rapping it against the tin can. They heard the dull noise, pricked up their ears, and then ran off. I hoped I wouldn’t find them waiting for me around the bend.

I stepped up my pace, anxious to get out of the boars’ territory before nightfall. I found another wild chicken’s nest with five turquoise eggs. I ate two of them and saved the rest for the next morning. I chose a nearby tree with protruding roots and made the same sleeping arrangements that I had had the night before: a mat of soft leaves on the ground and twenty palm fronds for cover.

I was glad to get into my bed, put my feet in the rubber sack, and give my tired body, my injured backside, and swollen face a rest. I had one medicine for it all, a magic potion: fantasy.

The night put me at ease. I was no longer frightened by wild animals, this due only to apathy, for I had no means of protecting myself other than the walking stick. I sometimes heard rustling and footsteps in the dark, but I paid no attention and went on with my dream. My cover of leaves warmed me in lieu of fire. I had no dry twigs or logs. In any case I wanted to save the few matches that I had left. I suffered most from the loneliness. It made me create imaginary friends who dropped in for chats. I often found myself talking aloud. When I caught myself doing so, I panicked and scolded myself,
That’s far enough, Yossi. Don’t go out of your mind.

It was difficult to grasp that I had been in the jungle two weeks. Two weeks alone. I couldn’t bear much more of it. I was physically weak and liable to lose my senses. Two days had already gone by since I had left Curiplaya. That meant I should be coming to San José the next day. Tomorrow I would be seeing people. I didn’t want to delude myself. To make myself believe that and to count on it. What if I didn’t make it tomorrow? I had been walking slowly, had lost my way, had wasted a lot of time. Anyway the Indians made the walk during the dry season. And they probably were better hikers than I. Maybe a four-day walk for them is like a sevenor eight-day walk for me. It made sense. I stopped thinking about the next day, but deep in my heart I fervently hoped that I would find the village. What a wonderful surprise that would be.

It had stopped raining, but the dampness of the last few days had taken its toll. The rash was beginning to spread over my feet, and my inner thighs were red and raw. There was an irritating inflammation between my buttocks as well, and I still suffered the tormenting pain of the deep gash in my backside.

I mustn’t coddle myself, have to be tough. I have to ignore the pain and keep going,
I reminded myself.

During breakfast, which consisted of two eggs, I swallowed an amphetamine. It was the second time I had taken one since the accident. It wasn’t long before it took effect, and I sprinted through the jungle as if I had the devil on my tail, assaulting the overgrown trail, breaking through branches, skipping up hills, and hopping over fallen trees. I lost the trail again and stayed stubbornly near the river, always careful to keep it within sight or at least within hearing.

The first animal I met up with this day was a snake, a brown snake about six feet long but not particularly big around. It was slithering through the grass, and I only noticed it when it sped off at my approach. Without a second thought I grabbed a rock and chased after it like crazy, trying to get close enough to have a fair shot. But the snake was faster than I was and disappeared into the underbrush. I was sorry. If I had caught it, it would have been nourishing, even raw. I would have eaten it salted. For the past few days I had eaten only eggs and fruit.

Later I encountered a pair of tapirs, a mother and her young. They were massive, and the earth quaked under their tread. When the poor things noticed me, they ran off in fright.

I didn’t actually see the third animal, but I knew it was there. It was before noon. I had emerged from the jungle and found myself standing on a lovely beach, the largest I had come upon since we had left Asriamas. The sand was so white, it was blinding. The river lapped pleasantly at the shore. The scorching sun was directly overhead. At long last some sunshine. I thought I would be able to dry out and heal the rawness of my skin. I bent over to remove my pack, and that’s when I noticed the jaguar tracks on the shore, lots of tracks of different sizes. There was no doubt that this was not a solitary jaguar, but an entire pack.

I followed the paw prints in the sand. Under a shady tree I found small piles of faeces, at least six separate piles. I stepped on one of them. Though no tracker or Indian guide, I knew enough to recognise that they were fresh; they were soft and didn’t crumble. There had been a lot of jaguars on this shore. It seemed to serve as their meeting place, but I didn’t want to leave, and the truth is that I wasn’t really afraid. I just couldn’t believe that I would be eaten by jaguars in broad daylight. I felt safe.

I made myself comfortable near the water and spread out all of my wet belongings on the warm sand. I gathered up a huge stack of kindling and used only two matches lighting a fire. I kept the fire well fed and placed a tin of water in it. I stripped off my wet clothing and spread it out near the poncho and the mosquito nets. I stretched out on the sand in my birthday suit, spreading my legs wide to expose my raw inner thighs to the sunlight. The flies and mosquitoes swarmed over me, and I was forced to cover myself with one of the nets. The sun shone through it, however, and gently caressed my body.

I lay there for about an hour and then got up to prepare soup. This time I put in two tablespoons each of rice and beans, intending to prepare them as solid food and take along on my way. I dipped the water out of the tin and drank it, until all that was left at the bottom of the tin was an oatmeallike residue. The rice was all right, though it didn’t smell fresh, but the beans had not cooked long enough. On top of that I had added too much salt. It tasted awful, but even so it was difficult to follow my resolve and save the bulk for later.

Since I had a good fire, I wanted to catch a fish and cook it. It looked like a good place for fishing. The river could have been as much as several hundred feet wide – from the bank it was hard to tell – and the current was not strong. I had no difficulty swatting a few big flies and tried to use them to catch a minnow. I stood on the riverbank, draped with the mosquito net, making sure the line had enough slack. The sun beat down on my head, and suddenly everything went black, and I lost consciousness. The cool water brought me to immediately. I leapt from the river, wet and frightened. I couldn’t let that happen again. It was both terrifying and dangerous.

I stretched out again for a while, then donned my dry clothing and gingerly put my socks and wonderfully sturdy shoes back on. Before leaving this fabulous beach I invested a great deal of effort in marking it. There were heavy stumps lying about, and I laboriously pushed and rolled them until they formed an arrow pointing in the direction I was going. As before, I made a letter
Y
and the date: ‘14.’

The map had also dried, and I studied it at length. The distance between Curiplaya and San José appeared to be twenty-five miles by river, or about thirty miles by the path alongside the river. I had been walking almost twelve hours a day. There was no reason to believe that I wouldn’t arrive in San José within a day or two. Only one thing worried me. San José was on the left bank, the opposite side of the river. The only landmark before the village was a large river that emptied into the Tuichi from the left. Karl had told us that it was the village’s source of water. He had said that San José lay not on the bank of the Tuichi but a few miles up that other river. On the right bank, the one I was on, there wasn’t a single landmark to tell me where I was. So I couldn’t depend entirely on the map. I was concerned that I might not notice the village and mistakenly pass it by. Then I would be lost. For good. Between San José and Rurrenabaque there were no other villages, and it would be impossible to walk the entire distance. The only really safe thing to do would be to cross the Tuichi and walk along the other side. That way I wouldn’t miss the village. I went on, looking for a good place to cross.

Farther on I came to a dead end. A stream fed into the Tuichi in a deep, impassable wadi. I had to change course and march upstream into the jungle until the wadi flattened out and I found an easy place to cross it. This detour took several hours. I doubled back on the other side of the stream, straight and to the left, in the direction of the Tuichi. Another stream cut across my path, but this one I could ford easily, skipping from stone to stone, careful not to lose my balance and fall in. Beyond the stream was a field of thorns. There were no trees at all, only bushes and thistles as tall as I was. Having no other choice, I plodded into it, trying to clear a path.

I experienced a new kind of hell in the field of thorns. I lost my sense of direction, and my entire body was scratched and mauled. Scathing nettles stabbed into me, and I shook with pain and fear. At long last I made it back to the jungle and to the lost path. The trail here did not look as if it had been in use, however. It was unreliable and led me astray for a long while. It was frequently covered over completely with jungle foliage. It couldn’t be that men marched over this path every year, I told myself, but no sooner had I done so than I suddenly heard, in the distance, human voices. There were speaking, and someone called out something. I started running and shouting, ‘Help! Hey, hey! Wait for me!
Espera! Espera!
’

I ran as if possessed. I shouted myself hoarse. I struck out at the branches that blocked my way. Then stopped to listen. Not the slightest whisper was to be heard. It must have been my imagination playing tricks on me.

My idiotic pride had long since worn thin. Now I prayed for someone to rescue me. Let people say that I was a wimp, that I should have been able to make it out of the jungle on my own. I just wanted to be saved.

It was now the fourteenth of December. Someone had to do something – Lisette, the embassy. Marcus must be back by now. Or Kevin perhaps. I was certain that I would soon hear the drone of a plane overhead. They couldn’t help but see me. I had left unmistakable signs on two beaches. They would easily spot the markings. But maybe, just maybe, I would still make it on my own. I must be so very close to San José.

Toward evening I thought that I had found a good place to cross. The river was wide, but the current seemed mild. Furthermore, there were four substantial islands strung out between one bank and the other. I could go from island to island until I reached the other side. Still, I thought, it might not be as easy as it looked, and I decided to take some precautions.