Indigenous knowledge, key to the survival of children who disappeared in the jungle

To say that it is a miracle would be to ignore centuries of indigenous ancestral wisdom, closeness and feeling with the Earth: the jungle, the rivers, the trees, the green that surrounds everything. Four minors survived for 40 days in the middle of a virgin, thick, humid and wild jungle. They did so guided by the knowledge of the territory that gave them life, but also –because of state abandonment and the isolation of the indigenous communities– almost snatched them away.

“Another child from another latitude would not have survived,” Luis Acosta, national coordinator of the Indigenous Guard, told France 24. Acosta argues that indigenous peoples have ancestral knowledge that transcends from generation to generation. Wisdom inherited through the word, in front of the fire, in the malocas. “They survived because of Lesly’s ability to deal with the jungle, its risks, and the knowledge that she is given at home to understand and get to know the jungle,” says the leader.

40 days wandering through the Amazon jungle

On May 9, late in the afternoon, the entire world watched in disbelief when Lesly Mucutuy, 13, Soleiny Mucutuy, 9, Noriel Ranoque Mucutuy, 4, and Cristin Mucutuy, 4, were found alive. Neriman Ranoque Mucutuy, 1 year old. Four brothers, indigenous Huitoto, who for more than a month were lost in the Amazon jungle of Guaviare, in southern Colombia. “It is complex to understand the spiritual relationship that we indigenous people have with the jungle. I think it has been rarely mentioned, people have not been interested in understanding it better”, says Alex Rufino, an indigenous Ticuna, an expert on survival in the jungle.

The story is this: on May 1, due to the threats his father, Manuel Ranoque, reportedly received from armed groups operating in that region: the FARC dissidents; The minors got on a plane to leave their small Amazonian village of Araracuara, bound for Bogotá, passing through San José del Guaviare. The precarious ship in which they mobilized suffered a mechanical failure and crashed in a remote and inaccessible point in the jungle.

There were three adults in the ship: Magdalena Mucutuy, the children’s mother, who died in the accident, the pilot and a community leader. 17 days later they found the wrecked plane among the tall Amazonian trees, but there was no trace of the minors. It was then that the Colombian president, Gustavo Petro, following a controversial tweet, gave the order to his military to tirelessly search for the children. Thus began Operation Hope, which lasted for almost a month, and which had the indispensable help of more than a hundred indigenous people of different ethnic groups. “It was a coordination between the ancestral wisdom of the peoples and the technological knowledge of the military forces,” explained Acosta.

An unprecedented union: military and Indigenous Guard

During the days that the minors wandered aimlessly through the jungle, they left clues: bitten fruits, footprints, some personal items and improvised shelters. The military shared their best technology and the indigenous their knowledge. “I think this one is super important. There is a gigantic effort, a unit also facing the protection of life itself and lessons that the military forces learned from the knowledge of the Indigenous Guard”, celebrates Rufino.

The search team did not lose hope of finding them alive, but the extreme conditions of the terrain made the search difficult. They were close to them, but the mountain did not allow them to see the image of the children, who according to the indigenous people were accompanied at all times by the spirits of their deceased elders. In the indigenous worldview they do not speak of death, but of sowing. Return to life in seed form. Rufino explains how the trees are living beings that take care of the members of their community who are submerged in the jungle, “just as the (deceased) mother protected the children and gave them the order to move forward.”

This Thursday, during a press conference of the National Organization of Indigenous Peoples (Opiac), Eliecer Muñoz, a member of the Indigenous Guard involved in the search, pointed to the coordination from the spiritual part that helped find the minors, but also the accumulated fatigue and physical difficulties they suffered during search: “It was very hard for us to enter a territory that is not ours, that is why we were so affected. We did it because our feeling is to have a sense of belonging to who we are as indigenous people”.

In the search, unusual scenes occurred for a country where indigenous communities suffer strong abandonment by the institutions: uniformed men and natives performing “fortress rituals”, drinking together ambil and mambe, a green powder –originally from the Amazon jungle– that is extracted from the stigmatized leaves of the coca plant and that gives “the word” to the indigenous people, connecting them with their ancestors, their elders. “For us, ambil and coca are very sacred, what we receive from that plant when we consume it is sacred,” explained Muñoz.

These days, the Indigenous Guard, often criminalized for its defense of territory, appeared on the country’s main news, accompanying the mission’s chief commander, Pedro Sánchez, who chanted: “Guard, guard. Strength, strength”, the rallying cry of the indigenous people. An excited Acosta added: “This coming together makes us lead to results. He was very respectful in that dialogue of knowledge to achieve an objective ”. And he reiterates: “It gives a very nice message to the world and to Colombia that we can come together. They are two forces that complement each other to defend life, we see it in this example. Two forces that come together to defend and protect life”.

How did they manage to survive?

How did they manage to survive? What did they eat? How did they protect themselves from the predators that the jungle harbors? The international and local press were looking for answers to an unprecedented event. “Colombia and the world are still unaware of the importance, not only of the traditional and ancestral knowledge of the peoples, they are unaware that there is a very large territory with clearly difficulties, but with communities that have known how to make good use of the territory,” he complains. the young Ticuna

Despite the dangers that the Amazon hides: poisonous herbs, predators of all kinds, a hostile geography and extreme weather conditions, only they: those who inhabit it, protect it and know how to read it, could survive there. In their worldview, indigenous people do not speak of “getting lost.” “We use these terms: ‘we got off track.’ Suddenly we are within our space, but we do not find the closest way to reach our relatives and when we do not see our relatives, we feel that in some way the energies or the spirits are leading us to the path that we should follow ”, Rufino says.

At this time, the minors are hospitalized at the Bogotá Military Hospital, where they arrived with various symptoms: dehydration, malnutrition and other jungle diseases. The General Directorate of the Central Military Hospital indicated that the Mucutuy brothers remain in the pediatric area and the evolution of each of them is favorable. Also the deputy director of Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF), Adriana Velasquez, said that the children are in very good spirits, “they have been colouring, drawing. They love to talk and draw, have been interacting with the books, and are very willing to be in this hospitable environment.”

“There are many threats and difficulties that children have”

For their part, OPIC called for respect for the situation from the media that gather daily in front of the hospital entrance. “To the institutionality, that this process be carried out with full cultural permanence adjusted to our system of knowledge, own cultural and spiritual practices, entrenched in the territory and from the perspective of action without harm”, said a spokesperson.

The members of the indigenous organizations that accompanied the search took advantage of the situation to request greater protection for the members of their communities from the institutions, to remove them from the historical abandonment to which they have been subjected for centuries. “There are many threats and difficulties that children have, and finally the towns. There are still latent conflicts in this type of territory”, explained Rufino, “I think that up to now it is also being seen that it is not only green that is important, but also the communities that live there”, in the extensive and deep forests, jungles and mountains of the territory of Colombia.

Acosta calls attention to the situation of minors in Colombia, especially those who live in areas where the internal conflict still persists: “We must pay attention to children, in that area indigenous children were murdered, recruited by dissidents. Children in Colombia are at risk and how we should protect them is the main attention”, because, according to what he says, they are the seed of the country.