...After I had drunk a lot of yãkoana [a psychedelic tree resin], the spirits of the forest and of the women of the water came to me during the day and took me with them.

I started running like a ghost, accompanying their light as it rushed far ahead of me. I followed their paths through the forest for a long time, constantly shouting: "Aë! Aë! Aë!" I truly ran to the end of my strength!

My wife's father feared I would lose myself forever and he protected me. He intervened to stop these spirit women from taking me to their house underwater. So they left me on the forest floor, unconscious, and my father-in-law sent his own xapiri [spirit] to bring me back to our house.

At the beginning, when you do not know the yãkoana's power, you do not stay standing for long! This is what happened to me. Its power made me die and instantly threw me backward. I rolled on the ground, twisting with fear and moaning: 'Akaaa! Akaaa!" I had become a ghost, but the xapiri remained invisible. This made me very anxious. I kept asking myself: "Why don't I see anything yet?"

Several days passed like this, without any spirits appearing to me. I was sweating profusely, and my skin was completely covered in dust. I was tormented and deeply agitated. I drank the yãkoana without respite and was scared. Each time its power seemed more terrifying to me, and I was feeling increasingly weak.

This is why few young people dare to present their noses to the elders! And when they do, they often quickly give up for fear of dying of it! Yet I wanted to continue because despite my fear I really wanted to know the xapiri.

This is why I was so worried that I would not be able to see them at the beginning. It is true! I was taking the yãkoana all the time and could not see anything! This is what usually happens, but I did not know. When you start drinking the yãkoana, you do not see anything at all. Your head is seized by a strong pain and your thought remains closed. You get weaker and weaker and simply lose consciousness. That is all. The xapiri do not instantly reveal themselves to him who drinks the yãkoana for the first time and, if he is not well prepared, he will not come out of this state.

The spirits only start to do their presentation dance after they have stretched the initiate out on their mirrors. You have to spend several nights in a ghost state and be very worn out before they manifest themselves.

First they contemplate you from the heights of the sky. They see you lying in the open, like a small clear stain on the ground. Then they start to come down in your direction because they really want you.

As for you, at first you only hear their voices converging from the distances. Then suddenly they approach you and seize your imge before you have had a chance to catch sight of them. It is so. The first day you really do not see anything. The following day you are unable to distinguish between day and night and you can no longer fall asleep. The day after that you become ever more exhausted. The next day the xapiri finally start to appear.

You no longer experience hunger or thirst. You no longer know pain or sleep. The yãkoana spirits have devoured your flesh and your eyes are dead. At that moment, you start to see the dawning of a vast and blinding light. Then you distinguish the cohort of xapiri singing as they head in your direction. Called by the elders from the ends of the sky, they approach you little by little as they dance along their luminous path. The first to arrive are still relatively few. They call the others as they pass. They gradually come together until they form a noisy throng.

This is what happened to me, and I was very frightened, for I had never seen anything like it. The dreams I had been having since I was a child were nothing next to this! Seeing the xapiri come down to me for the first time, I truly knew what fear was! What I started to see, though I could not clearly distinguish them yet, was truly terrifying. The forest initially became an immense void, which was spinning around me without letting up. Then suddenly everything was immersed in a blinding brightness. The light exploded with a great crash. Now I could see only the ground and sky in great distances strewn with brilliant white fluffy feathers. This luminous down covered everything as it floated gently in the sky. There was no longer any shade anywhere. I was watching over everything from a horrifying height.

I understood I was truly starting to become other! I told myself; "Father-in-law knows the spirits! This is why he truly knows the forest! He was not lying to me!"

When the xapiri want to put us to the test, they snatch our image and go put it down very far away, on the sky's back. The spirits of the paara powder trees, the spirit father of yãkoana, and the urihinan forest spirits are those who carry your image and your breath to lay them down on their mirrors. This is how one really becomes a shaman!

This is what I lived through, and it was truly very painful...