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PERU TRAVEL PLANNER
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Amarakaeri
Below is an account by a local Amarakaeri Indian from the
southeast province of Madre de Dios, a witness to the way of life that colonists
and corporations are destroying. Originally given as testimony to a human rights
movement in Lima, it is reprinted by permission of Survival International.
"We Indians were born, work, live, and die in the basin of the Madre de Dios
River of Peru. It's our land - the only thing we have, with its plants, animals,
and small farms: an environment we understand and use well. We are not like
those from outside who want to clear everything away, destroying the richness
and leaving the forest ruined forever. We respect the forest; we make it produce
for us.
Many people ask why we want so much land. They think we do not work all of it.
But we work it differently from them, conserving it so that it will continue to
produce for our children and grandchildren. Although some people want to take it
from us, they then destroy and abandon it, moving on elsewhere. But we can't do
that; we were born in our woodlands. Without them we will die.
In contrast to other parts of the Peruvian jungle, Madre de Dios is still
relatively sparsely populated. The woodlands are extensive, the soil's poor, so
we work differently from those in other areas with greater population, less
woodland, and more fertile soils. Our systems do not work without large expanses
of land. The people who come from outside do not know how to make the best of
natural resources here. Instead they devote themselves to taking away what
nature gives and leave little or nothing behind. They take wood, nuts, and above
all gold.
The man from the highlands works all day doing the same thing whether it is
washing gold, cutting down trees, or something else. Bored, he chews his coca,
eats badly, then gets ill and leaves. The engineers just drink their coffee and
watch others working.
We also work these things but so as to allow the woodland to replenish itself.
We cultivate our farms, hunt, fish and gather woodland fruits, so we do not have
to bring in supplies from outside. We also make houses, canoes, educate our
children, enjoy ourselves. In short we satisfy almost all our needs with our own
work, and without destroying the environment.
In the upper Madre de Dios River wood is more important than gold, and the
sawmill of Shintuya is one of the most productive in the region. Wood is also
worked in other areas to make canoes and boats to sell, and for building houses
for the outsiders. In the lower region of the river we gather nuts - another
important part of our economy. Much is said about Madre de Dios being the
forgotten Department of Peru. Yet we are not forgotten by people from outside
nor by some national and foreign companies who try to seize our land and
resources. Because of this we have formed the Federation of Indian Peoples of
Madre de Dios to fight for the defence of our lands and resources.
Since 1974 we have been asking for legal property titles to the land we occupy
in accordance with the Law of Indian Communities. The authorities always promise
them to us, but so far only one of our communities has a title and that is to
barely 5000 hectares.
You may ask why we want titles now if we had not had them before. The answer is
that we now have to defend our lands from many people who were not threatening
us in the past.
In spite of journeys to Puerto Maldonado to demand guarantees from the
authorities, they do not support us by removing the people who invade our land.
On the contrary when we defend our land, forcing the invaders to retreat, they
accuse us of being wild, fierce and savage.
Equally serious are invasions by gold-mining companies. The Peruvian State
considers the issue of mining rights to be separate from that of land rights,
and there are supposed to be laws giving priority to Indian communities for
mining rights on their lands - but the authorities refuse to enforce them. Many
people have illegally obtained rights to mine our lands, then they do not allow
us to work there. Others, without rights, have simply installed themselves.
There are numerous examples I could give; yet when my community refused entry to
a North American adventurer who wanted to install himself on our land, the Lima
Commercio accused us of being savages, and of attacking him with arrows. Lies!
All we did was defend our land against invaders who didn't even have legal
mining rights - without using any weapons, although these men all carried their
own guns.
We also suffer from forms of economic aggression. The prices of agricultural
products we sell to the truck drivers and other traders in the area have
recently been fixed by the authorities. For example, 25lb of yucca used to sell
for 800 soles. Now we can only get 400 soles. Such low prices stop us developing
our agriculture further, and we are not able to sell our products outside
because we cannot cover our costs and minimal needs. On the other hand, the
authorities have fixed the prices of wood and transport so that the amount that
we can earn is continually diminishing. And the prices we have to pay for things
we need from outside are always rising.
There are also problems with the National Park Police. They no longer allow us
to fish with barbasco (fish poison) in the waters of our communities, although
they are outside the National Park. They say that barbasco will destroy the
fish. But we have fished this way for so long as we can remember, and the fish
have not been destroyed. On the contrary: the fish are destroyed when people
come from outside and overfish for commercial sale, especially when they use
dynamite.
Our main source of food, after agriculture, is fishing - above all the
boquichico which we fish with bow and arrow after throwing barbasco. We cannot
stop eating, and we are not going to let them stop us from fishing with barbasco
either!
There are so many more problems. If our economic position is bad, our social
position is even worse. Traders reach the most remote areas, but medical
facilities don't, even now with serious epidemics of malaria, measles,
tuberculosis and intestinal parasites in the whole region. Our children go to
primary schools in some communities, but often the schools are shut. And there
are no secondary schools.
The commercial centres in the gold zone are areas of permanent drunkenness.
Outsiders deceive and insult us and now some of our people no longer want to be
known as Indians or speak our languages; they go to the large towns to hide from
their origins and culture.
We are not opposed to others living and benefiting from the jungle, nor are we
opposed to its development. On the contrary, what we want is that this
development should benefit us, and not just the companies and colonists who come
from outside. And we want the resources of the jungle to be conserved so that
they can serve future generations of both colonists and Indians"
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Published articles and reviews about us

2009
Testimonials
Noelle Melnychuk
Calgary, AB
Our tour to
the islands on Lake Titicaca was a
wonderful day. We had great weather and the people that we met
were very friendly. The island of Taguile was a beautiful little
paradise. The hotel in Puno was very good, with a great
breakfast. It is too bad we could only stay one night. We kept
the room for the second night so that we could freshen up before
going on the bus to Cusco Peru.
Thank you for everything that you have done to make our trip so
enjoyable. Please pass along to Christi our thanks for the great
job that she did in organizing our tour. She was able to
assemble an itinerary that included everything that we asked for
and still was not too rushed. It was an enjoyable, informative
and relaxing time.
Thank you again to all of the staff at
Peru travel Gateway
and your suppliers for making this a wonderful experience.
Peggy Chang
McLean, VA
US
I always wanted to write
you a line and let you know my husband and I had a great time in
Peru. Thank
you so much for the arrangement; everything was really smooth! The
guide in
Cusco, Eriksson, was really great. thank
you also for helping me with all
the reservation and all the changes!! Cusco and
Machu Picchu were all
fantastic, I"m sure we will want to go back to Peru at some point
again, and
I"ll definitely contact you again!! Thank you!!
Sincerely,
Peggy Chang
Mary W. Earp
WINNALSAW, NC
US
We had a very nice trip to Peru.
Thanks for you help. Our hotels in Peru
were what we expected, very nice and the hotel help went out of
their way to make sure we were comfortable and had what we needed.
Our guides were outstanding. Always on time and catered to our
needs. Our groups were small except for the Sacred Valley tour where
we had 25 members. Food was plentiful and tasty at each restaurant.
The Hotel Casa Andina in Cusco gave us an upgrade when we returned
from MP which was very nice. Also, the Radisson gave us an upgrade
when we returned to Lima although we stayed only 6 hours.
Again, thanks for your services. I feel very fortunate that I
selected your travel services, because of the services. Several on
the trip thought I was mighty brave to select an unknown agency. I
was impressed with Ivan during our first emails and phone
conversations. I trusted him and he trusted me, this makes for happy
results for everyone.
Sincerely, Mary Earp.
Wendy Feldman
Los Angeles, CA
US 90025
I just returned back to the US from my trip to Peru. I wanted to let
you know how grateful I am for the wonderful experience that you
help me coordinate and plan. I loved all of the sites and felt I had
a unique experience that I will never forget.
The tour planners and the tour
guides were all wonderful and extremely helpful. Each of them were
very polite and knowledgable about their subjects and locations. I
learned alot about Peru and its customs.
The hotel on Machu Picchu (Sanctuary Lodge) and the hotel in Puno
(The Libertador) were excellent and I would recommend anyone to stay
in each of those locations. The San Augustin El Dorado was just
adequate; I found the hotel to be clean and the staff helpful, but
there is too much noise during the evening and mornings; this is
because many of the rooms overlook the central lobby of the hotel
and the acoustics create echos of sound from the front desk and
those people having conversations in the lobby area. Also, the space
heaters in each of the El Dorado rooms I stayed in did not work at
all. I do not think I would recommend the hotel to people unless
they didn't mind a noisy atmosphere.
The Posada del Inca hotel in Bolivia was very nice; I really liked
the rustic feel and intimate setting and the private gardens--the
views of Lake Titicaca and the mountains were spectacular. Although
I didn't realize it would be a hike (literally) up to it. One of the
couples I was travelling with on the first day in Bolivia had
trouble making it up the hillside (they didn't know they would have
to hike to the top to get to the hotel). I would recommend letting
potential guests know that it is a 40 - 45 minute hike from the dock
to the hotel itself. The guides were very helpful and it was good
that our luggage was carried up separately.
The trip was amazing and I just wanted to thank you for all of your
planning. I would recommend you and your staff to everyone I know
who wanted to plan a trip to go to Peru.
Have a wonderful new year!
Regards,
Wendy
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