Pirates of the Ayahuasca | Sarah Miller
I have always been depressed, but by early 2022, observing the acceleration of climate change from the vantage point of a wildfire zone, I felt I had run out of rope.
我一直很沮丧，但到了 2022 年初，从野火区的有利位置观察到气候变化的加速，我感觉自己已经筋疲力尽了。
I had known for about five years that it was too late to do anything about environmental collapse, and that it was likely fascism would come with it.
大约五年前，我就知道现在对环境崩溃采取任何行动都为时已晚，而且法西斯主义很可能会随之而来。
I sensed that my understanding of this fact made me a doomer, someone who did not care about children because I did not have any, a hater of hope, anti-future.
我意识到，我对这一事实的理解使我成为了一个注定失败的人，一个不关心孩子的人，因为我没有孩子，一个讨厌希望、反未来的人。
I was weighed down by a new and horrible self-repugnance about being a middle-aged white woman terrified that capitalism had come for me — the nerve.
作为一名中年白人女性，我被一种新的、可怕的自我厌恶所压垮，她害怕资本主义已经降临到我身上——神经。
But I really did feel a deep conviction that we had all been robbed of our birthright, to enjoy the air, the rivers, the oceans, to see people younger than us grow old, possibly even to grow old ourselves.
但我确实深深地相信，我们都被剥夺了与生俱来的权利，享受空气、河流、海洋，看着比我们年轻的人变老，甚至可能自己也变老。
Perhaps worse than my despair was how impossible it felt to turn away from self-pity, especially since most of the world seemed to want me to do that more than they wanted to witness my sadness.
也许比我的绝望更糟糕的是，我感觉摆脱自怜是多么不可能，特别是因为世界上大多数人似乎更希望我这样做，而不是目睹我的悲伤。
The only solution that seemed to present itself with any regularity was to take my own life.
唯一似乎有规律性的解决办法就是结束我自己的生命。
My partner sent me an episode of a Marxist podcast, on which the host talked earnestly about the possibility that ayahuasca and other plant medicines might offer hope to those who saw “the 500-year death machine known as imperialism, capitalism, and colonialism” with clear eyes.
我的搭档给我发了一集马克思主义播客，主持人真诚地谈到死藤水和其他植物药物可能会给那些以清晰的眼光看到“被称为帝国主义、资本主义和殖民主义的500年死亡机器”的人带来希望。
The guest said that as long as he could remember, he’d “felt ecological destruction in his bones,” and a sustained practice of drinking ayahuasca — a sense of some consciousness beyond this one — had helped him to live with happiness, pleasure, and hope.
这位客人说，从他记事起，他就“感受到了骨头里的生态破坏”，而持续饮用死藤水——一种超越此意识的意识——帮助他生活得幸福、快乐和希望。
I’d never been especially interested in ayahuasca, as most of what I read about it involved personal liberation.
我从来没有对死藤水特别感兴趣，因为我读到的大部分关于它的内容都涉及个人解放。
I wouldn’t have called myself a completely healthy, wholly nonaddicted person, but I was way past wanting to heal my relationship with my family or improve my body image.
我不会称自己是一个完全健康、完全不上瘾的人，但我已经不再想要治愈与家人的关系或改善我的身体形象。
I wanted something beyond what I knew of this world to show itself to me and give me some kind of strength to stay in it.
我想要一些超出我对这个世界的了解的东西向我展示自己，并给我某种力量让我留在这个世界上。
There have been times in my life when I wouldn’t have taken seriously the possibility that a South American psychedelic could help ease the horror of systems collapse.
在我的一生中，有时我不会认真对待南美迷幻剂可以帮助缓解系统崩溃的恐惧的可能性。
But I was not doing at all well, and this podcast guy had been on the same terrible page.
但我的表现一点都不好，而这个播客也处于同样糟糕的状态。
Here was someone who had wrestled with the fact that an American doing ayahuasca was embarrassing, who had a well-developed but non-groveling sense of himself as a resident of the imperial core, but who had in the end decided the benefits of advocating for Indigenous plant medicine outweighed the drawbacks.
这个人曾与美国人做死藤水是令人尴尬的事实作斗争，他对自己作为帝国核心居民的发展良好但不卑躬屈膝的感觉，但他最终决定倡导本土植物医学的好处超过了缺点。
He recommended the center in Peru where he “drank.” The shaman was reputable, famous in a way I found promising, and the ayahuasca good quality.
他推荐了他“喝酒”的秘鲁中心。萨满很有信誉，以我认为很有前途的方式出名，死藤水质量也很好。
I filled out a contact form on the center’s website.
我在该中心的网站上填写了联系表。
Weeks passed without a response.
几周过去了，没有得到任何回应。
I wrote to the podcast guy, a friend of a friend, who wrote to Kara, the center’s director, and within a day or two I got an email explaining that the servers at the center were often down and that my contact form had disappeared.
我写信给播客的人，他是朋友的朋友，他又写信给该中心的主任卡拉，在一两天之内，我收到一封电子邮件，解释说该中心的服务器经常宕机，而且我的联系表格也消失了。
The email was signed “Love & Light, Kara.”
这封电子邮件的署名是“爱与光，卡拉”。
I filled out the contact form again.
我再次填写了联系表。
There was much to arrange, and each step (availability, receipt of deposit, flight plans) needed to be completed before taking the next, but Kara’s responses were sporadic.
有很多事情需要安排，每一步（可用性、押金收据、航班计划）都需要在进行下一步之前完成，但卡拉的反应是零星的。
I booked my flight but then had trouble getting the wire transfer approved, and then when I did it was unclear if I’d sent enough.
我预订了航班，但后来在获得电汇批准时遇到了麻烦，而且当我这样做时，也不清楚我是否汇了足够的钱。
At every turn Kara sounded as if I were bothering her.
每次卡拉听起来都好像我在打扰她。
I pictured her in tunics and wooden earrings, engaged in some intense form of spiritual bypass which had made her think schedules were a drag, even though the main task of her job appeared to be scheduling.
我想象她穿着束腰外衣，戴着木耳环，正在进行某种强烈的精神绕行，这让她认为日程安排是一种拖累，尽管她工作的主要任务似乎是日程安排。
“I’m not a hippie either,” I told him.
“我也不是嬉皮士，”我告诉他。
“I’m just here because I don’t want to kill myself.”
“我来这里只是因为我不想自杀。”
A month before my departure, there was at long last just one more thing to arrange: transport from the small Amazonian city of Iquitos to the remote ayahuasca center, which was in the Peruvian Amazon and did not have what is commonly referred to as an address.
在我出发前一个月，终于只剩下一件事情需要安排：从亚马逊小城伊基托斯到偏远的死藤水中心的交通，该中心位于秘鲁亚马逊，没有通常所说的地址。
This required a boat — not a ferry, operated by a company, but a little tiny boat, operated by just some dude.
这需要一艘船——不是由一家公司运营的渡轮，而是一艘由某个人运营的小船。
Kara said she would make it happen, Love & Light, Kara.
卡拉说她会让这一切发生，爱与光，卡拉。
During that month I went off Wellbutrin and cut out any substance that ayahuasca protocols name as interfering with one’s ability to access its benefits: meat, oil, caffeine, alcohol, and marijuana.
在那个月里，我停用了维布特林，并戒掉了死藤水协议中所说的任何干扰人获得其益处的物质：肉、油、咖啡因、酒精和大麻。
I wrote Kara several times to firm up the final leg of the journey, but she never wrote back.
我给卡拉写了好几次信，以确认旅程的最后一段路，但她从未回信。
On my layover in Miami I wrote the podcast guy an unhinged message about how I was halfway to Peru and still had not heard from Kara.
在迈阿密中途停留时，我给播客写了一条精神错乱的信息，说我已经在去秘鲁的半路上了，但仍然没有收到卡拉的消息。
He gave me Kara’s WhatsApp and said to just give her a place and time and let her deal with it.
他给了我卡拉的 WhatsApp，并说给她一个地点和时间，让她处理这件事。
I wrote: Pick up 10 AM Casa Morey Wednesday please.
我写道：请周三上午 10 点到 Casa Morey 接车。
She wrote back right away that she’d check with the driver and would confirm on Tuesday morning.
她立即回信说她会与司机核实并在周二早上确认。
Finally, I thought.
最后，我想。
We are in business.
我们正在做生意。
I knew that Peru was rich in minerals, gold, silver, copper, and lead, and that many of its mines were owned by American, Chinese, and Canadian companies.
我知道秘鲁矿藏丰富，有金、银、铜、铅等，而且很多矿山都属于美国、中国和加拿大公司所有。
And so, although I did not ask any one of the guests at the Lima airport Hilton what they were doing there, I invented the story that anyone in a golf shirt and pants who seemed like they were in a bad mood worked for a mining outfit.
因此，尽管我没有询问利马机场希尔顿酒店的任何一位客人他们在那里做什么，但我编造了这样一个故事：任何穿着高尔夫衬衫和裤子、看起来心情不好的人都在采矿公司工作。
The ones in golf shirts and shorts, in lighter moods, were there to see ruins and eat Peru’s legendary food.
那些穿着高尔夫球衫和短裤的人心情轻松，来这里参观废墟并品尝秘鲁的传奇美食。
No one presented as a fellow traveler, that is as someone who would pay thousands of dollars and travel thousands of miles to drink what is essentially the powerful hallucinogen DMT, plus another chemical that prolongs DMT’s effects, which together compel the drinker to vomit, witness their own death, or — my hope — develop a capacity to endure life.
没有人以同路人的身份出现，也就是说，有人愿意花数千美元，长途跋涉数千英里，喝下本质上是强效致幻剂 DMT 的东西，再加上另一种延长 DMT 作用的化学物质，这些化学物质共同迫使饮酒者呕吐，目睹自己的死亡，或者——我希望——发展出忍受生命的能力。
Later I realized such people were indeed in Lima, but they were younger than I was, and more inclined to thrift.
后来我发现利马确实有这样的人，但他们比我年轻，而且更节俭。
My boss was in Peru at the same time, eating and sightseeing.
我的老板同时在秘鲁，一边吃饭一边观光。
I do not want to draw a moral distinction between us.
我不想在我们之间划出道德界限。
Anthony Bourdain, Paul Theroux, and others have made much of the difference between the tourist and the traveler.
安东尼·波登（Anthony Bourdain）、保罗·塞洛克斯（Paul Theroux）和其他人对游客和旅行者之间的差异做了很大的阐述。
But from what I have observed, an American may be many things to himself, but to everyone else, he will never be anything but an American.
但根据我的观察，一个美国人对他自己来说可能有很多东西，但对其他人来说，他永远只是一个美国人。
Iquitos was dusty, humid, and about what you’d expect from the former headquarters of the Anglo-Peruvian Amazon Rubber Company.
伊基托斯尘土飞扬、潮湿，正如英秘鲁亚马逊橡胶公司前总部所想象的那样。
Around a well-maintained plaza recalling former, deadly prosperity, long bank lines formed around sagging colonial and drab modern architecture.
维护良好的广场让人回想起昔日的繁荣，长长的河岸线围绕着下垂的殖民时期和单调的现代建筑。
Ayahuasca’s place in the local economy was evident in the ubiquitous ayahuasca-themed murals, which look like all psychedelic art but extra goddess-coded, and lousy with jaguars.
死藤水在当地经济中的地位在随处可见的死藤水主题壁画中显而易见，这些壁画看起来就像所有迷幻艺术，但更多的是女神编码，而且与美洲虎的关系很糟糕。
The windows in my colonial-era hotel were double paned with heavily scratched plastic, and sealed shut.
我住的殖民时代酒店的窗户是双层玻璃，塑料上有严重划痕，而且是密封的。
It was frustrating to have such large windows that lacked the window’s essential quality of transparency.
如此大的窗户缺乏窗户的基本透明度，这令人沮丧。
I began to feel like my struggle to make out the lush date palms outside summed up my unbearable sense of a beautiful world that had been stolen from the Incas five hundred years ago, and then stolen again from almost everyone.
我开始觉得，我努力辨认出外面茂盛的枣椰树，概括了我对一个美丽世界的难以忍受的感觉，这个世界五百年前从印加人那里被偷走了，然后又从几乎所有人那里被偷走了。
As the sun set on Tuesday, I willed Kara to send her promised confirmation.
周二太阳落山时，我请求卡拉向她发送承诺的确认函。
She did not.
她没有。
I slept poorly.
我睡得很不好。
In the morning I resolved to get to the center by myself.
早上我决定自己去中心。
It would be hard, but surely not impossible.
这会很困难，但肯定不是不可能。
Also, what was I going to do?
还有，我要做什么？
Go home?
回家吗？
Hang out indefinitely in Iquitos, penning Shantaram 2 ?
在伊基托斯无限期地闲逛，撰写《Shantaram 2》？
I went back to the business district for batteries and extra cash.
我回到商业区去买电池和额外的现金。
I also bought a knife.
我还买了一把刀。
When I got back to the hotel at ten-thirty, a guy standing outside next to a moto taxi looked up from his phone and asked, in English, “Are you Sarah Miller?” I said I was.
当我十点三十分回到酒店时，一个站在外面一辆摩托出租车旁边的人从手机上抬起头，用英语问：“你是莎拉·米勒吗？”我说我是。
“I’m Victor.
“我是维克多。
You were supposed to be here at ten,” he said.
你应该十点钟到这里，”他说。
Not far into my explanation I realized Victor didn’t give a shit.
听完我的解释后，我意识到维克多根本不在乎。
We drove through Iquitos, past a technical university that I remember as having the shape of a Mayan temple under layers of a purplish ’80s lacquer.
我们开车穿过伊基托斯，经过一所技术大学，我记得那所大学的形状像一座玛雅神庙，外面涂着一层 80 年代的紫色漆。
It was for sale.
它是出售的。
Most of the billboards along the roads were campaign posters for Peru’s upcoming elections, and each candidate had some object or animal, like a chicken, or an acorn, or a cherry, next to their photos and names.
沿路的大多数广告牌都是秘鲁即将举行的选举的竞选海报，每个候选人的照片和名字旁边都有一些物体或动物，比如鸡、橡子或樱桃。
What the hell?
我勒个去？
We turned onto a road with ruts so deep a child could have hidden inside them.
我们拐进了一条车辙深的道路，小孩子都能藏进去。
Americans were idiots.
美国人都是白痴。
All we did was take drugs and then, like little babies, we came down here to have Ignacio fix us.
我们所做的就是吸毒，然后像小婴儿一样来到这里让伊格纳西奥治疗我们。
Victor drove me as far as a shore on what I later learned was the Nanay River.
维克多开车送我一直到了岸边，后来我才知道那是纳奈河。
I climbed into a skiff with a small outboard motor that took me through a series of ever-narrowing channels.
我爬上一艘装有小型舷外发动机的小船，它带我穿过一系列不断狭窄的通道。
After forty or so minutes we landed at another beach and I got out.
大约四十分钟后，我们在另一个海滩着陆，我下了车。
The driver of the boat led me through a muddy town, whose residents took note without real interest.
船夫带我穿过一个泥泞的小镇，小镇的居民并没有真正感兴趣地注意到了。
A fat dog was lying on a strip of grass.
一条肥狗躺在一片草地上。
When we got closer, I saw that it was dead.
当我们走近时，我发现它已经死了。
The sign advertising the center was faded and overgrown.
该中心的广告牌已褪色且杂草丛生。
At the entrance to the compound was a guard station, manned by four men carrying automatic weapons.
院落入口处有一个警卫站，由四名携带自动武器的男子把守。
Beyond the guard station was a clearing in the jungle, with a collection of thatch-roofed structures of various sizes on five or seven acres of fine white sand.
警卫站的另一边是丛林中的一片空地，五七英亩的细白沙滩上矗立着大小不一的茅草屋顶建筑。
I was taken to Kara.
我被带到卡拉。
She was Canadian, in her mid-thirties, slim, and moved as if floating.
她是加拿大人，三十多岁，身材苗条，动作轻飘飘的。
She wore a tank top and flowered pants that billowed around her.
她穿着背心和花朵裤子，在她周围翻滚。
I was nice for the handshaking.
我很乐意握手。
When I lit into her about failing to confirm — failing to do the very thing that society was built on!
当我向她抱怨未能确认时——未能做社会赖以建立的事情！
— her expression went from compliance-officer neutral to wounded doe.
——她的表情从合规官员的中立变成了受伤的母鹿。
“Oh,” she said sympathetically, “The internet here is out all the time.
“哦，”她同情地说，“这里的互联网一直无法连接。
I am so glad you made it!
我很高兴你成功了！
I am so sorry!”
真是对不起啊！”
I felt stupid.
我觉得自己很愚蠢。
I had been unnecessarily hostile.
我表现出了不必要的敌意。
I was here in part to temper feelings like these.
我来这里的部分原因是为了缓和这样的情绪。
Kara told me ceremonies were on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays.
卡拉告诉我，仪式在周一、周二、周四和周五举行。
Wednesdays and weekends were for rest.
周三和周末是休息的时间。
She said, “It seems like you could use some time to relax.
她说：“看来你需要一些时间放松一下。”
You’ll get used to how things work in the jungle.” I was free to do what I wanted, she said, until tomorrow morning.
你会习惯丛林里的一切。” “我可以自由地做我想做的事，”她说，直到明天早上。
“And then you’ll take your purgative, after breakfast, though, of course, I tell all the pasajeros that I don’t recommend eating before!”
“然后你会在早餐后服用泻药，不过，当然，我告诉所有的帕萨杰罗，我不建议在此之前吃东西！”
This is what visitors to the center were called: Passengers , said in Spanish without an accent.
这就是对中心游客的称呼：乘客，用西班牙语不带口音地说。
Passa-harrows .
帕萨耙子。
The shaman, Ignacio, appeared.
萨满伊格纳西奥出现了。
He was in his late forties or early fifties, medium height, wiry, dressed in a track suit.
他四十多岁或五十出头，中等身材，精瘦，穿着运动服。
I had seen him on the internet wearing something more traditional, tribal, but now he looked like a soccer coach before a big match — not just his clothes, but his unsmiling gravity.
我曾在互联网上看到他穿着更传统、更具部落风格的衣服，但现在他看起来就像一场重大比赛前的足球教练——不仅仅是他的衣服，还有他不苟言笑的严肃。
He was well respected in the world of ayahuasca.
他在死藤水界很受尊敬。
His evangelism of the Medicine was articulate, poetic, and widely read.
他对医学的传播是清晰的、富有诗意的，并且被广泛阅读。
I gave him an envelope of cash.
我给了他一个装着现金的信封。
He gave a curt nod, counted it in front of me, and shuffled off in his Puma slides.
他简短地点了点头，在我面前数了数，然后穿着他的 Puma 拖鞋拖着脚步走开了。
In my cobweb-laced hut I lay down on a hammock.
在我布满蜘蛛网的小屋里，我躺在吊床上。
The soporific effect of the intense heat was strangely magnificent.
酷热的催眠效果出奇地惊人。
A long with the pre-arrival dieta, vegetables and fruits were now out.
抵达前的长期饮食、蔬菜和水果现在都没有了。
Salt was out too, and with it went all the cheer of existence.
盐也消失了，生活中的所有欢乐也随之消失。
Our meals would consist of rice and lentils, plantains, some potatoes, and plain baked or boiled fish.
我们的膳食包括米饭、扁豆、车前草、一些土豆和普通烤鱼或煮鱼。
In preparing for the journey, I had been fastidious about giving up everything except coffee.
在准备这次旅行的过程中，我一直很挑剔，除了咖啡之外，我什么都放弃了。
And so it came to pass that I headed into my vomitivo, or purge, with a massive caffeine withdrawal headache.
结果，我因咖啡因戒断性头痛而开始呕吐。
The vomitivo was the last step in preparation for “drinking” and took place in the medicine hut, at the far end of the compound, presided over by a cousin of Ignacio’s, Antonio.
呕吐是准备“喝酒”的最后一步，在大院远端的药房里进行，由伊格纳西奥的表弟安东尼奥主持。
He had a gold tooth and the broad smile of someone who had lucked into a reasonable living in a nation whose GDP is around 1 percent of the United States’.
他有一颗金牙，脸上挂着灿烂的笑容，就像一个幸运地在一个国内生产总值仅占美国百分之一左右的国家过上合理生活的人。
He brought out a small bowl of a foul liquid to make me vomit, and a larger, empty one to catch it.
他拿出一小碗恶臭的液体让我呕吐，又拿出一个更大的空碗接住它。
Nico, an unusually tall German in his thirties, and one of ten or so facilitators making a small stipend to help out pasajeros, was there to assist.
尼科是一位三十多岁的德国人，身材异常高大，他是十多名为帮助帕萨赫罗斯提供小额津贴的协调员之一，他在那里提供帮助。
I complained about my caffeine headache.
我抱怨我的咖啡因头痛。
“Chug the shit out of this,” he said, handing me the vomit inducer — a watery concoction swimming with herbs, possibly tobacco, and God knows what else.
“把这个东西吐出来，”他一边说，一边递给我催吐剂——一种水状的混合物，里面混有草药，可能还有烟草，天知道还有什么。
“In a few minutes you’ll feel fucking great.” While I chugged he described his home city, its old bridges, its walled center.
“几分钟后你就会感觉棒极了。”当我大吃一惊时，他描述了他的家乡城市、古老的桥梁和城墙环绕的中心。
Wow, I said, cool.
哇，我说，酷。
A split second later I was convulsing into the larger bowl while Nico offered spirited encouragement like “Yes,” and “Do it,” and “You’re amazing.” There was not then or ever any kind of attraction between the two of us, but the experience was for me deeply carnal.
过了一会儿，我就陷入了更大的碗里，而尼科则热情地鼓励我，比如“是的”、“做吧”和“你太棒了”。我们两个人之间没有任何吸引力，但对我来说，这种经历是非常肉体的。
I would drink this stuff, the shamans would chant, I would have these memories or revelations, I would vomit and shit, and things would be resolved.
我会喝这些东西，萨满会吟诵，我会有这些记忆或启示，我会呕吐和拉屎，事情就会得到解决。
As I continued to puke and puke, he told me about his adored wife, his hated former job in IT, and how he had known after drinking a few times that he needed to spend a year “with the Medicine.” I was encouraged by his cynicism for the world in general, which he maintained while also believing that ayahuasca was a useful, non-bullshit thing.
当我继续呕吐时，他向我讲述了他深爱的妻子、他讨厌的以前的 IT 工作，以及他在喝了几次酒后如何知道自己需要“与药物相处”一年。我对他对整个世界的愤世嫉俗感到鼓舞，他坚持这种态度，同时也相信死藤水是一种有用的、不是废话的东西。
“I’m not a hippie either,” I told him.
“我也不是嬉皮士，”我告诉他。
“I’m just here because I don’t want to kill myself.”
“我来这里只是因为我不想自杀。”
“I promise the ayahuasca will help,” he said.
“我保证死藤水会有帮助，”他说。
My headache was gone, so I believed him.
我的头痛消失了，所以我相信了他。
Someone named Denise, who had been scheduled to vomit with me, showed up as I was finishing.
一个叫丹尼斯的人原定要和我一起呕吐，当我快要吐完的时候，她出现了。
Nico went to see about procuring her vomitivo.
尼科去找她的呕吐物。
Denise and I smiled at each other shyly.
丹妮丝和我害羞地相视一笑。
“Nico’s really fun to throw up with,” I said.
“和尼科一起吐真的很有趣，”我说。
I was gratified when she laughed out loud.
当她大声笑起来时，我感到很高兴。
She was blonde, toned, attractive in late middle age but in a washable prAna travel dress way rather than a Botox way.
她金发碧眼，肤色匀称，人到中年很有吸引力，但她穿的是可洗的普拉纳旅行装，而不是肉毒杆菌。
She explained that she was late because on the rutted dirt road between Iquitos and the boat, her luggage had bounced straight out of the back of the moto taxi.
她解释说，她迟到了，因为在伊基托斯和船之间的土路上，她的行李直接从摩托出租车的后部弹了出来。
All she had was her wallet and passport, and one other dress.
她只有钱包、护照和另一件衣服。
She seemed remarkably good-humored about this.
她对此显得非常幽默。
“Victor is arranging everything,” she said.
“维克多正在安排一切，”她说。
She added that he was rather extorting her but she didn’t mind.
她补充说，他有点敲诈她，但她并不介意。
“I’m suicidally depressed as a result of climate collapse, encroaching fascism, and my inability to do anything but be scared and feel generally bad,” I said.
“由于气候崩溃、法西斯主义的入侵，以及我除了害怕和感觉糟糕之外什么也做不了，我感到抑郁得想自杀，”我说。
“What about you?”
“你呢？”
“Gosh,” Denise said.
“天哪，”丹妮丝说。
“That’s quite a lot to deal with.” Denise had retired from a stressful career and was ready to heal people with plants, and to “meet Madre Ayahuasca.”
“有很多事情需要处理。”丹妮丝已经从压力很大的职业生涯中退休，准备用植物治愈人们，并“与死藤水妈妈见面”。
“What did you use to do?” I asked Denise.
“你以前是做什么的？”我问丹妮丝。
“Before you retired?”
“退休前？”
“I worked at an aerospace company,” she said.
“我在一家航空航天公司工作，”她说。
She named one of the big ones.
她说出了其中一个大人物的名字。
Antonio appeared with Denise’s vomitivo setup.
安东尼奥带着丹尼斯的呕吐装置出现了。
“Gracias,” she said to him.
“谢谢，”她对他说。
“What a beautiful smile you have!” She waved to me.
“你的笑容多么美丽啊！”她向我挥手。
“Hope to see you later.
“希望稍后能见到你。
Bottoms up!”
到底了！”
A ll the buildings at the center were made of wood and painted green with red trim and I felt like I was always in the same place.
中心的所有建筑物都是木制的，漆成绿色并带有红色装饰，我感觉我总是在同一个地方。
Around the perimeter were cabins for visitors and facilitators.
周边是供访客和服务人员使用的小屋。
Larger buildings in the center included the dining and lounge area, and, right next to it, Ignacio’s house.
中心较大的建筑包括餐厅和休息区，旁边还有伊格纳西奥的房子。
At the far end was the medicine house, and in the middle, a perfectly round building called a maloka, where the ceremonies would be held.
远端是药房，中间是一座称为马洛卡的圆形建筑，仪式将在那里举行。
We were under strict orders not to walk by Ignacio’s house, which was nerve-racking, because sometimes, without trying, you would look up and be like “fuck, that’s Ignacio’s house.”
我们接到严格命令，不能经过伊格纳西奥的房子，这很让人伤脑筋，因为有时，你不经努力，就会抬起头，然后说：“操，那是伊格纳西奥的房子。”
Ignacio had a much younger wife, never introduced, and two teenagers with a different mother.
伊格纳西奥有一位年轻得多的妻子（从未被介绍），还有两个十几岁的孩子，但母亲却不同。
A few yards from his house, what would have been the front lawn if there were lawns in the Amazon, was a monkey cage about the size of a New York City kitchenette.
距离他家几码远的地方，如果亚马逊有草坪的话，那应该是前面的草坪，是一个纽约市小厨房大小的猴笼。
I would hear later that during Covid, no one in town had work, money, or food.
后来我听说，在新冠疫情期间，镇上没有人有工作、没有钱，也没有食物。
Ignacio had helped out, supposedly, but people said it had not been enough.
据说伊格纳西奥提供了帮助，但人们说这还不够。
People were starving, killing the monkeys in the jungle for food.
人们正在挨饿，为了食物而杀死丛林里的猴子。
Someone, it was rumored, had tried to eat these monkeys, and had been kept away by force.
据传有人试图吃掉这些猴子，但被强行阻止了。
A handful of people were in the middle of long-term stays at the center, there for months or even a whole year.
有少数人在该中心长期停留，有几个月甚至一整年。
They were doing dietas of other sacred plants, drinking a daily dose of tobacco, or rose, or white sage, in the hopes that the plant’s properties would heal them.
他们以其他神圣植物为饮食，每天饮用一定剂量的烟草、玫瑰或白鼠尾草，希望这些植物的特性能够治愈他们。
(The rose, for example, is supposed to open the heart; white sage, to provide wisdom.) They also drank ayahuasca, though not four days a week every week for the whole duration.
（例如，玫瑰应该打开心扉；白鼠尾草应该提供智慧。）他们还喝死藤水，尽管在整个过程中每周不是四天。
These people alternated between acting as helpful mentors and tedious know-it-alls.
这些人时而充当乐于助人的导师，时而充当乏味的万事通。
When I said I didn’t like the fish and was only eating rice and potatoes, a woman who had been there for six months or so turned to me, eyes wide with concern.
当我说我不喜欢鱼，只吃米饭和土豆时，一位在那里待了六个月左右的女士转过头来，睁大眼睛，充满关切。
“Two weeks without real protein or fat will be catastrophic for your health,” she said.
“两周没有真正的蛋白质或脂肪将对你的健康造成灾难性的影响，”她说。
I wasn’t about to be coerced into eating gross fish, or to be out-know-it-alled by a person high on stewed rose petals.
我不想被强迫吃恶心的鱼，或者被一个大吃炖玫瑰花瓣的人打败。
In any case this struck me as so American, this panic over conditions that were above average for most people, and I’m sure it was my way of distancing myself from my own painful sense of entitlement when I said, “More than half the world lives on a starch monodiet.” I had invented this statistic on the spot.
无论如何，这让我感到如此美国化，这种对高于大多数人平均水平的条件的恐慌，当我说“世界上一半以上的人靠淀粉单一饮食生活”时，我确信这是我远离自己痛苦的权利感的方式。我当场发明了这个统计数据。
“I’m sure I will live to tell the tale.”
“我确信我会活着讲述这个故事。”
The head facilitator was a Romanian woman named Maria, who spoke six languages and was so hot that when someone mentioned her boyfriend, I thought, wow, there’s actually a person who gets to have sex with her, that’s crazy.
首席协调员是一位名叫玛丽亚的罗马尼亚女性，她会说六种语言，而且非常性感，以至于当有人提到她的男朋友时，我想，哇，居然有人能和她发生性关系，这太疯狂了。
Before a ceremony, pasajeros would meet with Maria or Kara to let them know what they wanted the shamans to “clean.” Having tried and failed to refrain from telling absolutely everyone how much I hated Kara, I was assigned to Maria.
在仪式之前，帕萨赫罗斯会与玛丽亚或卡拉会面，让他们知道他们希望萨满“清理”什么。由于我试图克制住不告诉所有人我有多么讨厌卡拉，但失败了，我被分配到玛丽亚那里。
Then, not wanting anyone as hot and generally composed as Maria to know how catastrophically miserable I was, I kept my list short.
然后，我不想让像玛丽亚这样热情、冷静的人知道我有多么痛苦，所以我把清单写得很简短。
It went something like: clean antidepressants, clean insecurity, clean deprimida del clima, tristeza por las guerras y estado del mundo.
大概是这样的：干净的抗抑郁药、干净的不安全感、干净的气候、为战争和世界奋斗。
It amazed me how quickly she could compress my anguish into a few words that could be passed onto the shamans so they’d have a sense of what to address.
让我惊讶的是，她能如此迅速地将我的痛苦压缩成几句话，然后传递给萨满，以便他们知道要解决什么问题。
Before the ceremonies, the facilitators came around and read the list out loud to each pasajero without fanfare, as if checking what you needed from the store.
仪式开始前，协调员走过来，不张扬地向每个帕萨赫罗大声朗读清单，就好像在检查您需要从商店购买什么一样。
I gnacio and two other shamans sat at one end of the maloka, and pasajeros sat in a semicircle on cheap mattresses.
我格纳西奥和另外两名萨满坐在马洛卡的一端，帕萨赫罗斯在廉价床垫上围成半圆形。
Next to the mattresses were clean vomit buckets and rolls of toilet paper, ashtrays, and cigarettes, rolled not from tobacco but something called mapacho.
床垫旁边有干净的呕吐桶、卫生纸卷、烟灰缸和香烟，卷的不是烟草，而是一种叫做马帕乔的东西。
At first blush, ayahuasca tastes like fermented, spicy chocolate.
乍一看，死藤水尝起来像发酵的辛辣巧克力。
As it came on, the Medicine seemed to draw me into a dark room, alone.
当它出现时，药物似乎把我独自带进了一个黑暗的房间。
Nico had warned me that I would want to lie down, but I should try to sit up.
尼科警告我，我想躺下，但我应该尝试坐起来。
The warm air smelled strongly of mapacho and Florida Water, which, oddly, my grandmother had worn.
温暖的空气中弥漫着浓浓的马帕乔和佛罗里达水的味道，奇怪的是，我祖母也曾穿过这些水。
I hadn’t smelled it since well before her death, in 1977, and had always thought it was just some drugstore scent, but apparently it was sacred, and, like mapacho, meant to offer light and strength if demons arrived.
早在 1977 年她去世之前，我就没有闻过它了，一直以为这只是药店的某种气味，但显然它是神圣的，而且，就像马帕乔一样，意味着如果恶魔到来，它会带来光明和力量。
I had followed the curriculum, so why was the plant spirit giving me extra reading?
我已经按照课程安排了，为什么植物精灵还要给我额外的阅读内容呢？
No demons arrived for me that first night.
第一个晚上，没有恶魔来找我。
Right away I had a small-scale but satisfying revelation: One of my best friends would never read anything I wrote unless I begged him to.
我立刻得到了一个小规模但令人满意的启示：我最好的朋友之一永远不会读我写的任何东西，除非我恳求他。
This had always made me mad.
这一直让我很生气。
But sitting there in the pitch-black maloka, as fellow pasajeros began to vomit all around me, I realized it was fine.
但坐在漆黑的马洛卡里，当其他帕萨赫罗人开始在我周围呕吐时，我意识到没关系。
It just made me love him more.
这只是让我更爱他。
He didn’t care what I wrote, he didn’t love me for my insights.
他不在乎我写了什么，他也不因为我的见解而爱我。
He loved me for my presence, as I loved him.
他因为我的存在而爱我，就像我爱他一样。
Kara came over to help me up.
卡拉过来扶我起来。
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“发生什么事了？”我问。
“It’s time for your song,” she said.
“是时候唱你的歌了，”她说。
She led me across the room to a cushion.
她领着我穿过房间，来到一个垫子前。
I sat on it and felt her turn me forty-five degrees.
我坐在上面，感觉到她把我转了四十五度。
Gradually I realized that there was a person seated across from me, chanting.
渐渐地，我发现对面坐着一个人，正在念诵。
I realized that in fact I had been hearing this chanting all night.
我意识到事实上我整个晚上都在听到这种吟唱。
Though the ayahuasca greatly altered my sense of space and time and reality I understood the music had greater significance than, say, hearing Brandi Carlile’s “The Story” at the food co-op, but maybe not much.
虽然死藤水极大地改变了我的空间感、时间感和现实感，但我知道音乐比在食品合作社听到布兰迪·卡莱尔的《故事》更重要，但也许意义不大。
But as I sat there it dawned on me that maybe the music was why I was even here.
但当我坐在那里时，我突然意识到，也许音乐就是我来这里的原因。
It might have behooved me to have some sense of what was going to happen when I went to Peru to drink ayahuasca.
当我去秘鲁喝死藤水时，我可能应该对会发生什么有所了解。
The podcast had surely explained that icaros, the sacred songs in the Indigenous language called Shipibo, were a cornerstone of the ceremony, and it was their sound, in combination with the heightened receptiveness created by the Medicine, that encouraged emotional and spiritual repair.
播客确实解释了伊卡罗斯（icaros），即土著语言中称为“希皮博”（Shipibo）的神圣歌曲，是仪式的基石，正是它们的声音，与药物所创造的高度接受性相结合，鼓励了情感和精神的修复。
But once I heard enough to attach myself to the idea that ayahuasca might do something for me, I guess — it sure sounded like something I would do — I had stopped paying attention.
但当我听到足够多的信息让自己相信死藤水可能会为我做点什么时，我想——这听起来确实像是我会做的事情——我就不再关注了。
Icaros, I was learning now, involve chanting at a fast clip, with a lot of repetition.
我现在正在学习《伊卡洛斯》，其中涉及快速吟诵，并大量重复。
They sound like a mouth harp sung with a human voice.
它们听起来就像用人声唱歌的口琴。
It is not a sound Americans are accustomed to, and I found it uncanny in the worst possible way.
这不是美国人所习惯的声音，而且我发现它以最糟糕的方式感到不可思议。
As the chanting intensified, I felt half of whatever was in my stomach decamp to my lower intestine and the other half slosh up toward my throat.
随着念诵的加强，我感觉到胃里的东西一半流到了我的下肠，另一半则流向我的喉咙。
I saw myself at 17, giving a guy a blow job that I hadn’t exactly wanted to give.
我想象着 17 岁的自己，给一个我本来不想给的男人口交。
I saw myself fighting and then giving in.
我看到自己在挣扎，然后屈服。
I barely made it back to my bucket, and I clung to it as I vomited, and then I went outside to the toilets and got rid of the rest.
我好不容易才回到我的桶里，呕吐时我紧紧抓住它，然后我走到外面的厕所，把剩下的扔掉。
Washing my hands, feeling a sense of time return, I thought: This is a piece of cake.
洗完手，有种时光倒流的感觉，心想：这真是小菜一碟。
I would drink this stuff, the shamans would chant, I would have these memories or revelations, I would vomit and shit, and things would be resolved, including, eventually, my desire to be dead.
我会喝这些东西，萨满会吟诵，我会有这些记忆或启示，我会呕吐和拉屎，事情就会得到解决，包括最终我想死的愿望。
Thinking this had all been a very good idea, I was lulled to sleep on my mattress in the maloka by the sounds of people who were not me vomiting — sounds that filled me not with disgust, but with fondness.
想着这一切都是一个非常好的主意，我在马洛卡的床垫上睡着了，除了我之外的人呕吐的声音让我充满了厌恶，但充满了喜爱。
T here were probably forty people in and around the center, fifty if you included the workers — women cooking and washing clothes, men guarding and cleaning — plus the long-termers.
中心及其周围可能有四十人，如果算上工人——做饭和洗衣服的女人，看守和清洁的男人——再加上长期工人，那就是五十人。
The long-termers mostly kept to themselves, and for a social circle I was left with my fellow short-term pasajeros.
长期的人大多独来独往，而在社交圈里，我则和我的短期伙伴们在一起。
Among them: two 40ish women, best friends, who had left Georgia as refugee children in the ’90s and now worked in Silicon Valley.
其中包括两名 40 多岁的女性，她们是最好的朋友，她们在 90 年代作为难民儿童离开佐治亚州，现在在硅谷工作。
I thought they were both giant bitches until I realized just one of them was.
我以为它们都是巨大的母狗，直到我意识到只有其中一只是。
The nice Georgian had a terrible husband who was mean to her, but he was also Georgian, a tie to the past.
这位善良的格鲁吉亚人有一个对她很刻薄的糟糕丈夫，但他也是格鲁吉亚人，与过去有联系。
Every time I talked to her I said, “Maybe you should leave your husband,” and she would look off into the distance as her eyes filled with tears.
每次我和她说话时，我都会说：“也许你应该离开你的丈夫。”她就会看着远方，眼里充满了泪水。
Two boomer professionals who knew each other and were maybe even cousins showed up a few days into my stay.
我入住几天后，两位婴儿潮一代的专业人士出现了，他们彼此认识，甚至可能是表兄弟。
One of them was a doctor, one of them was an architect.
其中一位是医生，一位是建筑师。
This visit was part of a longer vacation for them — after this they were going to see ruins.
这次访问是他们较长假期的一部分——此后他们将参观废墟。
They arrived with a good-looking guy in his early forties who had been married for a long time, had three kids, and, though he never came out and said it, had all the red flags of a serial cheater and sex addict.
他们带着一个四十岁出头的英俊男人来到这里，他已经结婚很长时间了，有三个孩子，尽管他从未公开说过，但他拥有连环骗子和性瘾者的所有危险信号。
I was wary of him, but I was also always hoping he would make a pass at me so I could prove at least one of the many theories I had come up with about the members of my ayahuasca community.
我对他很警惕，但我也一直希望他能对我开个玩笑，这样我就可以至少证明我对死藤水社区成员提出的众多理论中的一个。
There was Kitty, a rich Iranian woman who lived in Paris.
凯蒂是一位住在巴黎的伊朗富婆。
Kitty had been at the center for months and was now in the middle of her final ayahuasca dieta and therefore drinking nightly.
凯蒂已经在中心呆了几个月了，现在正处于最后的死藤水饮食阶段，因此每晚都会喝酒。
I thought there was no way she could be as awful as she came off.
我想她不可能像她表现出来的那样糟糕。
Did I have any friends?
我有朋友吗？
I did.
我做到了。
Nico, who loaned me an amazing battery-powered bug-bite zapper and also thought Kara was awful.
尼科借给我一个神奇的电池供电的灭虫器，他还认为卡拉很糟糕。
Kenny, a thin, sarcastic 30ish Northern Californian who was here because he hoped taking drugs would be a good way to get over taking drugs.
肯尼是一位 30 多岁的北加州人，身材瘦削，爱讽刺人，他来这里是因为他希望吸毒是戒毒的好方法。
My understanding was that he’d left a job in tech, where being surrounded by loaded Silicon Valley ultrabelievers had made him turn to intense self-medication.
我的理解是，他辞去了科技行业的工作，周围都是硅谷的极端信徒，这让他开始进行强烈的自我治疗。
He had meant to come to the center for two weeks.
他本来打算来中心呆两周。
Ignacio was allowing him to stay on for free indefinitely because he thought that another shaman had put a curse on Kenny by successfully encouraging him to trip on kambo, a toxic venom harvested from the slimy coating on a tropical frog.
伊格纳西奥允许他无限期免费留下来，因为他认为另一位萨满成功地怂恿肯尼被坎博绊倒，对肯尼施了诅咒，坎博是一种从热带青蛙粘液中提取的有毒毒液。
“Don’t ever try kambo,” Kenny said to me several times, and I assured him that while I was stupid enough to come here, I was not quite stupid enough to do kambo.
“永远不要尝试卡姆波，”肯尼对我说过好几次，我向他保证，虽然我蠢到来这里，但我还没有蠢到去尝试卡姆波。
Kenny laughed and said I was “a real one.”
肯尼笑着说我是“一个真正的人”。
He said he wished I had met him before he did kambo.
他说他希望我在他做坎博之前认识他。
I said he seemed fine the way he was.
我说他看起来很好。
“No,” he said.
“不，”他说。
“You have to understand.
“你必须明白。
This isn’t me.
这不是我。
That shaman stole my personality.”
那个萨满偷走了我的人格。”
There were two young facilitators.
有两位年轻的协调员。
One of them, Grace, had been born in Bolivia and came to the US as a young girl.
其中一位格蕾丝（Grace）出生于玻利维亚，年轻时来到美国。
The other was Marisol, who had been born in Michoacán.
另一个是马里索尔，出生于米却肯州。
Grace was totally apolitical, Marisol was a fervent anticolonialist.
格蕾丝完全不关心政治，马里索尔则是一位狂热的反殖民主义者。
One day Marisol and I found out that Grace listened to Joe Rogan, and we started pleading with her to never listen again, and she said, I don’t like being pressured to do things, and so Marisol and I went outside and hugged each other and cried.
有一天，玛丽索尔和我发现格蕾丝听了乔·罗根的话，我们开始恳求她不要再听了，她说，我不喜欢被迫做事，所以玛丽索尔和我走到外面，互相拥抱哭了。
Finally, Denise.
最后，丹妮丝.
My vow to ignore her because she worked in the defense industry had been derailed by the inconvenient fact that the two of us were soulmates.
我发誓要忽视她，因为她在国防工业工作，但由于我们两个是灵魂伴侣这一不方便的事实，我的誓言被打破了。
On our third morning she told me a story about how as a kid she and her sister shared a bedroom next to the garage, and that their drunk father regularly crashed his car hard into the garage wall, right on the other side of their beds, and that, jerked suddenly awake by the impact, they would clutch each other in the dark, laughing to the point of wetting their pants.
第三天早上，她给我讲了一个故事，说小时候她和她姐姐住在车库旁边的一间卧室里，她们醉酒的父亲经常把他的车撞到车库的墙上，就在她们床的另一边，她们被撞击猛地惊醒，在黑暗中互相拥抱，笑到尿裤子。
After that we were together all the time.
之后我们就一直在一起了。
We did yoga together in the open-air gym and talked for hours about our many love affairs, our jobs, our families, always trying to move on from the conversation, always saying “Just one more thing.” Her smile was electric, her laugh throaty and confiding.
我们在露天健身房一起做瑜伽，聊了好几个小时，谈论我们的许多爱情故事、我们的工作、我们的家庭，总是试图从谈话中走开，总是说“还有一件事。”她的笑容充满电光，笑声沙哑而充满信任。
She listened like she was on good drugs, and everything that came out of her mouth, unless it was about the military-industrial complex, was funny and fascinating.
她听着就像吸了好药一样，从她嘴里说出来的一切，除了军工联合体之外，都有趣又迷人。
We had grown up in a world that was gone, that had many horrors but also pleasures, and it would have been impossible to process all that I saw and mourned but also hated about that world without her help.
我们在一个已经消失的世界中长大，那里有许多恐怖，但也有快乐，如果没有她的帮助，我将不可能处理我所看到的、哀悼的和对那个世界的憎恨。
O n the second night the ayahuasca tasted terrible, like the entire jungle had shit into my mouth.
第二天晚上死藤水的味道很糟糕，就像整个丛林都拉进了我的嘴里。
The first sign of intoxication came in the form of a ticking sound.
中毒的第一个迹象是滴答声。
Next, I felt that there was a seam being stitched into my face.
接下来，我感觉到我的脸被缝上了一条缝。
The seam was not painful, but something was tugging at it, the same entity that was making the ticking noise, and as the ticking noise increased, the tension also increased.
接缝并不痛苦，但有什么东西在拉扯它，正是发出滴答声的那个实体，随着滴答声的增加，张力也增加了。
When I imagined my face, in my mind’s eye, it was blank, no features, not even skin, covered with thick stocking fabric.
当我想象自己的脸时，在我的脑海中，它是空白的，没有特征，甚至没有皮肤，覆盖着厚厚的丝袜织物。
I searched in vain for the part of my brain that could remind me this was not real.
我徒劳地寻找大脑中可以提醒我这不是真的的部分。
What was my name?
我叫什么名字？
What was the name of this scary drug I was on?
我服用的这种可怕的药物叫什么名字？
The ticking sound turned into the sound of rustling feathers.
滴答声变成了羽毛沙沙作响的声音。
I sat up, trying not to give in to the Medicine, but then I had to lie down.
我坐起来，试图不屈服于药物，但后来我不得不躺下。
The rustling went on and on, for hours, and I saw nothing but dirty feathers, broken plates and cutlery and swatches of fabric, refrigerator interiors and bathroom tiles and grandmothers’ wheelchairs and enema bags and pill containers and tomato egg timers and Pet Rocks from homes I’d been to in elementary school.
沙沙声持续了好几个小时，我只看到肮脏的羽毛、破碎的盘子、餐具、布料样本、冰箱内饰、浴室瓷砖、祖母的轮椅、灌肠袋、药盒、番茄煮蛋定时器和我上小学时去过的家里的宠物石头。
Sometimes I would think it was over, but then that ticking would start again, and my face would become that cloth mask again, and these towering figures, with small, mean eyes but no other features, which seemed to be made of cloth, twisted into cones, stood over me.
有时我以为一切都结束了，但随后那滴答声又开始了，我的脸又变成了那个布面具，而这些高大的人物，长着小而卑鄙的眼睛，但没有其他特征，似乎是用布制成的，扭曲成圆锥体，站在我的上方。
I was so relieved when the icaros ended and Ignacio lit a candle.
当伊格纳西奥结束并点燃蜡烛时，我感到非常轻松。
I turned to Denise and detailed the horrors I had just endured.
我转向丹妮丝，详细讲述了我刚刚经历的恐怖经历。
Denise told me how she had floated among angels and gone to distant planets and surfed on salmon-pink beams of light.
丹妮丝告诉我她如何漂浮在天使之间，前往遥远的行星，并在橙红色的光束中冲浪。
The contrast between our experiences was so unfair that we couldn’t stop laughing.
我们的经历之间的对比是如此不公平，以至于我们忍不住笑了。
A Swiss pasajero named Anne, who was puffing a fatly rolled mapacho cigarette, sending positively Krakatoan, dance-club-dry-ice-machine volumes of smoke our way, glared at us and hissed “Shhh,” and we laughed harder.
一位名叫安妮的瑞士帕萨赫罗人正抽着一支厚厚的马帕乔香烟，向我们喷出一股喀拉喀托式、舞蹈俱乐部干冰机般的烟雾，她瞪着我们，发出“嘘”的嘶嘶声，我们笑得更厉害了。
Over a breakfast of unsalted rice and plantains, I described the cloth figures as “kind of like clothespin dolls.”
在享用无盐米饭和车前草的早餐时，我将布制人物描述为“有点像衣夹娃娃”。
“Wait, I want to see Machine Elves,” people cried out.
“等等，我想看看机器精灵。”人们喊道。
The boomers and the (alleged) (by me) sex addict were the most disappointed and jealous.
婴儿潮一代和（我所说的）性瘾者是最失望和嫉妒的。
I thought these machine elves were my private nightmare, but it turned out they were a thing.
我以为这些机器精灵是我私人的噩梦，但事实证明它们是一个东西。
Terence McKenna, an American ayahuasca pioneer, had coined this term after hearing about a similar form from many people who drank.
美国死藤水先驱特伦斯·麦肯纳 (Terence McKenna) 在从许多饮酒者那里听说了类似的形式后创造了这个术语。
I had never heard of Terence McKenna.
我从未听说过特伦斯·麦肯纳。
“You have to read him,” one of the boomers said.
“你必须读读他的著作，”一位婴儿潮一代说。
I promised I would, a lie.
我答应过我会的，一个谎言。
I just wanted ayahuasca to show itself to me, to let me know I was not alone, to help me.
我只是想让死藤水向我展示自己，让我知道我并不孤单，帮助我。
I wasn’t interested in these Alan Watts motherfuckers who invented terms like “machine elves,” even if it was kind of genius.
我对艾伦·沃茨这些混蛋发明了“机器精灵”这样的术语不感兴趣，即使这是一种天才。
A fter people had been drinking for several days, themes began to emerge.
人们喝了几天之后，主题开始出现。
The architect boomer was always having a great time, the lucky bastard — you’d have thought he was taking MDMA.
这位建筑师婴儿潮一代总是玩得很开心，这个幸运的混蛋——你可能会以为他服用了摇头丸。
The doctor boomer kept vomiting, and he saw lots of snakes.
婴儿潮一代医生一直在呕吐，他看到了很多蛇。
Ignacio said it was going to take ages to get all the prescription drugs out of his body, and that he should stay here at least a month.
伊格纳西奥说，需要很长时间才能将体内的所有处方药排出体外，他应该在这里至少呆一个月。
The doctor said he couldn’t — he was meeting his wife at Machu Picchu — and Ignacio shrugged.
医生说他不能——他正在马丘比丘会见他的妻子——伊格纳西奥耸了耸肩。
Marisol’s grandmother came to her and told her to avenge her ancestors.
玛丽索尔的祖母来到她身边，告诉她要为祖先报仇。
The sex addict guy got in a screaming fight with his father, who came in the form of a cyclone.
这个性瘾者和他的父亲发生了一场尖叫的战斗，他的父亲以旋风的形式出现。
Kitty, whom Ignacio seemed to find enchanting, reported running through a field of flowers.
伊格纳西奥似乎觉得基蒂很迷人，她报告说她跑过一片花田。
Kenny went on a three-day fast to rid himself of his demon and on day one said he was cured and had never felt so full of love.
肯尼为了摆脱内心的恶魔而进行了三天的禁食，第一天他就说他已经痊愈了，并且从未感到如此充满爱。
When he completed his fast, the cooks made him an omelet as a special treat, which delighted him, but an hour later he fell into darkness once again.
当他完成禁食后，厨师们为他做了一份煎蛋卷作为特别款待，这让他很高兴，但一小时后他再次陷入黑暗。
The ayahuasca started to taste more and more terrible, and my ceremonies increased in severity, and I began to dread them as I have never dreaded anything in my life.
死藤水的味道开始变得越来越难吃，我的仪式也越来越严格，我开始害怕它们，因为我一生中从未害怕过任何事情。
There was always the ticking, the tension in the face.
脸上总是有滴答声和紧张感。
There was no pain, only pressure, and the sense of being worked by demons who hated me.
没有痛苦，只有压力，还有被憎恨我的恶魔所操纵的感觉。
Whenever I saw something clear, it was sad.
每当我看到一些清晰的东西时，我就会感到悲伤。
I saw myself in the future, burying my red heeler, my Ruthie.
我看到了未来的自己，埋葬了我的红高跟鞋，我的露丝。
My sadness had no bottom.
我的悲伤无底。
Another night, I went back to 1977, where my father sat with his head in his hands at my grandmother’s bedside in a hospital in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, as she died of bone cancer.
另一个晚上，我回到了 1977 年，在马萨诸塞州皮茨菲尔德的一家医院里，我的祖母因骨癌去世，我的父亲双手抱头坐在她的床边。
There was a worker at the center, a white kid from the Northwest who had trouble talking.
该中心有一名工作人员，是一位来自西北地区的白人孩子，说话有困难。
One night, I said something to him and he just stared at me and laughed and walked away.
一天晚上，我对他说了些什么，他只是盯着我笑，然后走开了。
The next day, a friend of his showed up, although no one was expecting him.
第二天，他的一位朋友出现了，尽管没有人在等他。
He had a big blue duffle.
他有一个蓝色的大行李包。
In the afternoon, I started to wonder if the duffle was filled with guns, and by the time I drank my dose of Medicine, I was sure it was.
下午，我开始怀疑行李箱里是否装满了枪，当我喝下我的药时，我确信是的。
All night I kept waiting for machine gun fire, and was relieved and surprised when I woke up the next morning alive.
整个晚上我一直在等待机枪射击，当第二天早上我活着醒来时，我既松了一口气又感到惊讶。
After that, I began to have a series of journeys that felt personalized, as if the plant spirits had heard my list of problems to clean.
之后，我开始进行一系列感觉个性化的旅程，就好像植物精灵听到了我要清理的问题清单一样。
I saw the outline of the Americas from space.
我从太空看到了美洲的轮廓。
North America was belching out strands of fat pearls, diamonds, gold and silver coins, swimming pools, cars, high-end watches, like the whole landmass was a slot machine with thousands of volcano-size receptacles.
北美喷出一串串肥大的珍珠、钻石、金银币、游泳池、汽车、高档手表，整个大陆就像是一台老虎机，有数千个火山大小的容器。
The coastline was rimmed with mounted machine guns, thousands of them, pointing outward.
海岸线周围布满了数以千计的机关枪，枪口朝外。
South America was made of mud, and I could see all layers of Earth, and the bones and skulls in it.
南美洲是由泥土构成的，我可以看到地球的所有层，以及其中的骨头和头骨。
The raised line of the Andes was not mountains, but enormous fountains of blood.
安第斯山脉的隆起线并不是山脉，而是巨大的血泉。
I also saw fat cylindrical pink creatures, with small eyes.
我还看到了肥胖的圆柱形粉红色生物，长着小眼睛。
“Why don’t I get to see anything fun?” I said.
“为什么我看不到任何有趣的东西？”我说。
“Why is everyone else solving family trauma or doing the two-step with purple jaguars and every night I just see that ?”
“为什么其他人都在解决家庭创伤或与紫色美洲虎进行两步走，而我每天晚上都看到这样的事情？”
“I know it’s not fun, but it’s good,” Marisol said.
“我知道这并不有趣，但它很好，”马里索尔说。
She was a true ayahuasca believer who referred to Madre Ayahuasca as if she were some cool lady she’d met at the club.
她是一位真正的死藤水信徒，提到死藤水妈妈就好像她是在俱乐部遇到的某个很酷的女士。
“Madre Ayahuasca and I had a whole conversation about those people last week.
“上周，死藤水妈妈和我就这些人进行了一次完整的谈话。
The ones who just have fun every time and don’t learn or see.
那些每次都只是享受乐趣而不学习或观察的人。
She told me they will pay later.
她告诉我他们稍后会付款。
You’re paying now.”
你现在就付钱。”
She said it was better this way.
她说这样更好。
She said that the Medicine was trying to show me something.
她说医学试图向我展示一些东西。
I said I already knew that Peru had been colonized by the Spanish and that as a Marxist I understood that primitive accumulation was ongoing.
我说我已经知道秘鲁已被西班牙殖民，作为一名马克思主义者，我明白原始积累正在进行中。
I had followed the curriculum, so why was the plant spirit giving me extra reading?
我已经按照课程安排了，为什么植物精灵还要给我额外的阅读内容呢？
I felt like the drug was making fun of my feelings, I told Marisol.
我告诉马里索尔，我觉得这种药物在取笑我的感受。
The ayahuasca was mocking my guilt and my fear, it was saying to me, you think you suffer?
死藤水在嘲笑我的内疚和恐惧，它对我说，你认为你受苦吗？
Let me show you how others have suffered and suffer.
让我告诉你其他人是如何受苦和受苦的。
I felt like ayahuasca was telling me how selfish and weak I was, a message I had already been getting from myself and the rest of the world.
我觉得死藤水告诉我我是多么自私和软弱，这是我已经从我自己和世界其他地方得到的信息。
“But now that a plant has said it,” I told Marisol, “I know it’s true.”
“但现在植物已经说了这句话，”我告诉马里索尔，“我知道这是真的。”
“Madre Ayahuasca would never hurt you,” Marisol said.
“死藤水妈妈永远不会伤害你，”马里索尔说。
She seemed almost mad that I thought this.
我这么想她似乎快要生气了。
“I know you will see what she is trying to show you, but trust me, she is not trying to hurt you.”
“我知道你会看到她想向你展示的东西，但相信我，她并不是想伤害你。”
At a post-ceremony meeting with Ignacio and the other pasajeros, I described those menacing pink creatures with small eyes.
在与伊格纳西奥和其他帕萨赫罗斯的仪式后会议上，我描述了那些长着小眼睛的险恶的粉红色生物。
Ignacio wanted to know if I ate pork.
伊格纳西奥想知道我是否吃猪肉。
I said I hadn’t had any for two or so months.
我说我已经有两个月左右没有吃过东西了。
But before that, Ignacio wanted to know.
但在此之前，伊格纳西奥想知道。
“Seguro,” I said.
“塞古罗，”我说。
“En gran cantidad.” He laughed.
“伟大的候选人。”他笑了。
Pigs were mean and smart, he said.
他说，猪既卑鄙又聪明。
When we ate them we were eating all of that meanness and intelligence.
当我们吃它们时，我们吃的是所有的卑鄙和智慧。
I said, “So what I am seeing is essentially small pigs?
我说：“所以我看到的本质上都是小猪？
Or chunks of pork, with eyes?” He did not dignify this with a response.
还是有眼睛的猪肉块？”他没有对此作出回应。
He told me that in his next icaro for me, he would “clean pork.”
他告诉我，在他的下一次伊卡罗中，他会“清洁猪肉”。
N ico selected me as his Settlers of Catan partner one night.
一天晚上，尼科选择我作为他的《卡坦岛定居者》合作伙伴。
“You’re smart,” he said confidently, as we squared off against Marisol and Kenny, and Grace and the nice Georgian woman.
“你很聪明，”当我们与玛丽索尔和肯尼、格蕾丝和那位漂亮的格鲁吉亚女人对峙时，他自信地说。
I assured him that I was so bad at Settlers of Catan it would blow his mind.
我向他保证，我在《卡坦岛》中的表现非常糟糕，这会让他大吃一惊。
He didn’t believe me, but by the end, he did.
他不相信我，但最后他相信了。
We won solely because of him and he stared at me and said, “I have never seen anyone worse at this game than you are.”
我们赢了完全是因为他，他盯着我说：“我从来没有见过有人比你更擅长这场比赛。”
At the post-ceremony meeting the next afternoon, Ignacio was in a bad mood.
第二天下午的仪式后会议上，伊格纳西奥心情不好。
Kenny was begging Ignacio to help him.
肯尼请求伊格纳西奥帮助他。
Ignacio ranted in Spanish as Maria translated in low, calm tones.
伊格纳西奥用西班牙语咆哮，玛丽亚用低沉平静的语气翻译。
The gist of Ignacio’s issue was that Americans were idiots.
伊格纳西奥问题的要点是美国人都是白痴。
All we did was take drugs and then, like little babies, we came down here to have Ignacio fix us.
我们所做的就是吸毒，然后像小婴儿一样来到这里让伊格纳西奥治疗我们。
Then he singled out Kenny.
然后他单挑了肯尼。
“No hay nada dentro de ti que te posea.
“没有什么可做的。”
¿Sabes qué te pasa?
¿Sabes qué te pasa？
¡Tú!” Maria’s echoing whisper, “There’s nothing inside of you, possessing you.
¡图！玛丽亚的耳语回荡着：“你的内心没有任何东西占据你。
You know what’s wrong with you?
你知道你出了什么问题吗？
You!” was more haunting than Ignacio’s shouting.
你！”比伊格纳西奥的叫喊更令人难以忘怀。
“If you stop being sad I will stop listening to Joe Rogan,” Grace pleaded.
“如果你不再悲伤，我就不再听乔·罗根的歌，”格蕾丝恳求道。
Denise and I looked at each other.
丹妮丝和我面面相觑。
“Poor Kenny,” she whispered, “Poor kid.” He was slumped against a wall.
“可怜的肯尼，”她低声说道，“可怜的孩子。”他瘫倒在墙上。
I knew how he felt.
我知道他的感受。
I wasn’t a drug addict, but I was aware of wanting to be fixed by a shaman, and the humiliation of the shaman knowing.
我不是吸毒者，但我知道自己想要被萨满治愈，也知道萨满的羞辱。
“There is only one person among you who is spiritually clear,” Ignacio said.
“你们当中只有一个人精神上是清醒的，”伊格纳西奥说道。
“Just one.
“就一个。”
That is Denise.” Denise has no artifice, he said.
那是丹妮丝。”丹尼斯没有诡计，他说。
She was simply warm and kind.
她只是温暖而善良。
He said that Denise didn’t even have to take ayahuasca anymore, because she didn’t have anything left to fix.
他说丹妮丝甚至不需要再服用死藤水，因为她没有什么需要修复的了。
I asked Denise if we could have a difficult conversation.
我问丹妮丝我们是否可以进行一次艰难的谈话。
We went to her cabin and faced each other in plain wooden chairs and I just came out with it.
我们去了她的小屋，坐在朴素的木椅上面对面，我就拿着它走了出来。
“I don’t understand how you don’t understand what you did for a job.”
“我不明白你怎么不明白你为一份工作所做的事情。”
“I mean, you built weapons to kill people.
“我的意思是，你们制造武器是为了杀人。
If the Plant Spirit is real, how does the Plant Spirit not know this?”
如果植物灵是真实的，植物灵怎么会不知道呢？”
Denise said that her job was defending America and its allies.
丹尼斯说，她的工作是保卫美国及其盟友。
She brought up the Iron Dome.
她提到了铁穹。
I stood up.
我站了起来。
She said she’d also worked on the Mars program.
她说她也参与过火星计划。
“You don’t think it’s cool that there are people in space?”
“你不觉得有人在太空很酷吗？”
She said of course, but she still wanted to know why I didn’t think outer space was cool.
她说当然可以，但她仍然想知道为什么我不认为外太空很酷。
I began to develop a real fear of Ignacio.
我开始对伊格纳西奥产生真正的恐惧。
The podcast guy had said he wasn’t warm and fuzzy and I had been fine about this, but I was starting to distrust his relationship to the pasajeros.
播客说他不热情，也不模糊，我对此没什么意见，但我开始不信任他与帕萨赫罗斯的关系。
Was he scamming us?
他是不是在骗我们？
Did he just want us to worship him?
他只是想让我们崇拜他吗？
I didn’t blame the guy for being ambivalent about a bunch of wealthy Americans who, when they weren’t crying about their families or their divorces, were talking about restaurants, vacations, and the other drugs they had tried and where.
我并没有责怪这个家伙对一群富有的美国人抱有矛盾的态度，他们在没有为自己的家庭或离婚而哭泣的时候，却在谈论餐馆、假期以及他们尝试过的其他毒品和地点。
But, I thought, something was off.
但是，我想，有些事情不对劲。
It had been apparent in the way Ignacio had spoken to Kenny.
从伊格纳西奥对肯尼说话的方式中可以明显看出这一点。
It was apparent, too, in his rapturous praise for Denise — if Ignacio had allegedly transported his spirit into the center of the Earth and into the cosmos many times over and returned with wisdom and power beyond the scope of human understanding, how could he not see that Denise had worked in an industry predicated on world domination?
从他对丹妮丝的狂热赞扬中也可以看出这一点——如果据称伊格纳西奥曾多次将他的灵魂传送到地心和宇宙，并带着超出人类理解范围的智慧和力量返回，他怎么会看不出丹尼斯曾在一个以统治世界为基础的行业工作呢？
That her wildly appealing sense of peace came from being oblivious to this violent fact?
她那令人着迷的平静感来自于对这一暴力事实的忽视吗？
Plus he worked with the clearly terrible Kara.
另外，他和显然很糟糕的卡拉一起工作。
I was ashamed to have these negative thoughts, and further ashamed to feel like I needed help thinking through them from Ignacio himself.
我为拥有这些消极想法而感到羞愧，更羞愧的是我需要伊格纳西奥本人的帮助来思考这些想法。
It was clear that he wouldn’t or couldn’t help me.
很明显，他不会或不能帮助我。
My sixth ceremony was the worst.
我的第六次仪式是最糟糕的。
As the drug kicked in, I had a vision of a reality where I had written an article about this place, which had been created to take money from Westerners to punish us for being killers or just douchebags.
当毒品开始发作时，我看到了一个现实，我写了一篇关于这个地方的文章，它的创建是为了从西方人那里拿钱来惩罚我们作为杀手或只是混蛋。
It was then staffed with people like Kara, and the guy who couldn’t talk, to encourage us to go insane faster.
然后它配备了像卡拉这样的人，以及那个不会说话的人，以鼓励我们更快地疯狂。
The ayahuasca here was extra potent, and we were all going to lose our minds and spend the rest of our lives trying to recover.
这里的死藤水非常有效，我们都会失去理智，并用余生试图恢复。
My article was called “Pirates of the Ayahuasca,” and when it came out, to much fanfare, Ignacio would be ruined but I would be left living in fear of his powers.
我的文章叫做“死藤水的海盗”，当它发表时，伊格纳西奥会大张旗鼓地被毁掉，而我却会生活在对他力量的恐惧之中。
Then the ticking started.
然后滴答声开始了。
My face was sewn up.
我的脸被缝起来了。
It was not just Ignacio, but the ayahuasca plant itself that hated me.
不只是伊格纳西奥，死藤水植物本身也讨厌我。
Ayahuasca laughed at me, at my attempts to understand, to empathize, to grieve the Earth’s conquest, and for having the audacity to be gripped by the fear of its destruction speeding toward me faster than I had thought possible.
死藤水嘲笑我，嘲笑我试图理解、同情、哀悼地球被征服的事实，嘲笑我竟敢于害怕地球的毁灭以比我想象的更快的速度向我袭来。
Ayahuasca was the one tugging this thread on my face, pulling it taut, standing over me.
死藤水是那个把这根线拉到我脸上的人，把它拉紧，站在我身边。
Its message tonight: There is nothing to understand except misery and death and the end of beings, of sound, of scents, of all beauty.
今晚它传达的信息是：除了痛苦和死亡以及生命、声音、气味和所有美的终结之外，没有什么可以理解的。
My life was a selfish joke.
我的人生就是一个自私的笑话。
My desire to express myself was risible.
我表达自己的愿望是可笑的。
I had come here to find hope but what I found instead was the definitive end of it.
我来这里是为了寻找希望，但我发现的却是它的最终结局。
T he next day was Saturday and Victor was offering an excursion into Iquitos.
第二天是星期六，维克多提议去伊基托斯游览。
I didn’t want to go but Denise made me.
我本来不想去，但丹尼斯逼我去。
We took a boat to a zoo, where we saw a giant snake, then to an island, where friendly monkeys jumped on us, then to another sort of animal park where we saw crocodiles and piranhas, and then to a tiny museum where we saw photos from the rubber trade, of barons and their slaves, and finally to see a ceiba, an enormous tree.
我们乘船去了一家动物园，在那里我们看到了一条巨蛇，然后去了一个小岛，友好的猴子跳到我们身上，然后去了另一种动物公园，在那里我们看到了鳄鱼和食人鱼，然后去了一个小博物馆，在那里我们看到了橡胶贸易的照片、男爵和他们的奴隶，最后看到了一棵木棉树，一棵巨大的树。
Victor even told us why everyone running for office had some animal or piece of fruit next to their picture.
维克多甚至告诉我们为什么每个竞选公职的人的照片旁边都会有一些动物或水果。
“It’s for people who can’t read,” he said.
“这是为那些不识字的人准备的，”他说。
“So they also know who they’re voting for.” We had a decent meal, in keeping, more or less, with dietary restrictions, but of well-prepared fish, and rice made with oil and salt.
“所以他们也知道自己投票给谁。”我们吃了一顿像样的饭菜，或多或少地受到了饮食限制，但都是精心准备的鱼和油盐米饭。
The boomers drank beer.
婴儿潮一代喝啤酒。
I thought I had somehow recovered.
我以为我已经康复了。
But the trip to town had been for me like Kenny’s omelet.
但进城之行对我来说就像肯尼的煎蛋卷一样。
Once it was gone, and once we had arrived back at the center, the horror came back, more intense than before.
一旦它消失，当我们回到中心时，恐惧又回来了，比以前更强烈。
You know now, a voice kept saying to me, you know that everything is just as empty as you thought.
你现在知道了，一个声音一直对我说，你知道一切都如你想象的那样空虚。
Emptier.
更空了。
Grace found me sitting in the middle of a patch of sand at the edge of the property, crying.
格蕾丝发现我坐在庄园边缘的一片沙子中间哭泣。
When my friends found out how sad I was they came to me.
当我的朋友们发现我有多悲伤时，他们来找我。
Kenny said my jokes were one of the only things that made it past the wall of kambo.
肯尼说我的笑话是唯一能够突破坎博之墙的东西之一。
Grace and Marisol took turns hugging me.
格蕾丝和玛丽索尔轮流拥抱我。
“If you stop being sad I will stop listening to Joe Rogan,” Grace pleaded.
“如果你不再悲伤，我就不再听乔·罗根的歌，”格蕾丝恳求道。
Marisol promised me that the relationship to Madre Ayahuasca was beautiful.
马里索尔向我保证，与死藤水妈妈的关系非常美好。
“I want you to experience her one day,” Marisol said, crying too.
“我希望有一天你能体验一下她，”马里索尔说，也哭了。
“I know you will.”
“我知道你会的。”
I was instructed to have a longer conversation with Maria, the sexy Romanian facilitator.
我被指示与性感的罗马尼亚协调员玛丽亚进行更长时间的交谈。
I had been afraid to tell anyone my bad feelings toward Ignacio, my deep distrust of him and the sense that he was actively trying to hurt us.
我一直不敢告诉任何人我对伊格纳西奥的不好感觉，我对他深深的不信任，以及他积极试图伤害我们的感觉。
Maria’s lack of alarm at my revelation put me at great ease.
玛丽亚对我的揭露并不感到惊慌，这让我感到非常轻松。
She said it was very normal.
她说这很正常。
“Many people have feelings of fear or resentment of the shaman,” she said.
“许多人对萨满有恐惧或怨恨的感觉，”她说。
“Those feelings about the shaman, of fearing him, those are about your fears, your fear of yourself.”
“那些对萨满的感觉，对他的恐惧，这些都是关于你的恐惧，你对自己的恐惧。”
So developing a terror toward the shaman was just normal Ayahuasca Transference 101 shit.
所以对萨满产生恐惧只是正常的死藤水移情101狗屎。
Nico told me Kara was getting fired.
尼科告诉我卡拉要被解雇了。
“Oh God,” I said, “I feel bad.”
“天哪，”我说，“我感觉很糟糕。”
“Ha,” he said.
“哈，”他说。
“You think you’re the reason Kara got fired?
“你认为你是卡拉被解雇的原因吗？
Do you always think everything happens because of you?”
你总以为一切都是因为你而发生的吗？”
On my seventh night, a plant spoke to me.
在我的第七个晚上，一株植物对我说话。
It wasn’t an ayahuasca plant.
这不是死藤水植物。
It was just a simple rose plant on the grounds of the center, near the medicine hut, a plant I liked.
那只是一株简单的玫瑰植物，位于中心的空地上，靠近药房，是我喜欢的植物。
It appeared to me and it talked to me, with a mouth and everything.
它出现在我面前，也跟我说话，有一张嘴，什么都有。
It explained to me that plants ran the world.
它向我解释了植物主宰世界。
They kept the Earth from blowing away, they kept the sea from rushing headlong over the Earth, they made things cool, they were food, plants were everything.
它们阻止地球被风吹走，它们阻止海洋冲过地球，它们让事物变得凉爽，它们是食物，植物就是一切。
You’re not in charge, the plant said to me, as clearly as if it were a person.
你不负责，植物对我说，就像它是一个人一样清楚。
We are in charge.
我们负责。
Your health is good or bad because of us.
您的健康好坏都因我们而定。
We are everything, and you are here as our guests.
我们就是一切，而您是我们的客人。
Nico had also drunk that night.
那天晚上尼科也喝醉了。
I told him I had something funny to tell him, if he was sober enough to understand a weird story.
我告诉他，如果他足够清醒，能够理解一个奇怪的故事，我有一些有趣的事情要告诉他。
I’m just a little high, he said, whatever you are about to tell me will be that much funnier.
我只是有点兴奋，他说，无论你要告诉我什么，都会更有趣。
“OK,” I said.
“好吧，”我说。
“My journey the other night was that I was going to write this article about Ignacio, exposing him as someone who took lots of money from people, and then gave them super potent ayahuasca to make them crazy.” I started to laugh and so did Nico.
“那天晚上我的旅程是，我要写这篇关于伊格纳西奥的文章，揭露他从人们那里拿了很多钱，然后给他们超强效的死藤水让他们疯狂。”我开始笑，尼科也跟着笑。
“And the article would be super popular, viral, and it would make me famous.”
“这篇文章会非常受欢迎，病毒式传播，它会让我出名。”
Nico was gasping.
尼科气喘吁吁。
“Very famous!” he said.
“很有名啊！”他说。
“Very important!” He giggled wildly into his hands.
“非常重要！”他双手捂着嘴狂笑。
“And the article would bring Ignacio down, but then, in the spirit world, he would have his revenge.” Nico was now shaking, he was laughing so hard.
“这篇文章会让伊格纳西奥失望，但随后，在精神世界里，他会报仇。”尼科现在浑身发抖，他笑得太厉害了。
“In the midst of my worldly success, he would find me and kill me.”
“当我在世上取得成功时，他会找到我并杀了我。”
“It’s so good.” Nico could hardly breathe.
“太好了。”尼科几乎无法呼吸。
“‘Pirates of the Ayahuasca’!
“‘死藤水贼’！
I’m going to die.
我要死了。
It’s too much!”
太过分了！”
“Have you ever heard anything,” I said, “I mean, literally anything so self-important in your life?”
“你有没有听过什么，”我说，“我的意思是，在你的生活中，有任何如此自以为是的事情吗？”
“Never.” Tears were streaming down his face.
“绝不。”泪水从他的脸上流下来。
“You’re so crazy.
“你太疯狂了。
It’s so unbelievable.
太难以置信了。
You are so crazy.
你太疯狂了。
Also, you’re clearly an idiot because you can’t even play Settlers of Catan.
另外，你显然是个白痴，因为你甚至无法玩《卡坦岛》。
People are so fucking crazy.”
人们真是他妈的疯狂。”
Grace and Marisol, who had also drunk that night and were still coming down, wandered over and sat on Nico’s mattress.
格蕾丝和玛丽索尔那天晚上也喝了酒，还没下来，她们走过来坐在尼科的床垫上。
They wanted to know what was so funny.
他们想知道到底有什么好笑的。
The next day, Victor arrived to escort me and the possible sex addict to the airport.
第二天，维克多来护送我和那个可能的性瘾者去机场。
We had the same flight out of Iquitos to Lima.
我们乘坐同一航班从伊基托斯飞往利马。
We walked past the guards into the jungle.
我们越过警卫进入丛林。
I thought about how most of my experience of going to Peru to drink ayahuasca had been about working through the shame of having done such a thing in the first place.
我想到我去秘鲁喝死藤水的大部分经历都是为了克服最初做过这样的事情的耻辱。
I spent half a month’s salary and met some awful people and a few good ones to discover a fact that I disclose with not a little embarrassment: plants can communicate.
我花了半个月的工资，见了一些糟糕的人和一些好人，发现了一个我不无尴尬地透露的事实：植物可以交流。
Some people will think I’m a crazy asshole for saying so, but they never gave a plant money and had the plant tell them actual facts in return.
有些人会认为我这么说是个疯狂的混蛋，但他们从来没有给过工厂钱，也没有让工厂告诉他们事实作为回报。
We saw Kenny on the road.
我们在路上看到肯尼。
He had gone to the tiny town for gum.
他去那个小镇买口香糖。
I asked if he was still leaving in a few days.
我问他几天后是否还要离开。
“No,” he said.
“不，”他说。
“I’m sticking around for another two weeks at least.”
“我至少还要再坚持两周。”
“I thought Ignacio just said the demon was you,” I said.
“我以为伊格纳西奥刚刚说恶魔就是你，”我说。
“I mean, shouldn’t you just go back to Mountain View and, I don’t know, get a job?
“我的意思是，你不应该回到山景城，然后，我不知道，找份工作吗？
Join a gym?”
去健身房吗？”
“Ignacio changed his mind,” Kenny said.
“伊格纳西奥改变了主意，”肯尼说。
“He said the demon is still in me.”
“他说恶魔仍在我体内。”
I looked at the plants around us.
我看着我们周围的植物。
I was aware of them being aware of us.
我知道他们也知道我们。
In six months, Denise would text me that the Georgian woman had left her husband.
六个月后，丹尼斯给我发短信说那位格鲁吉亚妇女离开了她的丈夫。
A year later, Grace would realize Joe Rogan was a dick.
一年后，格蕾丝意识到乔·罗根是个混蛋。
Almost three years later, I am still alive.
快三年过去了，我还活着。
“Oh, yeah,” Kenny said.
“哦，是的，”肯尼说。
“I am.
“我是。”
Ignacio says now he thinks he knows how to get it out.
伊格纳西奥说现在他认为他知道如何把它弄出来。
So I’m feeling optimistic.”
所以我感觉很乐观。”