Palenque

Thursday. Akiko opens the PowerBook. “Palenque,” she says.

The taxi came at sunset to take me to the bus station.

I was leaving Tulum, leaving Tarquin, Asaf and Gidi and the beach and that perfect frequency where everything made sense. The mood was heavy. But that's the nature of the journey. These moments that are so vibrant and full of life that you share with complete strangers, that you never know if you're going to see again. And when you meet them for the first time, you don't realize the brevity of the time you will spend together. And only when it's time to leave do you realize the uniqueness of the shared experience that you had with a stranger.

We arrived at the bus station. The sun had set. Venus and the early stars were visible. It was an overnight bus; the seats reclined comfortably, but the air conditioning was on full blast. I put on a sweatshirt, pulled out my sleeping bag, and got comfortable by the window.

A crescent moon followed us into the night.

I stared out at it and let memories from the past couple of days bubble up. The trance floors. The 0=1 shift. José Argüelles predicting 2012.

I smiled. Giggled. Felt something catch in my throat as I replayed the last 48 hours, trying to process and understand the adventure unraveling in front of my feet.

The next thing I remember is someone gently nudging me: Palenque. This is your stop.

I jumped up like I'd been hit by electricity, grabbed all my things, and a few seconds later I was standing on the side of the road watching the bus disappear into the morning mist.

The group email I sent home from Antigua gave that night two lines.

Overnight 8-hour bus to Palenque, which normally takes, between 10-11. Thought we would warp into different dimension while the Mexican speed bumps successfully sharply woke me up from drooling on my Mexican compadre's shoulder, Palenque!! a jungle with a waterfall and ruins, mushrooms also grow within a few fields surrounding the ruins.

The sun hadn't risen yet, but it was light enough to see. There wasn't much around; the bus station was on the outskirts of town, not in the center. Two other people had gotten off with me. A couple. They were being greeted by this middle-aged woman with long, carefully groomed red dreadlocks.

She had a pickup truck and introduced herself as Jenny, the owner of a yoga retreat in the jungle, very close to the Mayan ruins.

That's why I was here.

I'd heard about this temple built in the jungle, one whose hidden tomb had only been found in 1952. A real Indiana Jones lost temple situation. There was supposedly a river that went through the palace and waterfalls integrated into the architecture. Bathing pools built into the layout. Some sort of vacation retreat for Mayan royalty.

I'd seen a few pictures but didn't know much. What I did know: a variety of eco-retreats, yoga and meditation centers had sprung up around the ruins. And this woman with the dreadlocks ran one of them.

I walked over to her. “Where are you going?”

“I have a retreat,” she said. Her eyes were calm, her movements graceful and gentle. “Would you like a ride?”

“Do you have room?”

“Of course I have room. It's a big place. I have many options. If you want to sleep in a hammock, there's a mosquito-protected bay area. If you want a private room, you can have a private room. Everything in between. I'm sure you'll like it.”

There weren't many other options. And I was looking for a place to stay.

“I'd love a ride.”

I jumped into the back of the pickup truck with the couple. They were from Sweden, just a few weeks into their journey, and had also started in Cancun, like me. They'd been to Playa del Carmen but skipped Tulum. They were on their honeymoon.

Young. In love. Holding hands and staring into each other's eyes in that way that makes everyone else who's not in love slightly uncomfortable.

We drove down a dirt road that cut left just before the ruins. We entered the jungle, thick vines, leaves, branches. An auditory landscape infused with the impermanence of life. Insects, birds, rustling, breathing.

After a few turns on a twisty muddy road, an opening appeared.

And suddenly: this extraordinary little compound of hobbit homes, bungalows, a community kitchen, an eating area, a yoga platform, a natural jacuzzi, and a scattered assembly of cottages nested in the tropical rainforest.

It was magical.

As soon as the engine of the truck cut off, this incredible peace transcended everything. As if the breath of the forest was textured with all the sounds made by the creatures that lived in it. Together, this voice had rhythm and intensity, a cadence that changed throughout the day as each creature, and ultimately all of them together, went through the cycle of their existence.

I walked over to the common area where the kitchen was and took off my backpack.

And that's where I met Dario.

Dario was one of the most special people I met throughout my entire journey.

He was in his early 30s, from Napoli, Italy. Long dreadlocks down to his waist. Thin. Moved elegantly and gently, like water.

He'd been traveling for nine years.

And claimed not to have used money for over five.

He spoke six languages. He also claimed not to have a passport or any kind of documentation, said he'd been traveling all over South America for the past decade, crossing borders in the jungle, not believing in the rules of people because he was free.

We got into many long conversations about the nature of freedom and what it means to be a human being and how to live a sacred life. I had so many questions about how one sustains themselves living that kind of marginal existence.

When I walked into the kitchen area, he was making tea.

“How are you?” he said, looking up. “Welcome. Where are you from? What's your name, my friend?”

“My name is Niko, and I'm from Greece.”

“Oh!” His face lit up. “My name is Dario, and I'm from Italy. Very nice to meet you. I'm the chef here. I cook. But I also teach yoga. Ashtanga, every morning at 6 AM.”

He poured me a cup of tea. As I was sipping this aromatic blend of herbs I couldn't identify, a young guy, no older than 18, wandered into the breakfast area. It was obvious he'd just woken up. He stretched, yawned, and poked around in the cupboard looking for something to eat.

Dario opened his arms, pointing at each of us.

Ivan, meet Niko from Greece. Niko, meet Ivan from Mexico. Ivan is studying neuroscience and is here to learn about the sacred plants of the Mayans and indigenous medicine. He just came from San Cristóbal de las Casas in Chiapas, where he was studying with a Mayan shaman.

I nearly dropped my tea.

Oliver had reminded me to check in with Clara's cousin in Chiapas, Carlos the curandero.

Ivan looked up from the cupboard. No, not correct. I haven't been yet. That's where I'm heading soon, after here. But first, I need to make myself some mate. I spent the whole year in Argentina last year, and I'm addicted to this stuff. My brain doesn't start without a good cup of mate.

He pulled out a bag of crushed leaves, filled a funny little cup to the top with them, poured in boiling water, and let it sit for a few minutes. Then he poked it with a metallic straw and took three long sips.

His eyes went wide. Alert. Awake.

He rolled himself a cigarette and asked Dario to make him some eggs.

“So you're studying neuroscience,” I said. “What are you particularly interested in? What kind of herbs?”

“All kinds of herbs.” He sat down across from me. “You see, all plants have properties. Some are more pronounced than others. It depends also what you want them for, what are you looking to achieve?”

He took a drag from his cigarette.

“Plants have spirits. The spirits can do different things. Combining them together with other plants creates certain stories about how those spirits interact. Different effects can occur by mixing different plants together in different sequences.”

“It's just a different understanding of how the recipe works,” he continued. “I'm sure there's some scientific explanation based on chemistry and the compounds of each plant, that's what modern medicine is trying to replicate. But it goes beyond that. It's more subtle. More energetic. Less material. I'm really interested in understanding that viewpoint.”

“Me too,” I said. “That's exactly why I'm here.”

I'm so afraid that with all this progress and technology we're going to lose that way of looking at the world. This more metaphorical, intuitive and poetic interpretation. We're so eager and in a rush to move into the future that we don't realize that maybe some of these things that we're leaving behind are valuable. And before you know it, we're going to have become all the same, and there won't be these ancient different unique voices anymore. We'll have lost them.

Exactly, he said. We see ourselves as separate from nature. And that's a big problem. All of the indigenous communities of the world don't see themselves as separate from nature. Only the western man sees the natural world as something that you can take advantage of.

I spent the next few days at the retreat, falling into the rhythm of the jungle.

6 AM: Dario's Ashtanga class on the yoga platform. The air still cool, mist rising from the trees, howler monkeys screaming in the distance.

7:30 AM: Breakfast. Whatever Dario cooked, fresh fruit, eggs, beans, tortillas made by hand. Ivan drinking his mate. The Swedish couple gazing at each other.

9 AM: Walk to the ruins. The temple complex emerging from the jungle like something out of a dream. The Palace. The Temple of Inscriptions. The river cutting through the stone. The sense that this place knew things we'd forgotten.

Afternoon: Hanging in hammocks. Reading. Talking. Dario telling stories about traveling through Argentina, Bolivia, Peru without money, bartering skills, trading labor, relying on the kindness of strangers and the hospitality embedded in indigenous cultures.

“The Western world thinks you need money to survive,” he said one afternoon while chopping vegetables. “But that's only true if you accept their game. Indigenous people, they've been living for thousands of years without money. They trade. They share. They understand that community is wealth.”

“But how do you cross borders?” I asked. “How do you deal with police?”

He smiled. “I walk through the jungle. The borders are lines on maps made by people who don't live there. The jungle doesn't recognize those lines. Neither do I.”

Telling Akiko this now, I can see her eyebrows raise. “He just... walked through jungles to avoid borders?”

“That's what he said. And I believed him.”

“But the plants,” Ivan said, leaning forward. “The plants can teach you. They can show you that you're not separate. That's why indigenous medicine works. Not just because of chemistry. Because the plants have intelligence. They can communicate.”

I thought about the DMT on the Castle in Tulum. The way it had dissolved my boundaries. The way I'd felt connected to everything, the pyramid, the earth, the ocean, the stars.

“I believe you,” I said.

Ivan kept his promise. The next morning we went looking for mushrooms.

Cow fields. Tall grass. A million mosquitoes. We found what we came for, and I swallowed four big ones and hurried off toward the ruins.

Without Ivan. That was the mistake.

Half an hour in, three hours out. Mud and water, the jungle closing behind me like a door, and somewhere in it one of my sneakers, sucked off my foot in a pile of ooze. I came out on the main road with one shoe, close to exploding, and then I didn't. The ruins took care of that.

Ivan turned up a little later, small and grinning, an elf, and led me behind the main waterfall. A pool of water. The jungle leaning in over it, greedy, swallowing. Rocks that were plants. The camera was running.

Akiko looks up. “And the ruins,” she asks, “on four mushrooms?” I don't have that in words. I have it in the email from Antigua, the way I told it that week, still inside it, before I had any theory to put on top.

18 year old Mexican shaman in training, Ivan promises me to go mushroom picking the next day, and so we did.

After many cow paddies tall grass and 1000000 mosquito bites we got what we were looking for. I hurried off to the ruins after gulping 4 big psylocibin mushies. Big mistake leaving Ivan.... it took me 3 hours to get back to the main road and it had taken us only half an hour to get there, in mud and water and losing one of my sneakers in a deep pile of ooze, I managed to save myself from exploding with frustration, ruins......, very special experience, I am sure many have done this but it is a must, Ivan showed up after a little while and looked like a little elf who took me behind the main water falls to a special place, a pool of water surrounded by a swallowing greedy jungle, and rock-plants.... trust me Jedi stuff I am talking about here, and lets not forget the waterfall fairies.... Zelda fans, got it on tape, really happy about that, then Jenny the dready, a guy who has been traveling for 9 years Italian wizard healer, walked up Latin America 4 times now and travels with a sack, most of which is full of rocks, amber, and nuts...

One night, Dario made a feast.

Fresh fish from the river. Rice cooked with coconut milk. Grilled vegetables. A salad with herbs from the jungle that tasted like nothing I'd ever had, peppery, floral, almost electric.

We ate by candlelight in the common area. The Swedish couple. The woman with the red dreadlocks who owned the place. A few other travelers who'd arrived. Ivan. Dario. Me.

And we talked about what we were afraid of.

The Swedish guy said he was afraid of going back to his job. “We have two more months,” he said, holding his wife's hand. “And then we go back to Stockholm. Back to the office. And I don't know how I'm going to do it after this.”

His wife nodded. “We're different now. But Sweden will be the same.”

The woman with the dreadlocks said she was afraid that places like this wouldn't exist much longer. “Tourism is coming. Development. In ten years, this will all be hotels and tour buses. The jungle will be cleared. The magic will be gone.”

Ivan said he was afraid that indigenous knowledge was dying. “The elders are passing away. The young people are moving to cities. In one more generation, most of this wisdom will be lost. No one will remember how to talk to the plants.”

Dario said he wasn't afraid of anything. “Fear is a choice. I chose to be free. And freedom means accepting that anything can happen. Death, illness, arrest, whatever. I accept it. So I'm not afraid.”

Then everyone looked at me.

Ivan raised his mate cup. “That's why you're here. That's why we're all here. To remember. To witness. To carry it forward.”

Dario smiled. “To be the bridge.”

We drank to that.

On my last morning at the retreat, I woke up before dawn and walked to the ruins alone.

The jungle was still dark. The path barely visible. But I'd walked it enough times that my feet knew the way.

I sat on the steps of the Temple of Inscriptions and watched the sun rise over the canopy.

And I thought: The separation is the disease.

And the temples, places like this, they weren't just architecture. They were interfaces. Places where humans could plug into that larger conversation. Where the boundary between self and world dissolved. Where you could remember what it felt like before the separation.

Holy places feel like they have absorbed the reverence of all of the devotees who have come there over time. You could argue that it is through attention that we gain immortality. In fact, the further back you go into history, the fewer people we remember. And those are usually god kings, then eventually gods, and then eventually, maybe some military, generals, and heroes.

The sun broke over the canopy, golden light flooding the temple steps.

I tried to write that light down later, in the journal. This is what came out.

A curl of the spiral that joins the Milky Way to the end of fern leaf, unravels the path in front of thee who takes a leap of faith, he has courage and persistence to see it manifest the dreams that linger in between the quarks and electrons within the field no-body.

Vibrating a pulse, the echo of the first pulse, the first sound, resonating with me, paving a path that I must follow, to find the archetypal landing amongst the spectrum of consciousness.

Only then am I tuned, dancing in accord, following the predestined path cluttered regularly by ego, fear, pride, and free will. In search of grace and harmony through balancing the interior and externalizing it spontaneously through creative spurts of energy, fueled by our instinctual desire to create.

I stood up.

I had to keep moving. San Cristóbal was next. Then Peru. Then wherever the path led.

But I'd carry this with me: Dario's freedom. Ivan's curiosity. The jungle's intelligence. The temple's memory.

Akiko stops typing. “When did you write this part?” she asks.

New York, July 2002. Ten months after Palenque. Before her.

I never saw Dario again. I heard from someone that he made it to India. Then Thailand. Still traveling. Still free. Still refusing to accept that money is necessary or borders are real.

I never saw Ivan again either. But I think about him sometimes when I see pharmaceutical companies patenting indigenous plant knowledge. When I read about the Amazon being burned. When I wonder if the wisdom he was trying to learn is still being passed down or if it's already gone.

The retreat is probably still there. Maybe it's been developed. Maybe Jenny sold it. Maybe the jungle reclaimed it.

Howling monkeys who remind everyone at the camp we are not alone, oh no we are definitely not alone. I deviated from the regular plan to head off to San Cristobal de la casa in the pounding heart of the Mexican south Chiapas.