PERSONAL PROFILES

Don Hector Aguanari was born in the small hamlet of Punchana, upriver fromthe jungle city of iquitos, Peru, on the Amazon River. As he grew-up, hewould watch his father, famed healer and Ayahusquero, Don Manuel Aguanari(Mentioned in Luis Eduardo Luna’s Book on "Vegetalismo"), perform varioushealings and Ayahuasca ceremonies.
One of the ones that impressed him the most, and that he vividly recalls,is the time his father was brought a woman with a very swollen belly and inexcruciating pain. Upon diagnosing her with Ayahuasca, Don Manuel saw that she had been harmed by anotherAyahuascquero, using a veryhard-to-cure type of sorcery: She had been made pregnant by an anaconda!!! (This is not a too-unusual an occurrence, as Pablo Amaringo portrays suchphenomena in one of his paintings included in his and Luis EduardoLuna’s book on Ayahuasca Iconography. Also, I have heard accountsfrom various healers who claim tohave been confronted by similar phenomena).
Therefore, Don Manuel set-out to prepare a medicine from the very strongand highly regarded (as both, potentially healing or harmful) Katawa tree,whose resine is extremely caustic. When the woman drank the medicine, sheexperieneced very painful contortions in her belly, as the anaconda within writhed in pain. Finally, aseveryone had fallen asleep, the anaconda came out of the woman, leavingonly a trace of phlegm and blood on her path.
All such experiences undoubtedly had a strong influence on DonManuel’s young son, Hector. However, Hector didn’t set-out tobecome a shaman nor an Ayahuasquero until much later-on in life, choosing rather to respond to the exigencies of making a living andraising a family in Iquitos.
It was when he was in his late thirties, that he first started to learn themedicine-way of Ayahuasca, "out of necessity", as heexplains. He and his wife had fallen into a very hard rut, they literallyrepulsed each other, and couldn’t have the same mind on any topic. They consulted an Ayahuasquerowho told them they had been done harm to (ensorcelled) by envious peoplewho wished them apart, but even though both of them saw it was true in their Ayahuasca visions,both of them resisted believing it. Not until his wife left him forPucallpa did Don Hector seriously approach his Ayahuasquero healer, who then helped cleanse him and his wife of theirsorcery, and helped call-back the soul of Don hector’s wife back tohim. Two months later, Don hector’s wife, completely of her own volition, and without communication betweenthem, was back in Iquitos, reunited with Don Hector. The healer howevertold Don hector that not until he learned the medicine way would he findpeace and be free from trouble.
Therefore, Don Hector set-out to learn the hard path of becoming anAyahuasca healer.He was the last to join a group of five apprentices to his teacher. Aftermany rigurous diets, trials and tribulations, it beceme evident that onlyhim among the five would emerge empowered as a full-blown Ayahuasca shaman. Many where the difficulties on his learning path, but one that stands-outin his mind was when he was just about to graduate, and he entered a vision during an Ayahuasca session where he saw the whole worldending, and such was the horror and sadness of what he was experiencingthat he wept unconsolably and promised himself that he would never takeAyahuasca again. However, he withstood the trial and emerged victorious, and ever since he has been a practicingAyahuasca shaman with a thriving clientele, and coutless healings to hisname.
He conducts his ceremonies caringly and very strongly. His singing ispowerful, and beautiful. His ritual-style is quite traditional, usingmostly the leaf-bundle called "Shacapa" for instrumentation, and singing in a combination of Quechua, nativeamazonian languages and Spanish. He combines traditional jungle iconographywith Christian iconography in his songs, as is quite common among suchpractitioners in the Peruvian Amazon.
His healing songs came mostly from his teacher, but amazingly enough, eventhough long dead, his father, Don Manuel, now comes to help Don Hector inhis ceremonies, and all of Don Manuel’s songs have come back to DonHector, who now uses them.
Don Hector is in his sixties now, and going strong. He counts twenty-onestudents to his name, both men and women. His main apprentice is hisfoster-son Fernando, and together they sing well in ceremonies. "It is good to have apprentices that learn well" says Don Hector,"because when one is in trouble, one’s students may beable to help" .