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Vice Blog

BRAZIL - SECRETS OF THE GUARANI

If you head toward the Jaraguá peak, up Via Anhangüera, the highway named to commemorate notorious "Old Devil" conquistadors who threatened to burn down rivers if the indigenous people didn't reveal where their gold mines were, you'll eventually find a Guarani village standing right in São Paulo's concrete jungle. To an outsider, the lack of material goods is noticeable, since some of the houses are made of wood, like shanties. But inside the gates they only speak Guarani, not Portuguese, and anyway slums don't have any kind of security.

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I'm familiar with reports on indigenous people involuntarily losing their culture as they have no choice but to pursue poverty in the outskirts of the city, but that's not what's going on here: everybody lives in a constant process of reassurance of their traditional values and practices, even after 500 years of contact with non-indigenous people.

"When I visit my friends in the city, they say, 'Can you keep being an Indian once you wear clothes?' Can't they see that the objects I have don't change what I am?" says Little Thunder. Sure, he smokes from the huge carved-wood pipe that the Guarani people like to hit nonstop, but he's also got a cell phone, headphones, an email account, IM account, a habit of reading the newspaper, and a fantastic grasp of Portuguese (which is rare around here).

Born in the Guarani village of Parelheiros, his father had a friend in town with whom he made a deal that forced the boy to abandon the tribe and go to school. He was brought up in the city until he was ten, when he finished 8th grade. "I intend to keep on studying," he says. "I want to go to law school. But right now I need to figure out what's best for me. Because after graduating where will I work? In the city? I don't want to live in a city, because that's not who we are. That's not for us," he says. The existential crisis is not a city person's privilege.

In fact, none of the 300-plus people in the village wants to live in the city. No really, they don't—they spend a few months in this urban area and then go back to their reserve. "I can't tell you where it is, it's our secret," says Little Thunder. "It's where we live in our way. Here, if we want to hunt, what are we going to hunt? A car?" The Guarani way of living is called Nhande Reko, a system of traditions that includes every aspect of life, from religious rites to eating habits. They only eat once a day. Breakfast is drinking mate and smoking from the pipe.