Here in the Lacondon Jungle I look like I've been in a serious fist fight. My right eye is swollen mostly shut. I have a big bloody knot on my forehead over my left eye. I am covered with cuts and bruises.
I'm never entirely sure of how I get these injuries. Sometimes it seems I am in a great struggle with the nueve (nine) pinche, cabron, senores (lords) of the underworld.
But here in the land of the Lacondon Jungle Maya I feel wonderful. I'm engaged in the good fight, la lucha, that I was looking for when I left the Mystic, CT back in July.
I came here with the first intent of having the rumble in the jungle. Alexandro, one of my chess playing friends in San Christobal had to get to Cancun to return to Switzerland. He first proposed going to the jungle and I first proposed that we have the great chess rumble in the jungle. But right from the beginning something else was going on - something much beyond chess - with very physical manifestations.
I left for the jungle from San Cristobal first. I arrived in Palenque at first light on Feb. 6 and walked the about four miles to the Panchan - my home in Chiapas in 1997 (see The Jah DEP at www.libbyhome.blogspot.com).
As I walked I couldn't help but notice Venus. It was the brightest I had ever seen it as a morning star. I thought about the ancient Mayan astronomers and their close scruting of Venus - because Venus tells when it is time to fight holy war.
I found the Panchan much changed. In 1997 it was a place of magic and it was a fucking lunatic asylum. It was a place of much not-business-as-usual (n-b-a-u). It is now mostly business-as-usual (b-a-u).
But there is still some n-b-a-u there. I met a legal cannabis grower from California (he had his card). We smoked large on home made hash. Afterwards other people came and asked to be smoked up. One had a SUV and was going back to town.
When we arrived back in Santo Domingo (the town by the ruins of Palenque) the dude almost ran over a man, woman, and child because they were too short to be easily seen in the SUV.
I got directions to the commutivo (van) station that would get me to most of the way to Communidad Laconja - the place chosen for the rumble in the jungle.
As I was walking the streets looking for the station I was tripping hard. I hadn't slept for about 30 hours.
I stumbled feel to my knees, ripped my blue jeans, and then the weight and momentum of my backpack forced my head into the pavement. I broke open my forehead over my right eye.
When I was entering the commutivo I smacked the same place against the frame of the door.
As soon as I got to Communidad Laconja I was in a very unusual state of mind. I immediately began observing the great struggle of b-a-u and n-b-a-u. The real rumble in the jungle.