433 Chapter Seven Cosmos For the Matsigenka of Shimaa, kameti ...

courteous but distant. They saw them as more or less good people, and would attempt
conversations in broken Spanish on the few occasions when poñaronas passed by, but only a
few families downstream along the Kompiroshiato included them in their visiting and exchange
networks. This is an ancient pattern of minimal blending between Amazon Indians and Andean
Indians
Salient too were virakochas, mainly middle-class Peruvians and North Americans.
Occasionally, government officials and survey teams would pass through, socializing briefly
before passing on. These visits had great significance, because Maestro was encouraging the
Matsigenka of Shimaa to think of themselves as Peruvians. He viewed these outsiders as
powerful models to emulate. Other Matsigenkas, however, remained ambivalent: attracted by
the virakochas’ wealth and the opportunities they offered for trade, yet still frightened by the old
stories linking them to danger and disease.
Although the North American linguists and anthropologists were of less importance to
them as models than the Peruvians they encountered, the linguists Harold and Patricia Davis
spent much time in the vicinity of Shimaa before and after it was started in 1968 (Davis 1994).
They were greatly admired for their honesty and generosity, as well as their linguistic and cultural
mastery. Many men spontaneously and with great pleasure told me of Harold Davis’s physical
skill and endurance in negotiating even the most treacherous mountain trails, and of his profound
knowledge of their language. I had the impression that my physical and linguistic achievements
were being weighed in the balance and found wanting. During household inventories in 1972, I
learned that many of the trade items people owned had been gifts from the Davises.
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