Ndeku: Drugging the creek

"Where's your bag of fish?"--Woman
"I put my fish in someone else's bag."--Me
"Ha, then you won't be eating any fish tonight."--Woman

Ndeku, a Saramaccan fishing method for catching lots of fish where the fish get drunk and the people have to do a lot of hard labor. I know what you're thinking, doesn't that actually defeat the purpose of fishing?

Upon my return to Gunzi after a two and a half hour up-river boat trip from Zemoise, still with my bags in hand and life jacket on, I walked past a group of men who had congregated behind my house. "What are you guys doing?" Since Gunzi's motorcycle gang was there and logs and sticks were a plenty in the vicinity I figured it was some kind of Hell Angel's meeting like used to go down back home on East Lewelling. "Ndeku!", my friend Kuka yelled. I had been waiting for over a year to go on a ndeku trip. Up to this point, I had only heard the amazing tales from a few very lucky Peace Corps Volunteers who had attended ndeku creek druggings. I ran to my house, threw down my baggage, grabbed my machette and rubber boots, then headed out into the jungle with a 50 pound bag of sticks and logs on top of my head. We walked out 3 miles into the jungle before we arrived at the big creek that runs under the great bridge.

I walked out with 3 other men and met up with 13 other people who had come to drug the creek. There were about 20 sacks worth of ndeku wood that people had carried for 3 miles from the village to the creek. After dropping our sacks or wheel barrows of logs and sticks on the ground, we took our machettes and began to cut down trees. We cut pieces of these trees into clubs to hit and mash up the ndeku. The purpose of this was to expose the white wood underneath the bark which has some kind of chemical that drugs the fish and forces them to the top of the water. We spent over 2 hours pounding ndeku, re-filling the sacks and wheel barrows with the pounded ndeku.

We began bringing the pounded ndeku to a few big rocks that the creek ran around.
Maku, who appeared to be our spiritual leader, begged the god of the forest for a good hunt of the fish and prayed that none of the kids got hurt. I think he was praying for me. After Maku's prayer, a few of the guys began to rinse and pound the ndeku even further to create a milky looking white substance that began running down the creek. Within a minute a sting ray had floated to the top of the water which gave everyone a scare and then another minute later a load of little fish floated to the top of the water and the kids who had come to the ndeku began scooping them up with their strainers into buckets. After observing for a few minutes and waiting until the men got down pounding the ndeku, I jumped into the creek with my machette. Finally! All those episodes of Man Vs. Wild that I watched before Peace Corps were going to pay off.

With machette in hand, I began heading down the creek with the men who were wielding machettes and bags to hold their hauls of fish. Up to this point my only fishing experience had been with a 13 year-old kid named Stephano and I dropped the one fish he handed me which meant my total fish haul for my year and change in Gunzi was -1. So the guys did not tell me to bring a bag because they didn't think I would catch any fish or they wanted to take my haul. I was relieved to immediately snag a tiny fish that wasn't alive and had floated to the top of the water. I raised my living-room, aquarium sized fish in triumph, my fish haul for over a year in Gunzi was now 0. We continued to head further up the creek and I found a few medium sized fish, two of which I was able to maim with my machette and throw into someone else's fish bag. I caught a lot of little ones with my hands, by the end of the day I could grab the fish routinely like a shortstop scooping up a ground ball. By the end of the day, I had caught over 20 total fish.

Of course, this event couldn't pass without a comical, token Peace Corps moment. After catching a few small and medium fish I was getting my confidence up. I was holding my machette and knee deep in creek water. I was standing next to a man named Mambele, probably the best hunter and farmer in the village. I had just thrown a fish in his bag and we were standing next to each other looking for fish when all the sudden something began shaking underneath and between my legs. Apparently, my reaction should have been to swing my machette down and kill whatever had floated to the surface under my legs. Instead, I let out an exclamation of surprise and almost jumped out of my rubber boots. Mambele turned around and I pointed at the water. He swung his machete at the water a few times and then pulled a 30 pound monster of a fish out of the water. Moments later, he caught an even bigger fish and would finish the day with 3 fish around 30 pounds.

I'd estimate that we waded, and at some points swam, a little over a mile down the creek. The group of men I was with, seven of us, caught over 500 total fish in about two and a half hours. And that lady was right, I still haven't eaten any of those fish, yet.

Fon Ndeku

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLipx0WB3WM

Kids Catching Fish

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4G2hVADTWg

Me going for fish w/ machette

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElFPHgDzk90

The Big Kahuna!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS7t2GW9lQQ