The Medical Sorcerer

We decide the mini-village displays are for friends and relatives of people who are in the hospital. People who come from different parts of the Western Solomons. "What a grotty display," Freddy frowns. She's right, the mini-village is ugly. The huts sloppily built, the area filled with weeds, the people look like their homes - lethargic and filthy. We walk to the next clearing. This one is quite pretty and neat as a pin. The style of thatched hut is different. More rounded. The vegetation is arranged in neat little gardens. A big breasted woman is vigorously sweeping out her dirt floored hut, her large boobs swinging freely. A piglet squeals and bounds away from a little naked boy who is intent on getting the piglet out of the garden. There are flowers growing between the thatched huts.

On to the next display. Here two women talk in front of a tin shed. Their bright muumuus drape from neck to the ground. They look hot, but clean. A little boy, wearing tattered shorts, pulls at his mothers hand. The ground around them is mud. A big cock in full flare races after a chicken in the background.

"I've got museum fatigue," I complain to Freddy. "Lets shift it into high gear." We stride back down the old road to the trade store and stop to see if there is any sugar. The interior is mostly empty plank décor with a few cans on one of the shelves. A pudgy little guy of mixed blood and indeterminate age appears from the back room. He's wearing a pith helmet, a khaki safari shirt and matching shorts.

Kitchner keeps slipping one surprise after another into our afternoon. He's retired from Government service. What did he do? He was a medical doctor, trained in Fiji and New Zealand. This matches my estimate that he must be sixty something, until he adds he retired 20 years ago. If he retired at 65, as is normal for the civil service, he would now be 85 years old. This is absolutely impossible. He really looks like he's in his late 50's. An engaging, intelligent man with such a quick wit, 85? If his mother is 100 years old, she would have been 15 when he was born. Possible, I suppose.

We all guffaw for a couple of minutes and continue to eat in silence. I begin to think about the wind. The wind which, for us, is always on the bow. I sort of have it in mind - just for the fun of it - to look for a witch doctor and see if I can get him to do something about our peculiar (and rotten) luck with the wind. So, as Kitchner says, "Butter, please," I blurt out "What about the wind, being a fisherman you must be familiar with the stories about the old sayer who could control the wind and rain."

He stops eating, gives me a level look and then answers, "You happen to have been born into a strange era or the truth of those stories would be evident to you. Here in the Solomons, before the war, the weather followed certain patterns religiously. At the new moon it would rain. In certain months the wind would invariably blow from a particular direction. Changes would always be foretold by specific natural signs."

He hesitates, as if pondering something, chewing his lunch with a distant look in his eye, "There is a small crab that lives in the mangroves. We call it the Southeast Trade Caller because if you look out over the flats at low tide, and the crabs are waving their claws in a particular fashion like this you can be positive the southeasterly trades will begin in a day or two.

"Last March, I took my sailing canoe to Rendova to pick up a log for my new canoe. All the way there we sailed with the wind blowing on our stern. We went into the forest and spent several days felling the tree, trimming the branches and fighting the log down to the sea. I had arranged with a friend to come over with an outboard canoe so we would tow the log back. It would, we knew, be directly into the wind and thus impossible to sail back towing a bloody great log. Well, as it turned out, the man didn't come. I tried to get someone from Rendova to tow me back but couldn't find anyone."

"Shortly, we had run out of food and I had no money and didn't want to abandon the log. My helper asked me, 'Well, now what do we do?' 'Don't worry,' I said, 'Tonight I make prayer. Fix everything. Tomorrow we sail long home.' The next morning the wind shifted right around and was blowing in the opposite direction. Right out of the West Sou'west. Very unusual in March, you understand. I said, 'OK, lets go.' and we hoisted the sail. It took us four hours to make it here towing the log. Exactly one hour after we arrived, the wind stopped and blew from its normal direction again. We had just finished rolling the log up into the shed when it changed back. I turned to my helper and said, 'OK. You can paddle back to Rendova now."'

We all giggle at his story and the way he mimed every action with his face and body. His wife says, "His helper told everyone what had happened and it helped reinforce the people's idea that he was a sorcerer."

Kitchner throws her a "Be quiet look," but I perk up at this and inquire where he got such a reputation to begin with.

"Ahhhh, that's another story." He gets up from the table and we repair to the front of the Quonset hut where he has some lawn chairs. He settles into one and as Freddy and I sit down he closes his eyes leans back and begins, "One time, quite awhile ago, I was returning one night from a trip to Gizo. I decided to stop by the shop for a few things before coming to the island. I walked directly from the ferry landing to the store and right inside. Of all things there was a man there in the process of robbing the store! I was quite frightened but so surprised, I just kept walking into the store. I walked right up to the man, took him by the arm (he was as startled as I was) and calmly said, 'Come along with me, please' and quickmarched him directly to the police station.

"Shortly before that incident an old man well over 100 years old who we were taking care of had died. He was a very wise old man and knew many things. He was considered to be a sayer.

"When I walked so purposefully from the ferry right into the store and popped out again an instant later with the thief, the people assumed I a spirit had told me the thief was there. A small congregation of the village people came to my store the next day and asked me 'Did the old man bless you?' Well, of course it was too good an opportunity to pass up, so I put on a serious expression and simply nodded my head."

"But Kitchner," I turn to look at him, "What did make you go to your store at exactly that time and why did the trades reverse direction for just the time you needed to return home and why did the mullet jump into your boat at exactly that time? Do these things happen to you often?"

He laughs for a long time at my question. Finally, he agrees a large mullet had never before jumped into his canoe, especially not when he was playing a game with his son-in-law about magic and that his store had not been robbed often before and never afterwards. "The wind does seem especially favorable for me," he smiles "most of the time."

"Not for me," I grumble. "We have a shocking record of having adverse winds. We need a 'sayer' to fix our problem with the winds. It's always on the nose." I look hopefully at Kitchner but he just sits there, looking back at me.

I shrug and ask, "Tell me more about the magic fishing plant."

"Oh, more of that." He gets up and leads us into the garden and selects a plant with long oblate leaves striped with red. "First you take some of these leaves, like this, and tie them around your neck." He braids them together as we walk off towards his boatshed. "Then you fold another leaf in half and wipe it, just so, along the fishing line from the hook upwards. Muttering a few mystic words, of course." He reaches into a nook in the boatshed and brings out some elegant, hand carved pearl shell fish lures. Freddy's eyes go wide. She loves traditional fish lures. Kitchner shows us how to wipe the hook and line.

"Well, yes. Yes. Of course, I would list the psychological effect as a true effect, but you may be right. When several men are fishing for tuna say three or four men are paddling and another holds the fishing pole. If the fisherman doesn't catch a fish after a few minutes, we frequently change men. Often, the new man will immediately catch a fish."

"But, most of the plants used by the men on headhunting expeditions were clearly to focus their minds. Potana gave powers to the hunter from his spirit ancestors. A plant called Vina Puta would make you invisible. Doma would hypnotize the enemy. Mamahelo gave tremendous stamina and strength (it looks much like the magic fishing plant with red streaks through its leaf, here, this one), Puji allowed you to gorge yourself during a feast, and Vina manavasa had the wonderful property of inducing hospitality in all you met. The power of suggestion. Plus, perhaps, some elements of herbal magic." As Kitchner talks, he points to some of the plants he is describing. I find it more than of passing interest that this alleged sayer has all of these magic plants growing in his garden. On the other hand, he is a medical doctor....so an interest in herbs would not be out of the ordinary.

I continue with fish - a safe topic, "Walter Starck thinks reef fish which stay in one area get to recognize certain lures and fishing techniques and somehow can communicate this recognition to other fish. When the fisherman changes tactics and lures he often catches one right away."

Kitchner nods agreement, clearly happy to be off the subject of magic. "A well equipped fisherman for Bonito or tuna must have five or six different types of lures," Kitchner shows us a selection of his lures. "When I approach a school of fish I observe the birds; what kinds are there, what they are doing. If I see man of war birds present and active I use this silver lure for surely there are large sardines.

He continues, "Each lure must also be fished differently. But the choice of lures, and this type of fishing, is peculiar to the migratory fishes like tuna and bonito. Walter is quite correct with the reef fish. They do learn to recognize certain boats and fishing techniques. Once they learn, they are very difficult to catch. As a bit of exaggeration, the local people here insist the fish in some areas know each fisherman's canoe, the way he paddles, his particular lures, and perhaps his name."

We laugh and stroll down to the water. The lagoon is brilliant in the afternoon sunlight, "You know, when I go fishing for tuna I talk to the fish. When I see a school of fish I paddle toward them and say, 'Hello fish, it is Kitchner Wheatley again. You remember, from Munda. My grandfather and my great grandfather came out to see you. You remember me. I always paddle this canoe. You will recognize my lure if you come back to me.'

Ancient navigators could go between these islands and perceive exactly where the other islands were from hundreds of miles away. Just by knowing Sea's language. I can understand how those who are completely captured by the social scene of the village and the hardships of island life would be unable to understand how men like Kitchner know what the wind and the sea will be doing for days in advance.

Magic plays a large role in this awareness. I don't know why. Perhaps, as Kitchner says, you must quiet the busy social mind to listen to Sea's language. Ritual magic quiets the mind and allows ones attention to focus on the nonhuman language of Sea. Yes. I think that may be so. A magic talisman would stop the constant inner blabber and allow the person to be inwardly attentive. I think our understanding of Sea's language, or of the planet in general, comes from our unconscious mind a deeper, more primitive mind underlying our talkative social selves.

Why, that's .... No. Not exactly. But somehow this is close to how the Moirae work. I'm sure of it. Something about the way the natural language works. But Moirae are more than natural events. If a man reads Sea's language he can say what will happen because he sees....I want to say dedications of events.

He sees a chain of events which, causal or not, he knows means a series is being spoken. Like the first notes of a familiar jingle, once the first signals are made the other events will surely follow. The crab itself has nothing to do with the wind velocity or direction but it is part of a series of environmental events which predicts an outcome of weather trends.

I sit for awhile and contemplate this idea. Magic is a chain of events one cannot see or understand. I like it.

The Moirae are not supernatural, they seem, to me, to be magic only because I can't figure out how they work. They are beyond my direct perception but I know they are there because I can observe their behavior. I also know they have something to do with the directionality of evolution. It's an explanation of how creatures evolved. A behavior mandating a vector of development in response to environmental (I was going to say pressures but I really want to say) opportunities.

I've lost the thread. (Bad pun).

When he stops at Benny's display his otherwise deadpan face squinges up into a look of utter contempt and he hurries away. Benny has some of the best carvings in the display. He is visibly upset. "Don't worry Benny," I say, "He's just trying to make you lower your price. Don't come down on your prices. Your work is very good."

"Him no like work, going to pay nothing. Better something than nothing." He is really worried.

I can't convince him the man lied because the man said nothing. His face said plenty. This was really a sharp move on the buyer's part. Solomon Islanders are very expressive with their body language and, like most of us, impressions gotten from body language are usually absorbed unconsciously and therefore believed.

I limp after The Man and watch his technique. On each round he only buys one kind of carving, starting with the less expensive small fish, sea horses, and crocodiles. He points to the ones he wants and peels off some one dollar bills, making a big show of counting them silently two or three times right under the seller's nose. He ruffles and shakes and fans out the cash, snaps each bill as he counts it. When he's done he hands it to the artist and, if the man takes it, he walks off instantly to another display. His assistants quickly gather up the carvings in large burlap sacs while the artist counts the dollars one at a time, slowly, out loud. The two helpers whisk the carvings off towards the guest house. They are long gone before the carver gets finished counting.

The Holy Mama would soon show us a different Solomon Spirit...