ABSTRACT
The People of the Centre understand themselves to be distinct from other neighbouring groups in that their men and women lick tobacco in daily life and on ritual occasions, while their neighbours merely smoke or powder their tobacco. This chapter discusses the uses and meaning of tobacco for the People of the Centre, relying mostly on insights from two elders: Kinerai (Hipolito Candre), an Ocaina-Witoto man who lived along the Igaraparana River, and Enokakuiodo (Oscar Roman-Jitdutjaano), who lives in the Middle Caqueta region. The breath of cooling down tobacco and cooling down coca is received in the heart as a healing spell – breath of tobacco, breath of coca. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the technical processes of heating up and cooling down that define the basis of both tobacco’s hazards and its healing power, encapsulated in the oration of the tobacco maker.
