The Sirens of Yanacocha Two years ago I became a close friend of a muleteer named Ceferino. he had been born in Cuncani and had once enjoyed farming and ranching, until a series of changes in the climate reduced him to poverty. To avoid the embarrassment that follows such disasters, he abandoned his work, and using his good pack animals he set out to transport and trade food with other communities, near Urubamba, in the sacred valley.
Ceferino told me a story that had happened to a muleteer friend of his a few years ago. This gentleman was found floating in the lagoon.
Due to the great concern of his family, they all organized a search, worried about his tardiness, they followed all the steps and paths he had taken to finally be found just in time, the man was floating on the shore of the lagoon, they ran to take it out and nothing was missing for it to drown.
It took him two days to recover his consciousness and when he recounted what had happened he stuttered and was very affected and with many signs of delirium and madness, the little that could be understood was that when he passed by very late he began to hearing some women's songs that made him feel sleepy and that cooing was getting louder and made him get closer and closer to the lagoon, without him being able to avoid it, to later not remember anything as if he had plunged into a deep sleep .
One of his sons, without discussing it with the family, had left just at the time his father used to return. This young man sometimes surprised his father with some food and continued to help him on the way back. It was this infant who had found his father floating in the lagoon, the impression was so strong that he thought his father was dead and without hesitation he jumped into the icy lagoon and thanks to the fact that his father had collected a lot of straw to change the roof of his house had been face up still breathing and he was pulled to the shore, the boy's screams and the barking of the dogs had made it possible for them to be heard by the group that had come looking for him, the son responded to the call just when he had his father on the shore of the lagoon.
The locals never go through the lagoon before sunset and every time they go on a pilgrimage to the cross of the Lord of Torrechayoc they leave offerings and ask the lagoon for permission to continue the journey.
Photo: #RichoJaip Tale adapted from Edgar Allan Poe based on a fictional story.
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