"Deep in the rain forest of central Africa, an extraordinary initiation ritual is about to begin." "This is Bwiti, a unique religion based around the consumption of a powerful hallucinogen called iboga." "I'm about to be initiated into the Bwiti faith by a group of Babongo tribesmen." "I've got more." "The drug makes you violently sick, purging your body of sin." "Then the visions come." "The Babongo believe your soul leaves your body and is free to go on a great journey to speak with the spirits of animals and plants." "They say iboga allows you to see yourself as you really are from the inside out." "Days later you emerge, cleansed, reborn, but this rebirth is not without risk." "People have died doing this." "Their hearts failing as the drug pumps through their body." "I'm a day's walk from the nearest road, two days from medical help." "This film tells the story of my journey into the heart of Bwiti." "My name's Bruce Parry." "I'm an explorer and expedition leader." "I've spent a year visiting some of the world's most remote people, to see how their lives are changing." "I think there is only one way to really understand another culture, and that's to live as they do." "To become, for a short while, one of the tribe." "This is Libreville, capital city of Gabon." "It's a prosperous modern city made rich by the oil reserves offshore and the timber logged from the vast forests of the Congo basin." "It's Friday night and as the sun sets over the city, a congregation gathers for worship." "This is a Bwiti church, where devotees from all walks of life gather to take iboga and worship, drumming and dancing through the night." "Although almost unknown in the West, Bwiti is one of Gabon's three official religions." "Almost a third of Gabonese practise Bwiti." "In much of Gabon, Bwiti has become overlaid with the teachings of missionaries and has incorporated elements of the Catholic Mass." "Iboga is eaten as the sacred host and their rituals are steeped in Christian imagery." "This Christianised form of Bwiti is a long way from the animistic religion that began thousands of years ago with the forest people." "But there are places, deep in the jungles of the south, where the pure African form of the religion is still practised." "We're heading now into the jungle and my aim is to go and live with the Babongo people, the forest people, who were the first inhabitants of this part of the jungle, and hopefully sometime tomorrow, we're going to be trekking off" "and within the week I am going to be living with the Babongo people." "Gabon sits at the western edge of the Congo basin, the second largest area of tropical forest on the planet." "It's a globally important habitat for many of the world's most endangered species, from gorilla to forest elephant" "But even here, the forests are under threat." "Gabon has already lost between 20 and 30% of its original forest and it's estimated that a further third has been sold to the logging companies." "20, 30 years ago, it would have taken us a month to go where we are trying to go but now you can do it in a couple of days and now it's because of these roads." "The road we're on now is a logging road and is one of the biggest influencing factors in the way that the Babongo people's lives have changed of recent years." "Gabon, primary jungle mostly, and 80% of the land itself is forest covered, but of course it's diminishing by the day." "Every five minutes we see these big trucks with massive logs coming past and the place is just being devastated and the whole country has got this criss-cross of logging tracks going all across it and of course the forest people," "who up until now have been deep jungle, are coming closer and closer to the outside world." "Our guide on this forest adventure is Monsieur Hugues Poitevin, a Frenchman living in Libreville." "I am in love with Gabon, you know." "I came for two weeks... 33 years ago." "First I came to see a member of my family here and I stayed, because I met always so much love." "I thought must be something special here because this love I never felt that somewhere else, so that's where they told me about iboga." "Iboga is very important to me because it made me discover who I am." "Bwiti is central to Monsieur Hugues' life." "He was one of the first Europeans to be initiated." "He warns me the iboga experience is not for the faint-hearted." "You never take iboga by pleasure." "Once you took it once, you don't want to take it before long time, even in a small quantity." "We drive south for two days and stop where the road stops." "This is Mamongo, a tiny Babongo settlement that ten years ago was in the middle of thick jungle." "Then a logging concession came through and overnight the forest people became roadside people." "We are looking for a clearing and guess what - we came across this." "You know, obviously our hearts sank because it is such a strong indicator of what's going on around here at that moment." "We hear beyond there's massive areas of huge clear felling and it just, you know, words can't explain, you just need to see to understand what's going on here and this is where these people live" "and they don't really know what's going on and all these loggers everywhere, it's just tearing their world apart." "We want to get away from the influence of the road and the loggers to see how the Babongo live traditionally." "We've arranged to stay in Mokoko, a settlement a days' walk into the forest." "Half the village turns out to meet us, eager for work." "We've reached the end of the road." "It is a major turning point in our journey so far." "And now we're off into the jungle, so it's really exciting." "The Babongo are what we once called pygmies." "Pygmy is now perceived as derogatory term implying small stature and "forest people" is deemed more acceptable." "Traditionally they were nomadic hunter gatherers living entirely from the forest." "They are the first inhabitants of this part of Africa." "Forest peoples have a complex place in modern African society." "They are often treated as little more than animals and their relationships with their more powerful Bantu neighbours is often that of master and slave." "But curiously they also have some power." "Their unrivalled ability in the forest makes them master hunters, while their knowledge of its plants and trees means they are often feared as sorcerers." "It's been a tough trek, as you can probably see, but it's just so nice to be here." "I hope to be able to live with the people of Mokoko for up to a month to try and experience something of their lives before it changes beyond recognition." "I hope they will accept me, to the extent that they are willing to initiate me into Bwiti." "Bonjour." "Je m'appelle Bruce." "Faut pas qu'on se cache les choses." "Quand I'un est pas content, il dit pas à I'autre." "It is our hope, if it is OK with Monsieur le Chef and the village, is that we stay here for some weeks and it makes me very happy that the people I see here all look very happy and smiley" "and like a beautiful crowd." "The inhabitants of Mokoko seem delighted to see us and on the first day we are treated to a dazzling display of drumming and dancing." "The drumming called spirits from the forest." "These are the Macoi, ambivalent figures at once malevolent and benign." "The Babongo's lowly place in Gabonese society means very little interest is taken in their vibrant culture, so visitors get a warm welcome." "It seems the best possible start to my stay here and I go to bed exhilarated." "It doesn't last." "In 48 hours, two people will be dead." "Violent equatorial thunderstorms roll over the valley." "On two consecutive nights, we awake to hear terrible wailing and screaming." "A young baby and a woman from separate families have died." "While the baby's death passes almost unnoticed, the woman's death triggers an extraordinary display of grief." "Her children - two girls and a boy - are inconsolable." "We pay our respects to the families and offer to leave them in peace, but they say we are welcome to stay and film the funeral." "The Babongo believe that the spirit of a dead person will linger in the village and cause harm." "The village must be cleansed through drumming, dancing and ritual." "Inside the hut, the women wash the body and wrap it in a cloth." "Then the men carry it to the graveyard in the forest for burial." "The women paint their faces white with kaolin to symbolise purification and dance and sing to put the dead woman's spirit to rest." "Our presence here is complicated now." "We feel we are intruding and the village needs to grieve." "But we are still a distraction." "We try and keep out of the way until the funeral is over." "In the backs of our minds we just don't know where to put ourselves." "We want them to do their normal thing and we don't want to get in their way and so it's kind of been a bit of a yo-yo of them saying please come in and partake in the festivity, which it is, it's a festivity." "It's a celebration of life almost, it's a beautiful way that they do a funeral here, but because we don't kind of know whether they are doing it to be nice to us or whether they really want us to, or wanted us to come." "It's really, it's just very difficult." "After three days and three nights of mourning, the funeral is declared over and village life begins to return to normal... or as normal as it can be with me here." "The men begin to build me a hut, eager to demonstrate their considerable skills." "It's called a tudi, and it's a traditional Babongo hut made entirely from material gathered from the forest around the village." "A bent sapling structure overlaid with flat wide leaves for waterproofing." "When these people lived a nomadic life moving through the forest, this is what they would have lived in." "While the tudi is traditionally Babongo, the design of the mud huts is that of their neighbours, the Mitsogo." "This shift in architecture maps a transition from nomadic hunter to sedentary farmer." "The tudi takes just half a day to make." "Just weeding my living room." "Those builders, they always leave a mess, don't they?" "The heavens open, and my new home is put through its paces." "I've only been here a few days, but already it's obvious how flamboyant their culture is." "There's is a ritual for every action." "The spirits of the forest must be appeased at every turn." "My hut is blessed by the whole village and I move into my new home." "It's so nice to be here." "We spent all day making this beautiful house that I am sleeping in tonight and it's been a real communal effort." "Men and the women of the village getting together and..." "And tonight I left the crew behind, and I walked down the hill, and here I am." " Hugues." " Yeah, man." " I'm gonna miss you." " I'm going to miss you too." "I already miss you." "Thank you so very much, my friend, for everything you have done." "Oh, let's hug." " Vous ètes un bon oeuf." "Un bon oeuf." " Yeah, good egg." " Come on, let me walk you out." " OK, thank you." "Thank you very much." "You've really, you've just made the arrival here magical." "Monsieur Hugues returns to Libreville, leaving me with a small camera crew who camp outside the village." "Mokoko is just 100 miles south of the equator." "It's hot, humid, and the air is thick with insects." "The forests are malarial and tiny bugs called pharou carry dengue fever." "I'm trying to live as the Babongo do, to better understand their lives, so I'm not using a mosquito net or insect repellent." "Already, it's obvious I'm going to struggle." "Gabon is a former French colony." "While some of the Babongo speak French, most only speak their own language." ""Timoi" - les femmes." "The chief, Chimika, gets to work teaching me the basics." " Londabu." " Londabu." "Donc, je m'en vais à la maison, dormir." "Oh, so when you are saying good night." "And the word?" " Mejoi." " Mejoi." "And mejoi, au revoir pour dormir?" " Voilà!" " OK!" "Good night." "Chimika is the son of the recently deceased chief." "He was away in town working for a Lebanese company when his father died and is now reluctantly chief-in-waiting." "Chimika and his family will probably leave to find work in the logging camps or the towns." "But he is not representative of this village." "He has official papers allowing him to work." "Most Babongo have no papers and will stay in the forest hunting and trapping as change gradually engulfs them." "But for now these isolated groups still live in relative harmony with their environment." "Although predominantly still hunter gatherers the Babongo have some shifting agriculture." "The women grow maize, manioc and potatoes in small patches cleared from the forest." "They forage for crabs, a real delicacy, and smoke armadillos from their burrows." "Nior!" "Guess a nior is snake!" " Nior." " Nior?" " Nior." " Oui." "The men are master craftsmen." "Jean Claude Mombet shows me how they trap small game." "Wire is now used instead of rattan." "You can see it's ingenious - deadly and horrible - but ingenious nonetheless and what we have is, the snare's under tension and it's caught on a little stick and these slats here are fixed this side, but loose at the far end." "So as that goes down, you see, it suddenly slips out then that enables the snare to come free and it will capture the animal." "And the reason it comes in tension like that is so that the animal hasn't got anywhere to grapple with the ground, so it can't bite itself free." "It's just being held there and it's a pretty nasty slow death by suffocation." "I'm enjoying my stay here immensely." "Life is obviously tough, but the forest seems to provide almost everything that the village needs and the people of Mokoko undoubtedly have something that we have lost in our society - time for each other." "Traditional hunter gatherer people often have to work just three to four hours a day to satisfy their basic needs." "The rest of the time is spent just hanging out." "They play with their children, groom each other tell stories, smoke and sleep." "And where there is something to celebrate, the whole community celebrates together." "But behind the smiles, I am nervous." "I've been here two weeks now and the Bwiti initiation is playing on my mind." "Iboga is a powerful psychoactive drug that will send me on a long and painful journey inside myself." "The more I think about it, the more scared I become." "I walk around and I think, I'm a nice guy, you know." "I don't go out of my way to hurt anyone." "In fact, I more often than not am quite generous and I like to think of myself as a pleasant guy that likes people." "I'm very gregarious and, you know, I am a nice guy all round." "But that's not the whole story, is it?" "We've all got hidden little bits that..." "There's something about..." "None of us are perfect, and, you know, whether it's... you have a big problem with your family over the years, or whether it's that you know that you've, you know, upset people" "and maybe even not really been that remorseful about it." "I've, you know, I've broken hearts and I've, you know, I know in the past I've kind of done some pretty nasty things." "Now, the whole point of a subconscious in many ways, is to, like, stick that somewhere and kind of forget about it so that you can get on with your life." "And the thought of going there and knocking on doors and opening them up and seeing what you are really like, even though you think you're nice." "No, actually let's take a deep look, Bruce." "Let's check you out, let's really see, are you so nice, are you as nice as you say?" "It's just a few words - "Are you?" "Is this true?" Imagine what that must be like." "And all these things whereby suddenly... you know, you just get on with your life normally and then suddenly... you know, you really see where you are." "Well, I'll tell you something, no matter how nice you think you are, that's a scary thing." "That's a really scary thing." "I'm out with the boys and they're setting a right old pace." "We're zooming along and they're chattering like you wouldn't believe." "They're so noisy but they're so confident, they're obviously in their element now." "We're on our way to collect honey." "Forest peoples are renowned tree climbers and I can't wait to see them in action." "It looks as if I'm going to be disappointed." "Sat here having a few nuts with the boys, while the guys are getting all the ropes together to climb the tree." "They started going up a short while, and then one of the steps they were digging was slightly larger than I was expecting and I asked, are they going to climb here or are they going to chop it down," "and it seems they are going to chop it down." "Traditionally, they would have climbed the tree using a rattan hoop and pacified the bees with smoke." "The honey would have been lowered down in a container made from leaves." "The arrival of the axe has changed all that." "Almost immediately, my disappointment is replaced by a more pressing concern." "I'm no scaredy cat but this thing's just about to go, and these guys are just hanging around." "We don't know which way it's gonna go, and nor do they." "I don't know what they're gonna do, whether they are going to stay closer and dodge it, or whether they are going to move back later." "I mean, we're only 15 metres away from it, so it is not a safe distance, really." "Just millimetres left on that and we heard one big crack." "When it lands it's going to be not only a bunch of pretty pissed off bees, but that thing, we've just got to be miles away from it." "About five big trees went with that." "This big one here has been unearthed, that went down..." "There's another one over there that went down and that one came off the top of it, just mass destruction." "The nest is empty of bees but full of liquid honey." "You can smell it." "C'est bon." "That's so much sweeter than the honey you buy in the shops it's just like sharp, almost, it's so sweet, it's divine." "From all the effort, that was about two hours' worth of chopping." "These guys very rarely have anything sweet in their diet at all," "I can really see why they're getting so excited about it." "We returned to the village on a sugar high." "That morning, Chimika's wife has given birth to a baby boy, their third child." "The proud father cuts wood for a fire." "Change is coming so fast to this place that I can't help but wonder what sort of forest Chimika's son will grow up in." "Daniel and Jonas two of the village elders, tell me the Babongo were the first people on earth." "They want the road to come." "I'm not surprised, but I am worried." "The road will bring loggers, missionaries, alcohol, and disease." "A cash economy will upset their social structures and, although change is inevitable, if not managed sensitively it can be catastrophic." "This time, ironically, conservation rather than commerce is the catalyst." "In 2002, the president of Gabon, Omar Bongo, alarmed by the prospect of the oil running out decreed that at least part of his country's future lay in ecotourism." "He created 13 National Parks protecting huge tracts of Gabon's most beautiful landscapes and the wildlife that lives there." "Mokoko lies on the outskirts of one of these parks." "No one yet knows what effect they will have on the local people." "Hopefully they would bring prosperity and sustainability to the remote parts of Gabon and provide work for the forest people." "So this is it." " You see... iboga." "Oui?" " C'est ça." "Ça, c'est I'iboga." "The villagers cultivate iboga for ceremonial purposes." "Some Bwiti scholars believe this is the tree of knowledge from the Garden of Eden, so powerful are its visions." "Right." "You've got me started already." "Yeah, oui?" "Mange?" "Oui." "It's just kind of bland, really." "Oui, oui." "It is not as bitter as I thought it would be." "This is where the use of ibogo originated." "Thousands of years ago migrating tribes passed through here and found forest peoples taking iboga and dancing and singing." "On this foundation, the Bantu tribes built the Bwiti religion." "The men's hut is central to Bwiti in the village." "Its structure represents the human body - the carved pole at the front represents the physical parts of man, the screened area at the back the spiritual." "Only initiated men can go here." "The entrance is low so that you bow your head as you enter." "Humble before your god." "The guys have brought me out to make some hunting gear so they brought me to this bamboo grove and I believe I am going to make a quiver and some arrows for a bow." "The Bwiti initiation ritual is about my passage into manhood in the eyes of the village." "I want them to respect me as a man, so I ask if I can join them on a hunting trip to learn some of their skills and show them how strong I am." "Four of the men agree to take me to one of their remote hunting camps, but first we need to make some poison arrows." "Firstly, they get slivers of bamboo and they slice down to get a small chunk off and then they smooth it and round it like Jean Pierre is doing here." "Then they sharpen the end and finally they add the poison and the poison comes from a tree that they collect the seed pods, and they use like a pestle and mortar with this shell on a stone" "They crush it down to a fine paste, add a tiny little bit of water, and then using this like Havana cigar rolling technique they wrap a leaf round the leg and then slowly work in the poison to the tip." "The poison itself is really quite lethal." "I just asked le Chef here how long it would take to kill a man." "He said it would be instantaneous." "The camp is a day's walk into the cool forest." "The Babongo are masters here, equipped with an almost supernatural affinity with their surroundings." "I can't wait to see them hunt with the bow and it's not long before we're tracking something big." "We just walked into a whole troop of monkeys and the guys got ready but we were just too slow, I think." "I don't know exactly what it was." "It was definitely primate." "Long tail, dark, jumping from one tree to the next." "They were calling it all the way as they came in, and it was responding and then he finally rushed forward, got a shot, but he missed." "The hunting camp is a beautiful wooden structure built in the bend of a river, about 12 miles from the village." "We got here a couple of hours ago and then the boys, I didn't realise," "I thought they were just all foraging, but they came back with handfuls of fish." "They'd only been gone about 40 minutes and they must have caught eight apiece, so they have just been chopping them up adding a bit of chilli which we found en route, a bit of salt they brought and they wrap them in these leaves and bound them with twine" "and then just stuck them straight on the fire." "I think it will be delicious." "They had a potshot at a primate today." "I don't know quite what it was." "I know that they eat primates, in fact I know that they eat gorilla," "I know that they eat all sorts of things and they all get very excited when they see elephant tracks and that sort of stuff." "So, you know, and that's what these guys do," "I have no idea what, you know, what's going to come across our path tomorrow." "I go to sleep that night wondering what the next day will bring." "They have all got their own special one that they use, they're called into action depending on what animal it is that we seem to be chasing." "They bring up one of the guys from the rear, "Right, it's your turn. "" "And they're all quite different and actually I have never heard anything like it and I really don't know whether it's a direct imitation of a particular animal or whether it's something that doesn't sound human to cover our tracks or what" "but I'm guessing that they're particular animals that they're imitating to try and call the prey towards them." "By midday we have got nothing, so Jili goes to work on lunch." " Hey, Bruce." "Tiens." " Oui!" "Merci." " Masau." " Masau." "Oh, that's totally different, it's really nice, actually." "It's sweet... and like a gooseberry but not quite as sharp and a bit of avocado thrown in, it's nice." "Aujord'hui, peut-ètre un peu... hunting." "Aujord'hui?" "Oui?" "OK." "Bon." "I'm keen to do something, but the hunters have other plans." "My Western attitudes to time simply don't apply here." "The hunters have eaten so now they'll sleep." "When they're hungry again, they'll move, confident the forest will provide." "Evenings in the night camp are a little bit boring so we are having a cinema session." "The guys are loving it." "The next morning Jean Pierre suggests we go out alone." "The rest of the men return to camp and he leads me silently into the forest." "Soon we are tracking a large group of primates through the canopy." "We're very close." "Oui." "There." "He cuts a branch from the tree and strips some of the leaves to create a rattle." "As the monkeys react, peering down through the branches he takes aim and fires." "We are both resigned to returning empty-handed." "We were out for four days and caught nothing." "Perhaps it was just bad luck, but still it just goes to show how hard is to catch meat here." "Bonjour, Mama." "Ah." "Good to see you, too." "Bonjour." "Oui, ça va, ça va, ça va." "Bonjour!" "Our arrival in Mokoko feels like a homecoming." "Ironically, as we return Chimika heads into the forest, gun in hand." "I feel as if I have been accepted here now and achieved a new level of intimacy." "And the village feels it too." "After nearly a month here, the elders decide that it is time for me to be initiated." "The ceremony will begin in the morning." "Suddenly I'm as nervous as hell." "My time in the forest has taken its toll." "I've lost nearly a stone, I have intermittent diarrhoea and I'm running a fever." "I haven't slept properly for weeks." "I just hope I'm strong enough for this, physically and mentally." "The deepest concern I have is this element that it has that every person that's taken this drug has always talked about, which is that it's a very inward-looking drug." "You spend a great deal of your time looking at your life, how you have lived your life and where your life will go in the future and also what you are like as a person and all those little faults that you kind of subconsciously overlook" "and persuade yourself that you're a nice, normal human being, but when you actually unlock all those doors and clear all the foliage and you take a deep, strong, hard look at yourself, then maybe you might come up against something" "and realise that you're not the nice person you thought you were, and that is the biggest worry." "There's no denying, that's the one thing." "Now, I would like to say here and now that I truly do believe that I am a nice person and that I'm not hiding any massive flaws and I'm not... you know, I have got no misdemeanours that I am massively guilt-ridden about" "any more than most people, but there are elements of my character that could do with shaping up, you know, and that's something that will be quite tough, I think, and the real searching look and seeing your true faults," "whether it's selfishness, whether it's arrogance, whatever it is, erm... those things will, you know, will be tough things to look at, you know, full face frontal, just take a look at yourself, is quite daunting, there's no doubt," "but I can only persuade myself that that look, no matter how hard it is, can only be a positive thing." "On the day of the initiation, the village is crowded with new faces." "There is to be a huge celebration and I'm expected to provide food and drink." "This morning I am going to just rest in my tudi and collect my thoughts and prepare myself and I will be there whenever you want to come and collect me for the taking of the sacred root." "Chimika and the people of Mokoko are happy that I am ready, but there is a problem." "The chief of a neighbouring village is concerned that if I die during the initiation, there will be grave consequences." "They've never initiated a white man before and are unsure of the correct dose." "He's also concerned that I might be a sorcerer, in which case the iboga will surely kill me." "I sign a document absolving the Babongo of all responsibility." "Because of the danger of what I am about to do," "I've asked Monsieur Hugues to act as a translator and intermediary." "If things go wrong, I hope he will be able to help me." " No more... pim pim pim?" " No, I'm healthy now." "You've finished making up?" "Mate, thank you." "Thank you for coming." "As long as you respect iboga, as long as you are on your knee when you eat it, as long as you just be a good man, because everybody has the same wrong things, daily wrong things," "but the divinity knows that, you know, that you're human, you have spirits and as long as you try to be the best you can, the spirit will always forgive you." "Danielle starts the process by pricking my tongue with a needle to stimulate speech." "Then I am fed shredded iboga leaves mixed with forest honey." "The whole village blesses me with their breath." "This is the root of the iboga tree, iboga Tabernanthe." "It contains a powerful combination of alkaloids that, in high doses, produce vivid hallucinations." "It's a powerful psychoactive drug." "The Bwitiists believe it allows the user to wander in the realm of the dead, where they will see visions that will change them forever." "The iboga root is foul and so bitter it hurts to eat." "I force down slice after slice." " C'est bon?" " C'est bon." "The overpowering feeling I have is it tastes pretty horrible and it's quite hard to get down but the whole of the ceremony so far has been just overwhelming, really." "I wasn't expecting it." "And when everyone crowds around and all those noises and all the singing and chanting it's very overpowering and even though it's seems quite oppressive it's actually quite loving and..." "The feeling, I have now is actually, especially now that I know that it is Jean Claude who is my Bwiti father is just real love actually, it's a very..." "It's a very nice thing." "Really nice." "Recently the West has discovered iboga." "One of its active ingredients, Ibogaine, has been to used to treat heroin addicts, alcoholics and people with severe childhood trauma." "The cleansing process of taking iboga seems to allow them to move on from their past lives." "The drug trip is apparently terrifying, emotionally exhausting and ultimately life changing." "I can't help but wonder what it will do for me." "Feels like I've taken a poison, actually." "I can feel my stomach grumbling and air is coming up." "My head's a bit poundy and a bit woolly at the back." "Just, my body is telling me there's something pretty serious going on inside me." "Help." "You know?" "After six hours, my stomach begins to heave." " Pardon." " Non, c'est bon." " I've got more." " Oui, continue." "Encore, encore." "As you were before, sitting down." "Merci." "My blood feels like it's on fire." "I can feel panic welling inside and I check my pulse." "My veins have dilated and I can feel my blood pressure dropping." "For a moment I am sure, I'm going to die, here in the jungle, thousands of miles from home." "As night falls, my Bwiti father Jean Claude Mombet feeds me more iboga root." "He sings softly to encourage the hallucinations to start." "By now, my gag reflex makes it increasingly hard to swallow." "The father of Bruce, he says it's now time for Bruce to see the Bwiti, to see his light so we are not allowed to film any more because it's a big secret, it must not be out from Bruce himself and the father" "and so they don't want you to see how he will speak the Bwiti..." "Even if there is no camera they want don't want you to be inside." "The crew leaves and I am alone with the elders and the war raging inside my body." "The trip slowly builds." "Lights and shapes seep into my mind as I lie on the earth floor, powerful visions of childhood return, of past misdemeanours, things I have hidden away in my subconscious." "I begin to have out of body experiences, sometimes even occupying the consciousness of others, feeling the pain, I am causing them." "I understand that every action has an effect." "Everything we do has consequences." "I see the earth as a vast living organism, of which I am only a tiny part." "It is a vivid, disturbing and profoundly humbling experience." "I feel a bit fragile at the moment, because it's been quite a long night." "I'm forbidden from saying exactly what the dreams are, but I feel I can say that, erm... a lot of it is to do with memory of youth" "and some of it very vivid, and some of it stuff that seems clearer now a memory than it ever was before." "A great deal of my early visions were about wrongdoings... and the really fascinating thing was seeing the error from the viewpoint of the person that it had been done to, and so that meant that suddenly I was feeling the pain that I had been giving" "erm, from the other side." "The next morning, nearly 24 hours into the process, phase two of the initiation begins." "The men take me to the river, my Bwiti father Jean Claude leading the triumphant possession." "There I am passed through a vulva made of sticks suspended over the stream." "I am washed with water soaked with Bwiti leaves." "I am washed and anointed." "I am reborn." "By now, the feeling of love flowing through the village is tangible." "I feel invincible, held aloft by a sea of hands." "The men pull a sapling of the sacred Matombe tree from the forest and plant it outside the Bwiti temple." "This represents me as a child, uninitiated." "Throughout the day, the Bwiti elders feed me small doses of iboga and the ceremonies whirl and spin around me in a blur." "As the sun sets on the second day and with the drug still coursing through my system, the whole village steps up the festivities with a performance designed to bring on the hallucinations once again." "They wear brightly-coloured costumes, run at me, touch me, crowd around me." "It's complete sensory overload." "They really know what they're doing and as night falls I become increasingly disorientated." "A storm flickers over the forest." "Now begins the last phase of the initiation." "I will be called upon to see the Bwiti visions and speak of what I have seen." "Only then will I be called a man." "Fire dancers sprint the length of the village to entice the Macoi spirits from the darkness of the forest." "They are both worshipped and feared." "The fire draws and repels them." "They come to look at me, the Banzi, to see which tribe of man I belong." "The drums beat, the fire burns, the spirits dance and I see shapes and colours in the flames." "Once again I am taken away from the film crew to speak of what I have seen." "This is sacred knowledge only known to initiated men." "I tell them I have seen shapes and symbols." "They approve of my visions and finally I am one of them." "I can sit on a bench in the hut with the men and I can eat." "I am given a name" " Macanga, the blue star, after one of the shapes I have seen." "Overnight the men have planted a forest around my tree." "These represent the problems that will face me in my adult life." "I break two branches and then the forest explodes into a writhing mass of men." "They break the trees in a frenzy." "My problems are removed." "I stand alone, strong now." "A man, ready to face the rest of my life." "I really feel that I have been reborn, you know, and it's just..." "I haven't known these people long but they have given me something very special and I will be taking a piece of this village wherever I go the rest of my life." "There has been a lot of love, and these last two days everything they have done has all been towards myself and it's very strong and powerful to have all those people looking at you and feeling for you and holding you and giving you this thing" "that they truly believe every element of it." "And when you are in and amongst it, and it's happening to you and around you, you can't help but join in that, and you can't help but feel that coming towards you." "And the drug itself, of course, adds to that substantially and so I feel that everything that they have done has worked on me." "It's really been a rebirth." "Merci beaucoup." "The iboga experience was disturbing and emotional." "It seems to work on the parts of the brain that govern feelings of remorse and guilt." "It forced me to revisit some painful memories." "There was one particular incident, which was about a girlfriend who was ill and I'd always known that I had done wrong, not through any act but just by lack of care, if anything, and I had always known it was something that was bad" "but it was just made all the more poignant by seeing it full force and feeling it, actually, feeling the pain that they have experienced." "And so, yes, that's been on my mind a fair bit since, you know, and I intend to reconcile it in some way." "I can't reconcile it, it's too late, but to make some small amends by telling that person, "By the way, you know, I know what I did and I'm really sorry. "" "Merci beaucoup." "OK!" "Au revoir." "It's a year now since I was initiated and the experience still continues to affect me profoundly." "I saw clearly how our actions have consequences and how all our lives are interconnected." "Not only our personal lives, but our relationships with the world around us." "It feels to me as if we could all learn something from Bwiti, iboga, and the people of this forest."