The Temple Healers

Ynes Sanchez Gonzales

Now in her early seventies, Maestra Ynes has been working with ayahuasca and medicinal plants of the Amazon for more than 50 years.

Ynes was one of the original Shipibo healers who joined us at the Temple in Feb 2009, and has over the years continued to carry out plant dietas. After a break of 4 years not working at the Temple, we are very fortunate to be welcoming Ynes back to join us.

Ynes has now reached a level of mastery in her healing ability that exemplifies the very best of traditional Shipibo healing. She is well known to be blessed with an incredible visionary ability in her ceremonies, as well as working with a tremendous amount of care and compassion. Ynes is a traditional ayahuasquera (specializing with ayahuasca), palera (specializing with medicinal trees) and tabaquera (specializing with tobacco), and is also an expert in treating gynecological issues.

Ynes has trained all of her children in plant spirit healing and often works closely with her two daughters Laura and Lila, as well as her son Jose.

Laura Lopez Sanchez

Raised in a medicine family, Laura was born to the life of a curandera. She is a specialist in warme ikaros, used for unblocking and healing emotions and relationships.

Laura was born in the community of Roaboya. Her village was named after a legendarily powerful Meraya, the most powerful shamans in the Shipibo world of ayahuasca. Both her parents and grandparents were well respected Onanya, working as healers for the local villages, and from a young age, she was deeply immersed in the world of plant medicine. As with many young Shipibo born of curandero families, Laura was given small dietas by her grandparents from the age of 10, and by the age of 16 her apprenticeship started in earnest when she started to work with ayahuasca.

By the age of 20, she was travelling all over Peru with her aunt, administering plant medicines and ayahuasca ceremonies for local Peruvians, wherever their aid was requested. She has also worked extensively with her incredibly knowledgeable mother and teacher, Ynes, both in Peru and abroad.

She brings with her an incredible wealth of knowledge that has been passed down for many generations in her family line. With her contagious laughter, and passion for helping and healing from a pure space of love, she is an absolute gem!

Rojelia Valera Gonzalez

Rojelia was born in the Shipibo community of Santa Anna. She has three daughters, one of whom is a teacher in school, and one son, who is practicing as a healer.

Rojelia was drawn into the world of plants through her own need to heal. At the age of 12, she was struck down by a mystery illness that no western medicine could cure. Her uncle and brother, both healers, treated her for three years with a variety of different plant remedies to help her return back to health.

From the age of 15, she began to learn in earnest, but continued to battle with bouts of the mystery illness until the age of 50. She has been working as a healer in her community for many years, and has travelled to the coast and other outlying communities when called to help.

She works with a lot of love and from a motivation of understanding how difficult it is to deal with pain and illness and really wanting to help people heal. Her work at the Temple is her first experience of working with foreigners, and she deeply grateful to be able to share her knowledge of the plants as well as support her large family with the income she earns working with us.

Maricela Rios Inuma

Maricela, steeped in the heritage of plant-spirit medicine, healed herself and learned from the plants for two decades before working with ayahuasca.

Maricela was born in the beautiful village of Roya, Alto Ucayali. She comes from a long line of healers and was taught by her father and grandfather, both of whom were reputedly incredibly powerful curanderos.

At the age of 13, she started her first plant dieta to cure severe internal haemorrhaging. She was grateful for the healing and learning that the plants gave her, and continued to diet with many master plants including “toè” and wayra caspi, until the age of 33, when she drank ayahuasca for the first time. Since then she has been working as a healer both in her community and in other centres and now at the Temple.

Her incredible ikaros typically start with soft and gentle tones rising into strong and powerful crescendos, often inducing purging during ceremony for whoever she is working on at the time of singing. She is a highly skilled healer and much respected by all staff around the Temple.

Anita Fernandez Tananta

Anita comes from a family of healers and spent a decade dieting plants to bring to fruition her father’s vision of her as a medicine woman.

Anita is the mother of nine children, two of whom are currently apprenticing with the medicine. She is originally from San Pedro in the district of Contamana on the lower Ucayali River. Her father was a curandero as are her two sisters and she was around 15 years old when she drank for the first time. In this ceremony, her father saw that Anita “had a lot of medicine inside her”, and encouraged her to learn. She wasn’t ready at this stage, and unfortunately, her father died soon after.

At the age of 20, Anita’s interest in learning medicine was awakened as she watched her husband, a practicing curandero, working to heal patients with the medicine and plant remedies. She initially worked with the medicine on her own, and soon after, her husband took her under his wing and she spent 10 years under his guidance, dieting and learning until she was ready to work with patients.

Her favorite plant is noma-noma, a vine that is said to be a great teacher with a speciality in helping heal broken hearts and relationships. Her ikaros are beautifully melodic, and with her warm smile and open heart, Anita is a delightful member of the team.

Tony Javier Lopez Lopez

Maestro Tony has been immersed in the plant spirit world since he was a little boy. His Shipibo name is Sani which means “leader of a family”, and comes originally from the Shipibo community of Royaboya.

His Shipibo name: Sani, which means “leader of a family”, and comes originally from the Shipibo community of Royaboya.

He comes from a long lineage of healers (the Lopez family) and started to sit in ceremony when he was only 12, guided by his grandfather Sany Meny, who was a renowned maestro in his region.

He decided to start his apprenticeship with plant spirits through carrying out dietas when he was 22. His 2 year old son became very sick which called him to learn how to heal him. His initial intention was focus on healing his son and other children in his community.

He started dieting with gentle plants, known to transmit love and improve relationships. After several years focused on smaller plants, he then moved onto dieting larger plans and trees – known as ‘ani medicine’ (big medicine), used to heal more serious illnesses and conditions. He carried out a one year dieta with several different plants, including Chaikuni Rao, a plant famous amongst the Shipibo people. This is his favorite plant, which he claims fully opened his heart and healed him of his own childhood wounds.

Tony has three children, and his youngest daughter, who has just turned 12, recently started training and dieting under his guidance. His core intention is to be of service for the betterment of his family and society at large.

Jose Lopez Sanchez

Jose was born in the native community of Roya Boya. He has three children, one of whom he is training in the Shipibo plant medicine tradition.

Son of Ynes, Jose’s journey with the medicine started at the age of seven when his grandfather took on his tutorship.

Jose’s grandfather taught in the traditional way, which meant that he started with drinking ayahuasca very intermittently, and dieting many different plants varying in length from three months to one year. His first dieta was one year of dieting ikaros, specifically arkanas (protection songs), and two more years of various plants. Jose started to drink regularly at the age of 10, whereupon his grandfather started to ‘open and direct’ the medicine of the many plants he had dieted. Between the ages of 11 and 15, he moved onto dieting big trees for many months at a time.

At 15, Jose received his first patient, but was unable to cure him, so his grandfather set him on a year-long diet with Ayahuma (Couroupita guianensis). His grandfather died when he was 17, and just before he passed, he transferred his ‘Don’, or ancestral knowledge, power and wisdom, to Jose. Devastated by his grandfather’s death, Jose changed paths for one of study in marketing. This lasted eight months and was brought to an end by a mystery illness that he believed was the result of the plants calling him back to the world of natural medicine. Jose went home to his mother, who helped to heal him and then Ynes herself fell sick. Jose watched his mother growing weaker, and felt helpless as he didn’t have the strength to cure her and she didn’t have the money to pay for Western treatment. This was huge motivation for him to start dieting again in earnest, and within a few months he was able to cure Ynes.

He has since continued learning from the plants both on his own and with some incredibly powerful teachers, including his mother and Benito Arevallo. He has spent periods of time travelling, working in various communities and ayahuasca centers around Peru, as well as working and learning with another native tribe, the Ashaninkas.

Jose carries an immense amount of knowledge, power and wisdom with his medicine. One of his favorite trees is Shihuahuaco (Dipteryx micrantha) for the strength that the plant provides in diagnosing and curing serious disease. And Niwe Rao, the magical flying tree, that is full of light, opens energies and vision and is a great teacher and healer of mind, body and spirit. More recently, he has felt the call to work more and more in support of his mother, Ynes. Together they make a phenomenal team.

Nelson Barbaran Gomez

Nelson is native of the community of Nuevo Paraiso. His Shipibo name is Isasina, meaning “a bird who takes care of others.”

Nelson comes from a family of curanderos; both his father and grandfather practiced medicine. His parents died when he was very young, and very early on he started sitting in ceremonies held by his older brother, who is also a curandero. Lacking parental guidance, Nelson learnt from the medicine “how to be a good human being.”

Nelson drank ayahuasca for the first time at age 12, and was immediately fascinated by the medicine world. Soon afterwards, he asked his brother to open his first dieta for him. Following the advice of his older brother, Nelson mentally prepared over the course of one full year, strongly setting his intentions to become a healer at the service of others. After a year, his brother agreed to initiate Nelson on the path to become a Shipibo Onanya.

Over the course of the next two years, Nelson dieted and learned from the plants, crafting his own pipe and learning how to control and direct the mareación. During this period, he went through many of the challenges and tests that the plant spirits presented him in order to learn. At age 15 he started treating patients, and one year later started learning more closely with his grandfather Francisco. Nelson started working with western patients when he was 16. For Nelson, these encounters have been good opportunities to exchange ideas and knowledge between different cultures, and he has a deep appreciation for western psychotherapy and psychology.

Nelson is passionate about his work and craft, and is committed to helping others with his medicine. He is also passionate about his own culture, and sees his work as a vehicle to recover and preserve traditional practices and knowledge in a rapidly changing world. He enjoys seeing schools in some native communities teaching the Shipibo language again, and encouraging kids to dress in their traditional clothes and address each other in their Shipibo names, and he is proud about his role in the current revitalization of the Shipibo culture.

Richard Emerson Urquia Rojas

Richard’s Shipibo name is “Wasan Niwe,” which means “liberating the air.” Richard is a young and experienced curandero, heir to a long lineage of healers – his brother, cousins, and both of his grandparents are all curanderos.

Richard is from the community of Paoyan, a 12-hour boat ride from the city of Pucallpa, in the Ucayali department of eastern Peru. His first and main teacher was his grandfather who initiated him at a very young age; he drank ayahuasca for the first time at the tender age of 1. “From that moment”, Richard shares, “I thought, one day, I would also be a curandero. And now here I am! My medicine is born from my family.”

Richard chose to be a healer in order to help everybody in need. “I am a maestro because I want to heal people, clean them, free them, bring them into the light, and open their paths in life.” Richard’s favorite plant is the “Flying Tree,” Noya Rao.

Richard has hopes for the younger Shipibo generations. “The youngsters are looking good, more advanced, and better schooled. It’s a good thing that many chose to migrate to the cities, to go to university, or to learn a trade. But as the older generation passes away, we will also need strong youth to pick up the art and practices of their grandparents – the healers and curanderos. This is my aspiration for my tradition.”

Julia Zumaeta Tamayo

Julia’s Shipibo name translates to “Anaconda Woman,” and she is a matriarch in her own right, enjoying her 6 children and 15 grandchildren. Her passions are her family and her work, and she is devoted to the healing arts for the sake of the younger generations.

Julia comes from the community of Santa Rosa de Aguaytia, a 4-hour ride from the city of Pucallpa, in the Ucayali region. Julia is a vegetalista; an expert in the uses, benefits, and preparations of a wide range of medicinal plants known by the Shipibo people. Julia comes from a big family of medicine practitioners, and is heiress to a strong lineage of female healers. Her mother, her aunts, and her grandmother were all traditional healers.

“The plants are my life and have been the life of my family for generations. Unlike my children, I never learned to read or write. My knowledge is different, and I want to give it to my grandchildren, so they can carry on our work too.”

Manuela Lopez Fasando

Manuela is joyfully and fiercely committed to her work. “All of our guests love drinking these remedies, and we want all of them to return home healthy! We have so many medicinal plants here. This is why every day I go into the jungle with my machete, to gather different barks, different roots. This is how we heal.”

Manuela was born in the native community of Roaboya and has lived for the last 18 years in the community of Santa Clara, on the outskirts of the city of Pucallpa. Manuela is a vegetalista; an expert in the medicinal properties, the various uses, and the preparation of the healing plants of the rainforest. Manuela learned about the plants directly from her father, a renowned vegetalista himself. She has been working with the plants for the last 8 years, both in her community and in a retreat center owned by her brother. Manuela supports the work of the healers and lovingly prepares the variety of plant remedies available to our guests.

Manuela has 3 children, two of them attending university in Pucallpa. She says, “they are developing their careers in tourism and English language, but they love to come home during breaks and help me and their grandpa, collecting and preparing plants too. My message to the younger generation of Shipibo people is that everything is good! Go to university, learn what you want to learn, and also remain interested in our plants!”