Comment by IG_Semmelweiss | Hacker News Reader

Comment by IG_Semmelweiss | Hacker News Reader

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Visiting the deep amazon during COVID, I literally ate too much stuff (one of those nice, AYCA amazon lodges). Every date, I mixed all kinds of delicious things in a buffett setting, and constantly loaded with carbs. It was vacation, after all.

I normally do intermittent fasting and stay away from carbs during the work week. I don't do buffet and usually don't have 2 daily meals, let alone 3.

So, after 2-3 days of repeating the feast -3 times a day-, my stomach and intestines finally went on strike. I ended up with a strong reaction with a loose stool. 2 days later, it would still not go away. It was constant. I was chained to the bathroom. The rest of the family didn't overeat + mix everything, so naturally they were totally fine.

Finally on the 3rd day, I gave up on waiting it out and asked for help from our jungle guide.

He told me to have oregano tea, so had 2 cups. The change was instantaneous. Just like the article, all the locals from the amazon knew this was the standard remedy for diarrhea.

I googled this afterwards. None of the top hits for home remedy for diarrhea even mentioned oregano tea once in their articles. A medical dietitian had a 1 word link back to diarrhea in a "oregano health benefits" article [1].

Its crazy how ignorant we are of natural methods, and makes me wonder what other wonderful natural medicines are waiting to be re-discovered in the amazon.

[1] https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/266259

Where did you go in the Amazon and how did you get there? I was surprised to learn that not many Brazilians have ever been to the Amazon. But it makes sense once you realize that it's hard to get there and it takes a long time.

Visiting the Amazon is a 2000-3000 km trip from most large cities in the country, fuel prices and plane tickets are awfully expensive right now, and for most history, so it's a trip that would cost multiple times the minimum wage in Brazil. So it's not that surprising most people in the country din't ever visit there, unless they were already born close to it. Also, the most easily reachable parts are already very degraded. Roads spell doom to the forest. Pristine forest is far from the areas with affordable amenities that would please most tourists. In the brief time period air travel became more affordable, in the Lula-Dilma government terms, most people that could travel skipped domestic tourism and went straight into international travel, as from large cities like São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro a plane ticket to Argentina, Chile, or even Europe used to be very often cheaper than a ticket to, say, Manaus.

> Also, the most easily reachable parts are already very degraded. Roads spell doom to the forest. Pristine forest is far from the areas with affordable amenities that would please most tourists.

That's not really correct in my experience. You can find "deep wilderness" in about 30-40 minutes from the city of Manaus (by boat), as in places with no human activity at all. And Manaus is very reachable (actually what people consider "the Amazon").

The city doesn't sprawl too far, and you have deforestation along the roads, but it's quite impressive how the "deep" jungle starts just after the last man-made structure. There are more areas of uninterrupted forest than in any other region probably in the world. And I visited in 2020, not really long ago.

I'm Brazilian and I didn't really expect that, knowing our bad track record of deforestation. I thought the "real" jungle would be much further away. Coming from the Southeast of Brazil I can see the difference, and I'd call forests in this region definitely degraded. But up there it's as close to pristine as it gets with human involvement. The tragedy is that it's not for long.

I was in Ecuador, actually.

You can get to the Amazon from Quito with a 5 hour drive that is very pleasant. Then the road ends and you take a boat that can be anything from 30mins to several hours, depending how deep into the jungle you are going.

Once there, there's tons to do. Floating in an amazon tributary river -with no sound other than the occasional bird- and closing my eyes was one of the most incredible zen moments in my life. Could have stayed hours. That week went by too fast.

Regarding your brazil experience - doesn't seem uncommon. I've asked Peruvians, Ecuadoreans, Brazilians etc if they have gone to the Amazon. The answer is no.

Its not dissimilar to the experience you would get in the US if you asked someone if they have been to Mt Rushmore, Florida Keys, Grand Canyon, or even Yellowstone. Its far, and mostly out of reach for most americans (and we are far wealthier than our southern neighbors).

Also, I get a sense that touristic developments deep in South America wilderness tend to cater to foreign tourists. Such prices may be out of reach for most upper class locals. This is different from most US landmarks, which seem to cater primarily to middle class Americans (anecdata).

I came from Amazonas, a Brazilian state which contains most of the Brazilian Amazon. And yes not many Brazilians know the Amazon, most probably live as far from the Amazon as US is (Brazil is really big!).

It's wild how close this is to true, but by my measurement the shortest distance between the US mainland (so not counting Puerto Rico) and the nearest point I can see in the Amazon [white outline in 0, for lack of a better reference] is ~1,650 miles, and there is nowhere in Brazil that is more than 1600 miles.

[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_rainforest#/media/File:...

The northernmost part of Brazil is closer to Canada than it is to the southernmost part of Brazil. So yes, there are places on the US that are closer to the Amazon than some places in Brazil

https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/ibwul3/the_norther...

There isn't much to do there if you aren't a fan of raw wilderness and extreme heat

Brazil has too many nice vacation places and the Amazon isn't it

> There isn't much to do there if you aren't a fan of raw wilderness and extreme heat

Mostly this. If you want to see exotic animals, you'll be probably more comfortable on a Zoo. Favorite touristic points of Brazil seems to be northeast beach or coldest parts of the south. I was in vacation in Florianopolis, a capital city in the south, in 2019 and every time I said I was from the northeast they asked me: "and why are you wasting your vacation here?"

I imagine it would be interesting to learn about and get to know some of the tribal people.

I'm Brazillian and lived in Rondônia, extreme west of the Amazon. Never heard about oregano tea being good for the intestines, will try it if I ever need again.

Now, don't put so much trust on the "knowledge of the natives". That knowledge is not maintained by centuries because native indians didn't develop writing, so recipes vary a lot even from one city to another; there are different fruits or plants which have the same name in different regions and the same fruit or plant may have different names in different regions. It is also not tested with a large genetic pool since these groups are very small, familiar with little genetic diversity.

Read about Copaiba oil. It's a Brazilian oil from a tree. This thing is amazing. I used to always have earache after a couple of days diving in the ocean until I used one little drop of Copaiba oil in my ears. No more earache. Never again! It has multiple uses. Take a look at it.

It's amazing how little we know about the benefits of plants that cannot be easily monopolized.

Do you have a recipe for that oregano tea?

its simpler than you think.

Fill a 1/3 cup with oregano leaves. Dump hot water. That's all it takes.

I had 2 cups! (i was desperate lol)

Thanks, just wasn't sure how much oregano should be in there. Glad it worked for you lol, in those circumstances any relief is a real godsend

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