Friday 30 March 2018

Brazilian shamans even more effective than Dennis Howell*

I am always on the lookout for notable anniversaries to fill these pages, but this one was just weird. On 30th March 1998, two shamans from a tribe in central Brazil were flown to the northern Roraima province to perform a rain ceremony in a last desperate attempt to combat forest fires which had been raging there for weeks. It seems to have worked, because the rains came the very next day.


* For younger readers: Dennis Howell was appointed by Harold Wilson as "Minister for drought" in August 1976 after a prolonged heatwave. His appointment was followed by two of the wettest months on record..

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