"No one can enter with cameras," he says.

But this is part of Sebastiao's tour and he doesn't want "his" journalists to miss it. We were brought here to see that the Yanomami still lead their traditional life. And that they are happy that the gold miners are here. And, as he and other miners have said on numerous occasions, that it is the Indians who invited the miners into the area.

At Sebastiao's suggestion I hand my camera to Mario and enter the maloca with the woman reporter from TV Manchete. It is pitch black. One hole in the center of this vast cone-shaped structure supplies the light, a beam of sun that cuts directly through the darkness to illuminate a spot approximately three feet in diameter. A little dust adds texture to the beam, which falls on a square but indistinguishable object about twenty yards away. Various people area now screaming in the Yanomami language from the far reaches of this large circular room. Yanoman , as it is called, is a language I don't understand and one that perhaps only a dozen people outside their culture speak. I pass a man in a hammock, emaciated and coughing, his eyes watery and lifeless. I start to run another mental check-malaria, influenza-but my mind is fixated on this object under the light.

Sebastiao lingers at the entrance, trying to convince Joao Davi that he should speak in front of the cameras. Looking back, I see their silhouettes in the doorway gesticulating passionately, probably working out the parameters of their troubled middle ground.

Now I am getting closer to this object in the center of the room. Crossing the dirt floor, I concentrate on trying to make my presence unthreatening, thinking that I can somehow distinguish myself from the gold miners. Will they understand the word journalista? Where do I go from there? How do smiles translate in their culture? A small naked child, wobbly legged and disoriented, appears before me. Here, I tell myself, is an opportunity for a "baby friendly moment" a chance to ingratiate myself with the locals, a ploy borrowed from politicians but one I've used extensively in my documentary work with different cultures across the planet. The basic message: I like children too. Trust me. I'm human. I smile at the child and extend my hand but he is quickly snatched away by a young mother who disappears into the cool darkness to join dozens of others who have sought solace from the scorching heat of the equator's midday sun.

The village chatter level reaches a high, intolerable pitch. Now I have done it, I've probably reconfirmed what these Indians have always thought: that the white man is a baby-snatching monster sent down by evil spirits in giant bird-like helicopters to wreak havoc on their population. If someone were to suddenly plant an ax in the back of my head, I wouldn't be surprised. " Not a very smart move," I mumble to myself as I proceed thorough the darkness. There, just five feet in front of me is the object that has drawn me into the depths of their communal house. It is a gas stove- the type you we in a small economy-size apartment- with torn metal hoses protruding from the back, somehow left abandoned in this fantastic structure, a strange anomaly in this traditional village. Was it traded for a piece of land? Or perhaps given by the gold miner as a joke? None of what has happened today seems to make any sense, each event just another absurd piece of what is quickly becoming an indecipherable puzzle.