SOUTH AMERICAN SHANGRI-LA
(Investigator
17, 1991
March)
From 1973 until
1978 a
South American "Shangri-La", where it was common to live to 100, made
news regularly. (See for example, National Geographic of January 1973)
The
Advertiser
(South Australia) reported in 1973:
LONDON,
Today
(AAP-Reuter): A British doctor has discovered a beautiful Shangri-La
valley where rum-drinking peasants tilled the soil when well over 100
years old.
Dr.
David Davies, a
London University lecturer, said that in the mountain valley of
ViIcabamba in the Ecuadorian Province of Loka, "a life span of 100 is
regarded as unexceptional."
He
said, in an article in the magazine New Scientist, that the
valley's oldest inhabitants
were 142-year-old Jose David and 123, year-old Miguel Carpio. Nine of
the 900 inhabitants were centenarians and almost 30 were more than 85.
Dr.
Davies said the
tranquillity of the mountain valley, 1,500 feet above sea level, "is
regarded by the Ecuadorian and foreign doctors who have visited it as
the cause of these great ages."
The
peasants…drank two
to four cups of rum and smoked anything from 40 to 60 cigarettes a day,
he wrote...
Dr.
Davies, a lecturer
in zoology and an expert in gerontology, said the evidence of the
peoples' longevity was easily proved by baptismal records which the
peasants – all Roman Catholics – kept.
"The evidence of age drawn from these certificates
is difficult to doubt. Of the persistent higher, age records through
the world,
those for the citizens of Vilcabamba seem by far the best
authenticated so
far," he wrote... (February 12)
Shangri-La
originally
referred to a Himalayan valley in Tibet where people lived fabulous
life spans in conditions akin to paradise. The place was mythical and
didn't exist.
Vilcabamba,
the South
American Shangri-La, was investigated by Mazess and Forman (1979).
The
Vilcabamba villagers
had simply fooled reporters by pointing to baptismal entries of their
parents and even grandparents as their own.
The
lucrative tourist
industry of the area now began to decline.
Reference:
Mazess, R.B,
& Forman, S.H. Longevity in
Vilcabamba, Ecuador, Journal of Gerontology, 34(1):94-98.
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