By Andrew Tarica, Special to JTNews
Iquitos was an unlikely spot to meet a lost tribe of Jews.
But on the bumpy bus ride from the airport into the center of the town, one of the first things I noticed, next to a stand selling ceviche and Inca cola, was a modest restaurant called the Nueva Jerusalem Cafe. Out front was a mestizo woman, walking with a bowl of plantains in her hand, wearing a Star of David chain around her neck.
I first heard about this far-flung community while researching my August fishing trip to the Amazon, and a book titled Jews of the Amazon popped up on my computer screen.
Written by Ariel Segal, a BBC correspondent now based in Jerusalem, the book tells the story of a unique Jewish community in a remote jungle city in the world’s greatest rainforest.
My fishing trip immediately took a back seat to finding these Jews. I have been fascinated with tracing Jewish cultural migrations within the Diaspora ever since learning about my family’s Sephardic heritage, and here was an opportunity to combine this interest with my true passion in life: travel.
The first thing I did after arriving in Iquitos — a city of roughly 400,000 in northeast Peru, said to be the largest city in the world not reachable by road — was introduce myself to Scott Servais, a conspicuously blond-haired American expatriate tour guide. A few days earlier, he had responded to an email I had sent to the offices of Amazon Tours & Cruises, inquiring if anyone knew some local Jews.
“I’ve had a lot of strange requests before, but yours was the strangest,” said Scott, who’s probably the only guy in town who owns a New England Patriots T-shirt. “I had no idea there were Jews living here. But I’ll ask around and see if I can come up with some names.”
A week later, Scott greeted me at the dock in Iquitos, as our boat the MV Delfin returned from a 600-mile round-trip voyage up the Amazon and El Tigre rivers.
The fishing hadn’t been great, but Scott bore good news. “I have a name for you,” he said. “It’s Victor Edery.”
Already, I liked this guy. My grandfather was named Victor, my brother’s middle name is Victor, and when I took Russian a few years ago, even I was Victor.
I walked down Raymondi Street later that afternoon to a small apartment facing the Amazon River along Iquitos’s charming Malecon. It was Sunday afternoon, siesta time, when the temperature heats up and the pace of life slows down.
A sweet older woman who introduced herself as Diolinda Edery greeted me at the door and led me to a bench overlooking the Rio Amazona. She said her husband, Victor, was one of the founders of Iquitos’s Jewish community, but he was very sick and couldn’t speak.
“A long time ago, there were many Jews in Iquitos,” said Diolinda, referring to the late 19th century, when young male Sephardic Jewish teenagers from Moroccan cities like Fez and Tangiers and Rabat fled drought and disease, to seek their fortune in South America’s Amazon basin.
In some ways, Diolinda reminded me of my grandmother, who was born in Salonica, Greece, not far from my grandfather’s birthplace on the island of Rhodes. Both women were striking in appearance, with olive skin, pretty brown eyes and wavy black hair, and both spoke with a wonderfully melodious accent, the sweet sound of Spanish ringing like music to the ears.
When I close my eyes, I can still hear the love, affection and beauty always in my grandmother’s voice, more than a decade after her death. Diolinda had the same kind of voice.
“The original Jewish settlers came here came by boat, and some got married in small towns along the river,” Diolinda told me.
In the early part of the 20th century, Jewish businesses thrived in Iquitos, and many Jews founded commercial houses. One such house, Casa de Cohen, still stands at the corner of Raymondi and Marona streets, though it’s occupied by a grocery now.
As we talked on the bench, a young woman with an infant by her side strolled up. It was Sharon, Diolinda’s daughter, who was visiting from her home in Israel.
The striking brunette fixed me with a curious grin. “Are you Jewish?” she asked.
Today there just aren’t many Jews left in Iquitos. After the price of rubber plummeted in 1910, many returned to Morocco, leaving their native wives behind. But the religion survived, in small towns along the river, and in isolated homes in Iquitos, where a strange mix of jungle culture and Judaism evolved.
I thanked Diolinda for her time and asked her another question: Do they celebrate the holidays here?
“There is no rabbi in Iquitos, there is no synagogue, but we do celebrate the holidays,” said Diolinda. “And every Friday night, we light candles and sing prayers here at our family bar.” This was completely different from the way I grew up, in a primarily Jewish town on Long Island, where it seemed like everyone belonged to one of several local synagogues.
Diolinda told me that if I needed more information or wanted to talk more, I could come by anytime. “You are always welcome in our home,” she said. “Adios, shalom.”
Any reporter worth a dime will ask one source for another, and Diolinda gave me the name of a Jewish man who lived on the other side of town.
I hopped in a motorcarro, the ubiquitous motorbike carriages of Iquitos, and headed that way. I eventually met two older men standing on a street corner, who invited me into a rug shop. A phone was thrust into my hand, and I heard a man speaking English on the other line. “Hello, can I help you?” I asked.
“My name is Levy, Ronald Levy,” he said. I recognized the name from Segal’s book. “I am the president of the Communidad Judia de Iquitos. Perhaps you would like to interview me. You can come to my home tomorrow morning.”
This unexpected interview secured, I excitedly said goodbye to the old Jewish men and hurried back to my hotel room overlooking the Plaza de Armas to get ready for dinner.
It was Saturday night in Iquitos, and it seemed like the entire town was strolling along the busy Malecon overlooking the Amazon River. There were clowns and jugglers, restaurants and al fresco bars buzzing with the sound of samba, and street peddlers selling snake-tooth necklaces and coconut water pipes.
I treated myself to a meal at the best restaurant in town. La Maloca was also the only place in Iquitos with air conditioning — and it was completely empty. I dined amidst colonial elegance and enjoyed a true specialty of la selva (the jungle): grilled alligator with a side of yucca. It really did taste like chicken, though a bit tougher.
I was far from home, but after meeting the Ederys I felt a warmth that surrounded this town beyond the steamy rainforest stretching for hundreds of miles in all directions.
Iquitos’s warmth came from this tiny Jewish community, which felt, in a way, like they could be my own distant relatives.