Organized by Niles Heckman

We will be screening Episode 1 of our documentary series, Shamans of the Global Village, with director Niles Heckman and Writer/Producer Rak Razam, which looks at the work of Dr. Octavio Rettig and the Sonoran Desert Toad. Indigenous people across the globe have used sacred plant medicines for millennia to heal, illuminate and connect them to the web of life. From ayahuasca and San Pedro in South America, psilocybin mushrooms and Salvia Divinorum in Mexico, Peyote in North America, Kambo in Brazil, Iboga in Africa, and DMT-acacias in Australia, etc., each of these psychoactive medicines needs a healer to connect them to their patients: the shaman.

This investigative-adventure documentary show examines not just these shamanic medicines, but the shamans that wield them. Shamans of the Global Village focuses on both indigenous and Western men and women learning to become shamans, what drives them, what their backgrounds are, and why the role of the shaman is vital in the 21st century. If, as Marshall McLuhan said, we are now a “global village”, then we need our own healers that understand the deep power and sacredness these plant medicines can reveal.

Episode One features the work of Dr. Octavio Rettig and the Sonoran Desert Toad (5-MeO-DMT). The night will be a community gathering and commence with a one hour film screening and one hour plus discussion with the filmmakers and local commentators on the toad medicine and the shamanic resurgence. Panelists include: Rak Razam, Niles Heckman, Meriana Dinkova.

http://www.shamansoftheglobalvillage.com

Tickets are by donation, suggested $10 or more payable here or AT THE DOOR on the night. Being donation based the suggested price is just that, and open to the community. Address: 1665 Haight St, San Francisco, CA 94117, USA. Starts 7pm sharp.