Bélgica Dagua, "Guacamaya Apapuchu Story."

This is the apapuchu macaw. “They told me about this apapuchu macaw when we used to go barbasco fishing in a small river. My great-aunt, Aunt Verónica Vargas, who has already passed away, told me this story.” “She told me about this apapuchu macaw. She said there was a woman who went barbasco fishing together with her husband —the husband of this macaw.” “They were fishing with barbasco in the river and collecting the fish. That’s what they were doing. She liked to suck the flowers and, out of spite toward her husband, pauj! she stepped on the flower so he wouldn’t be able to drink from it.” “‘Pauj,’ she stepped on it out of meanness; it wasn’t a flower, it was an apapuchu. So when she stepped on the apapuchu— ‘Oh my God! What is that?’ By then the worm had already stung her foot.” “So it hadn’t been a flower; it was an apapuchu. Then she said to her husband: ‘Oh my God! It stung me, quick! Spit on it with your saliva.’ He expected her to do it quickly, but when he tried to spit, nothing came out.” “‘You’re an animal with a dry tongue,’ her husband said. ‘Why are you talking to me like that?’” “She said: ‘I’m going to bring up saliva from my throat.’ And when she tried ‘lin’… she said ‘kaug,’ because it got stuck in her throat.” “When the macaw was a person, she hid the flower with her feet because she thought her husband was going to suck it. She covered it, and the apapuchu stung her. That’s how they told the story.” “That’s all I know. Then I said: ‘Since then she is known as the apapuchu macaw.’ My aunt told me that.” “‘Is that when she transformed into a macaw?’ — ‘Of course! Because she was like that when she was still a person, she made the sound ‘aaug’ when she became a macaw. That’s how they told it.’”