Catherina Rust, born in 1971, lived until she was six with the Aparai-Wayana Indians in the Brazilian jungle, where her parents were involved in an ethnological research project. The first language she learned was Aparai. After her parents split up, she lived with her mother in the USA. After returning to Germany, she studied political science, ethnology and psychology. She is now carrying on with her father's research and is at present doing a scientific evaluation of his documentation on the culture of the Aparai-Wayana Indians.