Note: I have decided to alter some of the names in this story to protect the people in it, in the ever so slight chance that what I say could be found and cause conflict.
Quick, name a rainforest!
OK, now name one that's not the Amazon.
A little trickier isn't it? I'll help you out a little bit.
Forty-five million years ago, the Andes sprung up, separating the South American rainforest into east and west. In Ecuador, the east is still the Amazon, and the west side is known as the Chocó. The Amazon has more species overall than the Chocó, but the Chocó is richer in biodiversity per hectare. And with the Andes as a barrier, different subspecies started evolving in the Chocó, some of which evolved into different species altogether, like the brown headed spider monkey.
There are many more rainforests in the world, distinguished by the species that live there, but the one I know is the Chocó. My three night experience there was the clamoring of birds, frogs, and insects. The scent of the burning wood that cooked our food and boiled our water twice daily. The tired taste of chocolate and crackers, the itching of black fly bites, the squish of thick mud.
A little trickier isn't it? I'll help you out a little bit.
Forty-five million years ago, the Andes sprung up, separating the South American rainforest into east and west. In Ecuador, the east is still the Amazon, and the west side is known as the Chocó. The Amazon has more species overall than the Chocó, but the Chocó is richer in biodiversity per hectare. And with the Andes as a barrier, different subspecies started evolving in the Chocó, some of which evolved into different species altogether, like the brown headed spider monkey.
There are many more rainforests in the world, distinguished by the species that live there, but the one I know is the Chocó. My three night experience there was the clamoring of birds, frogs, and insects. The scent of the burning wood that cooked our food and boiled our water twice daily. The tired taste of chocolate and crackers, the itching of black fly bites, the squish of thick mud.
The crew was my mom and me, fellow traveler Shelly, local dance instructor Maria, and our biologist guide Paul. Before the break of dawn on our first day, we were off. The truck jerked along the heavily potholed road, segmenting each breath we took as we made our way to the trailhead.
About an hour before we reach our destinatination, Paul casually mentioned that the first thing we would do on our hike was cross a “very dangerous” bridge. This was a wonderful surprise, considering my fear of heights and, more specifically, my fear of falling. I spent the rest of the ride suppressing musings of slippery, one plank crossings.
In the end, the bridge was only slightly dreadful, and I comforted myself with the idea that the river below looked somewhat welcoming if worse came to worse.
On the other side, I took note that I had pricks on my arms oozing distastefully with blood.
“What type of bites are these? They don't look like mosquito.” I questioned Paul.
“Black fly,” he told me.
“What fun,” I thought. “What fun.”
It was around this time that I also completely internalized how little water we each had for our trek. In a normal exertion-free day, I can easily drink two or three liters of water. So with just 1.5 liters to myself, I braced myself for the eight hot hours ahead of me, knowing my thirst would at once be my biggest mental challenge and my biggest motivator.
There was a family that hiked with us at the start, and one of the women gave the gringas of our group walking sticks as she found them along the way.
After a few minutes, Paul described to us more what the trail would be like the rest of the way. “First, there is the German highway. Then there's the Ecuadorian highway,” he said.
I have never been to Germany, but I knew exactly what he meant. We were walking a gradual up, and the mud was already slowing us down, but the trail was for the most part easy, open, and wide. The locals had been widening it purposefully, thinking that perhaps a road would be built one day to make the trek to their jungle homes easier, even though it would only help a handful of families and add to the detriment of the rainforest.
The Ecuadorian highway was were we would need our walking sticks. There were ups and downs and then more ups and downs, and then, would you believe it? More of those silly ups and downs. But for me, the terrain was not a physical challenge but a mental one. All I could think of was water and getting to the end, because water. I was enjoying myself very little, and every step, every tree, every hill seemed the same.
About an hour before we reach our destinatination, Paul casually mentioned that the first thing we would do on our hike was cross a “very dangerous” bridge. This was a wonderful surprise, considering my fear of heights and, more specifically, my fear of falling. I spent the rest of the ride suppressing musings of slippery, one plank crossings.
In the end, the bridge was only slightly dreadful, and I comforted myself with the idea that the river below looked somewhat welcoming if worse came to worse.
On the other side, I took note that I had pricks on my arms oozing distastefully with blood.
“What type of bites are these? They don't look like mosquito.” I questioned Paul.
“Black fly,” he told me.
“What fun,” I thought. “What fun.”
It was around this time that I also completely internalized how little water we each had for our trek. In a normal exertion-free day, I can easily drink two or three liters of water. So with just 1.5 liters to myself, I braced myself for the eight hot hours ahead of me, knowing my thirst would at once be my biggest mental challenge and my biggest motivator.
There was a family that hiked with us at the start, and one of the women gave the gringas of our group walking sticks as she found them along the way.
After a few minutes, Paul described to us more what the trail would be like the rest of the way. “First, there is the German highway. Then there's the Ecuadorian highway,” he said.
I have never been to Germany, but I knew exactly what he meant. We were walking a gradual up, and the mud was already slowing us down, but the trail was for the most part easy, open, and wide. The locals had been widening it purposefully, thinking that perhaps a road would be built one day to make the trek to their jungle homes easier, even though it would only help a handful of families and add to the detriment of the rainforest.
The Ecuadorian highway was were we would need our walking sticks. There were ups and downs and then more ups and downs, and then, would you believe it? More of those silly ups and downs. But for me, the terrain was not a physical challenge but a mental one. All I could think of was water and getting to the end, because water. I was enjoying myself very little, and every step, every tree, every hill seemed the same.
In some parts, the trail was too vertical for the horse to make it, and the man guiding him, Arturo, had to lead him to our campsite a more roundabout way.
Paul has a complex relationship with the people like Arturo who have houses in the rainforest. They do things like hunt and kill endangered animals to boast their skins as prizes, clearcut their property and replace it with cacao and African palm plantations, and try to get that road going into the rainforest, which would especially hurt animals like spider monkeys that can't touch the ground to cross the clearing. As a conservationist, these things kill Paul, but he can't do much to influence their way of life. Doing anything to upset them like reporting on killings of endangered species would be a step in the wrong direction anyway, if he wants to remain on good terms with them.
This is very important for two reasons. One: Paul needs to cross through others’ land in order to get to his property, and he needs their permission to pass through. Two: Paul says there is the not so vague potential that he would end up dead if he messed with them.
Yep, Paul legitimately fears that he would be murdered if he pisses these people off, and with decent reasoning. Paul said that there are family feuds in the immediate area involving many generations of hatred. Many family members have blood on their hands already. He surmises that everyone who he has ever hired, except one person, has killed a man before.
“No one is from the rainforest here,” Paul had said.
There is no culture behind having a home in the rainforest, no deep-rooted excuse for how the rainforest is treated by the people who live there. Still, these environmental miscreants feel they have more of a right to the forest than Paul -- Ecuadorian in his own right, though he spent much of his life in the United States.
About six hours into the hike, we reached the first house we would pass. More important to me than the house as a landmark was the wide river before it. Though I still couldn't drink the water, just being in the river soothed me and gave me strength to continue.
On the other hand, my mom was done.
“Paul, do you think it's OK if I just stay here?” my mom asked.
“With potential murderers,” I thought.
“Well, no one's home, but I suppose....what if they say no?” answered Paul.
My mom didn't care. She was content swimming in the water, waiting for whatever came her way. Somehow, I had faith that she would be well taken care of as we left her behind.
About an hour after we left mom, we heard rain. We heard it before we saw it; minutes later we walked straight into it. The water somehow saved me once again, cooling me down and hydrating my spirit.
The rain stayed till I had drained my last drop of water, though I continued groping for another tiny molecule. It stayed until we made it to the skeleton of a house where we would be camping. It stayed until we were washing the sweat from our clothes in the river and filling our bottles with what dripped from the roof. And then it poured -- thunder and lighting through dinner, thunder and lightning through the night, muffling our shouts to each other.
Paul has a complex relationship with the people like Arturo who have houses in the rainforest. They do things like hunt and kill endangered animals to boast their skins as prizes, clearcut their property and replace it with cacao and African palm plantations, and try to get that road going into the rainforest, which would especially hurt animals like spider monkeys that can't touch the ground to cross the clearing. As a conservationist, these things kill Paul, but he can't do much to influence their way of life. Doing anything to upset them like reporting on killings of endangered species would be a step in the wrong direction anyway, if he wants to remain on good terms with them.
This is very important for two reasons. One: Paul needs to cross through others’ land in order to get to his property, and he needs their permission to pass through. Two: Paul says there is the not so vague potential that he would end up dead if he messed with them.
Yep, Paul legitimately fears that he would be murdered if he pisses these people off, and with decent reasoning. Paul said that there are family feuds in the immediate area involving many generations of hatred. Many family members have blood on their hands already. He surmises that everyone who he has ever hired, except one person, has killed a man before.
“No one is from the rainforest here,” Paul had said.
There is no culture behind having a home in the rainforest, no deep-rooted excuse for how the rainforest is treated by the people who live there. Still, these environmental miscreants feel they have more of a right to the forest than Paul -- Ecuadorian in his own right, though he spent much of his life in the United States.
About six hours into the hike, we reached the first house we would pass. More important to me than the house as a landmark was the wide river before it. Though I still couldn't drink the water, just being in the river soothed me and gave me strength to continue.
On the other hand, my mom was done.
“Paul, do you think it's OK if I just stay here?” my mom asked.
“With potential murderers,” I thought.
“Well, no one's home, but I suppose....what if they say no?” answered Paul.
My mom didn't care. She was content swimming in the water, waiting for whatever came her way. Somehow, I had faith that she would be well taken care of as we left her behind.
About an hour after we left mom, we heard rain. We heard it before we saw it; minutes later we walked straight into it. The water somehow saved me once again, cooling me down and hydrating my spirit.
The rain stayed till I had drained my last drop of water, though I continued groping for another tiny molecule. It stayed until we made it to the skeleton of a house where we would be camping. It stayed until we were washing the sweat from our clothes in the river and filling our bottles with what dripped from the roof. And then it poured -- thunder and lighting through dinner, thunder and lightning through the night, muffling our shouts to each other.
The next day we set off again. I was used to the mud: sliding in it, being coated in it, looking at it for hours at a time, and never ever touching it, as Paul had warned us of the many venomous creatures below our feet. We were finally not in a rush anymore, literally stopping to observe each new flower along the way.
PPaul also told us a lot about the different trees we saw, pointing out which were in trouble due to logging for furniture, and one tree that bleeds like a human and has special medicinal properties.
The highlight of the day was when we saw brown-headed spider monkeys, probably the least poisonous animals I encountered in the whole four days. Paul shook branches near us, making animal noises and double-pumping his fists in the air to get them to come closer. We watched them with care, fearing branches and poop thrown our way.
It was also on this walk that we met back up with my mom, who was in fact very alive. She described her time with the family whose house she stayed at with such gratitude that it was hard to imagine that those people had any malice toward anyone or anything. More than food, water, and shelter, she was given clothes to borrow, much patience with her limited Spanish, and fresh sugar cane and cacao to nibble as she was guided towards us.
The next day, my mom and I chilled at the campsite, turning down an again “dangerous” and slippery rock-hopping hike in the river to a waterfall. It was nice to have a day to relax and write as we mentally prepared for the eight hours back the next day, which we would end up enjoying a lot more than our hike in. My mom and I discussed our experience in terms of little hells and silver linings, overall grateful for what we had learned but itching to get back to my friend Camila and her wonderful family in Quito.
My time in the Chocó of course reinforced to how fragile the rainforest is. It also made me realize that rainforests that aren't well known like the Amazon are at an even greater risk; the region they cover is already smaller, so endemic species, meaning species that only live in that one place, could disappear faster. There are also fewer people worldwide gunning for the resurrection of smaller rainforests because there is no name recognition of the forests.
But what I really didn't expect to learn so much about was the complexities of human nature. The fight for the resurrection of the rainforests is not so simple; I never thought I'd be able to say that I am grateful to a group of potential people murderers and biodiversity destroyers for taking care of my mom in the rainforest.
It was also on this walk that we met back up with my mom, who was in fact very alive. She described her time with the family whose house she stayed at with such gratitude that it was hard to imagine that those people had any malice toward anyone or anything. More than food, water, and shelter, she was given clothes to borrow, much patience with her limited Spanish, and fresh sugar cane and cacao to nibble as she was guided towards us.
The next day, my mom and I chilled at the campsite, turning down an again “dangerous” and slippery rock-hopping hike in the river to a waterfall. It was nice to have a day to relax and write as we mentally prepared for the eight hours back the next day, which we would end up enjoying a lot more than our hike in. My mom and I discussed our experience in terms of little hells and silver linings, overall grateful for what we had learned but itching to get back to my friend Camila and her wonderful family in Quito.
My time in the Chocó of course reinforced to how fragile the rainforest is. It also made me realize that rainforests that aren't well known like the Amazon are at an even greater risk; the region they cover is already smaller, so endemic species, meaning species that only live in that one place, could disappear faster. There are also fewer people worldwide gunning for the resurrection of smaller rainforests because there is no name recognition of the forests.
But what I really didn't expect to learn so much about was the complexities of human nature. The fight for the resurrection of the rainforests is not so simple; I never thought I'd be able to say that I am grateful to a group of potential people murderers and biodiversity destroyers for taking care of my mom in the rainforest.
Songs I've been listening to: Andrómeda - Poolside Remix by Zoé, Danko / Manuel by Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit