Nuquí, Chocó Biogeographical Region. Part 2

On the arrival at the bitter-flavored beach, in a moment you'll see why but for now let me describe what I see that day. The boat manage to ride the waves and the beach showed the violence of the sea, there were some walls of about a meter and a half, exposing some roots of the trees on the shore, and some meters inside, you could see some wooden moldy stairs pretty slimy look and we had two bags of 80 Lt and more each one also those stairs were about sixty steps on it and some of them rotten for the salty humidity, from there, we knew there was gonna be the heavy start of that journey, there was no much help to put our things up in the base so we just figured out our way to climb the stairs. The place is all made of tropical wood, the bedroom we installed had two beds with mosquito net and some shelves where we put some ready-to-go clothes and materials to start the next day, the plan was clear and set before we arrive, we were supposed to be accompanied by a local expert, someone who knew about trees and valuable woods, so it would guarantee the success of the visit and we could enjoy some free time, but the first thing we knew is that the guide was not even an expert on the forest, so we lose not just the day of work but the hope of finding a decent individual of the such valuable tree. Later that day I was told about the reputation of the place (a bad one), not just because they have misleading advertising but because its a coursed land (and yes, forest scientist we do believe in the stories of the jungle), a community land which had been owed by the natives then genuinely sold to researchers and then some native (the one administrating right now that "preserve")in company of some bad people just taking it back passing over any ethic rule or word given, because land in those territories isn't written is throughout a verbal agreement that you can "own it", and usually you wont have a problem as a native to keep your place there, but this land had a terrible violent history of being the reason of disputes, this as some other places in the Chocó Biogeographical Region is full of routes, mammals routes, water routes, ancient routes and also problems routes*, so it was a situation were two people cannot share the same room anymore, adding to that the person managing the place was also having really bad reputation for lying to the scientist visitors about biological matters or logistics of the fieldwork, but coming back to the present, I was told all this information in the middle of the challenge, and thats were you close your eyes and beg all the gods in the jungle and the elementals to show you which and where is your tree within 60 meters canopies and thick forest, so that was the situation, we saw many wonderful things in the four days there , we saw two big groups of owler monkeys that curiously were mad at the guy that was walking with us but they were quiet while we two female were passing by there, we meet a native guy who was trying to set some traps for the hunting chore at night and we give it a try to see if he would know about our tree and a location were we could find it, after finding all the possible words to make sure we were being understood, he say he hasn't see that tree anymore because people just cut it so much, even the people that still working on the wood industry was saying that tree wasn't there anymore, followed by finding the people administrating the preserve was also cutting some trees systematically, so our hope was going in decline, our first 2 days went by just the same walking about 8 ours per day and not finding our tree, on the third day we planned to go diving since it was my colleague's birthday but again plans were ruined due to rainforest storm and for good because after spending the whole day inside and reading and processing our fieldwork data we heard that the ocean has had dangerous currents that day and it would be dangerous to be diving, so we were hoping at least to watch some whale jumping in the horizon, and yes we were in whale birth season but the place was so far into the wild that it was just better to watch them on a youtube video. Anyway, the last day was our last hope to make a huge appreciation for this specie extinction and we just went out on the search just for protocol really.
It was like 4 in the afternoon when we decide to stop the search and we just sit under the biggest tree around talking about our paper, what are we gonna say, how do we tell the scientific community this endemic special specie is disappearing and in this exact location it's a fact you can't find it anymore, there was rage and desperation at that moment, we were angry because this guy had told us we could find a good population of at least 5 adults plus and then nothing, so there was an awkward silence, I was playing around with some leaves from under this majestic tree, feeling frustrated and exhausted when there was a wind that blows and some fresh leaves fall in something call my attention in that leaf, immediately my mental checklist started to fill up and I told my colleague with a tear in my eyes, !THIS IS OUR TREE!. There was joy and hope, we went back to the camp, and was that night were everything went down the hill, it was the moment to finish paying our stay there, and we had an inconvenience bc there isn't internet signal there to do the banking transference they offered to sell us some satellite internet connection that also didn't work out, so the plan was that they were gonna take us to the town and there we will pay the overbalance that was las a 20 % of the whole cost, we didn't have that cash because the cost suddenly went up on absurd justifications like the day that we didn't work also we had to pay the field worker, we ended paying the field work and some other employees stay because even tho they aren contractor by the people there they don't want to cover anything legal even if they are natives too, every extra out after 9pm that the lights were on also had an extra cost, also apparently they had to buy extra groceries because they didn't consider the employees food, and some other costs we were not expecting but the fact was, we were gonna pay just we didn't have the tools to transfer the money there. There was this foreign women, who since the beginning was asking as for help on how to manage the preserve and some other things that researchers know to make a successful preserve, but she seem way to involved like almost this owning feeling on the land and later that day we had the inconvenience was her who become as the managing party, not accepting our offer to pay in town where we all were gonna go, also she start harassing and threatening with not letting us leave that isolated place and not letting us take the research material, so we saw how somebody just under bad intentions was pretending to charge us 4 days full stay and other expenses with no results, we freak out, we couldn't really sleep, and next day first time in the morning we were supposed to be pick up by the boat, so we packed our stuff and expected the worst, even with a contract in between we were in the coursed land, the land of nobody's that wanted to be the kings of the hill, we even offer ourselves to go with the police to make the payment effective but that didn't workout for that women either because she didn't want the money (not in that moment) but she wanted to be recognized as the queen of the hill, the owner of a native land she didn't belong, and she acted desperate because that was everything she though she had, the "respect " from the people when in reality it was just another villain Queen that no-one has heard about but she claim herself the queen of the bitter flavored beach, and natives were scare and tired of her tyrani.

*the unforgettable story of the Colombian pacific forest full of sophisticated labs in the jungle and the need to move around the outcome.

Posted on 31 March, 2023 15:40 by soniacamargo