Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
It was Antonio's father, Raimundo, who had established the farm in the 1970s, as part
of a wave of settlers encouraged by the Brazilian government, which was high on the idea
of developing the supposedly unproductive land of the Amazon. New arrivals could get a
100-hectare (250-acre) plot for almost nothing.
“It was beautiful then,” Raimundo said, sitting in the front yard of what I might
have otherwise called his still rather beautiful homestead. “The forest was vast, full with
everything,” he said. “Game and all living beings. In those days everything was easier.”
Like Nestor, Raimundo was now suffering the effects of the most recent wave of de-
forestation, and he echoed Nestor's complaints about the large soy farms. But Raimundo
didn't hate the soy farmers. He had been offered a trunkload of cash, and had turned it
down, and that was that. “We feel good, because everything they do, it's for Brazil,” he
said. “But what can I say? We feel the heat, because of the cleared land.”
“Once it's cleared, it will never be the same again,” Antonio said. “We know for a fact
that place will never be what it was before.”
And it wasn't over yet. We asked Raimundo what he thought the area would be like
when his son reached his age.
“If they don't come up with a law for a man to protect the forest he lives in, there will
be nothing left,” he said. “Nothing left.” Perhaps because it was so poorly enforced, he was
unaware that such a law already existed.
Rick's cabin was back in the forest, perhaps ten minutes by foot from Antonio's house.
The path led through the woods, along a wooden walkway that passed over a shady, clear-
running creek, and finally to a sandy clearing. The cabin was a simple structure, no more
than a few bare rooms made of planks cut by chainsaw. We slung our hammocks on the
narrow porch.
A wasp was harrying Adam. As he tried to squirm and jump away, it became enraged
and stung him on the cheek. “What did I do wrong?” he asked himself. Then, looking at
the encroaching jungle all around, he drew the lesson. “The forest is my enemy,” he said.
We dumped our bags in the cabin and gathered in a troop facing Rick, our commander.
“Are you ready for your jungle adventure?” he growled.
Rick had himself never made it to the depths of his own forest—because of how large
the property was, he said. But Tang suggested it was because Rick just kept going around
and around on the same trail.
“Have you seen the lake?” Tang asked.
“No,” Rick said.
“Have you seen the field?” Tang asked.
