Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
it seemed to me that the rainforest had absorbed the past, dissolved it like ancestral bones, and it
would take time for me to begin to comprehend the culture here in deeper ways.
More and more cocks crowed, and when I opened my eyes, the light was stronger, brightly out-
lining the wooden window shutter and the bedroom door's uneven planks. There was the swishing
sound of someone sweeping the dirt around the building. I got up and opened the uneven square of
wood that fit into the empty window.
Willy, the keeper of the Vie Sauvage headquarters, a tall young man with high cheekbones,
swept, moving the broom in controlled, rapid motions as sunlight spilled across the town, lighting
up earthen buildings and palm thatch in incandescent shades of orange and yellow. He held one arm
behind his back as he worked, bent at the waist, taking short steps, sweeping the dirt of the yard into
a pattern of symmetric brushstrokes like those in a Japanese stone garden.
In the main room of the headquarters, I found Sally already deep in conversation with local
leaders. She had told me about the delicate and time-consuming way in which social relationships
were built. All morning, as I prepared my bags and the cooks readied breakfast, people constantly
arrived to speak with her. They said they'd come to thank her and Michael for all that they'd done,
before sitting down and explaining their needs: the lack of funds to educate their children, the suf-
fering of a sick relative, the cost of medicine. Then they stayed, so that every task and discussion
was slowed by the presence of people sitting in the plastic chairs, on the wooden benches, squatting
in the shade of the overhang, leaning against the Land Cruiser's fenders.
Willy and Marie-Claire, head cook, hospital nurse, and the wife of Cosmas Bofangi Batuafe,
a local conservationist also supported by BCI, tried to convince Sally to stay another night. They
became visibly downcast when she explained that BCI had work in Kokolopori.
“If we stay another night,” Sally told me, “then they get paid for cooking and taking care of the
guesthouse. But we need to get to the reserve.”
Behind her, the hood of the Land Cruiser was up, held in place by a stick polished yellow from
use, five men looking closely at the engine. One wheel was off, and a young man was cutting
squares from old rubber tubing with a handsaw to patch leaks in the tire's inner tube. Marie-Claire,
whose round face had quickly regained its smile, began reciting prices, speaking Lingala though the
numbers were in French, as was the word
franc
.
“No, no, no, no,” Sally said, then answered in Lingala. From Marie-Claire's expression and bits
of French, I could tell that Sally was saying the prices were too high. Briefly, Sally looked angry,
but then she laughed and Marie-Claire did the same. I listened to Sally's new list of numbers, punc-
tuated by
franc
. Marie-Claire agreed, and afterward Sally explained the interaction to me.
“Because the election held us back, people haven't been paid in a long time. We're only around
for a month, so they know that this is their chance to make money, and the women in the kitchen
want to work. There's virtually no cash economy in the area. People barter, but conservation brings
in money that they can spend at the market.”
It was almost noon when we finally crowded into the Land Cruiser, Michael and I sharing the
front seat next to Jean-Pierre, the driver who, like many of those who worked with BCI and Vie
Sauvage, lived in the reserve. Sally climbed onto the back of a motorcycle. Michael explained that
Congo time required the addition of two or three hours to any plan, that if you didn't calculate the
extra time you'd get caught in the dark on a road, or spend your visit to the rainforest in a state of
constant disappointment.
