The Hike

I woke to the pinch of an ant biting my lovehandle. Not an uncommon occurrence in a tent that is slowly decomposing like everything else here in the tropics. Sometimes I think of myself as the god of the tent and the ants the living beings of my universe. Usually, I gently pinch them between my thumb and forefinger, unzip the tent and flick them into the forest. I imagine them scurrying back to their colony having freshly experienced a major religious awakening, spreading the gospel of the tent god. The ones that pinch me I kill. The hand of god is just and cruel.

I illuminated my Casio. Just after 4AM. Breakfast wouldn't be ready for another hour but Mira was already banging on pots and pans. It takes a little longer to cook over an open fire. I had finished my book and my Ipod was dead so I just laid there and thought.

At 5, I crawled out of the tent and began to pack up my stuff being careful to keep everything as dry as possible, no easy task given the amount it had rained recently. It was my last day at Iyema and Siri, Malou and I planned to look for bonobos for a few hours, return for lunch and then hike to Bosolomwa where Mawa and his pirogue were expected to meet us and take us back upriver to Ndeli. Amy, Mangue, Dipont and Mira would remain at Iyema for a few more days. After not finding bonobos and eating a plate full of noodles with tomato paste, we began the nine mile tredge to Bosolomwa.

The problem with life under the canopy is that you can't see what is coming at you from the horizon. After about 30 minutes of quiet hiking, the sound of thunder began to echo through the forest from not too far away. And then it began to rain. Now I don't mind being wet. My feet, nor my tent, nor nary any other item of mine have been dry but for 5 minutes over the last five days. But close lightning can be startling.

With each successive rumble, Malou began to whine like a trapped puppy. She is the AWF camp director and quite a woman. She grew up in war torn eastern Congo and fled to Kinshasa ahead of major fighting. She hasn't been home in over 12 years. She can be stubborn and bossy and is driven bu rules. She has been upset with me in the past because I gave a guide a tin of sardines solely because the AWF bought them for me-not the guides. It didn't matter to her that I don't even eat sardines unless in a pinch. Still she is a good woman with a smile that lights up her face. It's good to know that, in a country where rape is regularly used as a weapon of war, there is a stong and independent woman like her here.

Despite all of this and at first, her whimpering was a bit annoying. But as the lightning got closer, enveloping us, ripping through the trees like an overanxious child with an enormous present on Christmas morning, my irritation disappeared, my own fear set in, and I was retroactively sympathetic. We began to move faster, paying little attention to the thorny vines slashing at our arms and legs.

At one point a vine collared me about the neck and as I went to remove it, my fingers came into contact with an arrow head necklace given to me by my friend Jennifer the night before I left Bend. Immediately my thoughts went to home and Gwen and Silas and the vow I made to myself to return from this trip in one piece. It's not the rain or the lightning that scares me. Its the trees.

It may not seem intuitive, but the soil in the rainforest is poor in quality. Where we are at, 2.5 million years ago was a lake and the formation of the volcanoes in eastern Africa changed the climate patterns and allowed for the growth of the rainforest. The floor of the forest is essentially layer upon layer of leaf litter and dead plant materials giving the ground a soft bounce to it when you walk. There is not a rock for miles. This is why farming here and in other rainforests (think Brazil) is so destructive. If a family or company or whatever could farm a place forever, as we in North America tend to do, there would be fewer problems environmentally. But rainforest soil can only be used temporarily. After a certain period the soil goes fallow and the farm must move. It is also tough on the trees. Even when the weather is calm, I hear trees, seemingly healthy simply lose there perch with the soil and fall. Even more common are large branches, rotted and heavy, breaking from the canopy at heights of over 60 feet and crashing to the ground. The wind and rain increase the chances of falling foilage.

I began to imagine myself as an ant in an arboreal universe. A tree or large branch the vegetative hand of god. It was with no small amount of joy that we came to a clearing where the guides' families stayed back in the 90s, before the war, when Iyema was a fully functional research site. We ducked into an old thatched hut, leaking and barely standing but better than without.

Siri immediately ditched his handmade wicker backpack in the corner and ventured back into the rain. One of the older guides, he is as tough as they come. In 2007 when I was here last and before the AWF began providing footwear, he would walk barefoot through the forest, the soles of his feet thich like leather. All of these men speak in whispers but have to be in the conversation of world's toughest hombres. Where he was going in that storm, I couldn't begin to guess.



Malou wanted to start a fire. I said no and that we would be leaving as soon as the rain let up a bit. The prospect of staying in the hut made me impatient with the storm. After about 15 minutes Siri returned with about 3 dozen plantains and a pocket full of wild peppers, all of which must have been planted nearby when the camp was running. He had been out foraging. A few more minutes later, the rain let up and we headed out once again into the forest. Not but 5 minutes had passed before the deluge returned. Siri had to stop once or twice to fasten the plantains to his pack, a process that involved making "straps" from vegetation. With his adjustments, he no longer had room for his machete so I offered to carry it for him.



The use of a machete is an art form. One doesn't just start hacking though the forest unless one doesn't mind cutting oneself. On occassion, even the guides will come back to camp with a deep cut on some part of their person. The proper use of a machete involves the strategic placement of a small notch on a sapling, at which point the small tree is easily bent to one side. With smaller vines, the thumb powers the blade through it, as if peeling an apple. Only rarely is a full swing necessary to sever a branch or large vine.

I, of course, couldn't help myself but to take a few solid swipes. The tool felt empowering in my hand as I don't usually carry one. I thought that if the hand of god should take me, at least I would be armed. I imagined myself at St. Pete's gate, puffing mad, the vision of my wife and child husbandless and fatherless, respectively, the first of several bones I would use the machete to pick with any creator of this universe.

The rain and lightning spurred our pace. At one point we came to a newly fallen tree, the bright yellow wood at the point of the break, smiling like a preacher with golden teeth, signaling that it was a recent tumble. Siri continued to gather food. Seems he has an appetite for a particular caterpillar that tastes a bit like over cooked prawns. I wondered if he thought about the hand of god and if he got to the pearly gates he would cook St. Pete a dinner of plantains and spicy caterpillars. Then it occurred to me that he is probably so used to these conditions that he just isn't scared.



The rain let up but not before we were forced to cross a creek that, typically small and gentile, was fat and swollen and had found new energy from the rain. It rose to my thighs and Siri and I had to hold Malou's hands. We managed to ford the creek without incident finishing the hike somewhat peacefully as the storm abated. At Bosolomwa, we found the AWF pirogue, but Mawa, our usual conductor wasn't there. Instead Kobra was driving. We would come to learn that Mawa's eldest daughter had died in childbirth. She was 25. I don't think I will kill any more ants. Even the ones that pinch me.