One year later I get back to Jakarta airport, and the feeling still remains the same. Just getting off the aircraft the big difference of temperature between inside and outside makes you start feeling a little bit dizzy. What don’t help much is more than 50 people offering their transport in a quite insisting way. Definitely not suitable for not patient people.
In my opinion Jakarta is an awful city full of pollution, cars, rubbish and too busy, but we have to spend some days in here to get our research permits. Once we have them we make our way to Palangka Raya. Most of Indonesian people are really friendly and always take things easy. You will not see a stressed Indonesian man and that also means that thing takes much longer than in other countries, which can end up driving you crazy. Just walking around the market can be an interesting activity! Everyone looks at you and start shouting “Hello Mister” is an easy way to get an idea of how does it feels to be famous!
Once we have all the equipment we need for the projects we make our 2h way to the town of Bawan where some local guys will take us by bike to the beautiful base camp! In just 2 weeks the local guys turned an old hut from the loggers to a beautiful base camo for more than 20 people! It is a wooden construction with 3 rooms, 3 mandis (showers), 3 toilets, 1 kitchen and a table to spend our free time.
During July camp at Bawan is pretty crowded: Kath and I work for Marie who is doing a PhD in Oxford Brookes about Gibbons. There are a total of 8 volunteers: Klara, a young English lady that faces her fears every morning in the dark working with gibbons, Kirsty is Scottish and studies the orangutan nests, Emily is also Scottish and is “Miss Frog” she love frogs and wants to be a frog expert! Sarah comes from England and is studying butterflies. Charlotte, Charlie, Lilia, Ellie are volunteers that are always happy to help with whatever is needed. Jess (our lovely Jess) takes care of all the volunteers with a big smile in her face! And finally there is Ivan, a Spanish guy who works for Outrop during a year and tries to live without problems among all these ladies! Not an easy job!
In the small extension of forest of Bawan where we work we can find different types of degradation phases. At the edge of the forest there is a big burnt area, where camp is located, and inside the forest there are patches of macarangas, peat swamp and low pole, although Kerangas forest is the predominant type.
La selva de Bawan presenta diferentes grados de degradación, pero la mayor parte se trata de Kerangas, un tipo de selva que se caracteriza por un suelo muy poco grueso y con un pH muy acido. La mayoría de flora se ha adaptado a este tipo de hábitat para perder la menor cantidad de agua posible.
A normal day starts at 3.30 in the morning when the alarm starts ringing. We dress up as fast as we can and we make our way to our listening post which normally is about 40 minutes walking in the dark. Gibbons start singing around 4:30 until 7:30 or 8. After taking all the data that we need we go back to camp to have breakfast and most of the days we go back to the forest to be what we call “ Happy plotters” which consists on measuring the trees in order to identify the different habitats
The most amazing thing of July happens when Ivan and I go out to a gibbon survey. It is 4.40 in the morning when suddenly we see the most shinny eyes I have ever seen. Being really carefully and trying to flash him all the time with our head torches, Ivan starts to make photos to be able to identify what we had infront of us. Finally we could see that it was a Marbled Cat!! We felt full of joy!
On the 24/07/10 I write on my diary: “I should never forget that nature is “who” has the last Word. Here is raining every night and we can’t do our jod.” ( translated from my actual note in spanish from that date). When rains during the night, gibbons don’t sign in the morning and we can’t do our job. Things are getting difficult!
This is the sum up of July! Really soon ( as soon as I translate it from spanish) you we’ll have the one from August.
La de los monos
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