On Monday, my group went on a nature hike for 3 hours. This wasn't a normal hike though - it was pretty much a tour/getting to know the true forest. Our guide, Roberto, was amazing. He knows everything about every single plant/animal/waterfall/pile of mud in the forest. There were so many things I saw for the first time that I can't even write it all down. But I took a bunch of pictures so that everyone can look at it and admire nature with me. :) I think the three coolest things, though, were: 1. the waterfall 2. dragon's blood and 3. invisible leaf! I shall explain in a little bit. Monté and Dobby, the two dogs, followed us again; they are seriously the most amazing dogs ever because they know the forest as well as Roberto does. I dropped my camera lens cap somewhere in the forest and had to retrace my steps quite far back along the path. As I was looking for it, Dobby came to get me because he knew I obviously didn't know the forest well, and I just followed him back to where the group was. I actually didn't end up finding the cap :( BUT Roberto was super amazing and had found it because he went further back than I did. He's seriously super ultimate forest champion, man.
Anyway, about the three coolest things during the hike... First of all. We got to bathe in a waterfall - a WATERFALL!! It was so cool and so freezing cold. Even though there was a shower back at the "camp," we didn't want to bathe there because it would be so much more amazing to take one under the waterfall. The water felt great after an hour and half of hiking/climbing up rocks/bouldering, but it was still super freezing. As soon as I went into the water, I thought I was going to hyperventilate because I just couldn't take deep breaths. The water from the falls comes from the top of the mountain where it's really cold - I don't think there's snow on top of that mountain so obviously it's not melted snow, but if there is snow, then it's probably that. Either way, it was a great experience!
The second coolest thing was on our way back down the mountain when Roberto showed us a tree that looked like any other tree. Then he took his machete and made a slight nick in the bark, not even a centimeter deep. We all wondered what he was doing, when he suddenly ran the tip of the machete across the palm of his hand, and had produced blood! We sort of knew what it was because the other group told us, but if they hadn't, I would have freaked out because it seemed like he just gashed his palm with this machete! He later explained that the tree is called the Dragon's Blood tree because its sap is red and looks like blood. It's known as dragon's blood because of its medicinal uses; if you take a drop of the "blood" and rub it all over your skin, it turns into a white cream that is a good repellant and sunblock. Also if you mix a tiny bit with water and drink it, it's supposed to help with stomach aches and cramps and other bodily injuries.
The third, but definitely not the last, thing that was new and interesting was a "leaf" he had picked up. It wasn't actually a real leaf, but an imprint of one, which made it look as though it was invisible since only the outline showed. I've never seen anything like it. And I thought it'd be fragile, because it looked like it would break any minute, but it's not like it would break as soon as you lifted it up.
After the hike and lunch, an indigenous woman from the neighboring community of Junin (I think), came to speak about her work with the owners of the Intag reservation. She was one of the leaders of this one organization, whose name I forgot, that is working to protect the Intag area from North American and European mining industries that are encouraging the Ecuadorian government to exploit the land so they can extract petroleum and other minerals. It was really inspiring to see this young woman who looked like she was in her 20's working so hard to protect the land and the beauty of the place. Something she said made me reexamine my and our North American society's perspective on wealth. It was something like, "We may not have many things, but we have a rich social community," obviously in Spanish.
But what she said got me thinking about how mostly everyone in the United States views wealth in the form of money or material - superficial things that can change drastically within a day. However, the people in Intag (and I'm sure many other communities outside the major influence of modern technology) don't view wealth in this manner. It doesn't matter how many pairs of shoes you have, or how much your house costs, or how expensive your car is. What matters is how involved you are in your society and in your neighbors' lives. The people here are friendly and intellectual; they think about things I've never thought about in ways I would never be able to imagine. They challenged me to reexamine my values in life, what I want, and what I need to be truly happy.
Immediately after her talk, 5 women from Intag came to talk to us about their movement, Mujeres y el Medio Ambiente, which means Women and the Environment. This group of 35 women also work to protect Intag from oil companies that want to relocate the people and deforest the Cloud Forest just to set up extracting/mining facilities. However, they don't do the traditional protesting; rather, they raise awareness by selling artesanal goods such as bags, belts, bracelets, coasters, etc all handmade from this special type of fiber that comes from the agave plant. After a long process of smoothing out the fibers, they dye it different colors so they can use it to knit, crochet, or embroider their products. It was a really cool process to learn about because it showed how much time goes into making one little bag or a belt. Each item comes with a tag that displays their logo, some information about their movement, and the name of the woman who made that specific item. It was really inspiring - I wish I could explain more about them, but this post is getting too long. If you want more information about them, let me know and I can definitely tell you more about their cause!
After looking through their hundreds of products, I bought a belt for myself, a purse for my sister, and a set of coasters for my host family. I wish I could have bought one of each thing, but I didn't have enough money or patience to look through all their goods. :) Then came dinner and more chill time. Lisa, Laura W., and I went to bed earlier because we wanted to pack and were super exhausted from the hike. Before we went to bed, though, we talked for a long time about a bunch of stuff - really profound stuff hehe. It's been a long time since any of us have had such conversations because when the group is together, we mostly talk about plans or what we've been doing or other light and funny things. So it was good to get our minds rolling about controversial issues and such. It was a good night!
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