I’m walking in the Rainforest alone. I'm trying to peer between the trees, to listen and sniff as the explorers did. The Forest is a mystery, but this mystery is not scary, but attractive.
I feel at home here – I grew up, and the forest element is native for me. Well what of it that this forest is in another part of the world? Its soul remains the same as in Tyan Shan, Abastumani, Siberia, Borneo… I’m trying to merge myself with the forest, dissolve in it, to become the part of it, to let it come inside of me...
Suddenly, this forest meditation is interrupted by the noise of the wings making by a huge bird that is flying up just in half a meter from me. It is the big owl - Buho de Antejos if I am not mistaken. He flew up higher, perched on the branch and started to stare at me seriously and carefully. After a minute he turned aside – it seemed that I was nothing very much for him, and also he didn’t have his camera.
There is an old trail following the river, which people do not use a lot, so the wildlife here is in its own right. Somebody is jumping down in the water from the way. The colorful grasshoppers are springing out under my feet – they are rising in the air and turning into the little white butterflies – it looks like magic. The Macaws are screaming and flying here and there,
some birds – Jesus know which! – are singing by many voices.
The air is full of sounds and different aromas, and this mix is changing every moment, like the inside of a giant kaleidoscope made from all shades of all senses!
Suddenly, I'm almost tripped on by a snake! She was peacefully lying across the trail and leading her sting. I am not so familiar with the reptiles behavior, so can't say if she was hunting or just warming herself – but she was posing perfectly, as a professional model.
I am not so daring to make frontal picture indeed, so after a couple of shots, the photo session is finished. But the heroine doesn't even think to give me the way! What shall I do?... I’m picking a little chip and, stepping a couple of meters aside, throwing it to the snake. The reaction is coming immediately – but not that I expected: the snake is turning into the small cobra! I don’t know if this little creature is poisonous or no, so I’m not risking to come closer. I'm trying to frighten her off once again – no reaction, just her hood is becoming wider. Does she see me?
Finally, she is getting tired of that and moving away. I’m touching the grass by machete – just in case…
I have to say a couple of good words about a machete as an incredibly multifunctional tool. Using a machete one can easily make his way through in the rainforest. In case of aggression from anyone…or anything, it can be used as a perfect weapon. It might be used as a tower of strength in the process of climbing over the huge logs, or as a probe of the depth when crossing a bog. Some people use it to fan off mosquitos, others are catching snakes, pressing them to the ground by the flat side of the tool. I just can't understand why, during the evolution, the locals didn’t grow the machete as an organ.
I left the lodge early in the morning, and now it is afternoon. If someone told me before that I could walk ten kilometers in the rainforest when humidity is about 100%, and the temperature is more than 30 degrees, crossing the mud, stepping over the fractals of caterpillars, I would laugh with it as with a good joke.
So what happened to me here, in the wilds of Amazonia? Maybe it is because of the fantastic concentration of life energy that increased all world-average norms? It is the Life in its incredible diversity, eternal life that is changing its forms at all times but is never-ending. It is teeming, squeaking, singing; it is hiding behind every blade of grass and demonstrating its uncountable verges to the attentive observer. Anyway, I can understand well the people who came here for fun and remained forever, to become a part of this world – this alive, pure and so genuinely real world…
13.03.2015