TBS

*Due to be published in July 2016 but had some issues with google accounts/blogger. Here it goes anyways :)

Ecstatic bewilderment from squirrel monkeys waiting to be prayed by an eagle announced the beginning of our journey into the depths of the Amazonian rainforest. It was a delight for the trained eye and we were lucky to have many with such training in our boat – a primatologist group, a mammalogist group and community guides accompanied us. I was there with a group of Masters students and undergrads from different universities visiting USFQ, where I currently work.

It’s been over a year since I’ve written and undoubtedly, so many remarkable things have happened. Carbocycle won at Columbia! I have began and been part of development projects in the Andean region that gave us a UNEP award, larger sustainability projects at USFQ, writing for the Drawdown Fellowship and most importantly, an earthquake shook the coastal area and changed all my plans. A large portion of my work shifted focus towards sanitation efforts in the affected areas.

But I was forced and blessed to take a pause to go to USFQ’s Tiputini Biodiversity Station (TBS), to put everything into perspective in July.

Walking palms lined our entry into the forest as we felt our boots sinking into the mud.

Toucans were flying free. It was the first time I saw some without their wings cut. They were only visible from above the canopy. We stood at the crown of a centennial ceiba tree, where the vastness was finally legible. The lushness of the forest is overwhelming.

Smothered by the humidity we walked endlessly and it was nothing like I could have imagined. The diversity of caws, the textures… I went on a quest for color in the midst of the foliage. Wilderness opened to my lenses, and with the help of our guide, I could finally see through the camouflage –miniature bats under leaves, yellow spiders hanging in the middle of trees, hundreds of ants building their military homes.

It was pristine messiness. The kind only nature achieves and I hope we aim to mimic. Yet, as hopeful as I am, we still had to pass through an oil extraction station to enter TBS. And as we were leaving, we still had to pass through a small village where they only wore the traditional clothing to show how it used to be. We still saw the lagoons filled with crude oil that have not been remediated.

Despite that extreme combination of sights, I say today that I’m not only hopeful but optimistic.

I get to work alongside passionate researchers, wiser, more experienced than me, from whom I get to learn daily. But most importantly, I get to see the spark in my students’ eyes -the will, the want – so many studying Physics, Mathematics, Civil Engineering, considering going into renewables, upcycling in their own fields of work or at least interested in understanding a life cycle analysis and why it matters.

I believe, beyond the liberal arts education and the rigorous academics, we are bringing about human beings with a conscience. Those who will be brighter than me when they take the baton, with an entrepreneurial mind that have tools with no creativity limits. TBS- to be surprised.

Love,

Mel

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