We left Otavalo and went straight to Milpe by way of the Quito bus station. Milpe is the teeny tiny town between Quito and the coast primarily notable for being on KM91 of the west bound highway. It's other claim to fame is that it is the home of the Mindo Cloudforest Foundation, the 155 acre bird sanctuary where we were to volunteer. Our two week stint there started on July 27th.
We were quite pleased with the set up for the first week. The second week things went a little south. Our group consisted of the resident family who hosted us, a group of three university students from Ibarra who were doing a summer tourism internship, and our family. Accomodations were rustic but perfectly adequate. Food was adequate but less than scintillating. (We didn't have our own cooking facility so we were at the mercy of our host family who received $4/day/person for our food. The low point of our nightly cuisine was a meal that featured potatoes and pasta with mayonaise for a sauce. Yum!) Our first big task was to build a new bridge on one of the many hiking trails from which people birdwatch. Everything about this project took about 10 times as much energy and time as it should have so I got a chance to try and be really zen and suspend my normal tendency toward contractor efficiency and production.
At the end of 6 or 7 days of work we had built a nice little bridge that will probably last at least 5 years. Yes, 5 years. The cloudforest is a study in accellerated decay and regrowth. Hence, a secondary forest that only 15 years ago was leveled for cattle grazing can, with a little bit of selective planting and mostly just benign neglect, reinvent itself as a rich and diverse ecosystem providing ideal habitat for all but a few of the native bird species (who require old growth to thrive). Ironically, this reestablished type of forest is in many ways preferable for birding because the sightlines are more open. Check out some of Liam's bird shots!
Things unraveled a little bit the second week. Our little group of volunteers decided that they had enough of this work stuff and completely lost their mojo by the beginning of our second week. Things were sluggish but got a lot worse after "the brawl". Here's the story in brief: the Ibarra jovenes were alone at the gift shop/entrance to the sanctuary when a group of Quiteños with attitude arrived to look at birds. This was a group of 10 adults and several kids, women dressed in high heels, no bionoculars, no guide, no idea what they were doing...in short, if ever a group were less prepared for a successful birding experience I can't imagine how. Liam and I were out for a hike and swim when we encountered this group steaming back to the entrance area and looking decidedly unhappy. What ensued was a showdown between the students from Ibarra and the Quiteños that escalated unbelievably. The tourist group were incensed because they had paid to see birds and didn´t see a thing. The student volunteers should have refunded them their money immediately and sent them on their way but instead got a little self righteous. ("Este es un sanctuario. No hay guarantias que va a ver aves!" etc.) With no resolution in sight things got really crazy, really suddenly when one of the Ibarra students was called the equivalent of "nigger" and responded by calling the other woman an hija de puta - in front of her mother! No bueno. The Quiteños stormed the gift shop and bodies, computers, in short everything, was flying all over the place. I tried to pull a principal attacker off the Ibarran girl and got clotheslined from behind by some one of their tribe. As quickly as this mess exploded it was over. The "administrador" was reached on his cell phone and he told the students to give back the money and send the group on their way. I regret that my Spanish kept me from redirecting this unfortunate sequence of events. At least I hope that if I had been a full participant I would have had the skills and sense to see that this group didn't belong in a bird sanctuary in the first place and keeping their money as punishment for being so stupid wasn't really in the Foundation's best interest. You never know what kind of strange lessons one can learn at a bird sanctuary in the Ecuadorian cloudforest.
Mark
My experience in Milpe was a little different from what Mark described. Each morning I walked with the six year old son of the host family down the gravel road into what can loosely be called town. It's impressive that a settlement as small as this had its own school. It was a one room school house with 15 students, representing four families. Luckily for me, there was an extra room attached and this is where I taught. (School was in session in July because that part of Ecuador is on a different schedule. They shut down in January when the heavy rains start.) The teacher would send the kids over to me in groups and I would try to teach them a little English. We played a lot of games, especially with cards. It's amazing how attached you can become in such a short amount of time. One of the boys, Andaluz, is not going to continue school after he finishes the year. He is only twelve years old but his whole life is laid out in front of him. He's going to work in a lumber yard cutting wood with a chain saw. He already does it on the weekends and earns ten dollars a day. I wish I had a picture of him. What breaks my heart about the situation is how full of life he is. He has a real spark in his eyes and a real desire to learn and play. I hope he can keep that spark for a while longer.
As far as volunteer work goes the situation I had at the school was ideal. I had a small group of kids prepared to learn and I could decide how best to use the time. The volunteer work I've done in Cuenca has been different in that any learning that happens, happens by trickery. The kids at the shelter are prepared for special activities which I provide them with but it hasn't been a context in which I can observe progress.
After working at the school in the morning I would walk back to the sanctuary, have almuerzo, maybe a siesta, and then help with the bridge construction or do trail maintenance.
I only heard about the brawl second hand as I was practising my machete skills on the trail. It's lucky the would be birders didn't run into me as who knows what would have happened. Chop, chop.
The lack of desire to work on the part of the jovenes -and the quality of the food- really had an effect on Mark's and my morale. By the time our stay was over we were rather desperate to leave. We headed straight to the famous birding and tourist town of Mindo. Yay, pizza, brownies. Oh yes, and more birds.
Sheilah
PS We're sorry that the photos don't have labels. Either the program doesn't allow us to do it or we're just dumb.
Liam's hand next to a giant land snail at MCF.
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