the daily grind

18Jul07

We’ve finally started working! Well, actually, I’m almost done working now. Tomorrow is the final day for me and my group (Sue and Isla) working in the outdoor nursery with the older guys. The “big kids”, if you will. The outdoor nursery is a lot of fun and I would say that the common theme is “the element of surprise”. To set the scene I’ll say that the outdoor nursery is through a big fence, down a jungle path, up some Aztec temple stairs, past a storm demolished office to a semi-demolished set of huge cages. One of the cages is the new office. We have to lock ourselves in because we’re just in the middle of the jungle and the orangs run free ‘round those parts (and not just the orangs, but anything in the jungle). The other cage (the “crib”) still houses the newer big kids. They’re allowed out during the day but are put back at night because the bigger big kids bully them. One, Ankung, is pretty much always in there just because he’s such a shit disturber. My God they’re so smart. The thing about working in the outdoor nursery is that it’s the final stage for these guys before they’re released into the wild so you have to minimize their human contact and try to teach them that humans are bad (it’s a long stage, but it does work). This poses a problem because almost all of them grew up at Sepilok and were cared for by humans. Now, they know to listen to the rangers we work with (only one at a time in the outdoor nursery so that puts us at four humans versus twenty ‘tans) but it’s pretty obvious that the volunteers are just their playthings. They sneak up on you so they can climb you, or steal your waterbottle or put their hands in your pockets or just grab your arm and try to swing off of it. Basically anything a drunk toddler would do. That includes puking all over the place, even their own arms, and then slurping it back up. Eww I know. But part of their digestive system is in their necks (which is why they have fatty fat necks, some flappier than others) so they eat, regurgitate it and repeat until it’s watery enough to go through the first digestive stage. It’s actually quite endearing after a while. But never really normal. It stills makes the rangers giggle. Anyhoo, we now know all of the orangutans by name. Some of them have such distinct features too. Like, Britt. Let me prelude what she looks like with her personality: Britt is a bitch. She is a huge jerk. She beats up every orangutan she can find. She terrorizes the littler ones by sneaking up on them in their “crib” and then latching onto them and smashing them up against the bars. She also terrorizes us by swinging onto our “office” door and screaming and shaking it. But she’s also funny in the way that all orangutans and drunk toddlers are, even when they’re lippy. But mainly she’s just a jerk. But physically, she looks like the characteristic villain in a cartoon. She had an accident a year or so ago that has caused permanent swelling in her right eye so she’s always glaring and squinting. Funny. Besides all the orangutans we also have to worry about macaques. The macaques show up at all of the orangutan feedings and they show up in packs. If the orangutans are drunk toddlers then the macaques are cracked out 45-year-olds stuck in tiny trapeze swingers’ bodies looking for their next hit. This means they swing and jump and scream (like humans) and fight each other. They told us not to look them in the eye, but this proves difficult when you’re surrounded by 30 or so of them. The rangers call them bandits because they’re always stealing the bananas. So we’ve started calling them pencuris, which is robber in Malay. Anyhoo, the average day in the outdoor nursery consists of:

7:00am – wake up, shower, breakfast

8:00am – get bananas from the clinic and head up to the outdoor nursery

8:15am – sit around

8:30am – take bananas (pisang) and milk (susu) through the jungle to a feeding platform and start calling the orangutans (they totally answer to their names, just like drunk toddlers)

9:00am – head back to the “office” and sit around (it’s very hot so after any sort of physical activity, you generally sit for a bit)

Funny story: The word for hot is panas and the word for pineapples is nanas. So whenever I was making idle chit chat with local people they would ask how I like it and I would of course say, “Oh it’s very beautiful, but it’s SOO hot!” and fan myself and of course, I would say this is in my best Malaynglish so what I was actually doing was fanning myself and saying “it’s SOO pineapples!” and NO ONE told me! Pretty funny in retrospect, I made a fool of myself for at least twenty different people and they all just smiled politely.
9:15am – sweep the stairs and cage of leaves and poo

9:45am – bring milk and bananas through the jungle to the tourist feeding platform and call the orangutans (but stop calling for them once you’re in earshot of the tourists so it’s more exciting when they show up swinging on the ropes. there’s a huge ropeway all through the jungle so the smaller guys don’t get lost in the jungle before they’re ready)

10:00am – sit around “backstage” and watch the feeding (occasionally get accosted by leeches, macaques, poisonous snakes and rangers with sticks)

10:45am – back to the office to fill out paperwork and attendance for the orangutans

11:00am – lunch and shower

2:30pm – bring bananas to office and then straight to tourist platform for the afternoon feeding

3:30pm – back to the office for paperwork and attendance

4:00pm – end of day

Pretty simple but very fun and we definitely learned a lot of Malay from the rangers. And whenever it seemed like there was nothing left for us to do, someone would radio our ranger with something awesome to do. For example, on the second day they had to dart a rehabilitated dominant male that had wandered back to Sepilok following a mate and stayed for the food. He was starting to interfere with the younger orangutans and was just plain terrifying. He would only be good for one of the rangers, Jomius. So they darted him so they could re-release him into the wild, but he was soo heavy that they needed to put him in a wheelbarrow so they sent the three of us down with it. We figured we’d be pretty far away from the action but when we showed up Mr. G (the dominant male) was still swinging on the rope and being terrifying, already darted. So we got to watch the whole thing go down and then help move him and carry him. I got to touch his flanges! And he was still awake and watching me! Aieek! Very fun. Every time you sort of stepped back like, “this isn’t my place, I don’t wanna be in the way” they would wave you back in and have you do something. That was also the day I got my nickname, so if you’re ever at Sepilok just ask for Bodybuilder. Other than that we got to go on a lot of “rescue missions” to get the younger ‘tans when they wandered onto the platform or boardwalk where the tourists walk. We also had some very close encounters with some huge poisonous snakes (I’m told they’re called Black Mombas or something) and some huge wild orangs.

Anyhoo, the outdoor nursery was definitely a good time.

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