Tuesday May 27th

First day rather more collected. Trying to figure out my place here, who I can film, talk to. Kim had some success with Enrichment building little challenges for Macaques with nuts, honey and egg inside.

Sometimes the first day or two arriving in a new place I have this increased focus and energy with which to analyze and describe new experiences. The time directly following is so full of learning it becomes overwhelming to describe it all, I get caught up in the action and it becomes more difficult sitting down to express it.

I’ve been filming a lot in the last two days: three presentations with school children followed by planting trees, some shots of the general area and a little footage with the Macaques as they react to enrichment items placed in their cages. Filming in the cages is particularly difficult because two of three roofs are translucent green or blue which reflects onto the subjects. Not only that but the wires must be

It’s 7:10 pm here. Chants are ringing from the Mosques. The mosquitoes are making themselves felt. Geckoes, crickets and frogs fill the background with a chattering, chirping, burping buzz. During the evenings, after the first few hours of sleep I awake and my mind is spinning from question to idea back to question. I catalogue burning smells: sometimes I smell burning rubber or wood, sometimes plastic. They burn garbage here as there is no public disposal. Even outside the President’s palace there was a driveway with piles of refuse.

While piles of rotting waste and the burning stench are disgusting at least there is no avoiding the consequences of creating so much of it. Unlike the endless neatly tied bags we fill the bins with at home which disappear from sight and mind within a day or two.

The educational programs at I.A.R. Indonesia aim to increase the awareness school children have for the environment and their co inhabitants on the planet. It’s definitely moving in the right direction. The challenge is, however, a vast one.

Today Karmele and Marlene went to meet some captive Gibbons to see if they might find a suitable companion for Saar. I may be able to go to the shelter where they are sometime soon, something I really look forward to. I don’t know much about Gibbons except that they are amazing climbers. I remember watching them in awe at the Berliner Tierpark and of course Saar is a climbing prodigy.

It would be a great pleasure to be able film Saar meeting his new companion for the first time.

Since meeting Kim I had begun visiting zoos for the first since I was a very young child. I remember going with the whole family to the Seattle zoo and my parents’ disapproval at the shabby condition of the wolves there. Farley Mowat’s Never Cry Wolf was amongst my family’s book collection and they pointed out that these animals had all been taken from their natural habitat to live in small cages or enclosures. From that time I had avoided zoos on principle. Since Kim has a professional interest in animal health and a personal interest in their welfare I felt I would lift my ban to serve my own education.

One of the things I’ve learned about is “stereotypical behavior”, repetitive motion like pacing, head swinging, nail biting, continuous scratching. It’s the same kind of behavior associated with psychologically disturbed humans and comes from the same kind of alienating experience, such as being abused, locked in a very small space, isolated etc. Stereotypical behavior is not exhibited by healthy animals in the wild. Watching the Macaques at I.A.R. who often come from homes where they were abused as pets, you can still see signs of stereotypical behavior.