right, we cut across the grass and head towards the backyard. I am so busy looking down at the ground for any signs of unexpected slithering that I haven’t realized yet that the most beautiful scarlet macaw is serenely sitting on a tree bough, studying our approach. “Don’t be afraid. He’s very friendly,” the Amerindian woman assures me. “You can hold him,” and before I know it, the hefty parrot has been deposited into my hands. Wearing a mantle of exquisite blue, yellow, and vermilion red, the bird quivers ever so slightly, perhaps sensing my unease. Gustavo coaxes him onto his forearm and the scarlet macaw sidesteps his way - with attitude - to my husband’s shoulder. A flap of his enormous wings amidst a flurry of feathers, and the majestic psittacine is straddled between the two of us. One razor-sharp talon bites into my flesh and that formidable nut-cracker beak is only inches from my face. Now, this is indeed the genuine Guyana…the mysterious, sometimes haunting, playground of northern Amazonia. A ‘wild’ and untamed land, presenting the rawest of nature, where we have the rare privilege of seeing, and interacting with, the royalty of the rainforest’s winged population. Lovely parrots and grandiose macaws, like the ones only seen in magazine slicks or on TV, rollick in front of our eyes. Damon


24 BIRD SCENE


Corrie’s dreams of aspiration for his people have finally come to fruition. Foreign visitors from all around the globe can book a week-long holiday at the Ayonto Hororo Eco-lodge on the Pakuri Reservation, in the only English-speaking country in the Amazon River Basin and delight in the biodiversity of the Lokono- Arawak territory. After all, the most valuable asset toward saving the planet for our children, and our children’s children, plus slowing disastrous climate change is to protect the world’s rainforests. With every passing year, the forests dwindle further, and the wealth of creatures, great and small, who call the jungles their home, have less and less ‘living space’. The only way to halt the decimation is through education. Indigenous education. Being taught that “living animals of all kinds, we have respect for. All animals have a spiritual significance in dreams or visions, and a separate practical life lesson to teach in the waking state, when you observe the living animal going about its normal life…every insect, reptile, amphibian, bird, fish, mammal, arthropod, etc.” Our Amerindian host elaborates further, “The traditional way of living (the Lokono-Arawak way) did not reduce nature to a mere ‘commodity’ to be used or abused for the pursuit of money.” Eloquently put, Damon Corrie. That also means no big-game hunting trips on the reservation, no trophies for the wall.


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