cut off from civilization

The price I get for wanting a conservation-related placement is that I get thrown in one of the most remote areas, in a village just at the borders of the Cross River National Park, a village that is a clump of mudhuts and flat rainforest all around. I get stuck where there is no electricity, no post office, no cellphone signal, and absolutely no mechanism for handling solid and human waste. You would think, as it is back home, that the more remote the area, the cleaner the water. Well, not so at all here. Water from the few streams which dry up during the dry season (like NOW), is dirty. I feel that taking a bath and washing my clothes are rhetoric tasks, really. I only feel really clean when I take a bath at the stream at Rhoko Camp. Ok, for those who don’t know yet, my NGO here is a conservation organization founded by a Canadian and mostly run by volunteers, with a focus on preservation of primates (you guys should really visit the site I sent out long ago – www.cercopan.org. Our main office in Calabar (the capital of Cross River State) is a rescue center with over 90 monkeys (orphaned when their mothers were hunted for bushmeat – go to www.bushmeat.org if you want to know more about the issue). Then about five years ago a solar-powered electrified enclosure in the middle of the forest was built, and about 30 monkeys were airlifted to this enclosure, in preparation for their (we hope) release. This is Rhoko Camp, 8 kilometers into the forest from the village (the road from the village to the camp, though traversing streams, is much better than the road from the village to the highway). Some of the volunteers stay here, together with local staff who care for the monkeys and patrol the surrounding forest. Then there is I in the village, with two other staff (well, the staff at the camp are from the village and trek everyday anyway, even if there are quarters for them near the camp). So I trek to the camp to get my dose of decent conversation, clean water, and solar power. It’s also the place where I can freely wear shorts (oh joy!), though of course insects here, though there’s less chance they are malaria carriers, are more, since this is deeper into the rainforest. I’m actually expecting malaria to hit me any day now, starting on my 3rd week in the country. It’s just impossible to keep away from mosquitoes all the time. Most of the volunteers have had it, and since I take prophylaxis, it will be very mild IF I do get it. That’s why, even if I don’t take any drugs, I’m making a regular habit of my doxy, which is about the only routine thing I have been doing here.