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November 07, 2003
You've Seen the Forest Now
I am writing from a little town on the coast of the Caspian Sea. I arrived here with my host, seen above. He's the director of the South Caspian Educational Center, after an absolutely harrowing 4 hour drive through the mountains from Tehran. Words cannot describe to you how people drive here. Let's just say they pass on curves at 60 miles an hour into oncoming traffic, which they just miss by feet. This passing behavior even extends to mountain tunnels. Well, I guess at least there you can't tumble down the cliff if you don't make it.
One of the mountains we went down was called something like "The Mountain of 1,000 curves," and I believe it.
After several hours, we reached an intersection. My host wanted to take this back road so I could see something different--he wouldn't say what. Soon we we saw huge homes that had been carved out of the hills, which in recent times had been lushly forested. He stopped to take a picture of a particularly decadent one, and kept shaking his head at the rapid development that was occuring.
After 45 minutes or so, the road turned up into a forested mountain. Here we could see the remnants of the ancient "jungle," home to wild boars and the now extinct Persian tiger. The area has recently been hammered by a flood, so the road was down to one lane in places.
The air was full of mist and the trees were a welcome respite from all the development, and the previous hairpin turns of the mountain road. But all you could really see was trash. It's everywhere. "This kills me," said my host, who hopes to get the government to institute a management plan for the area that would allow people to only stop in designated areas.
We rounded a corner and saw a truck with two men. "I'll bet they're dumping trash," my host said. He jumped out of the cab to take a picture. "Right on!" I thought. I had wanted to stop and film along the way, but because we were in a cab for hire and he was paying, I didn't feel it was appropriate.
He came back with some shots of the men dumping all manner of trash right over the cliff into the river. "What did they say?" I asked. "I asked them why they do this," he said. They told me "a flood will take it away anyway; it's no problem." "I asked them where. They didn't know. I said, "it's going to my house, dammit."
I got a good look at this sorry mess when I had to stop to, er--use nature. I had to step around all sorts of animal feces spilling out of bags, paper and plastic trash.
When I came back my host greeted me with an ironic smile and said "you've seen the forest now." I laughed, but hope that isn't the truth.
Posted by MJF at November 7, 2003 03:00 PM
Comments
Great stories, Marcia! Thanks for making them available now.
Betsy
Posted by: Betsy Hall at November 10, 2003 11:23 PM