Orang utans part 2 of 3

The two park workers started making jungle-y sounding calls to entice the orang utans to come feed. Most of the rescued orang utans that come to the preserve generally start out completely dependent on the staff. The staff works to move these orang utans toward independence with the hope of reintroducing them into the wild.

If we saw any orang utans today, they would be orang utans who were in transition; they would not be living in facilities provided by the rehabilitation center, but they wouldn’t be living fully independent lives in the jungle either.

After five minutes of scanning the dense jungle landscape for any signs of forthcoming orang utans, we still hadn’t seen anything. I started to worry that we might not see any primates today. The park rangers kept up their calls.

All of a sudden, I heard a quiet excitement spread through the other people on the platform. I looked to see where they were focusing their attention. Sure enough, about fifty meters out–I couldn’t see an orang utan- but I could see the tree tops moving back and forth. I elbowed each of my daughters and pointed. Slowly we were able to make out the shape of an adolescent orang utan that was making his way toward us. He was high in the tree and we could only make out his silhouette because he was backlit against the bright mid-morning sky. Then we realized that there were two them.

Apparently, they were not in a big hurry since they were taking their own sweet time making their way to their morning buffet …and us. Slowly they got close enough that we could see them, their distinctive orange hair, and their coal-black eyes. Cameras clicked. I found myself torn between trying to simply soak in this amazing moment and trying to capture it on film. I have seen my share of primates behind bars, but it was almost indescribable what it was like to encounter them face to face as a visitor to their own habitat. A reverential quiet swept through the small group of people on the platform as we watched the orang utans' every move.