Urban dwellers need to re-establish their link with nature to erase the fatigue and exhaustion of living in the concrete jumble. Due to the lack of a sufficient number of trees in the city, the citizens of Dhaka surrender themselves to the lap of nature carved on the cityscape as parks and zoos. Urban areas were designed to accommodate commercial enterprise, so we find very little trace of trees in the entire body of the city.
On the other hand, rural areas are still doing well as the treasure trove of green trees, that's why parks are absent there. The urban dwellers either visit tourist destinations or their villages in search of green canopies. They find euphoria in this reunion with nature. Ecological euphoria is a necessary precondition of a peaceful life, otherwise, we may become the easy victims of depression. The bliss of being reunited with tamed nature is beyond the lexical limits. Whenever Dhaka dwellers find a weekend break combined with national holidays they throng places with sea, hills, or trees. In Japan, an excursion in the forest known as 'forest bathing' is prescribed to revamp the nexus with nature.
Ecological euphoria is so powerful in our lives that when we visit places with trees and listen to the beautiful tunes of birds, we feel chlorophyll running in our veins instead of blood. As rural people always stay in close contact with nature, they seldom feel its enveloping presence. Its absence in urban areas compels us to feel its special place in our lives when we have the occasional opportunity to rekindle the link. Trees and water bodies give us the energy and purpose to move on. The picturesque and breathtaking views become normalized once we start living in those places.
The imposed aloofness keeps us hungry for an occasional reunion with nature. Even though some urban dwellers feel the urge to mingle with nature, they always prefer to interact in a limited way. They do not want to embrace all the elements of nature, like mud or dirt. Ecological euphoria is sought after from a safe distance of brick-built houses having aluminium glass windows. And urbanites have phobias towards different animals, which is less common among the villagers due to their usual interaction with other animals.
To spice up the touch of tree-kissed breeze, zoos were planned to give the real sensation of a forest with caged and chained animals. Zoos were designed to bring animals from different parts of the world, display their wild nature to the spectators, and earn money. Ecological euphoria experienced by the zoo-goers is unjustified as those animals are prisoners in an artificially createdgreen environment. Every zoo is a prison for animals that are born free, but humans enslave them to earn money by forcing them to display their mere presence or sports skills.
“One pathetic incident caught our attention when the son of the elephant
trainer was crushed to death by a zoo elephant. The elephant was not
supposed to be imprisoned in the zoo and play with a ball to entertain
the visitors. I feel sorry to recall that I once enjoyed such a show in
Thailand where elephants were painting on t-shirts, playing football,
and scoring goals. In the USA one elephant named Mary was hanged to
death for killing her handler in 1916”
One pathetic incident caught our attention when the son of the elephant trainer was crushed to death by a zoo elephant. The elephant was not supposed to be imprisoned in the zoo and play with a ball to entertain the visitors. I feel sorry to recall that I once enjoyed such a show in Thailand where elephants were painting on t-shirts, playing football, and scoring goals. In the USA one elephant named Mary was hanged to death for killing her handler in 1916. Was it a human victory over a protest of an elephant to be part of a ridiculous circus show?To me, it was a grand fiasco of human civilization.
In the USA and some other countries, human zoos were introduced to satisfy the need of the spectators to scrutinize and make fun of human diversity.In human zoos, indigenous communities from different parts of the world were brought to some Western countries to create otherness and consider their culture as weird, strange, and uncivilized. People being driven by their notion of cultural superiority taunted those people. Familiarity with a known way of life makes us slaves to our culture. Are human zoos extinct from our agenda?The answer is: no. These days we find these zoos in Africa in the form of ecotourism.
Ecotourism is organized safari trips in Africa to see wild animals roaming freely and the culture of the local communities like the Masai, the Hadzabe, and the Datooga. Because of organizing safari tours the communities living in their original lands were relocated to a new place. Ecotourism empowers the local communities by giving them access to paper money so that they can be part of the globalized economy.
To make a living, communities as part of safari tours have to remain clad in their traditional attire, live in their traditional houses, and dance their local dances to showcase their culture. Tourists in exchange for money visit the culture of the communities, which remains frozen in time. It becomes a form of entertainment for the visitors giving rise to ecological euphoria. Africa has always fascinated us. Whether we talk about the tourists or the colonizers, Africa as a continent has etched a permanent place in our imagination.
Parks, sea beaches, hills, mountains, safari parks, and villages have always provided the privileged urban dwellers with an occasional tete-a-tete with natural bounty. Ecological euphoria is undeniable in this encounter with the natural environment. The advantaged non-agricultural labour force dreams of a mixture of urban facilities and natural beauty to forget the stress of fast-paced urban life. The alarming situation of receding trees from urban areas should be arrested to ensure the healthy growth of our bodies and minds.
The writer is an anthropologist working at Independent University Bangladesh
