Hello hairy cousin!

As soon as I began researching Indonesia, I became hooked on the idea of volunteering with or, at least, seeing wild orangutans.  Through online research, I learned that orangutans inhabit only 2 islands in the world, and that habitat loss on both the island of Sumatra (Indonesia) and Borneo (Malaysia/Indonesia), largely due to the palm oil industry, has led the Sumatran orangutan to be listed as critically endangered. 

Wondering how my consumer choices impact the orangutan, I found websites detailing products with palm oil, and I realized my favorite candy bars, tooth pastes, and shampoos topped the list.  Long story shorter, for the next 3 months as I traveled southeast Asia I searched in vain for a shampoo not containing some palm oil component--a search which included most major labels.  My fruitless search lasted until Australia, where I found a product in an organic grocery. Thus, early stages of orangutan fandom showed me the incredible uphill battle for habitat in the face of such an ubiquitous resource.

It became clear that any ' volunteering' with orangutans would likely be expensive, based on the popular model of raising funds via volunteer fees. Thus, I decided to simply go see the orangutan in the jungle, thus creating local monetary incentives for jungles filled with orangutans. 

My choice of jungle: Bukit Lewang!  On Sumatra's tourist trail, this is a small river town with a thriving jungle trekking industry.  Located near the town is an orangutan rehabilitation sanctuary, where orangutans are re-introduced into the wild from, often, illegal pet situations.  The center's model is that the orangutan can always get food at the center, but the diet is monotonous, thus encouraging the animals to search for variety.  This leads to a decline over time of dependence and visits to the sanctuary. 

The orangutans near Bukit Lewang are, thus, mostly 'semi-wild'.  As a friend of mine put it, an orangutan in the trees who will pose for photos is a pretty perfect orangutan.

Indeed, I saw not one, but several of my hairy cousins, and it was a humbling experience to see such a magnificent, large, inquisitive, and beautiful creature in its jungle environment. As the jungle was teeming with monkeys, toucans, and monitor lizards, the experience offered a glimpse of what many a jungle should be, once was, or could be again: such a bastion of life!  

However, the experience of researching and visiting the orangutan made me realize his dire situation, and I am convinced I saw an animal that may be extinct in my lifetime.  Thus, I am becoming a smarter consumer and figuring out what I can do to be part of a solution for the orangutan.  It's not too late...yet.