Sunset on the Mekong

First published on Positive News here

Credit: WWF

All I saw was the curved, beak-like head break the surface of the water, followed by the long back and short dorsal fin, but it was enough. A small part of this rare creature’s daily goings-on gave a giant stir to my soul –the Mekong River dolphin still exists.

The Mekong River is a vast and iconic river, draining an area of almost 800,000 square km. Its complex, meandering course brings melted Himalayan ice from China’s Yunnan province through Myanmar (formerly Burma), Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and finally Vietnam, where it flows into the sea. Each country has a different name for the river. The English ‘Mekong’ is derived from the Thai/Lao versions, and roughly translates as the Mother of Water.

For the diverse people who live within its bioregion the river is central to their lives, providing food, livelihoods and trading routes. The river and its surrounding land teem with life – only the Amazon basin is more biodiverse: 20,000 different plant species comprise the tangled banks and surge out of the murky depths; 1,200 varieties of bird; 800 reptiles and amphibians; and 430 types of mammals make their lives here. But it is the Mekong River dolphin that holds iconic appeal. Large, intelligent, social and sensitive creatures like this need space to thrive; a population of river dolphins is testament to the health of the land and productivity of the ecosystem. As a dedicated nature lover and chronicler of environmental issues, the remaining river dolphins are sacred to me. They are totems of the wild world that I long to live in.

The poignancy of seeing the Mekong River dolphin is that they may not be here much longer. Rapid, unsustainable economic development has already caused the demise of the Yangtze River dolphin. Those same forces are now enveloping Cambodia. I wanted to see these wild animals and learn what I could about efforts to protect them. I hired a bike in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, and headed out on a personal pilgrimage to find the Mekong River dolphin.

New roads being built

Crossing Cambodia by motorcycle is a journey back in time. North of the temples of Angkor Wat I glimpsed a rural idyll I recognised from historic art and writings. The slow life of close-knit, rural communities around paddy fields seemed perpetually lit by the golden rays of a setting sun. I was greeted wherever I went. When drinking tea in a roadside stall people would come in to exchange looks, smiles and, where possible, a chat.

Rural vibes

The landscape is vast and human population low. The journey felt adventurous with the occasional hint of danger. In Pol Pot’s hometown, Prek Sbauv, and much of the north of the country, all the men looked like Khmer Rouge, dressed from head to toe in camouflage. Whilst riding off road I remembered, in a stomach churning flash, that guidebooks warn of minefields off the main paths. Eventually I reached the dusty village of O’Svay and commandeered a boat to take me up the Mekong River.

We sped upriver, passing ancient, gnarled trees that had exotic, distorted shapes from a lifetime of leaning into the weight of water. In some places the river was wide like a lake, in others tributaries branched off. We made several turns and crossings to reach a stretch of water in which I saw the first signs of the dolphins. I tapped my guide’s arm and we climbed onto the bank to watch from a distance, thrilled to have a few moments in peace with these animals.

The magisterial Mekong River danced and sparkled all across its vast and humbling expanse, an epic backdrop for quiet contemplation. The beauty of the river, and the movement of the pod, seemed inseparable. I was spellbound. My heart was wide open, and brimming with joy, at being in this remarkable place with these remarkable creatures. And yet I couldn’t shake a sense of loss. The truth is I came to see these river dolphins because I believe I am one of the last humans that ever will.

My exhilarating experience with the dolphins sharpened my senses that we must act decisively now to protect these most precious and endangered, wild places. I thought through the implications. An effective global conservation strategy must identify the areas of outstanding diversity, such as the Mekong basin, and then create nature reserves large enough that the species within it can thrive. For river dolphins this means hundreds of kilometers of river undisturbed by dams or fishing nets.  A global network of giant nature reserves doesn’t mean no development, or the acceptance of poverty, it simply means restricted development in areas where the last orang-utans, pangolins and tarsiers are trying to make their home. Relatively, it wouldn’t actually cost that much. A recent scientific paper published in Science magazine estimated we could conserve global biodiversity for $76 billion. To put this huge amount of money in some kind of international context, in 2013 the USA spent $650 billion on its military.

What is needed is political effort to drive governments to protect the most special ecosystems. People who care need to join together to make the case that the world is richer, and that people are better off, sharing our planet with a diverse range of species. Ultimately, if we value nature we are going to have to fight for her. We must say clearly, and irrefutably, that we want to live in a world where river dolphins exist.

Only 85 Mekong Irrawaddy dolphins survive today. Sign this petition to save them.

Crossing this bridge was hairy

Washing on the banks of the Mekong

The boat – fast and unstable – you have to sit very carefully

Local traffic

They are still out there

Din Dins

The lives of many celebrities is at the opposite end of the well being spectrum to dump kids. Amy Hanson stepped out of one world into the other and was compelled to do something to help. Her genius move was to find a common currency to connect the two. Here is her story.

Small Steps Project started out as an emergency aid delivery project, then it became a documentary and then, due to the incredible public reaction it received, it became a charity and has been growing at speed for the last four years.

Originally, I was working as a features writer and celebrity reporter in London. I took 6 months out to teach in Laos and Cambodia. I was working at an HIV hospice when one of the doctors told me about the amount of children with HIV who had ended up on dumps. They took me to see and I was absolutely horrified to see children and toddlers naked and scavenging barefoot in toxic waste on the Stung Meanchey dump in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Amy with kids on a dump

The irony was that on the other side of the dump there was a great NGO that was offering medical care and education but, due to the terrain and distance, it was hard for many of the children to get there. Cuts to the feet and legs were common and even the smallest abrasion could quickly turn into a nasty infection so it was no surprise that while I was there people kept asking me for my boots.

When I got back to London I pitched a feature on the dumps but no one bit. I discovered later that, with a celebrity angle, the media would get very interested.

I had been working with an amazing Cambodian woman called Mey, who had grown up on the Stung Meanchey dump in Phnom Penh. We provided over 1000 people with boots, clothes and food and directed many of the children to the services that were available to them for on going help and education, which happened to be the same NGO that had rescued Mey from the dump as a teenager.

Mey told me, ‘I want to go back and help because I know exactly what it was like, but I don’t have the funds to help that many people.’ So I raised the funds and the project and it’s delivery was led by Mey.

Before I returned to Cambodia, a film company heard what I was doing and leant me the equipment to film it. We now make documentaries about most of the projects we deliver.

We filmed this project and then I contacted Apple who provided me with the equipment I needed to edit. The resulting documentary led to many of the publications that I had been writing for requesting features on the project and interviews about the dumps.

In one of these interviews I talked about the irony of celebrity culture, waste and poverty, the fact that the more rich and famous you get, the more you are given for free and the less you are expected to pay for.  But yet the poorer and more unknown you are, the harder life is and the less you get. Was there a way to help rebalance this disparity?

That is where the idea came for celebrity shoes: if every celebrity I had ever interviewed donated a pair of signed shoes, I would auction them, using the funds to pay for shoes and aid for those that really needed them. In a celebrity obsessed culture where often celebrities have more people listening to them than politicians, taking a small step and donating a pair of shoes could raise our charity’s profile and shine a light on the unacceptable conditions in which these children live.

Hot celeb plus shoe = winner

The Celebrity Shoe Auction is now our biggest fundraising campaign. In the last four years over 250 celebrities have taken part from Kate Moss and Madonna to Eminem, Chris Martin and The Rolling Stones.

The publicity it generates enables us to reach a wider audience who might not be aware of the extreme poverty outside the western world. Celebrities have huge followings and that is why they are used for endorsement- buy this coffee or these clothes but instead of endorsing consumerism- how about endorsing social change and using celebrity status to help those in poverty?

Today, our projects go a further than shoes. We also provide protective clothing, gloves, food, water and hygiene kits.  We also recycle items that would normally end up on landfill and instead redistribute them. For example Glastonbury Festival gave us wellies that were left by workers and festival goers and with the help of Festival Reboot we then delivered those to the dumps of Romania.

Through delivery we are able to create a census of dump communities to better understand how we can provide the second phase of help – sustainable solutions.

This is done on a dump-by-dump basis, each one is different and so are the needs of the community. Ultimately, we want the children to be able to have a choice and the support to be able to get an education. We provide outreach groups, school transport, mothers groups, nursery provisions and vaccinations. We often partner with in-country NGO’s on sustainable projects and work together to support the dump communities. We now work in Nicaragua, Cambodia, Timor Leste and Romania and are starting work in Laos next.

We believe that if everyone takes a small step, together we can create solutions for dump communities which are totally overlooked and neglected and whose human rights are being violated on a daily basis.

Small steps films: here
Website address: here
Facebook: here
Twitter: here
Contact email: here