The Island of Missing Trees(72)
‘Probably you are right, canim. Maybe it’s just … you know, it’s been extremely hard for you. Maybe we give other names to grief because we are too scared to call it by its name.’
Ada’s eyes teared. She felt closer to this woman then than she ever thought was possible. Still, when she opened her mouth what came out was different. ‘I’ll never forgive you for not coming to my mother’s funeral, I want you to know that.’
‘I understand,’ said Meryem. ‘I should have; I couldn’t.’
They walked in tandem, people rushing by left and right. Every now and then they stepped on a loose paving stone that splashed mud and left stains on their clothes, though neither of them noticed.
Ancient Soul
Cyprus, early 2000s
Back at the Hotel Afrodit, Kostas couldn’t sleep, his mind spinning around everything Defne had said … and not said. Towards dawn, he dressed and went downstairs, hoping to find a cup of tea. There was no one at the front desk; just the cat curled up in her basket, chasing wild rabbits in her dreams. Unlocking the door, he slipped out. The rich smell of earth came as a relief after the cramped fustiness of his room.
In the distance, by the undulating hills, he saw acacia trees. Sweet-scented, fast growers. An alien and invasive species from Australia. They had been planted widely across the island, with good intentions no doubt, but little understanding of the local ecosystem and its complex groundwater, which they now were quietly changing and destroying. Kostas knew it wasn’t only bureaucrats with barely any grasp of ecology who had caused the problem. Acacia trees were also favoured by illegal bird hunters, who kept planting them solely for this purpose.
A slow mist was rising from the ground, thin and fading like unfounded hopes. He felt a headache coming on and walked faster, hoping the fresh air might help. It was only when he got closer to the trees that he saw, looming in front of him, fine-spun nets suspended in the air, and – strung from them like grisly bunting – trapped songbirds.
‘Oh, no! Oh God!’
Kostas began to run.
The net was weighted with blackcaps, warblers, chaffinches, pipits, wagtails, wheatears and those brave merry skylarks, fine songsters, the first in every dawn chorus … They had been snared in the depths of the night. Kostas stretched up and tugged down hard on the net, but, secured from all four sides, it would not give way. He could only tear one corner. Frantically, he scanned the surrounding trees. Everywhere he looked he saw sticky lime spread on branches high and low. He was surrounded by dead songbirds, their wings spread out, tangled and motionless, their eyes glazed over, as if encased in glass.
About ten feet down the path, he found a robin glued upside down to a twig, its chest a soft ginger, its beak slightly open, lying inert, though still breathing. Gently, he tried to free the bird, but the adhesive was too strong. His gut coiled as he felt helpless, unable to do anything, unwilling to let go. When, a few seconds later, he realized the bird’s heart had stopped, he was overcome with a guilty relief.
Back in London, it had always amazed him how hard robins fought to make themselves heard above the urban clamour, trilling their way through the din of traffic, trains and construction machines. Constant effort with little rest. Distracted by the bright lights in the hours of darkness, many birds assumed they should carry on singing. When one began, the others followed, defending their territories. It cost them enormous energy, not being able to tell where the day ended and the night began. He understood how gruelling life could be for birds in the city, so it felt doubly cruel that they had met their deaths here on an idyllic island.
He knew, of course, that it happened all over the place. Ambelopoulia, the caviar of Cyprus: cooked songbirds – grilled, fried, pickled, boiled. Considered a delicacy, a popular dish. South. North. The UN territory. The British military zone. Among the islanders, the older generations regarded it as a harmless tradition and the youth saw it as a way to prove their mettle. Kostas remembered his mother’s hands, his mother’s face, as she neatly arranged the birds on the worktop before pickling them in jars. Don’t do that, Mama. Don’t want to eat them any more.
But what he was witnessing now was more than a local custom. In the years of his absence, a black market had sprung up – trafficking dead birds had become a profitable business for international gangs and their collaborators. The birds caught in Cyprus were smuggled into other countries where they would be sold for hefty prices. Italy, Romania, Malta, Spain, France, Russia, as far as Asia … Some restaurants displayed them on the menu; others served them on the sly at special rates. And the customers cherished the privilege, it was a matter of pride how many they could consume at one sitting. So the birds continued to be slaughtered, poached indiscriminately. More than two million songbirds were slain in Cyprus every year.
It wasn’t only passerines: others, too, got caught in the nets – owls, nightingales, even hawks. After sunrise, in no hurry, the poachers came to check on their prizes – one by one, they went through the birds, killing them with a toothpick to the throat. Those that made money were then placed in containers. As for the birds that made nothing, they were tossed away.
The poachers did not need to shoot the birds, they tricked them with their own songs. Hiding speakers behind bushes across open fields, they played pre-recorded avian sounds to lure their prey. And the birds came; looking for one of their own, they flew straight into the traps, the night closing in on them. Between the darkest hour and the earliest light, while they were snagged in the net, many songbirds broke their own wings in their desperation to escape.