The Lion Speaks Tonight

Adventurer/scientist Jon Turk on big cats, myth and storytelling

Mountain Life's longest-running columnist, Jon Turk celebrates the release of his 35th book. ERIK BOOMER

words :: Feet Banks

A lifelong skier and adventurer, Jon Turk spends his winters ski touring in British Columbia and his summers mountain biking in Montana. A regular Mountain Life columnist to the Coast Mountains edition, Turk is also our resident expert on how to avoid being drowned by a crocodile and evade death at the jaws of a charging lion.

For protection against lions, you need a rungu—the thick, knotted, hardwood club used by the Samburu people of Kenya. In his latest book, Tracking Lions, Myth, and Wilderness in Samburu, Turk recounts arriving at a remote “lion research camp” (more realistically a safari tourism outpost) on the African savannah, being handed his own rungu and instructed by his guide Ian on how to stop a charging 250 kg lion.

“Maybe you think to hit the lion on the head?”

I don’t need to make a fool of myself, so I shrug noncommittedly.

“No, you don’t,” he explains.

Ian takes the rungu back so he can demonstrate: “Like this.” Then, with a silent, explosive burst, like an NFL running back breaking through the line at the Super Bowl, he leaps into the air, spins sideways and swings his weapon horizontally at waist height.

I still haven’t quite comprehended the lesson until he explains, “You jump up and out of the way, so the lion does not eat you.” Ian looks at me intently, head cocked slightly to the side, to make sure I am listening, “And then, as you are falling back to the ground, you hit him on the side of the neck. Hard. Do you understand? You swing the rungu with your falling body and the arm. Together. Break his neck. If you hit him on the head, he will not stop. He will eat you.”

“Thank you. Got it.” I try jumping, spinning and swinging, and Ian smiles feebly as if to say, “If that’s the best you can do, my friend, then I guess that’s the best you can do. You are a white-haired white man, after all. We’ll have to live with that.”

Spoiler alert: The book isn’t just about lions. Turk uses his time in Samburu to dig into the history of human civilization and demonstrates that, for the past couple hundred thousand years (at least) the stories we tell have defined the path ahead—from the Cognitive Revolution 70,000 years ago that led to the development of language and a population explosion, to the mechanized labour of the Industrial Revolution, to the current climate crisis. Turk argues that the narratives we weave (or those woven around us) hold the keys to surviving our current perils of global warming, plague, pestilence, ego, greed and the impending self-destruction of humanity. On the other hand—yin and yang, black and white—the fundamental dilemma of humankind is that the narratives we weave created those same problems in the first place.

“We don’t need something new to solve our current problems,” Turk explains. “We need to rediscover something very old.”

Now in his mid-seventies, Turk has been a professional storyteller for decades and penned five adventure books, 30-plus textbooks and spoken at numerous events, including a TEDx in Canmore in 2016. As he releases what he says will be his last book (it came out in early September) we caught up with Jon to talk about storytelling, lions and why he jumps off cliffs to stay present.

CLOCKWISE, STARTING TOP LEFT A Samburu hut is built of sticks and vines, then covered with whatever materials can be scrounged. A lion killed and ate a cow. Tracking the lion, armed with his rungu, Turk sensed its power and majesty. Village women join in song as part of a wedding day celebration. A warrior with a Stegosaurus headdress. COURTESY OF JON TURK

Mountain Life: You wrote the first college-level environmental science textbook back in 1970, but most people know you for your adventure stories. This book feels the most like a hybrid or a bridge between those two worlds.

Jon Turk: This is really the book I’ve always wanted to write. To talk about the problems we have in a scientific way, but at the same time wrap it into a story that makes people want to turn the page. I wanted to write a book that encompassed more than a specific region or tribe; I wanted to wrap the condition of humankind into one story. Hopefully it works.

ML: You cover literally the entire history of humans in this book, but one part I really liked was early on: You’re alone and crawling into a thicket to get away from, maybe, rebels armed with AK-47s and you stop and say, “Feel this moment, you will never be here again.” When did you start tapping into that thought process, what people now call being present or finding a flow state? Has it gotten easier over the years?

JT: Oh you know it, the first time you scare the living bejesus out of yourself. You put yourself in a situation and think, Oh my gosh, I could be dead in the next five seconds. And then you feel your whole body focus in on the now and you have to focus completely on what you do in the next five, ten, ninety seconds to stay alive. And there’s this amazing clarity and wow… That was cathartic, that cleaned me out, that made me. A time when all the stories were gone from my head and I was no longer enslaved by thinking and the big brain… That is a wondrous feeling and you start reading later that this is what all the great teachers have been teaching for centuries. Now, putting yourself at risk is a harsh way to do it; if I was any good at meditation, I could do it without jumping off a cliff or whatever… but yeah, this is how people like us do it.

ML: And that ties into the main guts of this book, the idea of those stories that we are always telling ourselves and each other, how our big brains take over.

JT: Yes, and of course some of those stories can help us survive. They are predictions. So, when we see something moving in the bushes and we can’t identify it, we tell ourselves a story—the last time I saw that, it was a lion, so it might also be a lion this time. But then, over time, our stories can get wacky, and we start enlarging them or talking about things that don’t matter and eventually drive ourselves crazy. Or worse, cause real damage to ourselves and our planet. Our brains have gotten away from us—they can really get in the way by creating a narrative that doesn’t exist, or by buying into someone else’s false narrative.

LEFT A ten-year-old Samburu boy, armed only with a stick, tending cattle on the savanna. RIGHT Dressed for the occasion, Jon steps in as one of the best men at a Samburu wedding. COURTESY OF JON TURK

ML: And the next thing you know the planet is on fire, the ice is melting, people are fighting over any difference of opinion and we’re destroying the very things that sustain life—the air, the water, the land—to save a story we made up ourselves called “the economy.”

JT: Look, you recently turned me on to a book about fungi and mycelium, and some of those species have been around for a couple billion years. Humans, with our big brains, we haven’t been around that long—it’s an evolutionary experiment that’s only been tried once on this planet; this is our first try. And big brains are really good at predicting things and telling stories and building rocket ships, but I don’t know if the big brain is a real long-term solution to survival. The beauty of nature is hardwired into us, but so is this sense of tribalism. So, if someone on TV says, “Join the Pepsi Generation,” that means join the tribe. All you have to do is buy a Pepsi and you are with us, you are a member. And this competes with the cleanliness of nature, which is non-tribal. So there’s an evolutionary struggle there— the mythologies that gave us power have been hijacked and it keeps exploding. We’re using too much and expecting too much, and that’s a great tragedy.

But you can go out in nature—even without the danger. Just sit in a canoe for three weeks and by the end of the first day those stories will diminish. By the end of three weeks, you’ll be living in a different headspace. Nature cleans us: A day is better than an hour, and five days is better than one and so on. But that’s one lesson people can take away from this book—nature will clean us out and give us purity. ML: I think that is a good place to leave it—nature as salvation. Thanks, Jon. Hey, you mentioned that this will be your last book. Was that something you knew going in or did you realize that along the way?

JT: Before I wrote my last book, I said it would be the last book. So we’ll see. You can call me a liar, just don’t hit me on the head.

ML: Fear not Jon Turk, we’re saving that manoeuvre for the attacking lions.

Tracking Lions, Myth and Wilderness in Samburu is available now at jonturk.net. You can listen to a conversation with Jon that covers his books, adventures and a plethora of other topics on the new “Live It Up With Mountain Life” podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen.

Navigating between seasons. MAXIME LÉGARÉ-VÉZINA

MUTUAL CARE

Rethinking our relationship with outdoor spaces

words :: Jim Stinson

Throughout the pandemic, natural areas across the country have experienced a dramatic surge in interest and visitation as people have sought out the healing properties of nature as an antidote to the isolation of lockdowns. This trend has been fueled by a growing body of research and scientific evidence highlighting the physical, social and psychological benefits of engaging with the natural world. Researchers have shown that visiting, viewing, hearing and even smelling nature can help reduce risks of heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes and cancer, boost our immune systems, reduce stress and support our mental health.

Over the past 20 years, conservation organizations and parks agencies around the world have utilized this research to reposition and market parks and conservation areas as sites of health promotion. In 2000, Parks Victoria in Australia launched the Healthy Parks Healthy People (HPHP) movement, which aims to encourage the connections between a healthy environment and healthy society. In 2005, the Canadian Parks Council, a collaboration of all federal, provincial and territorial park agencies across Canada, rolled out their own version of HPHP, Healthy by Nature, which was followed in 2014 by their Connecting Canadians to Nature campaign, aimed at promoting the health and well-being of Canadians through park visitation.

Parks Canada now promotes health and wellness-focused activities and programming, including “forest bathing” and a Mood Walks program for mental health in Rouge National Urban Park. Ontario Parks launched their HPHP initiatives in 2015, and now offer free day use of provincial parks on Healthy Parks Healthy People day (July 16) as well as a range of health-related challenges designed to encourage park visitation and outdoor recreation. Ontario’s Conservation Authorities similarly encourage hiking as a form of health promotion through their Step Into Nature campaign. Most recently, BC Parks, and now Ontario, have rolled out a Parks Prescription (PaRx) program, which allows doctors to prescribe doses of nature to their patients.

While there is a significant body of evidence showing the human health benefits of nature, it remains unclear how increasing human visitation to natural areas will support the health and well-being of nature. Over the last 10 years, the number of visitors to Canada’s

Cross fox in his natural element. MAXIME LÉGARÉ-VÉZINA

national parks has risen 30 per cent, from roughly 12 million to more than 16 million visitors per year. Provincial and regional conservation agencies have noted similar increases. As Parks Ontario noted in a recent Facebook post, their online reservation system has seen its highest volumes of traffic ever. On March 2, Ontario Parks reported more than 34,000 users logged on to the online booking system between 6:30 and 7:30 a.m., representing a 200 per cent increase from the same day and time the previous year. There have been reports and rumours of bots being programmed to book large blocks of campsites for resale on secondary markets including Kijiji and Facebook Marketplace. Regional conservation authorities have been experiencing similar increases in visitation, with some, such as Grey Sauble, reporting at least a 50 per cent increase and warning of problems associated with “over-tourism.”

In reality, the interest and promotion of the health benefits of nature is putting more pressure on the already stressed environments of parks and conservation areas. A 2016 Parks Canada report (State of Canada’s Natural and Cultural Heritage Places) found that 46 per cent of national park ecosystems in Canada were in fair or poor condition. Throughout the pandemic, parks across Canada have faced issues with littering and waste disposal, with Ontario parks reporting widespread littering as well as overcrowded trails and backcountry campsites. Ontario Parks pointed out the problem on its Facebook page and website, posting pictures of trash piling up on beaches, parks, campgrounds and the onsite washrooms. Another issue has been with traffic and parking, with popular parks, conservation areas and trailheads experiencing traffic jams and roadsides congested with vehicles.

While this renewed focus on the health benefits of the natural world is a welcome development, we should be wary of nature simply being rebranded as a “service provider” from which we can consume health benefits in the same way we go to the pharmacy to buy medications. While conservation organizations promote the ethics and principles of Leave No Trace as a way to mitigate the environmental impacts of outdoor recreation, solely adhering to Leave No Trace guidelines is inadequate.

In order to promote both human and environmental health and well-being when engaging with natural areas, we need to do more than Leave No Trace. We need to recognize and foster the reciprocal relationship between humans and the non-human world and engage with nature through an ethic of mutual care. On March 20, for example, youth from the Saugeen First Nation engaged in a 19-kilometre water walk to seek healing for their community from the effects of a serious opioid crisis. In this case, the youth did not seek to attain the health benefits of nature as consumers of a separate and external nature, but petitioned and prayed for healing through an act of stewardship and caretaking which recognized and respected the life-giving power of water that resides inside us all. A practical application of this ethic can be seen in growing instances of outdoor recreationists taking initiative to pick up litter along shorelines and hiking trails.

As we emerge from the pandemic, a renewed emphasis and acknowledgement of the reciprocal relationship between human and non-human well-being could help us foster both healthy people and healthy environments for future generations.

While this renewed focus on the health benefits of the natural world is a welcome development, we should be wary of nature simply being rebranded as a “service provider” from which we can consume health benefits...

James Stinson, PhD, is a Postdoctoral Fellow, Planetary Health and Education, at the Dahdaleh Institute of Global Health Research and Faculty of Education, York University.

RAVENNA COUNTRY MARKET