by
Obododimma Oha
If one is located in the jungle, one has to watch one's back constantly. If one does not, one is done for. Other animals may find an accessible meal. But that should be known to all. Humans that relax their alertness or behave as if security does not bother them in human community don't get it. They are yet to understand life and to realise that, as it is in the jungle where we have various kinds of antagonistic animals, so do we have in the human community. Humans may pretend that they are refined and civilized, but they are animals all the same, with appetite for food and awareness of the meanings of various sounds and smells in their own civilized jungle, as well as how these can affect their survival. Perhaps one scholar that understands this very well is Thomas Sebeok, who is associated with biosemiotics, the science of signification in living organisms. But we are not centrally looking at the scholarship of Thomas Sebeok, but how animals in the jungle try to read sounds and smells in order to survive. The reader would at the end find that it is all about the civilized jungle where one animal can suspend its refinement and eat another animal; then, clean its mouth and wait for another time.
Sounds and smells fill every jungle and how well an animal reads them would determine the measure of safety such an animal has in that jungle. An animal that just strolls into the jungle and behaves as if it does not care about the sounds and the smells wants to die quickly and would see death in its true colours. That means that sounds and smells in a jungle are among the signifying elements that the inhabitants should bother about. Other sources of signs in the jungle would include movements, sights, and space. Every environment has and speaks a "language". A jungle dweller just has to be able to decipher and speak this language. That dweller has to have adequate competence in the language of the jungle.
So, how is competence in the semiotics of sounds and smells of the jungle read by inhabitants of that habitat? Mind you, "inhabitants" would in this case include humans, even if they do not like it. Let me also add here that, as a villager who walked the bushes and climbed trees once in a while, I needed and also used this competence in moving around. It helped me to know when what type of animal was nearby and what to do. It helped me to know when a bird was in what type of trouble or when a snake was dangerously around. That is to say that new folks in the art of hunting and gathering or those grazing their cattle free range in the cattle routes of New York and London should try and consult me.
Well, even though I use my eyes and nostrils in the reading of these signs in the jungle, some animals only use their bellies to read sounds and complicated olfactory organs to process smells. Am I not lucky, given the technology of my creation?
Some animals are just so unlucky or stupid or even both, and misread sounds and smells in the jungle, getting into trouble as a result. As a hunter, I know this and also that I need to deceive or mislead more with sounds. One may even pretend to be a mate looking for another and issue one imitated sounds. Right away that misled creature comes along. And "Bang!" that stupid fellow is killed.
And imagine this, too: one sets a trap, positioning a tempting bait. Of course, that hungry animal is supposed to decipher the human smell still lingering there. But the "longthroat" idiot still tries to risk it and, "BAM!" It is caught and is used as trophy. But wise animals may avoid the trap especially because it carries human smell until days later. Even days later, some animals may just dance around the trap, looking for a safer route. If they cannot find one, they leave. These are clever animals who see a trap as a trap. Stupid ones are carried away by the hunger in their stomachs and fall prey. In that case, ignoring a trap and only thinking about food (and becoming food) is clearly stupid. Humans exhibit this, too, and should be called "stupid idiots trapped by their stomachs."
In that case, let us pity that creature which sees all the risks in a trap or sees that an item is a trap, yet gets into it. The chances of escaping a trap are slim, very slim.
These are some of the possibilities of getting into a trap:
1. Ignoring or suspending personal safety and caring only about the material satisfaction that the trap promises;
2. Being carried away by other views about safety in a jungle, like the creature's god coming to the rescue;
3. Thinking that one is strong enough or equal to the task and being too confident; and
4. Not considering the fact that some other creature in the jungle is busy looking for food and that food could be oneself!
Civilized jungles could be terrible in setting traps or making something a trap. This is even why one has to behave like that newly acquired chick that is temporarily released in the homestead and has to hang up one of its legs,while studying the place and waiting to run for safety, if need be. One has to know the very nature of a civilized jungle and how to navigate one's way through it. One has to know what could be a trap and what could not. It is not advisable to put down both legs and to start making noise, probably dragging one's "Ghana-Must-Go" bag up and down. One has to come to fair knowledge of place first and find things out quietly.
If there is anything that a jungle promises an animal, it is its being entrapped here or there. If that animal is able to know traps and think safety, well and good. That an animal is an expert in climbing trees or flying to another galaxy, is not to be relied upon. Every animal is a potential victim. Every animal is a hunter and could become the hunted. If an animal thinks that it cannot be hunted, forget it or start looking for your toothpick.
Every jungle dweller needs to understand that sound and that smell as part of the current situation in the jungle. Every place invites us to know the "language" it can speak. Every place is even a language and one needs to understand and to speak it. We need to pity civilized jungle dwellers who do not realise that a jungle is a jungle and a language.
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