Song From the Forest – Dialogue List 10:02:55:00 10:04:28:11 LOUIS SARNO: I love the Mumbongo. This is a beautiful stream. This was the first place where I lived in the forest, camped with the Bayaka, was at the Mumbongo. Right around here someplace. I had some great walks with the Bayaka in the forest. Probably one of the best was when Goma’s grandfather, Awungi said, “I’m going to show you my forest. This is my forest where I’ve roamed since I was a kid. And someone like Awungi was the most incredible man in many ways that I’ve ever met. He could live in the forest forever. He never would have to go out, you know. He spent long times in the forest. He was showing how he did it. Because we didn’t have manioc with us. We had a little salt. That’s the one thing we brought from the village. And we just wandered through the forest and we were eating like kings. Bush pig with the natural garlic-flavoured thing you get in the forest, a fruit called mungimba. And cocoa leaves and sometimes mushrooms and then honey for dessert, honeycomb. Wild honeycomb. The most delicious, fragrant honey in the world, packed with pollen from different flowers. Man, it’s like some kind of candy. You’re going slowly, ever deeper and deeper into the forest over a period of months, just moving farther out and farther out and farther out. That was great. 10:04:56:24 10:05:59:22 LOUIS SARNO: The other thing is, when I used to record, staying in one spot just completely quiet: you see things, you know. Animals come up to you. You have encounters, but they’re the ones that encounter you. You don’t encounter them, you know. You’re already there. And I’ve had lots of encounters with animals, including with a gorilla. And this gorilla – maybe it didn’t know what humans were – but this gorilla just sat down about 20, 25 feet away from me for half an hour, without any kind of reaction. Just like it wanted company. It came on up this elephant trail and there was no undergrowth. And there I was and I was scared. I would have run away, but I had all my microphones around and everything. Even though I knew you’re not supposed to run away, I probably would have. It just stayed there for half an hour without any kind of reaction. And then got up and walked on. It was really strange. 10:06:55:16 10:06:59:07 MEN: We're not finding anything to eat here. -No animals. 10:07:01:06 10:07:02:21 MAN: The forest is sick. 10:07:04:07 10:07:07:21 MAN: There's no game here! -The forest has been cursed. 10:07:08:00 10:07:09:16 MAN: Always bad luck! 10:07:13:01 10:07:15:19 MAN: Let's go, there's only hunger here. 10:07:45:15 10:09:46:02 JIM JARMUSH: I remember him coming back after he’d spent the first long period of time with the Bayaka and I saw a change in him. I could see his obsessive love for the music, his interest in the culture, the place. I could tell he’d found something. I didn’t know it would endure his whole life, but it has anyway. I love Louis as a friend and I just feel very close to him. It’s funny, no matter how long we don’t see each other, it’s immediately always the same feeling. We’re right back where we were. There’s no reacquaintance required ever in our friendship. He was not - like all of us… We didn’t quite know where we belonged yet. And you know, we’re kind of outsiders and always will be. Not trusting the economic system, the political system, the social system, even the infrastructure. Seeing how ridiculously greedy and self-centred people with power are. Being young and not wanting people telling you what to do. Not wanting parental authorities or police authorities or governments or borders or territories or nationalism. You know, it means not believing in the kind of racism and apartheid that we still have in America, that people are in denial of. You know, this is kind of a form of apartheid here. And it’s true in Europe and it’s true even in South America. It means not feeling comfortable with what we’re told: “This is the way the world is.” 10:09:58:01 10:10:00:21 TRIBE: Oh woman! You should have taken a better rope! 10:10:01:02 10:10:05:22 TRIBE: Help me, people! Help me! You loser! You asshole! You dick! 10:10:12:06 10:10:14:16 TRIBE: My back hurts! My back! 10:10:15:15 10:10:18:19 TRIBE: My husband, climb that tree and get me honey! 10:10:28:15 10:10:30:08 TRIBE: You'll kill yourself. 10:10:31:06 10:10:35:01 TRIBE: My husband, climb that tree. 10:10:38:15 10:10:40:00 TRIBE: I've hurt my stomach. 10:10:42:18 10:10:44:03 TRIBE: My stomach hurts! 10:11:05:16 10:11:09:18 RADIO: And more on that a bit later on, here on World Update. 10:11:09:24 10:11:11:04 LOUIS SARNO: My favourite programme: World Update. 10:11:11:08 10:11:49:17 RADIO: On the BBC World Service let’s turn to the rather less comfortable situation on the Eurozone crisis. A new government headed by Lucas Papademos will take office in Greece today. A tough job: his country is threatened with bankruptcy and the challenge of getting his parliament to ratify a 130-billion-euro – that’s 178 billion… … has been developed in Uganda. Let’s have a quick look at the numbers: the euro at the moment is up against the dollar, a dollar thirty-six point five US cents for a euro. Against the yen, a dollar gets seventy-seven point four… 10:11:50:14 10:12:56:22 LOUIS SARNO: The most remarkable example of not being in touch with the world was when I was in the forest once for three months and I came out. I didn’t have a radio back then, but one of the Bayaka was working for the project and he’d bought a boom box and had the radio on. He was sitting in front of my house – which was up at Yendoube then – twiddling the knobs and he just happened to stop at the BBC and it was in English and I suddenly heard and it was the end of a news report. And the sentence I heard was: Mr Gorbachev was the president of the former Soviet Union. And you know, I didn’t know that there was a “former Soviet Union”. When I got into the forest, there was still the Soviet Union. So I was like, “Wait a second. What? What?” Then he twirled the knobs again and I was going, “Wait, wait! Go back, go back!” But then the news programme was over. It was something else, like Outlook, or some stupid programme like that. So I didn’t know. I didn’t hear it for another hour and then they didn’t refer to it because it was something that had happened already a while ago. So there wasn’t any news item about it, but it became clear to me that the Soviet Union didn’t exist anymore. 10:13:21:18 10:13:24:10 LOUIS SARANO AND MAN: Where are the others, hunting? -Yes. 10:13:24:24 10:13:27:21 SPEAKER UNCLEAR: The women, too. 10:13:34:09 10:13:37:03 MEN: Quick quick quick! Put it up! 10:13:41:06 10:13:45:00 MAN: Let's get the tarp up. Get on with it. 10:13:49:13 10:13:52:08 LOUIS SARNO: Please, help me out of here. 10:13:55:06 10:13:58:11 MAN: The rain came through. 10:14:02:17 10:14:07:10 MAN * LOUIS SARNO: Samedi, make room for your father. -Can you move over a little? 10:14:10:02 10:14:15:19 LOUIS * MAN: I have to get out of the rain. -Yes, Louis, you are right. 10:15:37:00 10:15:39:12 SAMEDI'S MOTHER: Samedi? Samedi! 10:15:39:23 10:15:41:18 SAMEDI'S MOTHER: Go and get me some water! 10:15:43:13 10:15:44:23 SAMEDI'S MOTHER: Samedi! 10:15:48:24 10:15:51:20 SAMEDI + SAMEDI'S MOTHER: There's water left, Mama! -I'll use that to wash later. 10:15:54:12 10:15:55:22 SAMEDI'S MOTHER: Come on! 10:15:58:05 10:16:00:07 SAMEDI + SAMEDI'S MOTHER: Did you catch the armadillo? -No. 10:16:08:08 10:16:11:16 LOUIS SARNO: Do you want to stick your head out? 10:16:20:24 10:16:22:24 LOUIS SARNO: You're still eating that little ball of manioc? 10:16:23:08 10:16:24:16 MAN: Yes, it's only a small ball! 10:16:24:20 10:16:26:04 LOUIS SARNO: Why don't you eat it up fast? 10:16:26:08 10:16:28:03 MAN: We take our time and chew it an hour.