Ricardo Pelai

The Original Beanery Coffee House | March 30, 2019

WARNING! Millions of unidentified white asteroids are falling from the sky in the Vancouver area. Expect delays and chaos. People may unexpectedly forget how to drive, and may start running in circles. Public transit may collapse.

Every time it snows in this city, I get a message more or less like this from Ricardo. This one, from earlier this year, is quite possibly my current favourite. Let me introduce you to Ricardo Pelai, a true child of the tropical forest.

I met Ricardo in the summer of 2015, when his go-to fun fact about himself was that he’d never been to a McDonald’s. Mine probably was something like, I just came back from teaching English abroad, or I had like a million addresses in the past two years. It was a phase I now call: “I’m a world traveler and adventure seeker and that makes me cool and interesting!” Yikes.

I remember asking Ricardo, fairly early on in our friendship, if he’ll let me write a book about him one day. I found his stories of growing up in Bolivia and Brazil, the way he spoke so fondly of the Amazon, and his unique insights into the diversity and complexities of Latin American countries, all very fascinating.

Fast forward a few years sprinkled with many rounds of beers, a handful snow days, and a couple of hikes (go on a hike with a friend who studies Forestry, they’ll tell you all about the trees!), Ricardo is a social scientist and researcher, finishing up his MSc in Forestry. And I thought, now was as good of an opportunity as ever to work on a teaser for the Tropical Kid in Canada story. Before someone else snatches that book deal, you know.

So here’s how a tropical kid from the Amazon ends up in British Columbia’s rainforest. Cheesy as it sounds, it’s a story about a boy following his passion. That is, a love for nature and curiosity about the people of the forest. And the places he’s lived and grown up in, sure have a whole lot to do with it.

Manaus, Brazil

We’ll start in Manaus, Brazil, where Ricardo spent early years of his childhood. On a map, you’ll find Manaus literally in the middle of the Amazon. And it’s a kind of place where each moment, you’ll be reminded of the forest surrounding life. Reminded not just by the wildlife, green spaces, and warm weather, but also with its colourful markets, and the bats that sometimes end up in your house. Ricardo remembers Manaus as a city with a strong indigenous presence and a unique Amazonian culture. The local dances had indigenous flavours.

Except, that reality was more complex than that. “I grew up in a place where people were so connected to the forest. In my lifetime, a lot of that forest surrounding [Manaus] has been cut, clearcut.” Around this time, Ricardo moved to Bolivia, where he was born. But he would come back to Manaus at least once a year and wondered, what happened to the forest that was around us? With promises of industry and development, forest companies and mining companies showed up in Manaus. It resulted not only in the destruction of the forest, but displacement of the indigenous people. Many of them had lived in reserves around the city.

But then, an interesting shift happened. The conservation movement, largely internationally-driven, came to the Amazon. As Ricardo remembers it: “It was not an issue about clearcutting anymore, but people would still be displaced in the name of conservation. A lot of indigenous people, for example, would hunt certain animals for their own subsistence or cultural practices. And now there was this pervasive idea, that humans should not belong in nature. And you shouldn’t have people living inside it.”

Cochabamba, Bolivia

From a young age, Ricardo was always curious about indigenous peoples of the Americas. In Bolivia, indigenous peoples make up more than half of the population. And yet, the history and much of everyday life focuses on the country’s white and mestizo population.

“Living in Bolivia, in a city in close enough proximity to the Amazon, surrounded by the forest, I grew up thinking about the forest and people in it. And how in my mind, people should not be separate from nature.”

Vancouver, BC

When he first moved to Vancouver for university to study conservation, he didn’t know exactly what he wanted to focus his studies on. What he did know was that he was in the right place. This was a city with a long history of environmental movements. (Anyone else knew that Greenpeace originated in Vancouver? I didn’t!) But when he took a course on the human dimension of conservation, he knew that he wanted to further pursue conservation as a social scientist.

“ I grew up thinking about the forest and people in it. And how in my mind, people should not be separate from nature.”

Ricardo’s research focuses on the social impacts of BC’s new forest management practice. This new and contested forest management strategy involves planting trees where they have never been planted before to follow climate change, and using genetic engineering to inform some of these decisions. There is a growing consensus among experts that these novel interventions are necessary in the face of climate change.

While his research delves into high-level questions, such as policy design and process, Ricardo finds himself contemplating and learning more about indigenous ways of thinking along the way.

This, Ricardo explains, was inevitable, because of the contested nature of the land. British Columbia, on paper, is 95% Crown land, but it is home to many indigenous nations with pre-existing claims to the land. It is important to note that this land was not ceded. British Columbia’s case is unique in that there are very few treaties signed compared to the rest of Canada.

Throughout his research, Ricardo has had opportunities to speak with a few First Nations leaders, who emphasized the interconnectedness of nature, voiced caution against human hubris, and spoke of the invasiveness of BC’s policy approach not only with regards to the nature, but with a land ethic that imposes a certain way of thinking about the land.

“I learned about indigenous ways of seeing the world, indigenous ways of knowledge, that were so different than what I was exposed to. But then, reflecting back on what I saw and my exposure to indigenous peoples, it just clicked.”

Montreal, QC

With his time as as a Master’s student slowly coming to an end, I’m proud and thrilled (read: heartbroken and bitter) to share that Ricardo is moving to Montreal this summer, upon accepting a position with the United Nations Environment Programme. It’s a short contract at the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (SCBD), but with extension possibilities. Ricardo and I have a shared love for the city of Montreal, and he is excited to check out its many festivals this summer. And of course, the food.

Bagel!
Helen Cook | Flickr — Helen Cook | Flickr

“This is controversial, but the Montreal Bagels are better than the New York bagels!”

Another thing Ricardo and I share is a wariness of change. We’ve talked about this so many times over the years, and agree that it doesn’t get easier. Even when you think you’re used to it. At the thought of leaving this city, Ricardo has this to say:

“One of the realizations I came to recently is that I have roots in Vancouver. For the longest time, I always felt that I was here temporarily. I was another transient. But this experience has made me realize that I do have roots in Vancouver. And they run deep, deeper than I thought.”

Over the next few months, Ricardo will be settling into life in a new city, starting a new job, all the while finishing his thesis.

Ricardo, with a moderate dose of love but mostly a tremendous amount of resentment and jealousy, I truly wish you all my best. I couldn’t be more excited to see what lies ahead for you.