Night in Mountains is Terrifying: Environment Guard, a Neighbor to Squirrels and Trees

(Photo: Abbas Kosari)

Sound of shotgun was heard from a distance that seemed far, far away. Then there was the sound of rocks falling off. The team went on to search for the guns. The night was yet to fall and it was beginning to get chilly. There was still enough time for them to get down the hill, hide in the right spot, and ambush the hunters. They blocked the road. The chill from the snowcapped mountain had reached the middle of the road. A furious wind was blowing, passing through the abundance of acorns, making the silence of the forest even more frightening. Time seemed deadly stagnant. Fifteen people were standing in the horrid meandrous road throwing the lights of their flashlights on each other’s faces.“Which side are they coming from?” they asked each other.“Some of us should watch here and some there,” one said. They moved the road block bars so that any passing car would have to stop. At 2:30 a.m., what other car but those of the hunters’ could pass that dangerous road? They had to walk to get warm. In that silence, any noise could be heard even from far away. The heard a car zipping toward them. They commanded the car to stop. The Pride did not stop. It zipped past the barricades with the same speed and went away. Some of them got into a jeep and chased the hunters. The chase went on for kilometers, to the borders of “Chahar-Mahal and Bakhtiari”, where the hunters’ car turned off the road. The sides got into a battle, took weapons out and started to shoot; both sides shot and injured.

He looks for a charger. The only available charger in the police station is constantly disconnected. He needs to keep the only way for his communication with the family going. He has told his wife over and over again that there is nothing to worry about; the post of guard is armed and a soldier accompanies him all the time. But“what does a woman have to do with a post of guard? What if he comes a day too late? What if he never sees his one-year old daughter again?” Lost in these thoughts, he was also thinking of home. Of the hunters’ hatred. Home is far from the village and he is afraid the hunters might go for his wife and kid. “When you are alone for more than a couple of days you imagine things”. He has reassured his wife a hundred times over, but he himself is worried too. He picks the cellphone up and calls home. His daughter is asleep, his wife awake. He was supposed to go back home tonight but the post of guard’s soldier was on leave, supposed to come back the next day. He is leaning on the two pillows on he has put on the bed and gazes at the bed beside his. No noise wakes the soldier but as soon as the environment guard shuts his eyes, all of a sudden he hears a weird noise. He goes out, patrols with his motorbike but does not see anything. “After midnight, you imagine things”. He was a soldier on duty here back in 2005. When the service was over, like many other youths from Yasuj, he went to “Asaluyeh”. He would work on some days and rested on others. He worked there for a year. He couldn’t stand the distance and the low wage. He returned to the mountains from the sea. He worked as an honorary environment guard for seven or eight months and then picked the job up with any sort of contract. He is not employed yet but how could one abandon the life in the mountains; stop seeing the antelopes, birds and foxes and drinking from the springs every day. He remembers the day they failed to catch the hunters; the day a bullet hit a young antelope, and all the hunters immediately ran away. “The bullet has to be deadly, if it only injures the animal, nothing can be done.” Knowing this, the hunters passed that day disappointedly.

When the sound of shotgun and rocks fill the mountains, ears become sharp and eyes automatically turn towards the noise. In that day’s dusk, he searched the location where he had heard the gunshot from but the hunters were gone and there was no sign of any animals. The next morning, he passed the canyons and rocks, got back to the same spot and found the antelope shot. The guard’s eyes quickly spots wounded animals in distance. He saw the antelope, one of its legs given away to the hunters. “Poor thing. It should be taken care of”. Starting from the next day, he located the antelope’s routine path and never took his eyes off the animal. Now the antelope is nine years old, walks through the canyons with its three legs to find forage.       

Sometimes, he has to spend the night in the mountain; nights with the possibility of danger. “Nights in mountains are cold. Nights in mountains are frightening. We erect a tent at nights if I’m not alone”. He has to take his own food. Tea if he fancies; he should take dried tea and firewood. “There is no firewood to be found up there. Rocks and snow are all there is. All the expenses are on the guard; as for the organization … not a dime. This means living with hardship in a grueling situation.” In the corner of the room, there is a ragged backpack and a sleeping bag. He has put the binoculars on the table. Every day he carries binoculars around, patrols, eats, and passes time to reach the last working day so that he can go to the village for two days. So that he can buy something for his daughter on his way home from Ahmad Agha’s. But his thoughts are with the mountain and the sounds of it. The wife pouts in irritation and goes back to her cooking.    

His wife wants them to get a loan and rent a place in “Yasuj”, for Kimia (their daughter) to grow up in the city where she can attend school and take painting classes. But he who spends many days in the mountains and the post of guard enjoys this very being home, wishing to sit in the balcony for hours and chat with his parents sitting in the adjacent balcony; talking about farms and his younger brother’s wedding this summer. How fast these two days of rest come to an end. When parting time comes close, Kimia makes herself busy playing. He hates saying goodbye. The wife remains quiet; just a few short sentences: “Be careful; Careful of the hunters. Call.”

He moves the charger wire to get a few green bars filling and emptying on the corner of the screen.  When the director arrives, he quickly puts the phone somewhere on the corner of the window, trying not to disconnect the power. He puts the kettle on the stove and brings his daily journal out of the closet. He has visited the old antelope today. The director has some tea, thanks him and leaves.   

The sun has gone and the mountain is resting in the cold shadow when a shotgun is heard; from a distance, that could be guessed, was so far. The team has reached a distant place where in the midst of a battle between the hunters and the colleagues he suddenly finds his leg is getting warm. He remembers the day that tea tray slipped in his hands and the tea cup poured on his daughter’s leg.

*This article was originally written in Persian and printed in Aftabnet magazine in June 2013.