Abridged version published in The Globe and Mail, Oct. 30, 2024.
There’s no other way to put it:
I’m a shameless sucker for souvenirs.
So when I stumbled upon a tchotchke-vendor-filled parkette outside Antigua’s Iglesia de la Merced, I was transfixed. Traditional textiles, hand-painted ceramics, and a worrying number of worry-dolls vied for the attention of Semana Santa pilgrims, but my gaze was drawn to something altogether unexpected—a cheap, plastic, owl figurine.
Owls are everywhere in Guatemala. Symbols of good fortune and prosperity, I must have passed dozens of them on postcards, pillowcases, keychains, etc. But for some reason, when my eyes connected with that mini-made-in-China-piece-of-crap, I thought to myself, “Pretty sure I’m gonna see a real owl tomorrow”.
“Knut just whatsapped me.” My husband blurted, interrupting my intuitive moment with the universe.
“Who?” (tonally this sounded more like, “how dare you”)
“Knut. Our birding guide. He’s doing some owl research and wants to know if we’re game to go look for nocturnal birds”.
+++++++
I started birding during the pandemic.
(cliché, I know).
I didn’t feel any great need to reconnect with nature, nor was I looking for an excuse to buy a Tilley hat. I started because as soon as I got my first close-up look at a bird, I knew this hobby—historically reserved for the aged and/or eccentric—was going to help me manage my pain.
Why do I have pain? Here’s the abridged version:
I was born with Klippel-Trenaunay Syndrome (if you need a minute to re-read that, sound it out, etc. feel free). KTS is a rare vascular disorder affecting around 1 in every 100,000 people worldwide. As a child, I spent a good chunk of time in the hospital. Surgery was commonplace. As an adult, I’ve spent (and continue to spend) good chunks of time in therapy exploring how to best play the hand I was dealt. Because of my polysyllabic disability, I’ve lived with pain—both physical and psychological—my whole life. But things really came to a head in 2020.
I was working in advertising. Despite the fact that COVID had turned the world into a post-apocalyptic tire fire, the ad machine barely skipped a self-serving beat (after all, potato chips are an essential service). My anxiety levels were wild, worrying about meeting one unnecessarily tight deadline after another.
Because my mind wouldn’t let me take a break, my body forced me to…it broke down. The pain was crazy. I couldn't get comfortable. I couldn’t sleep. Basic tasks became impossible. Might seem a bit woowoo, but when physical pain manifests for no obvious reason, it’s my body’s way of demanding I slow down and be more present.
So I accommodated my body’s legitimate, albeit super annoying demand. I took up things that require presence. I started with the obvious: restorative yoga, meditation, journaling, etc. And over time, the seemingly self-indulgent mindfulness stuff started to work, I was better able to manage the pain. So when I reached for a pair of binoculars at an Airbnb in rural Ontario and realized that listening for a bird, spotting a bird, tracking a bird, etc. required a huge amount of present-moment awareness, I quickly added birding to my selfcare routine. And it stuck.
When my pain was finally under control, I decided to combine my new found hobby with my long-standing passion: travel. Shortly after cross-referencing my vacation bucket list with a generic list of birding hotspots, my husband and I took off to the highlands of Guatemala.
++++++++++++
Knut, the co-owner of Cayaya Birding Guatemala, pulled up to our hotel just after 4am.
An ultra-lean, bespectacled German wearing quick-dry everything, Knut was straight out of central casting. With a warm welcome and an equally warm thermos of coffee, we were on our way to look for owls.
A short drive brought us to Finca el Pilar, a mixed pine-oak nature reserve on the outskirts of town. Knut clearly knew the park well. He sped through the dark, up meandering dirt roads, before purposefully pulling over at a seemingly random place.
We stepped out of the car and onto the set of a horror movie. In the pitch-black forest, a gang of Brown-backed Solitaires made sci-fi torture device sounds as a pack of Highland Guans blew their evil clown whistles. The demented duet was creepy in every possible way. To temper the sense of impending doom, I asked Knut, “why here?”
“The territories of several pairs of Fulvous Owls overlap here—it’a the perfect location to find to spot one.”
“Coolcool…I can’t see my hand in front of my face. How am I gonna spot an owl?” I thought but I kept my dumb question to myself.
Knut pulled a speaker and an antiquated iPod out of his fanny pack. After fiddling with the contraptions for a minute, the speaker let out a hoot. He explained that playing the Fulvous call would make resident owls think something was up and—fingers crossed—they’d come to check it out.
Between digital bird calls, we stood around in relative silence. I used the opportunity to get mindful: I turned off my thoughts and tuned into my senses, focusing on the environment, the present moment. Just as dawn was breaking and just as I was losing interest, a non-digital hoot rang out. Knut, my husband, and I, as though choreographed, craned our necks in the same direction.
The hoot exchange between Knut’s iPod and the owl continued for a few minutes before our Fulvous friend swooped onto the branch of a nearby tree. I could just discern its black silhouette against the only slightly lighter backdrop of the forest. Knut expertly readied the scope and answered the dumb question I dared not ask: he shone a flashlight about five feet away from the bird.
The scope revealed the details of every feather. My eyes took it all in. Feeling like I should bow, curtsy, or show some kind of reverence to the creature that has captivated humanity for centuries, I muttered to myself, “thanks owl, thanks universe”. Worried someone might have heard my witchy commune with the animal world, I stepped back from the scope and made some 5 a.m. small talk with Knut,
“Weird, the light doesn’t bother them.”
“Ya. They seem to like it. Useful for hunting.”
That was all I could muster up.
After a few minutes of ogling, the bird had had enough. I watched as it shifted its body weight from one talon to the other before leaning slightly forward and vanishing into the woods, without a sound.
Between a half-day trekking in Finca el Pilar and a few hours of hiking through Tecpàn, another birding hotspot about an hour outside Antigua, we saw 60+ different species of birds (highlights included Pink-headed Warblers, a few Northern Emerald Toucanets, and a Mountain Trogon). When our expedition was over, Knut invited us to his place so we could go over “the checklist”.
Checklists are huge in the birding community. Birders have lists for everything: things they’ve seen, things they’ve heard, things they think they’ve seen, things they want to see, etc. In their purest form, lists are a good way to memorialize a field day. On the flipside, they can turn innocent birders into joyless fanatics, more interested in moving on to the next bird than being grateful for (and present with) the bird that’s in front of them.
Ok. Am I being unnecessarily judgy?
100%
But my judgement is a form of self-preservation. I know I can fall victim to these types of compulsive behaviours, so I tread cautiously around birding lists, using a holier-than-thou-gratitude-based philosophy to keep me from being led into temptation.
Is it a foolproof plan? Hell no.
I was frothing to get box-ticking at Knut’s place.
From his off-grid front yard, we dutifully took note of what we saw and where we saw it (honourable mentions to those we heard but did not see). Knut intermittently interrupted our type-A behaviour to point out who was visiting his freshly-filled bird feeders. A clan of Bushy-crested Jays. Oh look. A Slate-throated Redstart…I was hoping to see one of those. I held my breath when the Violet Sabrewing touched down. Like, honestly, who designed these things? Incredible.
The birds at the feeders were too good. We raced through our lists and Knut set us up in his blind (Yep. He’s got a blind in his front yard).
After most certainly overstaying our welcome (I would have moved in), Knut, who had research to do, drove us back to our hotel.
++++++++++
In hopes of finding the tchotchke salesman pedalling the lack-lustre owl figurines (I now wanted one as a keepsake), my husband and I wandered back to the Iglesia de la Merced.
As we walked the city’s famously picturesque cobblestoned streets, we took stock of the day. Hiking the outskirts of Antigua with Knut was a huge success. With few exceptions, we crossed paths with all the birds we were hoping to meet. But we had to admit that loafing around on Knut’s front lawn was definitely a highlight.
Somehow, birding keeps reminding me that, if I slow down and pay attention, what I’m looking for is usually right in front of me.
Bird photos: Cayaya Birding
