Just a simple fairy tale
Irina Baslyk (Minsk), Specially for "Belovezhskaya Pushcha - 21 Century" Website, April 14, 2005
. There were many years passing by while it lived there... Wonderful, mysterious and unpredictable. What do people see it left behind? A large waste ground, covered by grass.
It was a fairy tale in our childish eyes. A boundless emerald space changing into something new each day: an ancient battle field accepting your wounded body with affectionate embrace, a ship deck rolling under your feet and carrying you into the sunset, towards the mysterious land which holds the treasures you desire under a green glass. How many great feats, how many discoveries did it witness!... But it suddenly gone away. It just disappeared under the pressure of roaring excavators and of people wishing to make profit from everything. Existence of another miracle was ceased, even if there aren't too many in our lives.
Certainly, all this is disputable: it's possible to say that the actual value of a wasted plot of land was insignificant and that its charm would be prolonged for us another couple of years at best. One can say that, certainly, it is reasonable is to waste a piece of land because there are other beautiful places left. One can say it's silly to weep over a wasted ground since there are thousands of them. I agree. But nevertheless, you could feel just like me, a little sad for the simple reason that our mystery was resolutely attacked.
Now listen to the other story. Once upon a time there lived Pushcha, a wild dense wood. Let's call it Belovezhskaya Pushcha. She appeared very long time ago, occupying hundreds of kilometers, freely covering hillocks and low-lands with her glades and thickets, brooks and paths. Old Hercules-like trees defended her peace while giant bison roamed under her canopy. Countless life forms found shelter here. Some species have found their last refuge in the Pushcha, while they were exterminated in other places. Life in the Pushcha followed its own laws. Even people obeyed them, and limited their desires. This was in the past.
Now everything is the other way round. Pushcha is being cut. Those who are cutting it say they do it for sanitary purposes, cleaning it from dead wood. But cutting is at industrial scale as a matter of fact. Local people say wood processing plants have appeared around the Pushcha's forest and that a sawmill purchased abroad especially for industrial timber processing appeared just at the right moment - a hundred, two hundred, three hundred and six hundred year old trees cover the high-quality wood demand of domestic and, what is certainly much more profitable, foreign consumers. A specially protected natural area where human activity should be extremely limited becomes an intensively exploited resource. Stump-covered areas show up white, amber tears flow, Pushcha becomes thinner.
I believe the destruction of art - no matter, made by Da Vinci, Rastrelli or Michelangelo - would be considered scandalous vandalism by the public which would require immediate suppression. If it is so, why do creations of an ingenious sculptor, architect and artist like Nature deserve an indifferent attitude? They are creatures made laboriously, carefully and incomprehensibly. They are unique creatures! Someone devised artificial forest plantations within Belovezhskaya Pushcha (is this like a wood is formed up in lines?). In this case, we should ask ourselves whether original antiques and mass produced consumer goods (the last are things of other level and other cost) have the same status.
Moreover, what right do people have to encroach upon those things which are not made by human hands? Who gave them the right to force pines to cry and to kill trees which are older than their forefathers? Who gave them the right to trade an invaluable treasure and to measure a fairy tale in cubic metres?
We can also look at this from another point of view. Belarus is a small country. The bowels of its earth are not too rich. Not too many historical heritages have been saved here. But there is something here that stirs feelings of pride. One of our riches is Belovezhskaya Pushcha, a wood inscribed on the List of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. An ancient, relic forest cherished since the end of 14th century. The last of its kind in Europe. We inherited it. We are responsible not only for a national treasure but also for a property common to all mankind. Is it possible to allow even the thought that someone could lift a finger against it? This is a blasphemous idea. But what epithet corresponds to the action of DESTROYING and SELLING it? And let's not forget, besides Pushcha itself, here lives the largest bison population in the world, an abundance of animals and plants unmatched in Europe, a huge amount of species listed in the Red Book. Everything that lives, breathes here will disappear together with the Belovezhskaya Pushcha Forest.
Do not forget this. Because suddenly you will have to tell a simple fairy tale to your children "She - a wonderful, ancient being, Belovezhskaya Pushcha - lived for many years there ... But she has suddenly gone away...."