Baobabs

 
 

My first encounter with a baobab was in  The Little Prince, which I read for a class in high school. I thought it was an invention by the author, Antoine de Saint-Exupery. The name baobab alone seemed too exotic to be real, not to mention the tree's odd shape and remarkable pace of growth. Sensing our skepticism, the teacher told us to look it up.

In those days that meant reaching for a dictionary, or better yet, grabbing the “B” volume of the maroon or navy blue-backed encyclopedia series (depending whether you favored World Book or Britannica).  Today, if you look up baobabs on line, you’ll find something like this (compiled from several sources):

Adansonia digitata L. - a deciduous, tropical tree, characterized by swollen trunks and branches used to store water. Fire and drought resistant. Grows in arid, semi-arid, and sub-humid tropical climates. Fast growing and long lived. Can reach heights of 25 meters and live for thousands of years.

In The Little Prince, the baobabs get a pretty bad rap. They symbolize something very evil and threatening, the spread of which can lead to catastrophe and destruction for the Little Prince’s world (or asteroid, to be more precise).

Saint-Exupery wrote The Little Prince in 1942, not long before joining the Free French Air Force in North Africa as a pilot. He was shot down and killed in 1944 during a reconnaissance mission over the Mediterranean. His plane and body were recovered only decades later.  The timing of his writing of The Little Prince leads some analysts to suggest that the baobabs in the book represent the spread of Nazism.

Here is a quote from the book:

“You must see to it that you pull up regularly all the baobabs, at the very first moment when they can be distinguished from the rosebushes which they resemble so closely in their earliest youth.”

Sometimes," he added, "there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day. But when it is a matter of baobabs, that always means a catastrophe.”

The illustration is striking, and is evidently the one of all those in the book on which Saint-Exupery spent the most time.

Saint Exupery's illustration of what would happen to the Little Prince's asteroid if he did not pull up the baobabs as soon as they appear. From Chapter 5, The Little Prince

It’s been more than 70 years since Saint Exupery wrote the Little Prince. The war to which he gave his life is long past, though perhaps not all the threats of other wars and evil forces.

Though our world’s climate and landscapes have changed significantly since that time, and are doing so at an ever-escalating rate, the baobabs stand firm. Far from threatening to break up our planet, they stand out as a symbol of resilience and adaptability. They can grow in sparse environments. And because they only keep their leaves about three months of the year, baobabs can take on a skeletal appearance only to spring back to life when their leaves re-emerge

Britt and Valerie in front of a baobab

I love baobabs. I love the way the name bounces in your mouth. I love their odd shape and grandeur. I love the way they dot the rugged landscape of southern Kenya. I love the fact that according to legend the baobabs got their funny look because they were jealous of the other trees, so were plucked out of the ground and put back in upside-down. They aren’t beautiful, really, but are striking and compelling. Even when they look half dead, they stand out among the blue hills, red earth, golden savanna, or green brush that characterize the area between Tsavo East and West National Parks and the Kenyan coast, where you see lots of baobabs.

Because my career is currently taking me more in the direction of research on the importance and future of trees, forests, and agroforestry, I’ve recently learned that baobabs also are very useful – including just about every part of the tree. The fruits, sometimes called monkey bread, have up to 20 times the vitamin C of mango and 30 times the calcium. The bark is used to make cloth and rope. The leaves are nutritious and used for condiments and medicine. People sometimes live inside the enormous trunks, and animals live in the crown.

We ran into a leopard napping on the wide branch of a huge baobab in Tsavo West Park, making good use of its height and the cool shade of its leaves. We took photos of ourselves in front of one baobab standing alone on the savanna with Mt. Kilimanjaro just visible in the mist behind it. And we came across baobabs in the bend of the road, as we traversed the very bumpy but beautiful trail from Tsavo to Diani.

For people who have grown up with baobabs, their longevity and steadfastness can be a great comfort. For the rest of us that perspective can be a good lesson.

There is a lovely and touching film called “Baobab” that speaks to the pain of wars and separation in Sudan and South Sudan (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRpEawpqXZs). In it, one of the characters says something like this:

“Bring your children to the baobab, my son. Tell them it has been living for thousands of years, never greedy with its shadow or water. Tell them it did not discriminate between people based on color or tribe. Teach your children to be similar to this tree…”

Bring your children to the baobab...