Save What You Love with Mark Titus

Alexandra Climent is a rainforest conservationist, sculptural artist, and the founder of Endangered Rainforest Rescue, a women and Indigenous-led nonprofit organization working to restore biodiversity by planting endangered tree species and protecting indigenous land in the Darién Gap of Panamá. Alexandra has led expeditions for several years into this unexplored rainforest where she and her team are working to reforest an essential corridor for the endangered jaguar. The main goal is to use endangered tree species as the building blocks for habitat restoration in deforested areas, reconnecting them to primary forests. The Darién Gap stands as a vital ecological corridor connecting the Americas, holding immense importance in safeguarding the global ecosystem. The work of Alexandra’s organization is not only crucial at a local scale but also pivotal for worldwide climate mitigation efforts.

Alexandra’s artistic practice involves utilizing materials gathered from fallen trees in the rainforest that she collected over several years, working with some of the most dense and beautiful wood in the world. The aim of her work is to showcase the rainforest's beauty and highlight its urgent need for protection.

She has published articles about her work, most recently in "The World Sensorium, Plantings," where she emphasizes the importance of protecting the Darien Gap and its crucial role in preserving indigenous lands.

This week, Mark and Alexandra talk about work on the ground, bringing the work to the world and doing it with a lot of curiosity and wonder.

Save What You Love with Mark Titus:⁣

Produced: Emilie Firn

Edited: Patrick Troll⁣

Music: Whiskey Class⁣

Instagram: @savewhatyoulovepodcast

Website: savewhatyoulove.evaswild.com

Support wild salmon at evaswild.com

Creators & Guests

Host

Mark Titus

Mark Titus is the creator of Eva’s Wild and director of the award winning films, The Breach and The Wild. He’s currently working on a third film in his salmon trilogy, The Turn. In early 2021, Mark launched his podcast, Save What You Love, interviewing exceptional people devoting their lives in ways big and small to the protection of things they love. Through his storytelling, Mark Titus carries the message that humanity has an inherent need for wilderness and to fulfill that need we have a calling to protect wild places and wild things.

Guest

Alexandra Climent

What is Save What You Love with Mark Titus?

Wild salmon give their very lives so that life itself can continue. They are the inspiration for each episode asking change-makers in this world what they are doing to save the things they love most. Join filmmaker, Mark Titus as we connect with extraordinary humans saving what they love through radical compassion and meaningful action. Visit evaswild.com for more information.

00:00:00:10 - 00:00:26:03
Mark Titus
Welcome to the Save What You Love podcast. I'm your host, Mark Titus. Today I catch up with Alexandra Clement in upstate New York. Alexandra is a rainforest conservationist, sculptural artist in the founder of Endangered Reinforced Rescue, a women and indigenous led nonprofit organization working to restore biodiversity by planting endangered tree species and protecting indigenous land in the Darién Gap of Panama.

00:00:26:05 - 00:00:58:05
Mark Titus
Alexandra's artistic practice involves utilizing materials gathered from fallen trees in the rainforest that she collected over several years, working with some of the most dense and beautiful wood in the world. The aim of her work is to showcase the rainforest beauty and highlight its urgent need for protection. She has published articles about her work, most recently In the World Sensorium Plantings, where she emphasizes the importance of protecting the Darién Gap and its crucial role in preserving indigenous lands.

00:00:58:07 - 00:01:32:08
Mark Titus
In 2023, Alexandra was selected as the United States Country Leader for the G20 Changemakers Summit hosted by India, and was also recently chosen as a next generation explorer at the Explorers Club in New York City, where she is a member. This is a very satisfying interview. I'm so excited to present to you Alexander Clement. She is really doing the work on the ground, bringing the work to the world and doing it with a lot of curiosity and wonder.

00:01:32:10 - 00:01:35:20
Mark Titus
Enjoy the show today.

00:01:35:22 - 00:02:12:00
Music
How do you save what you love?
When the world is burning down?
How do you save what you love?
When pushes come to shove.
How do you say what you love?
When things are upside down.
How do you say what you love?
When times are getting tough.

00:02:12:02 - 00:02:15:13
Mark Titus
Alexandra Clement, where are you coming to us from today?

00:02:15:15 - 00:02:21:09
Alexandra Climent
Today I am actually in my home in upstate New York, in Roseburg, a town called Narrows Park.

00:02:21:11 - 00:02:49:00
Mark Titus
Cool. Well, you you get around, and we'll get into that in a little bit. But I am such a big fan of your work, and, you've taken a passion and turn that into your art, and you've also turned it into activism, and you've also created a personal, on the ground resonance with it as well. very few people get to do that.

00:02:49:02 - 00:02:54:03
Mark Titus
Who encouraged you to do this work in the beginning. How did you find your way?

00:02:54:05 - 00:03:21:15
Alexandra Climent
That's interesting. I feel I had such a story that was, very random in the beginning. It was. It wasn't so much that I studied woodworking or conservation. I kind of fell into it. So just to give you a little bit of background, I was working for a construction company in college, and I was basically their secretary. my parents couldn't really afford to send me to school, so I had to work a full time job.

00:03:21:17 - 00:03:56:19
Alexandra Climent
And this construction company builds bridges, docks and piers throughout the tri state area of New York. So they were using this one type of wood and all of their government contracts to build these bridges. And that and I became fascinated with why there was only one supplier of this wood. So a long story short, I convinced the construction company to let me go down to the rainforest, where I found out this wood came from and kind of tried to do some research on it, you know, to figure out why, only one person sold it.

00:03:56:19 - 00:04:17:18
Alexandra Climent
Was it ethical? you know, just I was fascinated, so I before I went down, you know, looking back now, it was I thought that I was making all these connections in South America where I can go visit these sawmills and find this wood. But when I got down there, none of these things exist. Said it was just weird internet times, you know?

00:04:17:19 - 00:04:34:16
Alexandra Climent
And I was just down there and I fell in love with the rainforest for the first time. It was the first time that I ever saw a rainforest. And I also fell in love with the wood. So I had found out that the wood was used in construction because it was some of the most dense wood in the world.

00:04:34:16 - 00:04:58:13
Alexandra Climent
So when you put it in water, termites can't penetrate it. It doesn't rot for a very long time. So I went down there and I saw this material, I saw the forest that I came from, and I just knew that you couldn't cut down these trees, for this wood. But I also wanted to share that feeling that I was feeling of the rainforest.

00:04:58:13 - 00:05:10:19
Alexandra Climent
And I wanted to show the wood to the world. So I guess you could say the construction company inspired the first phase of this, but I don't want to give them too much, credit.

00:05:10:21 - 00:05:47:22
Mark Titus
Wow. That our our inspirations are really aligned. similar feelings about, wanting to share salmon and share the places that salmon are from and why they're so important to protect. in, in our side of things over here. I'm curious, even before the construction company in that, was there something inherently curious in your makeup that led you to art, led you to, finding and curiosity and wonder and and, excitement in, in materials.

00:05:47:22 - 00:05:50:10
Mark Titus
And how did you see the world as a young person?

00:05:50:11 - 00:06:14:20
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. I mean, we we had it rough, you know, I was fortunate to live. I was born in Queens. We moved out to Long Island, where I went to high school. so I was able to see to different types of the world and living in people. So I feel like I was really lucky to be born in Queens and kind of be able to see diversity from a really young age, but, things weren't easy.

00:06:14:20 - 00:06:33:23
Alexandra Climent
My dad was a musician. He owned his own business. My mom worked a couple of different jobs, so I got to see pretty early on. you know how life can be a struggle. And I was always very curious about other parts of the world, other people, other cultures. And, that always made me think outside the box.

00:06:33:23 - 00:06:56:22
Alexandra Climent
And I think when it came to going to the rainforest and actually experiencing that, it really all came together for me, because the rainforest is a place with more diversity than anywhere, right? Even, even queens. so it's, it's, I think, tied back to my childhood in a way, where I just always wanted to get out and see something different.

00:06:56:22 - 00:07:17:16
Alexandra Climent
I wanted to see how other people lived. and I'm, I'm very happy that I had that background of parents that were creative. And they, you know, they had to work, but they also it wasn't like they were doing these normal jobs, like my father, you know, being a musician, like, but also seeing him struggle with that too, you know, it was all part of it.

00:07:17:18 - 00:07:28:07
Alexandra Climent
But, but yeah, so, I mean, all of these things, it's like wings of a butterfly, right? You never know where they actually meet you, and then you go with it.

00:07:28:09 - 00:08:01:05
Mark Titus
exactly, exactly. it's always fascinating to me, how people find their path of mountain water, you know, and it's generally not a clear, decisive path. It's something that takes us off in a different direction oftentimes. thank you for sharing that. how did you get into working with wood specifically? And what type of wood was it that you were exploring with the construction company back in the day?

00:08:01:06 - 00:08:23:02
Alexandra Climent
So the name of the wood the construction company was mainly using for their project was called Green Heart and a little bit of eBay, which is more common, commonly known. and when I went down to the forest, like I was telling you earlier, and I saw the rainforest for the first time, you know, I didn't know what I wanted to do with the wood.

00:08:23:02 - 00:08:46:18
Alexandra Climent
I just knew I didn't want to cut down any trees. Right. I just the feeling I got when I was there. So I actually went on this journey of spending many, many years of my life collecting fallen trees from the rainforest. And this is how I gathered the wood, basically, right now, I had no idea what the heck I was going to do with it when I got it.

00:08:46:18 - 00:09:08:10
Alexandra Climent
I just knew that I wanted to use it and show it to people. So after spending several years of my life collecting this wood, waiting for it to come to New York, because it was a whole battle of dealing with customs. And, you know, I was like 19 or 20 at the time. So yeah, it was, there are so many different, you know, like a lot of red tape.

00:09:08:12 - 00:09:26:07
Alexandra Climent
I'll just put it to you that way. So, once I got the wood back to New York, I so was working a full time job. Like, I think I had moved from the construction company since then. I had graduated from college. I was working in the basement of some, like, retail store. It was, like, very depressing.

00:09:26:07 - 00:09:42:22
Alexandra Climent
But then I would be there. But then I was like, going down to South America to collect this wood. And I had this larger project in the work. So it was like such a weird identity crisis. and then anytime I when I finally got the wood back to New York, I didn't have a wood shop. I didn't have anywhere to work with it.

00:09:42:22 - 00:10:14:08
Alexandra Climent
I didn't know how to make anything from it. And my idea at first it was like, okay, I'm going to make tables, right? I have these stamps about, you know, seven, eight inches thick and I need to get them cut into thinner cookies and then I can start to, to make tabletops from them. So actually, my mom would drive me to all these different mill mill shops, woodworking shops, like throughout Brooklyn upstate on the weekends whenever I had off from work and I'd take a piece of wood with me and I say, hey, can you help me cut this?

00:10:14:10 - 00:10:35:00
Alexandra Climent
And everybody said, no, all that. We're just like, I'm not putting that wood on my blades. Like, that's going to break the blades. I don't want to get involved. And I finally it took me so long to find a shop. I was walking in Brooklyn and there was a garage that was shut, but I heard, like, the sound of a table saw, and I, like, knocked on the door.

00:10:35:00 - 00:10:50:14
Alexandra Climent
And some guy came out and I was telling him I was like, I have this wood, I have a bunch of it, and I need help, cutting it, learning how to use it. And, they let me know, like, oh, come in, bring it in. You know, actually, they're like, just take a table, come after work and you can play around with it.

00:10:50:16 - 00:11:19:16
Alexandra Climent
And it was kind of from there that it was a bunch of trial and error. the shop was filled with a bunch of, of dudes, you know, from all over the world. And each one of them was trying to, like, help, like cut it and do different things. So then they were all stuck. They were like, oh, this material's so hard and dense and, so to bring to go back to like, what species those ended up being, they are names that a lot of people haven't heard of, but I'll rattle off a few for sure.

00:11:19:18 - 00:11:39:07
Alexandra Climent
caribou. Collie Shibden woman. there is a little green heart in there are more, just to name a few. Pentagram, which is very similar to Purple Heart, but it's a different species of tree, which a lot of people try to argue with me about online. so, yeah, a lot of names that people haven't heard of before.

00:11:39:09 - 00:11:58:13
Alexandra Climent
And, you know, from the beginning, from when I started this, using that material and making something from it was really a callback to the rainforest. Right? It was like, maybe if people can understand the beauty of this wood through something that I make, and I'll get them to care about a place that maybe they'll never see in their life.

00:11:58:15 - 00:12:05:16
Alexandra Climent
Right? So that was the beginning of that whole entire process. And it took many years, many, many years.

00:12:05:21 - 00:12:50:05
Mark Titus
Well, so well spoken at the I'm just blown away. I mean. I could barely navigate, getting up to Bristol Bay when I was a 19 year old, you know, to work, in a fishing processor. how did you put this all together? I mean, clearly would have been a very precocious young person, but, man, at logistics, getting yourself down there to the rainforest, just yourself, much less identifying the wood that you need and having access to it and getting it onto a barge and or a ship and getting it up here and dealing with the red tape, like, how did you put that all together on a on a practical level?

00:12:50:06 - 00:13:09:14
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. I mean, it was difficult. It took a really long time and there were so many roadblocks. I mean, it's been so long, but I just remember, this feeling of so many times, I just thought, is this actually going to happen? Like, can I actually pull this off? Because, I mean, even honestly, being a woman down there, like, was difficult.

00:13:09:14 - 00:13:36:09
Alexandra Climent
People didn't want it. They were confused. So they thought, like, I used to actually disguise myself as a man when I would. When I would go down there, I'd sign my emails. Alex, just so people would think that I was a guy, you know? So, I mean, it was it was hard to navigate, you know, but I think from a practical standpoint, I mean, I can't remember all the details, but just making sure everything was in line, like, I, when I was back here in New York trying to figure out all the paperwork.

00:13:36:13 - 00:13:53:11
Alexandra Climent
It was such a passion of mine. Like, I was so determined to get that wood back here that I love every obstacle that came. I was like, I will solve it. I'll figure it out. I'll go drive to the customs office and talk to a guy so that I can make sure that he knows who I am. So when that boat comes in, there's no problems.

00:13:53:11 - 00:13:57:09
Alexandra Climent
And you know, anything I could do during my free time was dedicated to this.

00:13:57:11 - 00:14:33:03
Mark Titus
Wow. Yeah, I'm feeling that and seeing it and hearing it. And I mean, right down to signing your name, Alex. I mean, putting up with bullshit, with, you know, other, mentalities. It it's inspiring. you said this is a quote. there is an intimacy. This is from from your bio. But there's an intimacy to Alexandra's methods that functions to signify the importance of the world outside ourselves and our responsibility to live harmoniously with nature through the preservation of biodiversity.

00:14:33:05 - 00:14:36:10
Mark Titus
I'm curious, what do you mean about the intimacy.

00:14:36:12 - 00:15:03:15
Alexandra Climent
The intimacy and the connection? And I think that a lot of us have lost with nature. when you are surrounded by rainforests, when you are living inside of indigenous communities, which is something that I do often in my conservation work. Now, you feel this symbiotic relationship with nature that I think here and more, wealthier nations where we're just totally weren't detached.

00:15:03:15 - 00:15:26:02
Alexandra Climent
We're not we're not attached at all to that way of thinking. so that's again what I was trying to communicate with my work to, to to feel like some sort of connection with nature and plants and animals and everything that we are supposed to be surrounded by, that we're just a lot of us, unfortunately, aren't anymore.

00:15:26:03 - 00:15:54:20
Mark Titus
I understand that that connection and that desire to be with people that understand that connection, it's it's prevalent in the work I do, too. And once you've seen it and you felt it and you've lived it, it's, you can't really go back. You can't really put that genie back in the bottle. Right? you know, this all takes place.

00:15:54:20 - 00:16:15:07
Mark Titus
All of this is centered in the rainforest. This this work, this passion, this curiosity, these relationships. it's something you're clearly very passionate about. Where do you think that that passion originally came from? And what what made you interested in the durian gap in particular?

00:16:15:09 - 00:16:21:08
Alexandra Climent
Sure. So let me get you over to the Darian Gap in my in my timeline of stories. yes, please.

00:16:21:08 - 00:16:22:10
Mark Titus
Sure. Yeah.

00:16:22:12 - 00:16:43:00
Alexandra Climent
Because, you know, right now I, I still do woodworking. It's still part of my practice, but the conservation work is really at the forefront of my career. So I will just kind of, I'll tell you, when I was working with this wood finally and starting to create these pieces, I would keep traveling back down to Central America or South America rather.

00:16:43:06 - 00:17:04:17
Alexandra Climent
And I would just see the forest, just it would just be disappearing, every time I went down. So the very species that I was working with, that I had become so intimate with, right from finding them on the slopes, the jungle floor, to taking them back to New York and sculpting them with my hands like those species were at the threat of extinction.

00:17:04:19 - 00:17:36:13
Alexandra Climent
so I decided to switch my work from finding fallen trees and to finding seeds of endangered tree species for their reforestation. So that's how I ended up in Panama. Sort of. I actually had a container of wood coming from, from sorry, from Guyana to New York, and it stopped in the Panama Canal. So the boat was stuck there, and it was like my whole life felt like it was on the line because there was problems with some other containers on the boat.

00:17:36:13 - 00:17:50:10
Alexandra Climent
They were going to turn the boat back around to Guyana. And, so it was just like I was I was like, I'm going down to Panama. I have to figure out, like what's going on. So I ended up going to Panama for the first time, and I just fell in love with the country. I fell in love with the people.

00:17:50:12 - 00:18:14:00
Alexandra Climent
I started to talk to locals about the endangered tree species that I was looking to find, and I kept hearing about the Darién Gap. so this area is a highly unexplored rainforest. It has more biodiversity per square foot than the Amazon. So a lot of these tree species that I was looking to find could actually still only be found in the debris.

00:18:14:00 - 00:18:24:06
Alexandra Climent
And that. So that's how I ended up in Panama. And that took me on a whole new, journey in my life.

00:18:24:08 - 00:18:58:07
Mark Titus
Everything that I'm hearing is you. You discover by experiencing, by saying, yes, there's a lot of yeses here. And and self propulsion, in into these new experiences is. Are you afraid of saying yes. Are you afraid of going to these new places, in these new frontiers and these new horizons? Do you ever get any kind of anxiety about that, or is it something that you you're override of curiosity and wonder takes you around that fear?

00:18:58:09 - 00:19:29:06
Alexandra Climent
Yeah, I think my curiosity propels me very quickly into saying yes to things, because usually I'm it's more about the anxiety comes from people around me not saying yes quick enough, you know, to like, like for example, even getting to the Darién Gap, it took years to convince anybody to take me there. So I'm I'm kind of always ready to hop on the next opportunity because, I mean, even especially with my work in conservation, like, we don't have time to be taking any breaks with this, right?

00:19:29:09 - 00:19:45:05
Alexandra Climent
The conservation work needs to happen now because this forest is at the threat of mass deforestation. So I just feel that you have to when you're passionate about something like that, there's really no time to say no.

00:19:45:07 - 00:20:07:17
Mark Titus
We're going to go deep into Darién Gap and what's happening, in just a moment. But I want to hover still on the art for a moment and, can you describe for us get paint a picture what your artwork looks and feels like. And I we're going to have links in our show notes. And, listeners, please check this out.

00:20:07:19 - 00:20:22:16
Mark Titus
Alexandra's work is gorgeous. And, can you explain, though, a little bit about the inspiration for your work and obviously you're using hardwoods. You're using wood. Do you use other materials as well in your work?

00:20:22:18 - 00:20:46:23
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. I mean, I would say that most of my work is to showcase the material. Right. Going back to that. So I try to use a minimum of other materials to accompany that and try to keep it very natural. But I have used, I've used Lucite, you know, a few times in my pieces. I've used brass, but always very minimal.

00:20:47:01 - 00:21:04:03
Alexandra Climent
so yeah, I would say from the beginning it was always about just trying to do really fine finishing on my pieces to, to show, like, almost like you're looking inside of the wood, right? Like you're looking inside of the forest. You're looking inside the tree. Because that's something that I always think about when I was in the rainforest.

00:21:04:03 - 00:21:24:15
Alexandra Climent
Like all these trees are standing there and like, if you can peer inside, you know, what would that look like? So that's kind of what I was trying to do with my work. So I would say it's a mix of fine furniture and functional art through sculpture. So one of the pieces that I became kind of known for my signature was sculpting a seashell.

00:21:24:17 - 00:21:54:12
Alexandra Climent
So these seashells were sculpted from a cross-section of a tree. So it's actually a difficult to carve into because it's the end grain. and with my obsession with fine finishing, you know, these types of things take a very, very long time. So the seashell for me, represented an expedition, kind of. I found myself when I would enter the jungle and when I would leave the jungle, I always ended up on the on the beach or the ocean.

00:21:54:14 - 00:21:55:09
Alexandra Climent

00:21:55:11 - 00:21:56:13
Mark Titus
Oh, wow.

00:21:56:15 - 00:22:00:16
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. So seashells were kind of some of the last thing I saw.

00:22:00:16 - 00:22:03:05
Mark Titus
Cool. Man. Yeah.

00:22:03:07 - 00:22:28:17
Alexandra Climent
you know, even the first time I went to Darién, I sailed and we stopped at all these little islands in the middle of of the Pacific Ocean before we got there. And I just remember seeing seashells that I've never seen in my life. They were just wild. So it was. I remember being very nervous, you know, on these expeditions, not just with the dangers of the jungle, but just with my own expectations that I set for myself.

00:22:28:19 - 00:22:56:06
Alexandra Climent
And something that always calmed me down was the ocean. When I came back in the ocean before I left. So that's the idea behind the shells and why I think they became such a structure in my work. so outside that, I would say all my furniture again, and even the seashell sculptures, just to go back to that, it's all functional, like the whole idea with this material, right, is that you're going to have something that lasts forever.

00:22:56:08 - 00:23:14:05
Alexandra Climent
so the idea of sustainability, right? I mean, that wasn't really a hot word back when I was 19 years old. but for some reason it resonated with me. But it's like, if I make something from this, it's going to last for generations. Like this stuff. Literally, this word, this material doesn't rot. It's so hard to damage it.

00:23:14:07 - 00:23:32:04
Alexandra Climent
So, that was always very important to me as, like to have things that are you don't have to replace. So when I make furniture, dining room tables, coffee tables, desks, things like that, it's their furniture, but they're almost pieces of art. But but that you can use, you know.

00:23:32:06 - 00:23:49:10
Mark Titus
Love everything about what you just said. What a satisfying answer. I didn't know the seashell part, and that makes me so happy to incorporate that into the functionality, the beauty, the esthetic. It's lovely. Nice work.

00:23:49:12 - 00:23:50:03
Alexandra Climent
Thank you.

00:23:50:09 - 00:24:18:12
Mark Titus
Thank you. so to to give us we we heard about your bio essentially at the top of the show here, but in your own words, how would you kind of describe the balance of your life right now? You've got some really beautiful, amazing and and intense, let's face it, aspects to your life. How do you balance that all out?

00:24:18:13 - 00:24:31:12
Mark Titus
What are they? First of all, what are the different facets of your life right now? And how do you find balance in these things that are really time, physical, mental, spiritually exhaustive?

00:24:31:14 - 00:24:58:14
Alexandra Climent
Yeah, I mean it's not easy. I would say now more than ever, I've had to make some choices about what's, the priority in my life. Right. So, for example, right now I've had to take a little step away from my woodshop, which is difficult. but the conservation work has really taken over. And the nonprofit that I founded, you know, in order to scale it up to where it needs to be to get the work done, I had to take a step away, because it was very hard to to balance all of that.

00:24:58:14 - 00:25:21:03
Alexandra Climent
Right. It's like such a different, different world when you're in the shop all the time. So I think it's been interesting for people who have been following along with me for all these years to see that transition. but it's also been really beautiful to see the different communities kind of come together. And now you had people that never thought about conservation that are now very interested in, in the conservation work I do.

00:25:21:05 - 00:25:40:13
Alexandra Climent
So right now, I would say that I spend about half the year in Panama. That's usually ends up working out. And then the rest of the time I'm in New York and even though I would like to be in the field all the time, the work that I have to do back here is also important because I'm doing a bunch of fundraising.

00:25:40:15 - 00:26:05:07
Alexandra Climent
right now we are working to build a corridor, connecting indigenous land in this big patch of deforestation. And, you know, a lot of that work that I have to do is convincing people that these this, this area matters. And, it a lot is going into that, like, looking at all the different properties and creating this, all these different maps that I, you know, I'm teaching myself all of these new things.

00:26:05:07 - 00:26:22:10
Alexandra Climent
So just to emphasize that it's like important to have a balance between the field and then back home here and whenever I have time or I'm, commissioned a piece, I can kind of do my woodworking slower. I think people can kind of understand that, like clients that I have for the woodworking, they know that I'm in the field.

00:26:22:10 - 00:26:28:16
Alexandra Climent
They know that my work takes a long time to make. So they're understandable as the process is is more slow.

00:26:28:18 - 00:26:39:19
Mark Titus
Well, just asking for a friend. If someone did want to commission you for a piece of art. What? What are you talking about in terms of the the turnaround for something like that? I'm really curious.

00:26:39:21 - 00:26:57:21
Alexandra Climent
Yeah, it really depends, you know, on the piece, if it's if it's, a dining table or a coffee table, you know, that I could take. I mean, this is just if I'm not in the field, you know, that could take a couple, like, maybe 6 to 8 weeks. no, I mean, that's like, for something small, like a coffee table.

00:26:58:02 - 00:27:12:14
Alexandra Climent
I think if you're talking about a sculpture or, like a larger, piece, like a table, you know, that can take six months. It could take a year. the sculptures take a really long time. one shell that I made took me about a year to make.

00:27:12:16 - 00:27:13:07
Mark Titus
I.

00:27:13:09 - 00:27:17:02
Alexandra Climent
It's just the sculpture part. Not not even the rest of the of the piece.

00:27:17:04 - 00:27:44:20
Mark Titus
Wow. Well, that feels to me like you're still flying. That I was going to say months to years for the tables, even. But, we'll maybe talk about that later on. Down, down the line offline. Some more. I'm super curious about it. endangered Rainforest Rescue is the name of your NGO. tell us about it. How did how did it format in your mind?

00:27:44:22 - 00:27:50:02
Mark Titus
what is your primary function? What is your primary purpose, and where are you with it now?

00:27:50:04 - 00:28:10:08
Alexandra Climent
Sure. so I've been doing the conservation work. I'd say, for the last 7 or 8 years, but I officially formed the nonprofit organization Endangered Rainforest Rescue almost two years ago now. and that was because I really saw the need to amplify the work that I was doing and scale it up quickly because of the deforestation that was happening.

00:28:10:10 - 00:28:37:13
Alexandra Climent
So my work, in the nonprofit, we were proudly a woman and indigenous land organization. most of my team is based in Panama. I'm kind of the only one that pops back and forth. And the project started out really with these expeditions to find endangered tree species. So, you know, when I had left Guyana, when I got the wood back and then came to the dairy and got for the first time, my mission was to find these lost kind of endangered tree species.

00:28:37:15 - 00:29:06:02
Alexandra Climent
So basically, in the beginning, we would go on these long expeditions into the middle of the Darién Gap, for example, and map and locate these trees and collect their seeds. So over the years, we've set up a couple different nurseries and different indigenous communities, basically where we grow all of the seedlings that are the seeds that we collect from the forest, grow them into seedlings, and then when they're ready, we plant them out in areas that have been deforested.

00:29:06:04 - 00:29:29:18
Alexandra Climent
So that was kind of like the basis of the organization. Now, we really kind of, I want to say change it up. It's still the same thing. But right now we've taken on a really big goal of this corridor that I mentioned to you before. So it's a very ambitious project. and if I can just I'm going to use my hands.

00:29:29:18 - 00:29:30:19
Alexandra Climent
But so, so sorry.

00:29:30:20 - 00:29:32:09
Mark Titus
Please do that.

00:29:32:11 - 00:29:33:21
Alexandra Climent
Please do your.

00:29:33:23 - 00:29:36:09
Mark Titus
Hands. Friendly show here.

00:29:36:11 - 00:30:05:15
Alexandra Climent
So imagine so the area that we're working, it's the largest patch of deforestation in the area. And it's surrounded by on three sides, protected areas. Right. So right in that middle of deforestation is Panama's longest river that you cannot see. And we're kind of using that river as a guideline to create a protected area. So actually the the there's some that's like fragmented forest happening in between this corridor.

00:30:05:15 - 00:30:29:11
Alexandra Climent
Right. And most of the deforestation is from cattle ranching. So you have, for example, the jaguar that is walking this really thin line of forest through the corridor. and to me, you know, listen, I know people love jaguars, I love jaguars, but it's really just a way to get people to, to pay attention because the jaguar is a sign right, of biodiversity.

00:30:29:13 - 00:30:48:21
Alexandra Climent
So we have a plethora of endemic and endangered tree species in this corridor. So we're trying to close it. We're trying to protect it. We're trying to buy the land, put it into protective trust, have the local people manage it. And in the patches of, deforested land, we're going to put back in native forests. That's my specialty.

00:30:48:21 - 00:31:19:23
Alexandra Climent
Right. So all of those and those species of endangered trees where we have mapped, we're going to gather those seeds and we're going to grow them, and we're going to plant in native forest in all of that fragmentation and then connect it, connect those to the protected land. So, this is a really exciting project that will probably take ten years, but it's almost like one of those legacy projects, because if you look at a map, you'll be able to see, how much of an impact this will have on the area of the dairy.

00:31:19:23 - 00:31:49:02
Alexandra Climent
And now, just to backtrack a little bit, I, the dairy guy, like I said before, has more biodiversity per square foot than the Amazon. But what's really interesting is that we, a lot of us that we only hear about the Amazon, Amazon is huge. It's very important to protect, but it's very difficult. The Darion guy is relatively small, and its geographical significance is not to be understated as an important factor for global weather.

00:31:49:05 - 00:32:09:02
Alexandra Climent
Right. But we lose one catch of forest. we're kind of screwed, but it's a very tangible goal. We can actually do it. We can we can cut off deforestation from happening in that area. And that's what I'm trying to do.

00:32:09:04 - 00:32:43:16
Mark Titus
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00:32:43:18 - 00:33:07:22
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00:33:08:00 - 00:33:23:02
Mark Titus
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00:33:23:04 - 00:33:47:23
Mark Titus
This is, beautiful and exciting, and it's motivating. it's really inspiring. And it feels tangible. And it also, though, feels like so much to learn and to get a grasp about. I mean, we're going to go into your partnerships here in just a second, but.

00:33:48:01 - 00:34:21:16
Mark Titus
Clearly you had, you have to have an understanding of botany of, of trees, of biology in some sense. Is this something you learned in school? Have you learned on the go? I'm guessing there's a large part in your partnerships that's tucked into this as well. But, you know, I'm just kind of astonished by all of the things that you're able to handle and to hold simultaneously, and have a cogent understanding in order to do that work.

00:34:21:18 - 00:34:24:04
Mark Titus
Where did that understanding come from?

00:34:24:06 - 00:34:50:16
Alexandra Climent
Sure. I mean, I am proudly, a citizen scientist. I taught, myself pretty much everything, but I would say I learned the most from the indigenous communities and the local people on the ground. and this is something I like to speak about because I think it's really important, especially during this time when there is such an urgency to protect our planet that, you know, a lot of us don't have time to go to school anymore, right?

00:34:50:19 - 00:35:12:06
Alexandra Climent
We need to do the work. So there's always been a barrier. I think, academia can be fantastic, but there's a financial barrier. there's a time barrier. And it's really, you know, something that's not accessible to everybody. So I am self-taught with the woodworking, and I'm self-taught with the science. And, you know, I did years of research, and I do it when I'm back here in New York.

00:35:12:06 - 00:35:39:11
Alexandra Climent
All I'm doing is reading up on trees and trying to understand how to identify them easier. reading all these books and at the end of the day, most of the most of what I learned is from the people. And there's a lack of research already in this area. And what I was always thinking about when I was reading about these trees that are identified, for example, was, well, what about, you know, this book was written ten years ago.

00:35:39:11 - 00:35:50:23
Alexandra Climent
What about all of the other things that have happened since? There's got to be other trees that are endangered that we're not even considering. So what do you do, you ask? The people who live there who have standard things there?

00:35:51:00 - 00:35:51:19
Mark Titus
Absolutely.

00:35:51:21 - 00:36:18:08
Alexandra Climent
So when I say endangered tree species, some of them are the IUCN Red list, which does a great job. It's a, you know, a global database of species that are endangered. You know, they have their list that I pull from of what what's considered endangered. But I will also incorporate on my list of what's considered endangered, what the people on the ground tell me as endangered because they'll tell me, hey, I haven't seen this species of tree, you know, for the last ten years.

00:36:18:08 - 00:36:37:19
Alexandra Climent
And it's not even there's no data on it. So, learning from those people is everything. And I think we all need to be more open minded to do that. And I also want to give people the confidence that, like at any moment in your life, you can go learn something. You don't have to put yourself into debt, you know, going to school to do so.

00:36:37:21 - 00:37:13:14
Mark Titus
Well, I think cultural attitudes toward mandatory college enrollment for, quote unquote success in life are shifting dramatically these days anyways. And I know lots of people that are like, you are I'm one of them. Two are self-taught in many things. friend up in British Columbia, Alexandra Morton, who's lived in in place around salmon and then salmon farms that have come in and mostly, you know, learning about, observation.

00:37:13:15 - 00:37:40:05
Mark Titus
My friend Tom Douglas, who's a chef, he, he learned all self-taught on the ground as well. It's what I'm hearing from you. Is this internal combustion inside of yourself to seek out that which brings wonder and joy and curiosity in your life, and then stopping at nothing to learn about it and to the fullest extent. And that's incredibly admirable.

00:37:40:07 - 00:37:50:20
Mark Titus
you've you've stated up front that you're proudly woman and indigenous led and partnered. Why is that so important to you?

00:37:50:22 - 00:38:13:19
Alexandra Climent
Sure. I mean, you know, from what I told you before about being 19, 20, 20 years old, you know, going to the jungle, being a woman, all of these things, it was like I had to break down a lot of barriers. and often we see organizations, and, you know, this isn't just about being a woman and being indigenous, but it's about like having people that don't come from the same class background as well.

00:38:13:20 - 00:38:20:02
Alexandra Climent
Right? Like we're talking about class issues, and, in tandem with cultural issues as well.

00:38:20:03 - 00:38:20:12
Mark Titus
Sure.

00:38:20:15 - 00:38:40:11
Alexandra Climent
So, I always like to, to highlight that too. and, you know, being indigenous, like, I mean, it's a no brainer. I mean, it's it's their forest. It's it's they've taught me everything. So, there is no school that they could go to where they learn any more than they need to living in this environment, which is the most beautiful thing in the world.

00:38:40:11 - 00:38:59:19
Alexandra Climent
We don't, it's just, I mean, and this is going outside your question, but just that they live in a place where they have a symbiotic relationship with the forest. Everything around them is what they need. You know, it's a truly sustainable way of life. So having them be at the forefront of the organization is very, very important.

00:38:59:21 - 00:39:10:13
Alexandra Climent
And being a woman is important to just to show other women that it's possible, right, that, that that you can do this. We often see a lot of conservation organizations, run by men.

00:39:10:15 - 00:39:39:02
Mark Titus
Good on you. Great answers. can you give us a big picture on why you've you've given us little snippets all along the way. and it's making sense to me perfectly. But why from a global perspective, why is the gap so important and what would paint a picture for us? What are we looking at there when we if we were to set our feet down on terra firma, what would we say?

00:39:39:04 - 00:40:00:05
Alexandra Climent
Yeah, I mean, this is one of the most exciting things for me to always, explain to people because I just think it's fascinating. so the Darién Gap is, a little patch of rainforest that connects North and South America. So previously you had, North and South America, where two separated continents, but then the ocean, you know, in between there were not connected.

00:40:00:07 - 00:40:23:22
Alexandra Climent
And millions of years ago, because of all these different cool things that happen over time, the Darien Gap rose up and connected the Americas for the first time. So this area is a connector of the Americas. And what this means, back then, is that it opened up migratory pathways for animal and plant species between the Americas for the first time.

00:40:24:00 - 00:40:49:15
Alexandra Climent
and also what's fascinating, too, is that the mountains, they rose up and down out of the water over millions of years as well. So a lot of species were trapped on these mountaintops. And that's why you have so many endemic species that are yet to be discovered in this area. So from the perspective of globally, you have a forest that has some of the highest carbon stocks in the world.

00:40:49:17 - 00:41:17:13
Alexandra Climent
you have a forest that is, again, like I said, relatively small compared to the Amazon. But you have every different type of ecosystem. You have upper montane forest, lower montane for a swamp, forest fires, you have coastal forests. And it's all in this very tiny place, cloud forest. so it's really like the Darien Gap is kind of like the Garden of Eden, you know, that's I like to describe it.

00:41:17:15 - 00:41:23:12
Mark Titus
incredible. my light switches are all. I'm going to try to stay focused here.

00:41:23:14 - 00:41:24:08
Alexandra Climent
I like.

00:41:24:10 - 00:41:27:14
Mark Titus
Like, got seven things that just lit up. but. Oh, I.

00:41:27:14 - 00:41:30:23
Alexandra Climent
Thought you would like physically, your light switches were going off, and I'm like,

00:41:31:01 - 00:41:52:11
Mark Titus
I would be a good trick to that. Would be that special effects here? Yeah. it's in Panama. how is it working with the Panamanian government? Do you have any kind of interaction? Is it is there any friction? There is that have been a decent experience. And and what's it like working with the Panamanian people writ large.

00:41:52:13 - 00:42:17:01
Alexandra Climent
Right. I mean, Panamanian people are they're the they're the ones that made me want to work in this country to begin with. I mean, just the most open, loving people, curious people, that I've ever met. so they've been fantastic. And I think, you know, historically, for most Panamanians, they don't hear about the Darien Gap from a place of, ecological significance.

00:42:17:01 - 00:42:39:05
Alexandra Climent
They hear about the Darién Gap, and they're just told never to go there because it's too dangerous. So it's been really interesting over the years, with my Panamanian friends, like, convincing them, to think about this place in a different way. and it's kind of. I'm been working on, you know, I hate the word marketing, but, you know, the marketing of the Darién in a different way.

00:42:39:07 - 00:43:11:00
Alexandra Climent
and to speak to the government, there's a there's a lot of issues, historically with the government in Panama. I can get into that and ramble on for another hour. But I will say that they just had an election, and the new, Minister of the environment has been very open to helping, conservation projects. So he's I'm very excited, about his, you know, part of the government where he's working and what they may do.

00:43:11:02 - 00:43:33:22
Alexandra Climent
Have they done it yet? You know, it's it's remains to be seen. But I think that after the protest, there was mass protests back in October against, an illegal Canadian mining contract. And since that, there's been a new pride in keeping Panama green. so I think that the government has kind of, latched on to that, which is good.

00:43:33:22 - 00:43:56:06
Alexandra Climent
It's putting pressure on them to care more about the environment. And there's a new sense of pride in the Panamanian people. You know, you mentioned Costa Rica before. That's a country that's very prideful for the eco kind of conscious. Right. and Panama has that same potential, but they've never focused on it. It's always been more about the economy and development and growth.

00:43:56:08 - 00:44:01:07
Alexandra Climent
but they still have a lot of work to do, a ton of work to do.

00:44:01:09 - 00:44:14:13
Mark Titus
What would you you mentioned ten year window here. in terms of a project, what to what does success look like to you in a ten year time? Time horizon?

00:44:14:15 - 00:44:43:05
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. I mean, when we're talking about the the corridor, I think getting a lot of that land secured and out of the hands of people who are coming down and clearing it is a major success. I think the scariest thing to me is not doing that right. and those patches of forest that are still intact. I'm scared that people are going to come in there and cut them, just to graze cattle, even though there's plenty of cattle places to do that that are already cut, they're still coming in rapidly.

00:44:43:07 - 00:45:04:06
Alexandra Climent
So success to me is protecting that land and having something tangible to point to. Because if we can do this, and people start to see it, we can do this in other areas of Panama. And as I described before, the Darién Gap and the Panama as a country, you know, it is the ecological corridor of the Americas.

00:45:04:08 - 00:45:22:15
Alexandra Climent
So we need to keep that intact if we can do it with this one corridor in the Darién, which is the most important part of Panama, in my opinion. we can do it and others. So, there's lots of different ways I can answer that. I mean, success comes in the strangest. You know, it doesn't need to be this big thing that always happens, right?

00:45:22:15 - 00:45:47:01
Alexandra Climent
Sometimes the small moments I reached. I recently had an organization that I brought down with me that wants to help, you know, raise funds for the properties that we need to buy. I mean, that was huge. That was success in itself, just to get another organization to see the work, see the corridor and care about it. So there's there's things all the time, you know, even just finding a seed that's so successful to me.

00:45:47:03 - 00:46:11:21
Mark Titus
Yeah. You're you're reading my mind, you're skipping down to already that's I was going to ask you next about the, the orgs that you're partnered with. folks involved in making these land purchases, or are you working with folks like Eco Trust or others that are Nature Conservancy? Obviously comes to mind. but is that kind of the model that you're thinking about?

00:46:11:23 - 00:46:22:15
Mark Titus
Land purchases reallocation toward regenerative, sustainable? place based and indigenous people based stewardship?

00:46:22:17 - 00:46:51:01
Alexandra Climent
Yes. Basically, that's the whole idea. And also incorporating know people that live in the area that are not selling their land. Right. Because it's very important, I think, what a lot of, people and organizations, miss is not putting the local people at the forefront of these projects that are in there. Right? So if you it's great. If you can buy a bunch of land, put it into a trust, have it locally, run indigenous, run lead, but you still run the risk of it being destroyed.

00:46:51:03 - 00:47:20:21
Alexandra Climent
And that's that's half the problem, right? You need to have safeguards in place to keep that land actually protected. So what we're also incorporating is working with, cattle ranchers on the ground who want to keep their cows. we need to put back forest on their land if we can. So the approach that we're kind of working on is switching them over to, rotational grazing, for example, where we can they can do their cattle on a lot less land, sometimes even less than half.

00:47:20:23 - 00:47:46:19
Alexandra Climent
And then in exchange, we put back a native forest on the other part of their property. And through that, it's just a win win for everyone because they are experiencing the effects of, of of the weather changing of, less trees. There's droughts. It's they're not making as much money with the cattle anymore. The cows are dying. so it's a win win for everybody to put back to the forest.

00:47:46:20 - 00:48:00:16
Alexandra Climent
But basically that that's the model that we have with them. And of course, if we can get them off cows, and into some sort of permaculture, we try to push for that as well. So go ahead.

00:48:00:18 - 00:48:01:11
Mark Titus
Finish your thought.

00:48:01:15 - 00:48:06:04
Alexandra Climent
But oh no, I was just going to jump back into, the organizations that we partner with.

00:48:06:04 - 00:48:07:19
Mark Titus
So please do. Yeah.

00:48:07:19 - 00:48:33:05
Alexandra Climent
Very, very excited to say that we are partnering with Saving Nature, which is an organization that's, that's focused on corridor. So something that I've been, you know, screaming at the top of my lungs about is like how important it is to connect forests. Like we have all of this fragmentation happening between these beautiful, intact forests. So when you have this fragmentation, you species can't can't move as normal.

00:48:33:05 - 00:48:51:21
Alexandra Climent
Right. It's disruption. So if we're reforesting, we don't want to reforest in just some random area of deforestation. I mean, that's great, but we want to do it in areas that are where connecting to make a larger impact. So it's not just a dairy and it's not just Panama, it's the Americas. Right. That's that's how we want to have impact for more.

00:48:51:21 - 00:49:11:07
Alexandra Climent
We grow these native forest. So that's what saving nature does, is they help facilitate that. So they are our kind of main partner right now to start the funding of these properties. But like you mentioned The Nature Conservancy, there's some other organizations that we've had contact with and rewild. We're not officially partnered with them, but I have a great contact there.

00:49:11:07 - 00:49:26:08
Alexandra Climent
So we're all kind of pooling our, ideas now that this corridor really came together. Now that I put together the mapping for it and the vision, it's it's like we can present it in a way, where I think a lot more of these organizations are going to want to get involved.

00:49:26:10 - 00:50:07:07
Mark Titus
Beautiful card. You're doing it. All right. The other piece that you hinted at that I was super curious about is you're so right. You can have these grand dreams and expectations and, and, you know, goalposts, but it's really being in the now. And I get a sense from looking at your social media and the media that you've put out, that there are some really satisfying moments in the now, can you maybe describe some of the, maybe a couple of the most satisfying feelings you've had doing this work on the ground in Panama storm?

00:50:07:09 - 00:50:31:17
Alexandra Climent
I mean, there's so many that come to mind, but on one of our recent, reforestation trips that we did, we were kind of busy. The seedlings were ready to be put back into the forest, and we were reforesting on this kind of the edge of a mountain. And I had a small team with me that there was about five of us, six of us, but we had, you know, a couple hundred seedlings maybe, that we had to carry up into the mountains.

00:50:31:17 - 00:50:52:17
Alexandra Climent
And this happens often, but we started to load them up. We had these little backpacks, and all of a sudden our team of 5 or 6, like, turned into double and triple. And then we had like 20 people come in to help us, on this trip. And it was just all members of the community that kind of like, walked out and started to carry, you know, plan.

00:50:52:17 - 00:51:19:09
Alexandra Climent
So you had little kids that were carrying just one little seedling, and they hiked up the mountain, and it was just this beautiful reminder of coming together on this. And I, I was just so overwhelmed with emotion. Like I said, even though there's been moments like that before where the community is kind of out, but it just made me really understand, how you can inspire other people as well, like all of these people that weren't previously interested in this just coming and helping and feeling so pride.

00:51:19:09 - 00:51:37:02
Alexandra Climent
So at the end of the day, like that, that was so beautiful to me. So there's so many moments like that. And I mean, even just going back to the trees that I've mapped and seeing that they're still there, right? These, these old growth trees that are producing seeds, they're not easy to find anymore, some of these species.

00:51:37:04 - 00:51:46:18
Alexandra Climent
So when I go back and I'm able to see it and their seeds on the ground, it's just overwhelming. I get overwhelmed in emotion.

00:51:46:20 - 00:52:25:00
Mark Titus
you are living a very rich life. A very full life. one that is seems like it's moving fast. I can identify with that, too. when you're in that rainforest, do you take time for yourself to be present, like you just mentioned, a moment of, observing, but is there something there in that connected space with those ancient trees and the people that have been there for time immemorial that allows you to really tap into the now?

00:52:25:02 - 00:52:51:13
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. I mean, I'm fortunate to have so many of those moments just even throughout the day there. Right? Because there's no service. There's no cell service. And every moment I'm waking up and having breakfast with the local community to dinner and laughing and sometimes some chicha, which is like an alcoholic drink that they make, you know, there's there's so many moments throughout that when we're not doing the physical work, but we're just talking to each other.

00:52:51:15 - 00:53:11:03
Alexandra Climent
so there's a people connection for sure. Just times on the beach, one of my nurseries is located on the Pacific coast, in the Darien region. when you're almost in Colombia, I don't know if that makes sense. but it's it's called time work zones and beach. And it's very, very hard to get to very difficult.

00:53:11:03 - 00:53:30:23
Alexandra Climent
So you have a beach with nobody on it except for the local community. and I just get to sit there every day after being in the fields with the kids and watch them play and just watch the sunset and it's just, I still get so emotional about it. It doesn't matter how many times I've been there.

00:53:31:01 - 00:53:53:17
Alexandra Climent
And yeah, to me, that ocean forest connection, there's just something so beautiful about that. Like calling back to my sculptures with my shells. It's like we spend the whole day in the dense tropical forest which backs right up to the beach. but there's something so beautiful about going into the forest, sweating, being covered in bug bites and then coming out to that ocean at the end of the day.

00:53:53:19 - 00:54:12:20
Alexandra Climent
And when you're surrounded by these trees and as far as and these sounds like there's nothing more like it's funny because there's no humans, but there's nothing more human about it, because it's like, that's where part of it where, like, you feel the vibrations. It's like. It's like you don't even need to, like, it's the best job in the world, right?

00:54:12:20 - 00:54:30:07
Alexandra Climent
It's like, because you're just your whole body just absorbs, the frequency of all of the biodiversity that's around us. So sorry if that was a long winded way to answer your your question, but it's I get it's when you even think about it, I start to feel those feelings.

00:54:30:09 - 00:54:35:20
Mark Titus
You went right to the heart of it and I got nothing to add. It's beautiful.

00:54:35:22 - 00:54:37:20
Alexandra Climent
Thanks.

00:54:37:22 - 00:55:04:22
Mark Titus
You know, I think some of our listeners probably are thinking from a practical level. Are you what what kind of measures are you taking to take care of yourself like this is this is not you know, this is not walking in the suburbs. just the travel, the, the the people that might, might have nefarious, ill will along the way.

00:55:05:00 - 00:55:11:17
Mark Titus
you know, the, the rainforest itself. I'm guessing there's venomous snakes, I'm guessing. How do you take care of yourself during all this?

00:55:11:19 - 00:55:32:06
Alexandra Climent
Yeah. it's always something that I have to work on. Because when you're doing something like this, it's constant. There's never a moment where I feel like I'm not working. Right. And so I think something that I've found that's very important for me recently is trying to surround myself with people who have a similar worldview and outlook on life.

00:55:32:08 - 00:55:51:07
Alexandra Climent
I think that oftentimes we kind of get absorbed into communities. Or when I'm back in New York, for example, you know, people that you just know in your whole life and that brings a whole different perspective on things, and that's great. But there's something about having other people that you can speak to about these types of things.

00:55:51:09 - 00:56:14:11
Alexandra Climent
So that's something that I'm really trying to cultivate in the last couple of years, especially since things have intensified. you know, I think a big break for me, where I needed it mentally was after the protests in October, in Panama, my friend lost his eye. he was shot by the police with a pellet gun.

00:56:14:13 - 00:56:37:10
Alexandra Climent
And I, you know, there was so much emotion in that, I think being in the street and protesting alongside everybody was healing. but it was just so much to think about. Like, all all that I'm doing in the forest, and it's like people are still getting hurt every day. You know, the world is in such a state.

00:56:37:10 - 00:56:58:15
Alexandra Climent
There's other things going on that, deeply affect me. And you start to I started to think like, what is does what I do even matter? You know, it's own this much? and that's when I kind of knew that I had to, to take a step for myself and just mentally take care of myself. And talking to my friend Aubrey, who lost his eye.

00:56:58:17 - 00:57:28:09
Alexandra Climent
He's actually the one that was like, healing me, you know, from being upset about what happened to him. And it's because he also has a connection to nature and he understands the relationships and how our current society, is very destructive and I need to be around that. So again, a long way to answer your question, but I wish I could just tell you, like I go to the spa once in a while, but I don't really get to it doesn't really work for me, although, I'm not.

00:57:28:09 - 00:57:31:15
Mark Titus
Sure I'd buy it if you said that.

00:57:31:16 - 00:57:38:13
Alexandra Climent
I mean, even, like, cutting my hair. Like I haven't had a haircut, like three years. I'm like, I should go do that. That would be probably a good thing.

00:57:38:15 - 00:58:09:14
Mark Titus
Wow. You know, I, I so get what you're saying. And especially on the level of surround yourself with people that feel the same way. And I mean, in a really heartfelt sense, I had the privilege of recently going to a wedding and taking photographs for a dear friend of mine from up in Bristol Bay, Alaska, who's a wonderful person and a really strong and inspiring indigenous leader.

00:58:09:16 - 00:58:37:07
Mark Titus
And, the whole time I was there, I was feeling so home. And I've been, I've been thinking about it since I got back and I think a large part of that is that these are folks that are have thousands of years of generational knowledge of this land and love, deep love and understanding of the land. I'm a newcomer.

00:58:37:08 - 00:59:04:20
Mark Titus
also, my heart is tied to that land. it's it's totally, you know, completely taken me. And so coming from that place, reuniting with folks like that and, having that common ground of work of of working towards something that you love saving, something you love. In Bristol Bay's case, it's keeping a giant open pit copper mine out of the headwaters of its salmon rivers.

00:59:04:21 - 00:59:29:06
Mark Titus
And in your case, clearly it's about preserving and and re flourishing this beautiful rainforest that makes you feel like you're home and you've got a common language. So everything you said makes perfect sense to me. And, I too wish it was as easy as saying, I'll just take a spa day. Maybe I should anyways.

00:59:29:06 - 00:59:32:01
Alexandra Climent
But yeah, I mean, I should.

00:59:32:03 - 01:00:02:03
Mark Titus
Yeah, yeah, that's a good thing too. Well, hey, speaking of, kind of more localized things, you're in New York and a lot of our listeners will know what the Explorers Club is. Some don't. So, would you do us a kindness and let us know what the Explorers Club is? And then what does it mean to you to be listed as a next generation explorer by said Explorers Club?

01:00:02:03 - 01:00:03:23
Mark Titus
And congratulations, by the way, that's a no.

01:00:03:23 - 01:00:27:19
Alexandra Climent
Thank you, thank you. Yeah. the Explorers Club is a really cool, fantastic, interesting place. and it's kind of this headquarters where explorers can meet from all around the world. So, I mean, it's been on my radar for a long time. I had a lot of people telling me like to, to join and apply for membership, and it was just kind of always on my list.

01:00:27:19 - 01:01:00:05
Alexandra Climent
And I think it was two years ago now. I finally got my application in and, they accepted me as a member and chose me to speak, at their next generation Explorer Summit. like, I think it was even before I officially became a member. So it was a really interesting introduction into the club. And, I mean, I think historically the club, it's it's filled with people that have done exploration and scientists, astronauts, people who have made such contributions to science.

01:01:00:07 - 01:01:23:21
Alexandra Climent
And the club is trying to lean more in an inclusive direction as well. You know, having younger people in the club, having more women, having more indigenous people. So it's I'm an honored to be part and considered in next generation explorer there. And I think it's it's just an incredible resource to have access to other people who are trying to do, to save the world in a lot of regards.

01:01:23:21 - 01:01:50:07
Alexandra Climent
Right. So it's all about coming together. and the club is a great place for that. So this year, I actually was chosen to speak again as a next generation explorer during Climate Week and to mention climate Week. There's just there's such a fantastic programing there, right, where people from the outside can come and learn. So yeah, I mean, if any listeners are ever in New York and want to check out the club, it's always a great place to go.

01:01:50:09 - 01:01:55:09
Mark Titus
Great. And when would that, speaking event take place?

01:01:55:11 - 01:02:07:18
Alexandra Climent
Oh, sure. So Climate Week in New York is, I think the last week in September. my talk is on the 25th of September. 230. Wonderful club.

01:02:07:20 - 01:02:29:15
Mark Titus
Well, that is something to look forward to. And when I get back east, I will make sure to check it out. And we should definitely connect in, in, for the capacity. I'm so inspired by this conversation today, Alexandra. I can't I can't even tell you an hour is not nearly enough here. We I think we just kind of scratched the surface.

01:02:29:17 - 01:02:54:10
Mark Titus
your work, for you listeners, Alexandra's work is going to be featured in our show notes, linking to all of the artwork and the, the endangered reef rainforest rescue link as well, and ways that you can get involved. Alexandra, what if you're going to leave a parting thought for us on how to get involved?

01:02:54:12 - 01:02:59:12
Mark Titus
Best with the work that you're doing. What would you what would you tell us to do?

01:02:59:14 - 01:03:22:07
Alexandra Climent
Sure. I mean, just if you can follow along with what I'm doing, you know, you can find me on social media doing that. I think that will immediately, once you start watching and seeing the places you go, we go, there's a connection. Immediate connection, curiosity. So also, if you can donate, that's always very helpful. What we're trying to do in the corridor, you know, it takes a lot.

01:03:22:09 - 01:03:41:18
Alexandra Climent
and every person has a part to play in that. So again, having that tangible impact, trying to raise money for these properties that we will protect, you can do so on the website. And, you know, in the future, we plan to bring a lot more volunteers down to the gap. We have a lot of work to do as we start to acquire more of these properties to reforest.

01:03:41:18 - 01:03:49:12
Alexandra Climent
So in the future, you know, there may be a lot of opportunities for people to come down to the corridor and help us in the field.

01:03:49:14 - 01:04:21:16
Mark Titus
Well that's incredible. going to ponder that too, man. nobody escapes this show without the bonus round. So you are unfortunately going to get, interrogated with this question. And it's fun, I promise. but we're just do a little thought exercise with climate change, rising waters. Let's just pretend for a moment it's not happening, but pretend that your your house is going to get inundated with water and you only had time to get out your loved ones, including your pups or your your critters.

01:04:21:18 - 01:04:26:07
Mark Titus
And you can only take one physical thing. What would that one physical thing be?

01:04:26:08 - 01:04:52:14
Alexandra Climent
Oh, I already know it would be my book called The Trees of Panama and Costa Rica, which is one of the books that I, I well, this I actually lost the original one I had, which is very sad, but it was given to me by my friend's uncle, who, I did a lot of reforestation on his farm in Panama, and it's this beautiful book that was the first kind of insight into me identifying the trees that I'm looking for.

01:04:52:17 - 01:05:07:00
Alexandra Climent
So like I said, with all the lack of research and me trying to find like a needle in the haystack, this book was really, you know, where I started. So I would grab that. And since I lost that version, I was recently given a new copy by a friend at the club who's actually the chair of Climate Week, Alex Moore.

01:05:07:05 - 01:05:12:02
Alexandra Climent
So he he got me this new copy and I will never let it go.

01:05:12:04 - 01:05:34:02
Mark Titus
That's a great answer. And I think you win for fastest answer. Most people have to sit and think about it for a while. So that was awesome. second last part is okay. If it was just one trait about you, one thing that makes Alexandra Alexandra, what would that one thing you take with you be.

01:05:34:03 - 01:06:04:02
Alexandra Climent
That's a harder one to think about. you know the first thing that I'm just going to say, the first thing that came to mind because I've been told that I'm too sensitive of a person. So I think in order to be contrary to all those people that told me that I would take my sensitivity, because I think that's what's opened me up to wanting to experience the world and to see other cultures and people as equals.

01:06:04:03 - 01:06:20:09
Alexandra Climent
is my sensitivity and to see the injustices of the world and, people and nations, like the global South, for example, dedicating my life to another place that I feel like we've taken so much from. So I think I would take my sensitivity also.

01:06:20:09 - 01:06:30:14
Mark Titus
Beautiful. You are doing great work. I'm so inspired. And, Alexandra Clement, we will see you down the trail. Thanks for joining us here on the Save What You Love podcast.

01:06:30:20 - 01:06:33:18
Alexandra Climent
You so much for having me. It's been fantastic talking with you.

01:06:33:20 - 01:06:36:07
Mark Titus
You too. Take care.

01:06:36:09 - 01:06:43:21
Music
How do you say what you love?

01:06:43:23 - 01:06:51:14
Music
How do you say what you love?

01:06:51:16 - 01:07:07:15
Music
How do you say what you love? How do you say what you love?

01:07:07:17 - 01:07:31:17
Mark Titus
Thank you for listening to Save What You Love. If you like what you're hearing, you can help keep these conversations coming your way by giving us a rating on whatever platform you're listening from and leaving a comment on Apple Podcasts. It really helps get the word out. Check out photos on our Instagram feed. We're at Save What You Love podcast, and you can get links from today's featured guest in the show notes of this episode.

01:07:31:19 - 01:08:00:15
Mark Titus
Join our growing community by subscribing to our newsletter at evaswild.com, and then clicking on connect in the upper corner. You'll get exclusive offers on wild salmon shipped to your door, and notifications about upcoming guests and more great content on the way. That said, Evaswild.com the word save spelled backwards, wild.com. This episode was produced by Emilie Firn and edited by Patrick Troll.

01:08:00:17 - 01:08:06:13
Mark Titus
Original music was created by Whiskey Class. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you all down the trail.

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