Why Goodall feels lucky she grew up in WW-II

MUMBAI: sAt 90, renowned British primatologist, ethologist, anthropologist and conservationist Dr Jane Goodall, who demonstrated to the scientific world that chimpanzees have minds capable of solving problems and emotions like happiness, sadness, fear and despair, calls herself an obstinate person. Her stubbornness stems from her mother’s advice to her at 10, when she wanted to go to Africa to live with wild animals and write books about them. Everybody laughed at her, saying “you are just a girl, you cannot do things like that”. But her mother understood her dream.

“This was 80 years ago, and the world was different. But my mother said ‘if that is what you really want to do, then you are going to really have to work very hard, take advantage of every opportunity, and if you don’t give up, I am sure you will find your way’. And I did,” said Goodall to a packed auditorium of parents and children at the Museum of Solutions (MuSo), Lower Parel, on Saturday.

She walked in with Mr H, a stuffed monkey eating a banana, which was gifted to her by Gary Haun, a blind former US Marine. Her travel companion of 33 years, Mr H has accompanied her to 60 countries.

To celebrate the zoologist’s birthday, a travelling exhibition, called ‘Celebrating Jane’, was hosted at MuSo in August. It was designed to be an engaging and immersive experience for visitors of all ages, with five zones that took them through her journey, from early life to ground-breaking work with the primates in Africa.

In 1960, Goodall, all of 26, took off to the Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania, to observe and record the behaviour of chimpanzees under her mentor anthropologist Louis Leakey. For four months, chimpanzees ran away from her. Finally, one of them, David Greybeard, began accepting her and showing that chimpanzees can use and make tools to fish termites, for instance.

“This wouldn’t be exciting today because we know that many animals including octopus and pigs use tools. But back then, it caused chaos in the scientific world because it was considered that only humans used to make tools,” said Goodall, whose mentor pushed her to do a PhD in animal behaviour from Cambridge University so that scientists could take her seriously.

On her first trip to India, Goodall, DBE, founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and UN Messenger of Peace, is part of her historic Hope Global Tour from November 16-19. The highlight of her India visit is to showcase ‘Roots & Shoots,’ the flagship youth programme by the Jane Goodall Institute India (JGII) in collaboration with Godrej Industries, which aims to empower young people to become compassionate leaders for animals, people and the environment.

Earlier on Saturday, Goodall made her first public appearance at the Ocean Literacy Dialogues (OLD) at the CSMVS Museum where she delivered the inaugural lecture titled ‘Great Talk’. India’s first Ocean Literacy Dialogue is in collaboration with UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), the British Council, and the CSMVS Museum. She will deliver the closing address ‘Reasons for Hope’ at Lit Live, on Sunday.

Through her talk at MuSo, Goodall drew parallels between traits of humans and chimpanzees (who she described as our closest living relatives) from love, compassion and true altruism to being capable of violence, brutality and aggression. She added: “Males reach a higher rank in the hierarchy and females are better mothers. This is just one of the ways our closest relatives are like us.”

She said while most animals are “great solutionaries”, those who have failed have gone extinct. She blames humans for pushing them on the verge of extinction. “They need our help now. We need to use our amazing brains to get out of some of the mess we have made. I find it strange that we are the most intellectual creatures to walk on planet. We developed the internet and sent rockets to mars,” said Goodall highlighting that she used the word ‘intellectual’ and not ‘intelligent’.

“Intelligent creatures do not destroy their only home,” she added, referring to the impacts of man-made climate change, loss of biodiversity, loss of soil, industrial agriculture, sea and river pollution, among others. “Humans are finding ways to solve it. And the young should take the lead to restore what we have destroyed,” she said.

Alleviating poverty and sustainable lifestyle is very important and one of the ways to save and conserve forests and wildlife, said Goodall.

“Most of us have more than what we need. I am not suggesting that we become monks and forego all our worldly goods. But if we think about it, we probably can do with a little bit less. For instance, girls can do without an extra dress for a dance or wear the one you wore last year unless you’ve grown out of it,” she said.

Goodall had a suggestion for those who don’t know how to contribute to an already messy world. “Think about what you buy, how it was made, did it harm the environment, was it cruel to animals like the intensive farms, is it cheap labour. If it costs a little bit more, it will mean we value it more,” said Goodall. “I am lucky I grew up in World War-II, everything was valued and rationed. We did not waste a thing and learned to live with what we needed. It helped me understand how wasteful people are and what a different world it would be if we truly valued what we have.”