The allure of alliteration tempts many to talk about the tiny tarsier as a “pint-sized primate” but witty wordplay shouldn’t obscure the more fascinating fact that four or five of them could be packed into a pint. Weighing 3 to 5 ounces, only the mouse lemur tops the tarsier for the coveted crown of “Most Petite Primate.”
We happened to see about a pint of tarsiers at the Philippine Tarsier Sanctuary on the island of Bohol. Tarsiers live on several islands in the Philippines/Indonesia/Malaysia area but are hard to spot in the wild because they are tiny, nocturnal and endangered. Tarsiers spend the night flitting from tree to tree hunting for insects and other meaty morsels (they are the only purely carnivorous primate) and bed down at daybreak, clinging to a branch. In this sanctuary, rangers scour the forest every morning and mark the locations of the sleeping tarsiers so primate fanciers like ourselves can find them easily.
Whenever you observe wildlife, it is best to keep as quiet and still as possible. We were doubly cautious when watching the tarsiers because guides told us that tarsiers will commit suicide in various gruesome ways if they are disturbed or kept in captivity. The concept was simultaneously horrific and darkly comical to us, as we imagined additional ways they could do the act (fashioning their long tails into nooses, etc). This behavior is widely reported on the internet but we couldn’t find any scientific source backing it up. One of the reported suicide methods, holding their breath until suffocated, is likely a physiological impossibility and perhaps evidence that a suicide legend was invented to preserve them in the wild. And it worked — no tarsier in our luggage.
The Chocolate Hills are the other main attraction on Bohol. They are 1,776 pleasingly mammiform limestone mounds rising several hundred feet above the otherwise flat tropical forest. During the dry season, the hills turn brown when the grasses that cover them die (the solid rock doesn’t support the growth of trees). We visited during a semi-dry period so the hills were more mint-chocolate chip than dark chocolate. We viewed them from a hill-top observation platform where we jockeyed for prime selfie position with other tourists and from a beautiful farm nestled among the hills.
Despite the tease of a food-related headline, this posting is not food-focused like our last two. We had a decent meal on a dinner river cruise but it was nothing to write home about (oops, just did). The forest on either side of the river was lit with colorful spotlights; an overall effect somewhere between magical and garish. The joyously un-self-conscious display, and its accompaniment on the dinner-boat by a lounge singer crooning 70’s disco classics, were perfect embodiments of a Filipino ideal of fun, immune to our party-pooping ideas of aesthetics and irony.
We were charmed by Bohol. The island is lush and unhurried, probably like Hawaii 100 years ago. We were also told that it has great beaches. If you ever want to spend a few relaxing days in the Philippines, Bohol would be a perfectly pleasant place.