Luquillo Mountains: Overwhelming Complexity

I was in San Salvador, El Salvador, 2 weeks ago and I got so used to the green landscape that it looked homogeneous to me. I didn't really go into the forests, however, so from afar it just looked like a green mass. When I came to PR a week ago, then, I was slightly disappointed to see that same green mass. Walking into the forest today was so overwhelming though. As Tim and Ashley began to detail the various plants and what made them different I began to notice how complex this greenery actually is.

I began to see the leaf litter on the floor mixed with insects, decomposing logs, and clay-like, almost orange dirt. It is always wet and humid, accelerating the decomposing process. The various ferns began to distinguish themselves in the understory, only to be engulfed in the frenzy of the canopy, linked by the tangle of vines, varying from green to brown, from a soft stem to a woody one, growing from the ground up or hanging about. I was fascinated by the bromeliads, a type of epiphyte in the pineapple family that grow on the branches of canopy trees. The bromeliad doesn't perforate the tree as it grows on the tree branch, rather it gets its nutrients from the decomposing materials within its tank, as well as from material in the air which it catches with the fuzzy hairs on its leaves. Its like a mini-ecosystem all on its own!
It is a good thing that I read last night, so although it still felt overwhelmingly complex, I could appreciate the variety more. In that sense I can see how reading and research is key; otherwise, the forest would have continued to seems like a green bulk to me.

With this greater appreciation I feel eager to share my knowledge with my boyfriend Omar, who is a native puertorican and is studying tourism, especially "ecotourism". We were talking last week about how the tourism industry is not achieving its maximum potential because there is such a focus on hotel building and on beach lounging. Few people who come to PR come to discover the local riches, riches such as El Yunque, the Fajardo bioluminescent bays, or small eateries of antojitos, intent instead on the heavy tourist spots. Moreover, even if they skirt these trite spots for more obscure areas, how will they know what they are looking at? But I suppose that is the fault of the very tour companies/guides in PR--they have to be well-versed in their own treasures in order to adequately present them to outsiders.

As such, I'm excited to show Omar the rough organization of the rain forest, and what I've learned so far about plant identification. Another question arises from this, however. How does one frame a message to the the local people about the treasures they actually have? How can a highly urbanized mass, intent on service economics, urban jobs, etc., learn to appreciate and protect the beauty and recognize the services that their surrounding nature provides them?