Tonight, I find myself on dinner duty again. On Fridays, we have pizza. This is nearly exciting. It would be a lot more exciting if there was twice as much food. They say that you can have too much of a good thing. I would argue that this does not apply to carbs. Luckily, following weeks of post-dinner peckishness, this time I am prepared, having saved two of my tucumanas from yesterday. Mario did the same and argues that they are not as nice cold. He is correct, but I am not complaining.

Usually, on Fridays, after dinner, we go to the park cafe – our drinking quarters. Crystal and Raul lead the way, delegating various drinks to be carried by a team behind them. They do, of course, perform a significant amount of carrying themselves. They are commendable leaders. But tonight, they are nowhere to be seen and we are wondering at what time we will set off.

Hours pass and the two of them finally enter the room, and with their emergence, an abrupt change in the atmosphere follows. Something isn’t right. Raul plainly states “annuncio”, a change from the usual time of 8:20am. Nena, the head of the organisation follows, with Ivan, the biologist, Jenn and her husband Felipe. All sit, with Jenn and Ivan standing in the usual spot in which we receive the breakfast news. Jenn’s eyes are red.

There is the obvious question of what we are all doing here? There are 170,000 jaguars in the Amazon rainforest and no one knows the number of pumas. Everyday, cats and monkeys are illegally hunted, poached, sold as pets or will lose their home and perish in forest fires. This park boasts one thousand hectares of land, with, at the time of writing, 40 volunteers dedicating their time and efforts to around 20 felines. It does seem like a lot for such a small slice of a big problem. Why are we all here?

Jenn acknowledges that there have been many staff meetings in the past week and that we may have all realised that something is going on. I already have a feeling I know where this is going. Aeddie has stopped seeing their afternoon cat, Niko. She has grown increasingly shy and has stopped coming to say hello, so Cleo has been checking on her instead. Niko is very old. Jenn explains that it is time to release her from her pain and put her to sleep. Jenn first visited the park in 2013 and will have spent nearly half of her adult life here. She knows every single one of these cats. I knew when I first spoke with her that she is a good one. Her eyes sparkled with kindness. Seeing how affected she is by Niko is testimony to her massive heart. Felipe looks over from the table, also red in the eyes, struggling to see his wife in this pain. Ivan translates the news into Spanish. He is always so full of energy, always smiling and laughing as he talks, but in this instance, his tone is flat, as if a different person is speaking.

Most of us sat down have never worked with Niko. The real sadness is in seeing Jenn and thinking about poor Violette, who has just finished her time here, having spent every afternoon with Niko for the past few months. I think about how I would feel if the news had been about Gaia or Kusiy. I wonder how often a decision like this needs to be made. There was a time, three years ago, when the same decision had to be made for Ru. I remember discovering the news myself. I was in a night club in Cambridge, following a reunion dinner. This was my final wake up call to get a move on and come back here.

So why are we here? It is possible to believe that each time a feline finishes their journey in the sanctuary, that it is just another cat that is passing away. But seeing Jenn this evening is a reminder that this is not the case. It is important to note that these animals are wild, they belong in the wild, and it is a key objective of the charity to make it clear to people that they are not suitable as pets. This is all true, but this mindset misses something important, or at least made me do so. I used to think of a wild jaguar as a predator whose soul purpose in life is to hunt for food and fight for survival. It was when working here nine years ago that I came to realise that every animal has their own unique personality and quirks, whether they be wild or a pet. If Kusiy had never been snatched from his home, he’d still be the silly cat that he is now, just in a different environment. Each and every animal in the park is their own person and Jenn has had the joy of getting to know them all. Niko is not just another cat, nor is any other puma that perishes in the wild. Although the charity can only use its resources to help a handful of animals, every one of them is worth as much as any human life.

We head over to the cafe in a small group. The mood is solemn, but it is Mario’s last night and we are determined to give him a good send off. I head home at about 2am and spend my final moments before bed time eating noodles with Elyse and Tanya. I then wake up at 9am the next day to discover that Mario has already hopped on the morning bus. No big goodbyes. He just slipped away. Perhaps one day I will discover his pizzeria in Bologna and see him again.

There is no electricity in camp today. No one knows why. Upsettingly, this also means no water. Not ideal when one is hungover. Still, we make do and a group of us head into town to buy snacks for the week. With the mood low and many folks wishing to have a day at home, I offer my services as a personal shopper and return to the park with a 10kg bag of fruit (about 8kg of which is for me).

Sunday comes around fast and it is back to the working week. Rain falls heavily all morning and we have only a short walk with Gaia. I nearly fall flat on my face having caught my foot in a vine, and both Aeddie and I shiver in fear as we hear barking in the bushes ahead. It turns out that chanchos bark. I present Gaia with a gift that I had collected for her in the town – a coconut. So begins the new daily affair of hiding Gaia’s favourite new toy in a different spot each morning for her to find at some point during the day.

Kusiy is tired today, so Luca and I work hard clearing a fire break between his enclosure and the surrounding jungle. This involves lugging a great big log around for us to balance on, then attempting to slash the above branches with a machete until there is a satisfactionary gap in the bushes.

Monday arrives and it is a sad day on all counts. Flo and I are on the baños and showers task. Her incredibly thorough job of scrubbing the showers leaves me burning used toilet paper alone. This gives me a chance to stand by the side of the road and make my farewells to the wonderful Abbie and Bex. They have only spent two weeks here, but quickly became two of my favourite faces. I will miss them dearly. There are no annuncios this morning. Instead, I head straight over to Gaia with Aeddie, carrying new hay for her on our journey. We then return to camp to the news that dear Niko is now at peace.

Jenn invites the volunteers to join for a little ceremony, as Niko is placed in her resting place, near her enclosure. We stand in the sunshine, faces covered by the veils that are our mosquito nets, breathing in the scent of the mosquito spirals being handed around to keep the mischievous creatures away. Jenn and others say a few words and we take it in turns to sprinkle in soil. Jorge and Ivan then fill the grave and we depart, heading off to see our afternoon cats.

We enjoy a shorter, but highly energetic session with Kusiy, before heading home for bed time. To my dissatisfaction, I arrive in camp to learn that there is no electricity again, and therefore, no water. My wellies are still full of swamp juice and I am carrying all the sweat and stink of the afternoon. With no intention of getting straight into my clean evening clothes, I decide to wait out the power cut in the Fumador. Alex and Lennart join and, as the sun sets, we share a few laughs and begin to accept that none of us are showering tonight. We each collect our respective head torches and head into the Comedor for dinner. We eat in the dark and I begin feeling reminiscent of the times nine years ago when we would dine by candle light. With the mood low, there really is no reason to stay up. I head over to my dorm, ready to reluctantly sabotage my clean evening clothes with my filthy body, when I hear a cheer in the distance. The Comedor has lit up and folks are celebrating the return of power. Without a second wasted, I jump straight into the shower. The cold water feels far more brutal when the sun has set and it is not cooling you down right after a day of hard work, but nevertheless, I am relieved that I will be going to bed clean.