For the past six years, I have had one foot in Poland. During that time, I have come to know
not only a nation that rose from the ashes of war, but also an animal that, alongside that
nation, survived against the odds and was brought back from the brink of extinction.
For thousands of years, the European bison lived alongside humankind, though not without
conflict. Hunted and driven from its territories, it witnessed the rise and fall of the Roman
Empire, the conquests of Genghis Khan, kingdoms and monarchies rising and falling,
revolution after revolution, war after war. Then, in 1921, the last wild European bison was
killed by hunters, and the species became extinct in the wild.
Only twelve animals remained, scattered among zoos across Europe.
The Polish people refused to let the story end there. These remaining animals were
gathered together and placed under protection in Poland. Through careful breeding and
dedicated conservation efforts, the population slowly began to recover. Despite the
devastation of another world war and decades under Soviet rule, the bison were gradually
reintroduced into the wild, returning them to the lands of their ancestors.
Today, barely a century later, these last giants have spread across vast territories once
again. Their numbers have grown to somewhere between 11,000 and 12,000 worldwide,
with approximately 8,800 living in the wild, as their ancestors did for countless generations.
Stories like this have always fascinated me—stories of perseverance, of triumph over
adversity, of the seemingly impossible being made possible through determination and will. I
see connections to this everywhere, not only in my own life, but in the world around me.
Stories exist everywhere we look, and each of us hears something different in them.
Sometimes we can learn an extraordinary amount simply by looking into the eyes of an
animal. Its history, its struggle, and its survival become something larger than itself, because
in some way, that story lives within us all.
