Zachary Gerskowitz

A PHENOMENOLOGIST IN
THE RAINFOREST CAF
DePaul University
Philosophy 391

So, Four Phenomenologists Walk into a Restaurant

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We were given several options for our final paper, one of which was to write a
phenomenological analysis of the Rainforest Caf. Regardless of whether anyone would
ultimately decide to write about their experience there, I felt it would be fun to get a
group of classmates together and enjoy time together outside of class. Fortunately for me
as a burgeoning phenomenologist some classmates accepted my proposal. Walking
through downtown Chicago, exposed to the cold and wind, we eventually happened upon
the Rainforest Caf, and the faux wooden sign above the entrance proclaiming that, your
adventure begins here. Given how cold and windy it was that evening, we could not wait
for our tropical adventure to begin.
Methodology is an important part of any analysis. To do a phenomenological
analysis of the Rainforest Caf, I feel it would be wise to first explicate the methodology
involved. We start with the phenomenological reduction, also known as the epoch. This
involves bracketing out all of the epistemological questions related to the phenomena,
leaving us with our experience of things. When we experience things, we do not just
experience sense data; the world is not composed of patches of color assembled together.
When we experience something, we also experience the meaning imbued in it. When you
hear somebody speak, they are not merely making noises, but the sounds have meaning to
them and we recognize them as such. One cannot shout fire! in a movie theater because
we understand the meaning behind the vocalization.
Further, we do not only experience objects, but we experience the entire object,
regardless of its appearance being partial or whole. For example, the group put together
to visit the Rainforest Caf originally contained six total students. Two were unable to
attend because of work, leaving the remainder with the present absence of the other two.

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In an uncanny coincidence, the table we sat at had room for six, leaving the two empty
chairs as reminders, further invoking our apperception of the other two. The apperception
is merely one of the ways in which we can experience things including other students.
As it turns out, we can experience things in an infinite number of ways. Husserl uses the
term horizon for this infinite possibility of experience.
The horizon is shaped like a bell curve on top of a line, with the edges of the
curve being asymptotic, reaching out into infinity, never touching the line. Stretching out
into infinity displays the infinite number of possible experiences of an object. However,
being shaped as a bell curve, there is a general trend in which the bulk of possibilities are
grouped around similar experiences. By increasing the number of people who experience
something, we gain a more comprehensive view of that object, and perhaps can come to
access what it means to be that object. My experience of the Rainforest Caf is tempered
by the experience of the other three students who joined me. And, when I next see the
two students who were unable to join us, I can berate them for ruining my
phenomenological analysis! Their experience of me as being upset will be one of the
infinite number of ways of experiencing me, which leads to an important distinction. As
there are an infinite number of ways of experiencing something, the horizon is always
open. Truth is never finished, but instead becomes a project.
Our project began by entering the Rainforest Caf, and, after having warmed up,
moticing that the downstairs of the restaurant was bereft of people, except for one hostess
who arranged our seating for the evening. Everybody who visited the restaurant was
seated upstairs, despite seating being available downstairs. While the downstairs was
mostly void of people, it was not lacking intriguing things to look at. A gift shop

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dominates the first floor of the restaurant, enticing people to spend more money as they
enter and exit the restaurant. Certainly the Rainforest Caf knows their clientele
comprises of mostly children, and that exposing them to a variety of objects is an
efficient way to increase profits. With t-shirts, stuffed animals, action figures, mugs,
plates, Beanie Babies, photographs, posters, jewelry, luggage tags, board games, and
more all lining every available square foot, my senses were overloaded. Especially when
considering the two bright tanks of water, presumably recycled and reused for the
waterfall near the stairs, draw our attention there as a light draws a moth towards it.
When exploring the gift shop, I saw a mother promise her son that when they
came back downstairs she would purchase the toy he was enamored with. I am uncertain
if she kept the promise, but this demonstrates the effectiveness of this type of advertising;
continually tease the children with toys, and they cannot fail to annoy their parents. Then,
spending a few dollars seems like a reasonable exchange for quieting the loud children,
especially on the first floor where other patrons entering and exiting might mistake you
for a bad parent. But, even more than that, by purchasing something for your child, you
make a statement of sorts. You say that not only can you afford to eat here, but, in full
view of any patrons on the first floor, you state that you can also afford to purchase some
certainly overpriced piece of merchandise. Perhaps a psychological egoist reading
into some of these situations would not be so far off the mark. But, if Hobbes is correct in
this instance, would he not also be correct regarding any other non-necessary expenditure
of money?
In looking to have a less disheartening view of the world, I would like to approach
this topic from outside the traditional liberal view. If we reject that the individual self is

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isolated, selfish, and alone, and turn to communitarianism then we have a vastly different
view. No longer are we alone in the world, but born into a complex series of
relationships. In performing these relationships, rather than thinking that there is a
rational I underneath all of our experience, the psychological egoism instead turns to
trying to make a child happy, and improve the relationship between two people.
Phenomenologically, we also notice categoriality. Think here of a piece of bread placed
in a toaster. After the process is finished adding the heat to the bread, we call it toast. We
cannot separate the heat from the bread, it becomes something new. Taking someone to
the Rainforest Caf cannot be separated from the kindness involved, especially
considering the numerous birthday celebrations we observed.
Returning to the gift shop itself, and taking inventory of the merchandise
available, that the restaurant is geared towards children is an unmistakable conclusion.
No adult who visited the gift shop paid any more than partial attention to the merchandise
available. But there is also a further underlying meaning regarding the gift shop.
In choosing to place the gift shop on the first floor, with the restaurant relegated to
the second floor, the Rainforest Caf could be seen as sending a message that the
commodification of the rainforest is of paramount importance. As the first and last things
we see when in the restaurant, what other message could we have? Here we might turn to
larger ecological trends of deforestation, particularly in the Amazon and Indonesia.
Deforestation has numerous negative impacts on the environment, including increased
risk of flooding, habitat loss, topsoil erosion and loss of soil fertility, and association with
climate change immediately come to mind. Corporations willfully ignore all of the

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potential risks and consequences of deforestation so long as they profit from the actions
they take. The commodification of nature is seen here in all its glory.
Included in deforestation is a sense of mastery; humans think that they are
masters of the environment, able to control everything about it. Even if everything goes
wrong, technology will fix it; but it will not come to that, because we will do this
responsibly. Recall Nicomachean Ethics, where Aristotle writes of the unique function of
humans is not growth, as all living beings share that, nor perception, as all animals share
that, but logos. Aristotle does not say here, implicitly or explicitly, that logos should be
utilized to dominate nature, but it would not be a stretch to think that others might
misappropriate this for their own desires in the same way that 19 th century Europe used a
perversion of Darwinism social Darwinism as justification for the colonization of
Africa. While some might strive for a mastery, we must be aware of our fundamental lack
of control of nature, but also of ourselves and our own conditions. We do not write our
own story ourselves, but are thrown into the world and inherit circumstances. The very
temporality of our existence repeatedly demonstrates our fundamental lack of control. As
the Rainforest Caf does not explicitly invoke a message of conservation, perhaps we
must turn to their specific presentation of the rainforest to see what message they attempt
to send.
The message the Rainforest Caf looks to send can be deciphered in part by
looking at the deliberate choices they make in regards to what they keep from real
rainforests, what they remove from them, and what they import from other ecological
areas. Most obviously, Rainforest Caf keeps jungle animals, including snakes, gorillas,
various exotic birds, frogs, chimpanzees, turtles, crocodiles, iguanas, and jaguars; all

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animals that are native to rainforests. However, there are some notable absences.
Rainforests, such as the Amazon, are notable for their substantial precipitation. A
continuously wet environment would be the ideal breeding ground for various insects,
none of which appear, thankfully enough, in the restaurant. Looking at Celebration,
Florida, originally founded by Disney as a subsidiary, they have all residents sign a
contract which forbids them from complaining about mosquitoes. If nobody can talk
about it, perhaps it is not a problem. Here, Disney could only dream to be as nice as the
Rainforest Caf; all the trappings of the rainforest, without any of the problems. They
even had thunderstorms around every half hour, where the lights would dim, and bright
flashes of lightning would be accompanied by thunder.
In a manner similar to Disneyland, we could look at the Rainforest Caf as being
the idealized Platonic rainforest, actualized. The Amazon is inhospitable to humans, what
with the venomous snakes, large jungle cats, poisonous spiders, and dangerous terrain.
The rainforest presented to us here in downtown Chicago offers none of these problems
when in our experience of it. Instead we have a rainforest perfectly suited to serve
humans. Rather than entering into part of the food chain, we instead rest comfortably at
the top, having food served to us. The Rainforest Caf, through its hospitality to humans,
turns into a location for ecotourism of sorts. Appearing here for all to see is the unlocked
essence of the rainforest! But if this is the ideal rainforest, what would the message be
regarding all of the other rainforests? Would it be appropriate to alter them until their true
essence has been unlocked? And, importantly, what would that altering involve?
Part of any change would involve animals, as while the aforementioned animals
are all native to rainforests, many animals are also present that are not. Among the

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animals that decorate the walls are elephants, zebras, hippos, and rhinos all animals we
would think about when looking at sub-Saharan Africa, not a rainforest. Introducing new
animals would radically alter the food chain, and therefore environment. However, at this
point we must take a step back. When talking of the rainforest, we must delineate what
we mean by rainforest.
The obvious answer when asked about where the rainforest is would be in the
Amazon. Highlighting this is the globe, held up by Atlas, at the top of the waterfall.
Emblazoned with the words, save the rainforest, the globe only shows North and South
America. Thinking of rainforests that exist on those two continents, the only answer is the
Amazon. And, although correct, this only partially answers the question. Significant
rainforests also exist in equatorial central Africa and Southeast Asia. In the nonAmazonian rainforests, we might see all of the animals that initially looked out of place,
except for the zebra perhaps the iconic striping was too appealing to pass up. What is
now established is that of the rainforests, the Amazon might be the Platonic essence.
However, to truly capture what a Rainforest is, to aggregate all of the rainforests into one
ideal rainforest, that belongs to the Rainforest Caf. They are steps on the Platonic ladder;
the Rainforest Caf is the true form, the Amazon is the next step down, and other
rainforests are mere illusions of mere illusion. Perhaps we should be cautious in giving
them a gift, then. But, we might want to give them a gift if it could poison Platonic
metaphysics. If people view the Rainforest Caf as the idealized form of the rainforest,
we have no need for the other rainforests in South America, Africa, and Southeast Asia.
For many both children and adults the experience of the Rainforest Caf might
be their first encounter with a rainforest. Television, movies, and other media might have

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shown them what other rainforests look like, but unlike other media, visiting the
restaurant gives them firsthand experience of it. Especially for younger children, this
experience of a rainforest might dominate their phenomenological horizon of what a
rainforest is. With the visuals, coloring books, merchandise, photos, and more, there lies
the potential for a strong and stubborn horizon. Growing up, they might have their
horizon opened further by videos of the rainforests, but always present under their
horizon is the experience of the Rainforest Caf. Or, they might seek to reinforce their
previous experience rather than open their horizon to the infinite number of possibilities.
Beyond the decision of which animals to include and which to exclude, there are
additional elements to their presence in the Rainforest Caf. First, many of them only
display their heads on the walls. Although I can imagine the restaurant as trying to show
the animals sticking their head through the foliage to investigate what seems to be going
on in our particular part of the rainforest, they also resemble a hunting lodge where a
hunter proudly displays all of the animals they have killed. In the former scenario
probably more accurate to what they intended to portray we could be rightly seen as
ecotourists. But even here humanity attempts to assert control over other animals; they all
present themselves for our entertainment. More insidiously, we turn to the latter scenario,
a wall filled with a collection of dead animals. The Rainforest Caf does its best to
dissuade that notion, notably having the animatronic elephant move at various points,
notably during the thunderstorms as a presentation of fright. Regardless of what view
people have, both display a control of nature by humanity.
By only presenting the heads, the Rainforest Caf executes an interesting
phenomenological trick. Phenomenology says we experience the entire object we come in

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contact with, regardless of how much of it we see. This is perception and apperception.
By only presenting the heads of most animals, they consciously hide the remainder of the
body. This allows our minds to fill in the blanks. Rather than have a less than perfect
replication visible to everybody, our minds form the remainder of the body in the best
possible way for the restaurant out of our memories. Accordingly, the experience of the
Rainforest Caf becomes more lifelike, as the animals are shaped by the memory of each
individual. Rather than constructing an animal in the physical form, they encourage the
patron to use their mind, separating it from each body, to more comprehensively access
the form of the animal. Made much easier by the animals not being present in the
rainforest, one interesting note is how animals used for food pigs, chicken, and cows
are absent. While even the tables have designs of lions on the plains of Africa, and whales
in the oceans, there are no animals we would typically use for food. It would not be in
their best interest to have the patrons consider the ethics of what they eat.
Other changes to the rainforest includes the notable addition of music, something
one would be hard pressed to find in other rainforests. The music we first encountered
when seated was A Mi Nena by La Diferente. Most of the music was in a foreign
language, and thanks to some phenomenological analysis from my classmates, we agree
that some of the music could be classified as exotic. If only the staff at the restaurant
spoke with a foreign accent, then there would be virtually nothing separating us from
tourists. Everything looks to transport you into another world. And, speaking of other
worlds, when browsing through the menu, the name of an appetizer caught my eye.
Describing it as, flatbread topped with char-broiled, hand-pulled chicken breast,
our Smokin Mojo BBW sauce, mozzarella cheese and chopped cilantro, the Rainforest

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Caf named it the, Brave New World Flatbread. I can only imagine that the staff at the
Rainforest Caf are not aware of the book by the same name, penned by Aldous Huxley.
This is because the alternative that they are fully aware of the book and the meaning of
it, and are still actively promoting it is a frightful consideration. Even scarier still is the
thought that the patrons could passively accept this. Perhaps we already live in the world
Huxley envisioned; one where critical thinking is reprimanded, high culture no longer
exists, and where production and consumption are seen as the Good. Brave New World
could even be seen as cultivating the perfect liberal; one completely alone from their
artificial birth. Maybe the Rainforest Caf would have gotten away with it, if not for us
meddling kids!
Through all of the conscious decisions the Rainforest Caf makes in regards to
similarities and differences in comparison to other rainforests, we see them as attempting
to refine the ideal rainforest. Could the slogan across the globe, save the rainforest,
then talk about saving the rainforest? Being the most ideal form of the rainforest, would it
not make sense to save it rather than the other ones, out of sight and mind? They
knowingly place the save the rainforest sign in a place where you would have to be
seated, or own your way to be seated, and purchasing a meal in order to see. The Tracy
Tree, a Rainforest Caf exclusive, is meant to educate people about the rainforest. There
is little wonder to be had in the fact that they place the Tracy Tree right near the checkout
counter in the gift shop. You are free to learn about the rainforest, but only so long as you
also remain a consumer. With all this talk about rainforests, we should not forget one vital
piece of information: The Rainforest Caf, no matter how much decoration they put up,

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is, first and foremost, a business. Their ultimate goal is to promote the consumption of
their products to make money for their shareholders.
Out of the liberal tradition we get the declaration that the self is fundamentally
isolated, selfish, and equal. When Rawls develops his veil of ignorance, the equality of
the self allows him to do so. The equality of the self means that underneath all of the
differences there remains something the same about all of us; the liberal tradition takes
this equality to be an underlying rationality. Thus, whenever the veil of ignorance makes
its appearance, we shed our differences and return to our inherent rationality. There are
several criticisms to this theory. First, that the self is isolated is most obviously critiqued
through the fact that at birth we are not alone at least one other person is present.
Second, that we are selfish is questionable. For this, we can look turn to Hobbes and
psychological egoism and the refutation of his argument mentioned earlier. Third, we can
argue that the veil of ignorance fails because, upon draping the veil over ourselves, there
is nothing left. This communitarian argument posits that we are not able to be stripped
away, but are instead composed of our memories and relationships. Heidegger says that
we are thrown into a world that is already running, meaning that we are thrown into a
series of relationships immediately at birth; we are a child to parents, a sibling, a cousin,
a niece or nephew, a grandchild, and more. This means that whenever we take any action,
it does not only affect us as an individual, but inherently has ethical and political
significance. Phenomenologically speaking, there is always a categoricality to every
action. From Existentialism is a Humanism, Sartre adds further responsibility to every
action. As existence precedes essence, we must burden ourselves with the knowledge that
any action prescribes values to everyone else.

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In light of this radical freedom that we find ourselves burdened with, we could
look towards the Rainforest Caf and ask whether they shoulder this burden or not.
Promoting traditional liberal ideas not to mention Brave New World I find it difficult
to see them as authentic. Through the conscious decisions that the Rainforest Caf makes,
they advocate values such as consumption and consumerism. The entire message of
ecological conservation appears to be of secondary concern, utilized only to position
themselves in good standing. While here we look at the example of a corporation, we
need not limit ourselves only to corporate ethics.
As Marx says in his Theses on Feuerbach, Philosophers have hitherto only
interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it. How can we change the
world, then? Perhaps through philosophy. Truth, which supposedly tells us the good
Aristotle said all actions aim for, is not fixed as Plato would say, nor is it entirely relative.
Truth, rather, is a project, one that we carry out little by little. And as the horizon reaches
out towards infinity, we understand that this project will never finish; it remains destined
to forever be a work in progress. Perhaps this is why, when writing papers, the ending is
always the most difficult to forge. The author changes through the process of creating
something, and opens themselves up to another of the infinite possibilities under the
horizon. And, more than the exposing themselves to one possibility, they become all the
more aware of the possibility of an infinite number more.
If existence precedes essence as Sartre says, then we are, at every moment,
confronted with the question of what we want to make our essence. When we look at our
ephemeral life, we realize we cannot separate it from our death. But this could inspire us
more. Why try to change the world? Because we must eventually die, as all things must.

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Now is the only time we have to forge our own essence, to create the meaning of our own
life. However, like truth, our essence and meaning is a project, open to its own horizon.
So, if you will excuse me, I need to go change the world now, while we still have time!