Monday, December 8, 2014

Gorillas in the Wild


Our first view of him was just his hands from behind, reaching up to pull down leaves.
We enter into the jungle clearing and our guide urgently whispers, “come come, they are here!” Our hearts leap into staccato and we exchange looks of wide-eyed delight. We are about to see gorillas! We step through knee deep plants on the forest floor and quickly our attention is drawn up towards the sound of something falling through the forest canopy; a baby gorilla has lost his grip and is plummeting towards the ground, he’s about the size of a one year old child, and I gasp just as he reaches out to catch his fall on a looping vine. As we watch him repeat the falling and grabbing over and over we realize this is a game for his own delight. At this point we become aware that a large family of gorillas surrounds us. We scramble through the groundcover, propelled along by our excited guide. Babies are latched on to their Mama’s thick black hair as they stroll in front of us, while adolescents chasing each other, dart back and forth behind us. “Take pictures” insists our guide, Lambert. “Come here, move forward”, he instructs in the next breath, his excitement apparent. “Look, there he is.” Lambert points at a hillock of vines and leaves and we see nothing but a buzz of flies. And then a massive, wrinkled hand, exactly like a humans but five times larger, reaches up and deftly plucks a series of leaves from a vine. It disappears again behind the mound of vines. I gasp and my heart beats with delight. The silverback!
Tea Plantation Below the National Park

Tristan and are in Kahuzi-Biega National Park, South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo. That’s right, the scary part. Except for its not scary, it’s beautiful, and welcoming and incredible. After living in DRC for over two years we decided that there was no way we could say we had lived in Congo without seeing some of its most incredible residents. Kahuzi-Biega became a park in 1970 and spans an area of 6000km2.  It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and listed on the Parks in Danger list.  Hundreds of rangers, my heroes, protect its resident forest elephants, chimpanzees, and endangered Eastern lowland gorilla from encroaching agriculturalists, poachers, and war lords. 
Me and some of the forest rangers, these guys truely are heros, risking their lives to protect incredible animals

This is the only place in the world where this species of gorilla, the world’s largest, live. There are an estimated 180 individuals remaining. The population size is slowly climbing since it was decimated during the wars of the 90s (the gorilla population was around 600 before this). Our guide has worked in Kahuzi Biega for the last 30 years. He has seen it all.

When we left the rolling tea plantations below and moved into the protected mountainous regions of the eastern park we met another guide. Miniature in stance, with a big filed-to-triangular toothed grin and a presence that makes you realize this is his forest. Our new guide was introduced as “Chocozy”. Lambert explained to us, “Chocozy is a pygmy and his family has always lived in this forest, we employ as many of his tribe as possible to provide them with an alternative to hunting. Plus, they know the forest and its animal inhabitants the best.”
Chocozy, our pygmy guide, has been working in the park for decades

Our guides, Tito, Chocozy, Jamarie, and Lambert
It was at this point that Lambert gave us our little talking to: 1) you will have to wear a mask – we don’t want the gorillas to get a cold; 2) take lots of pictures – its very important that your pictures reach the expats in Kinshasa and the western world so people will come to visit; so they know what is here that needs to be protected; 3) look the silverback in they eye – these gorillas were habituated by a man so they will think you are weak if you don’t (opposed to the Eastern mountain gorillas to the north that were habituated by a woman - you can’t look them in they eye). His last piece of guidance was both stereotypical and nerve racking: If an adolescent pounds his chest at you, go ahead and pound back as an exchange….but don’t do that with the silverback, he will take it as a challenge to his authority. Um ok, check.

Back to the silverback. We ogled at his amazing hands for a moment or two, and then Lambert encouraged us to come around to face him. And there he is. All 359 pounds of him. Munching on leaves and scowling in our general direction. He is about four meters away from us, so close we can hear his breath between the sounds of his molars grinding leaves. His massive body sits in a great mound of course black hair, his chest the blackest leather. He’s exactly like a gorilla costume you found at value village might look, only this is the real deal. Flies buzz around him incessantly and he swats at them distractedly. He sits quite quietly; reaching up for a vine of leaves, tearing in down, deftly eating the leaves off it, repeat. A few times he looks straight into my eyes, as if to say, you may think I’m just zoning out, but I know you’re there.
Tristan and I with Mr. Silverback right behind
True to his look, one minute he was grazing leaves, the next he was on the move, and I was in his path! Lambert grabbed my backpack and yanked me backwards out of the silverback’s way as he brushed past me. Just in time. He lumbered past us and for the first time we could really see his incredible silverback. No it’s not just a formidable name.
An adult male gorilla weights about 170kg and is considered mature at 12 years. Silverbacks generally leave their original family with one or two other young males and remain together until they are able to attract their own group of females. This particular family is about 30

gorillas, the silverback, his ladies, and a number of babies and young males. Lambert himself has been working with this particular family for 30 years and it is for this reason that we can stand here right now. These gorillas have been habituated with humans, they know that we mean them no harm and while they don’t know us, they know and trust Lambert. He can identify and tell the story of each individual.

The silverback was still walking away from us when he stopped and started to urinate. A great golden stream of steaming liquid, shortly we smelled its deep rank odor too. “He’s pissing,” Lambert helpfully informed us in a loud whisper.

The sliverback lumbered further away and up a hill. Lambert asked us if we wanted to follow. Um..YES! So we scrambled up through the vines following him. He stopped about 25 meters from where we first spotted him and plunked down in the same position, delicately munching leaves and occasionally swatting flies. We stood about 3 meters away and he looked me straight in the eye, and then lunged straight at me, stopping about 1 meter from my face and returning to his original position. My heart jumped behind Tristan, and Lambert had to stop me from falling down the hill. Holy Shit! “Don’t worry, he’s just bluffing,” advised Lambert under his breath, as if to prevent the silverback from hearing his counsel. After a few more minutes of staring at each other from behind our masks and wondering if we were going to be charged again Lambert gently suggested that it was time to give him a break and visit some of the others. We agreed, taking one last, one more last, and one very last look, knowing this may be our only chance to see this magnificent creature and his family in the wild.

***The End***
The silverback and his silverback

Baby playing on a branch near us
Mom carrying her baby around with her
Walking through the tea plantations

Monday, October 6, 2014

Baby Bonobo Love


Tristan and I are the proud foster parents of a one-and-a-half year old Bonobo orphan. How did this happen? What exactly is a Bonobo you say?  

Bonobos are one of the four great apes, the others being gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans and, well us. Ok, five. Chimpanzees are famously known as human’s closest relative however, bonobos also share this claim to fame. Interestingly bonobos and chimpanzees are genetically closer to us than they are to gorillas. Originally bonobos were thought to be a subspecies of chimpanzees, and were called pygmy chimpanzees, but it was determined in 1954 that they were indeed a separate species. Similar in stature and appearance at first glance, there are actually a lot of differences between bonobos and chimpanzees. Chimpanzees can be quite fierce and are known to fight to the death, while Bonobos are, um, more friendly (more on this later). Another huge difference is their geographic location. Chimpanzees are found in many countries in central and western Africa and their population is thought to be as large as 300,000. Bonobos, however, are only found north of the Kasai river and south of the Congo river in the forests of the Congo river basin in the Democratic Republic of the Congo; an area about three times the size of France. Tristan and I live smack dab in the middle of their restricted habitat.

Bonobo Habitat in the Congo Basin
Most of us believe humans are the most intelligent animals on earth, but there is one problem we have not been unable to overcome. We have not figured out how to avoid murder, war and bloodshed. We share this trait with our other closest relative, chimpanzees. Bonobos are the only great apes that have never been seen to kill their own kind. If we can figure out their secret, we might be able to make our greatest accomplishment – world peace. Researchers have discovered that the main reason bonobos are so peaceful is that males are not in charge. The dominant bonobo in any group is never a male. If a bonobo is acting violently the females will band together and prevent him from hurting anyone. Over time bonobos have evolved to be unaggressive and peaceful. Another related fact that reduces and solves conflicts in bonobos is that of hormone release. In humans and other apes a conflict situation will increase testosterone levels which is related to competitiveness. In bonobos the same type of situation leads to an increase in cortisol which is related to stress. This stress response leads bonobos to seek social reassurance and they hug and share instead of fight (paragraph copied from Friends of Bonobos). 

Bonobos are listed as endangered on the IUCN red list of endangered species. It is very difficult to estimate their numbers in the wild, it could be as low as 5,000 but may be as much as 30,000. In any case, its not very many. Because of their already restricted habitat, encroachment from development, logging and poaching is having a devastating impact on their numbers. On the reproduction end of things, bonobos only give birth at a maximum of once every 5 years and not until they are 15 years of age. You can image with an already low population, a restricted habitat and low reproduction rates the threat of hunting and habitat loss could, and is, having a devastating effect on this enigmatic species.

We don’t have extremely high levels of poaching here in Mai Ndombe like you find in Kenya for ivory, we mainly have hunters who’s family have hunted for generations. Like father like son. Bushmeat is still a main source of protein for many forest people, but it also has a high – and increasing - market value in Kinshasa, because it is prohibited and considered a specialty. The hunter likely killed our foster bonobo’s mother and perhaps the whole family for bushmeat, but maybe it was a trap set for another animal. He then took her baby thinking she would be valuable to sell in to the pet market (he was right, a black market bonobo can go for a lot of money). Obviously he was not thinking through the logistics of doing this though. 
Perhaps we should have called her side-burns

Bosongo (named after a village near where she may have come from) was brought here to Inongo in a sac bound by her ankles and waist. At some point she managed to escape and run away. She was spotted in an avocado tree, which is surprising - and indicative of her fear- given she is so small and much too little to be climbing trees on her own. The neighborhood spotted her, caught her and caged her in one house. Luckily the owner of this house was a good man and he and his wife knew that it was illegal to keep a bonobo. His neighbors and family began harassing him to sell Bosongo (prices were rumored to be as high as $1,500,000), but he knew better and visited the District Commissioner (like a mayor). It was at this point that my team caught wind of her presence in Inongo. I immediately called Lola ya Bonobo the Bonobo sanctuary we have visited multiple times near Kinshasa to find out what more I could do. Over the next few days I discussed the logistics of getting Bosongo back to Kinshasa with them, but as this was proving tricky we also worried about Bosongo's health in her current home. At this point I suggested that I ask the man if he would agree to me looking after her instead. Fanny at Lola was delighted with this idea and the man and his wife were very relieved. The exchange was done by the cover of darkness at the District Commissioners house. He pretended that he was giving her up to the District Commissioner to escape his neighbors that were now harassing him to kill her and divide the meat between them. And to save us further harassment. She is now a orphan stow away in our house.
Bosongo with a snowy lip
We prepared a room for her with some toys that she couldn't eat or hurt herself with, and a soft bed to sleep on. She was scared at first and just sat limply in my lap during the drive back to our house. I was worried about what may have happened to her and her psychological well being. But after an hour or so she began to look around more and hold on tightly. We prepared some water for her with oral re-hydration salts at the direction of Rafael, Lola's vet, and laughed when she stuck her face directly in the powder before I had a chance to put the water in. She looked like she had been in the snow.

We were happy to see her drinking some water and she showed mild interest in a guava. She was rubbing her eyes and very tired so we thought Tristan would sit with her in the dark and see if she fell asleep. She did within five minutes and didn't notice when he left. 
Tristan putting her to sleep the first night

Now she is a different baby, she is very attached to us, and wants to be held or touching us most of the time, but with a bit of encouraging or distraction with a toy she will play and walk around. She drank an enormous amount of water at the beginning, until I decided to stop her for a bit as she had the hiccups. She really must have been dehydrated. I’ve put antiseptic cream on the wounds that she has from being tied up, they are very deep and will take a long time to heal but she doesn’t seem too bothered by them. She's eating mango's and amaranth leaves and she slept on my lap during my French lesson and the rest of the time she is doing a good job of pulling things off our shelves and generally keeping us busy; like when she stole my French toast off my plate this morning. 
Bosongo entertaining herself in the kitchen
Helping Mom cook dinner. Ya!
"Please pick me up! I need to be cuddled!"
The last few days with Bosongo have been wonderful, time consuming and hectic. She is like a toddler but with 4 arms! If I am giving her cuddles then all is fine, but if she is free she is either begging to be picked up or she is on the table eating butter, knocking spices of the shelf, going through the garbage or generally getting herself in to mischief!

One thing that caught us out at first is if you stop her from getting in to something as you would a child, she invariably continues with her feet, her feet are actually more agile than her hands. As well if you catch her doing something bad she usually turns around quick and leaps in to your arms, we aren’t sure if it is a distraction technique or maybe has something to do with the cortisol hugging reflex. She also likes to eat what we eat, so will sit at the table and purse her lips and put them right close to your lips, an intimate kind of begging. She has captured our heart and there is nothing sweeter than having her look up to you, put her arms up and demand to be cuddled. Normally Bonobos stay with there mom until they are 5 years old, at this age they rarely venture further than a few feet from their moms, so she very much needs us and all the love we can give her. 
Close range begging. Do bonobo moms feed their babies by mouth?
We’ve had a few friends say that its good training for us to have kids, and we agree. Tristan and I are having to work as a team to distract her while one of us cooks, or take over with cuddles while the other one of us has a shower etc. One thing that is quite tricky is that she won’t go to anyone else, our cook is very kind with animals and he has tried for days to get her love, but I think she trusts us and that is enough for her. The transfer to the sanctuary will be an emotional one.

We were very alarmed the first few times she got in to trouble and we stopped her from doing whatever and she bared her teeth, screamed like a banshee and arched her back trying to get out of my arms. We are trying to keep her presence in our house on the down low in the neighborhood but when she makes that sound I think the whole town can hear.
Rather than looking scared, she looks like she's going to bop Zamba
Taking care of a Bonobo baby is a handful. Unfortunately we don’t have diapers (which has been done with primate babies before) so we are left cleaning up after her wherever she goes (she farts a lot too). Luckily she must know to not go in her nest, so she tends to go over the edge of things. Like down the back of the couch or over the edge of the table on Zamba sleeping below (bonobos in the wild sleep in nests, they make a different one each night and a good way of telling how threatened they feel is how close they build it to the ground). 

We were quite nervous about the dogs at first, and kept them out of the house the first day, but when we let them in and they ran over to inspect her, she wasn’t scared and she didn’t move away, so they quickly lost much interest. They do try and play with her when she runs around, which she doesn’t like much, but she just asks up and we rescue her. I actually caught her stroking Zamba the other day, and he protected her from the neighbors dog yesterday. 
Example of an Ape hug

As long as we are cuddling her she is normally fine, but when she sets her mind to something its nearly impossible to stop her. She is extraordinarily smart and learns fast. This morning I was drinking my smoothie and gave her a taste, by the end she was drinking it herself out of the bottle. I’ve also taught her to drink out of a glass. Putting her to sleep is another challenge. You lie her down but she holds on with her legs, you slowly try and slip them off you as she drifts off, but the moment you get up to leave she jumps up and tightens all four limbs around you in her baby ape hug. We gave up last night and slept with her in our bed, which actually worked out fine.
Feeling at ease, a good time for grooming
Bonobo hugs are amazing. She is strong enough to hold on without assistance from us. When she is worried she holds on so tight. But if we are relaxing, after a while she lets go of her death grip and turns around with her back to your body and proceeds with her chill pose. This is a good time for inspecting feet and hands and just being. 
Bosongo has quickly become a big part of our family. As I type this she is lounging in the chair with me, eyes blinking as she slowly drifts to sleep. The similarities between her and a human child are striking and you can feel it most when you look in her eyes. There is understanding there, communication, kindness, reason. She is so much more than just an intelligent wild animal, there is something deep in her eye. 
Chillin with Dad

A lot of people have asked us why we aren’t keeping her as a pet. First of all its completely illegal. Even in the wild west that is Congo her species is highly protected, it wouldn’t be long until the authorities were knocking at our door to seize her and fine us or put us in jail. Traveling out of the country with her would be impossible unless we were very corrupt indeed. But regardless of that, her survival and reintroduction to the wild is critical to her kind. When she is 15 she will have a baby, bonobo females only have about 4 or less offspring in their lives, so her survival means a lot to the survival of her species. In addition to this, bonobos are very social creatures, they are referred to as the hippies of the forest because they spend much of their social time in various types of sexual interaction. Chimpanzees fight, Bonobos make love. Bonobos also play a lot, scientists have begun studying them to see if we can learn more from bonobos about play interaction and socialization. If we were to keep her as a pet she would miss out on important social development and interaction with her fellow species. For this reason it makes me very sad to think of all the bonobos our there that have been bought as pets. It would be the same as keeping a human in a cage, or separate from other humans, just for the enjoyment of others that they can’t quite communicate with or understand.

So in the next few weeks we will get her paperwork in order so we can fly her or take her by boat to the sanctuary in Kinshasa. This paper work is expensive and time consuming. Frustratingly the very laws that are intended to protect her are making her rescue tricky. The flight and paperwork to get her to the sanctuary is going to cost $3,000 and then she will need surgery for the cataract in her eye. The American fundraising arm for the sanctuary has started a fund raising effort for Bosongo so if you would like to assist you can donate here. Both Tristan and I have visited it a number of times and we are confident that it is the best place for her to go. She will be with other orphans her own age and they have full time “foster moms”. We have visited the baby nursery before and they have a lot of fun. One thing that really makes us happy about her future is that Lola has a release program. So every year they take a group of bonobos that are ready to a remote forest where they know the local people won’t hunt the bonobos and release them. On one of our visits we bought a beautiful film of the work that Lola does so the footage from this release is sitting strongly in our minds when we look at little Bosongo.

The story of Bosongo can be a happier one (although it would be better if she were still in the wild where she belonged), but there are many other similar stories that don’t end the same way. By reading this, by sharing it with your friends and creating awareness for this little known but oh so special species, you are helping to save an animal that could teach us a lot about our own way of socializing and living on this planet. 

If you would like to donate to help get Bosongo to the sanctuary please do so at the Friends of Bonobos website; 99% of their donations go directly to Lola ya Bonobo. 

More on Bonobos:

TED Talks:  
Evolutions Gift of Play - How sex & play can solve problems
The Gentle Genius of Bonobos - Is what a species can do determined by biology or cultural exposure? 

Articles:
The Left Bank Ape - National Geographic  

Non-Governmental Organizations: 
Friends of Bonobos - Direct funder of Lola ya Bonobo
Lola ya Bonobo - Sanctuary and release program where Bosongo will be raised 
Bonobo Conservation Initiative - American organization dedicated to protecting bonobos in DRC
Les amis des bonobos en Belgique - Fundraising arm for Lola in Belgium
Friends of Bonobos on Facebook

More Photos:
She learns so fast. Nothing gets past her. You can see her computing and then she remembers later.
 


Generally she prefers to use her feet
Hands and feet. Feet is the one on the left with the thumb and fingers holding on to the hand. And other hand to the right.
Learning how to drink water from a glass.
Sleeping on Mom's boob.

She knows there are Mangos on the bar - look away for one second and she will be up there.

Chillin with mom and the dogs. As Tristan said, "she doesn't have much of an agenda" and so neither do we.
She's a Laaady!

Chillin with Dad
This is how we chill - she's got it down pat
Random sleeping positions are all the rage





Friday, September 12, 2014

Things that Bump in the Night


Those that know me well know I’m not a fearful person. If quizzed, my friends would probably say I have a high fear threshold, especially when it comes to the natural world and adventure. However, when I first travelled into this very rural part of Congo two years ago, even I was remotely apprehensive. Not scared, just acutely aware that I had little idea of what I was up against.
In my first week here I crossed the lake to the project area for the day, but when we went to cross back the boat drivers cautioned that the wind and waves were too high and we would have to wait for safer waters. As we stood contemplating our next move a big storm began to pound down around us and we all ran up the road and around a few corners for the cover of the village hotel (think old elongated cement shack with a few separate doors). Evening turned to night time and the storm showed no sign of lifting so our local staff began to bed down for the night. My coworker, Bryan, and I were shown the roomswhere our local staff had kindly offered to share their thin pieces of foam on the floor. Bryan spotted a large spider on the wall in his room and we looked at each other sideways, raised our eyebrows, and asked about the tent abandoned in the yard because of the rain. Were we scared of spiders we were asked? No, we responded, but explained we preferred to not sleep on the floor knowing they were in the same room.  At this point our level of discomfort and apprehension was raised slightly, but not unmanageably so.
The road outside the hotel compound (not during rain).
We spent the next few hours co-reading my kindle by headlamp. Determined not to spend the night, when the rain and wind let up around 9pm we discussed finding the port to rouse the boat drivers. At this point its been dark and raining for 3 hours and the entire village, including our compound is quiet. Even the crickets aren’t cricketing. Bryan and I aren’t 100% sure where the water is, as we ran from there to here in the pouring rain, but we are determined to figure it out, so we set off.  
We started off in what we thought was the most likely direction with my headlamp for our light and each other for our courage. The road was mud and severely rutted from rain torrents, we stepped around mounds of debris piled up here and there and our hearts jumped when a drove of wayward pigs raced across our path. You know that feeling when you are really nervous or excited but trying not to make a sound? You kinda feel like doing a cross between a yelp and a laugh. You suck your breath in and hold it high in your throat. Your eyes are wide. But no one can see because its pitch black. I remember thinking, “you are in Congo Jenn, you are walking through a village in the pitch black and you’re not really even sure where you are going….are you freaking crazy?”
At this point we saw some smoldering embers beside the road. I stared at the fire for a few moments and went to move towards it, then with a start I saw the hidden black skin of a man beside it, his face almost completely obscured in the darkness. My heart leapt to a point somewhere near my left ear and stayed there for a while.
We found the boat drivers, asleep in their life jackets in another shack by the beach (that’s how we knew they were our drivers) and demanded they take us back. They drowsily looked at the lake and said, “too rough, need to wait more.” When we demanded how long they guessed an hour. So we trudged back to our hotel waited an hour and made the journey down to the lake once again. The third time it was a little less nerve racking, but only a little.
It’s been two and a half years since that first night in the forests and villages of Congo and I’ve become quite used to walking around by myself at night. My breath doesn’t catch in my throat and I no longer jump at the shadows. However, Tristan still keeps a machete by his bedside, just in case, and every once in a while something goes bump in the night and those feelings from my first night in the heart of darkness come rushing back.
Mango tree is the dark green one that towers above the last window
One of the first nights I slept in this house I was woken in the wee hours to the sound of a gunshot. I catapulted out of bed and stood in the darkness naked, feet apart, eyes wide, wondering what the fuck was going on. Silence. I hovered at the edge of the bed and slowly the realization came over me, mangos. Our bedroom is located directly below a massive mango tree. Mangos come in to season twice a year here and we love having an abundance of their juicy wonderfulness. However, mangos are big, the tree tall, and green mangos are heavy and hard. We discovered, over various inopportune moments in the first weeks living in this house, that a mango, falling from a great height onto a tin roof above your head, makes a sound almost imperceptibly like a gunshot might in a moment of shock.
Our guard dogs, Kitoko (Beautiful) & Zamba (Forest).
By now we don’t flinch when mangos rocket through our night. However, one night recently I heard something different. I was by myself in the house and just getting ready for bed. I lay down with our two dogs and was chatting to my friends on our group What’sApp. We have a generator that we run in the evenings but we turn it off before we go to bed, so at that time I was using a candle for light. I said good night to my friends and the dogs, blew out the candle and closed my eyes in the darkness with the sounds of cicadas outside my window. Moments later I hear the distinct strumming of a guitar. My eyes fly open but it’s too dark to see, again I hear it, this time it’s a proper chord. I turn on my light. Nothing. I hear another strum, this time more like something has just brushed the strings of the guitar. I text my friends something along the lines of “o.m.g. Tristan’s guitar just strummed a chord by itself in the darkness, wtf!!”. My breath catches in my throat, then I hear rustling inside the guitar and it dawns on me that a creature, a mouse or a gecko or a cockroach, must be crawling inside and made the strum. I text the girls “I think it’s a mouse”, and they respond "lets go with that”.  Nonetheless, I get up and move the guitar to another room to avoid further disturbances.
A few weeks ago Tristan was away for over a week and we were having problems with our generator. So I spent a series of nights alone in the dark with just a bad headlamp and some candles for light. I have to say, I thought more than once that I’m glad we have the dogs. One evening I walked in to our bedroom and spotted a massive dark brown spider poised on the edge of the bed frame. I’m not sure how I saw it, because it wasn’t moving, and it was the colour of the wood. It was almost the size of my hand and I swear it was eyeing me up, “whadaya gonna do about me, huh?” Now I’m not scared of spiders, and I have been elected more than once as the group appointed spider-evacuator by the girls, but this guy, with his antennae gesticulating and eyes sparkling, was pushing my spider limits.
Not the spider in my room, and about 1/3 the size.
Of course, running and screaming wasn’t exactly going to help, as the spider was on my bed, and unless I planned to pitch a tent, I had to do something about it. When I was a little girl my mom taught me the handy technique of putting a glass over a spider, sliding a paper underneath it and voila you just plop it outside. Now that’s all fine and dandy, but as I looked at the spider, and walked out of the bedroom and looked at our glasses I realized that nothing we had was big enough. I grabbed a wine glass. Nope, too small. A narrow jug? Nope too small it will cut off his legs. I contemplated spraying it, but again, those of you that know me know that it is nearly impossible for me to kill anything intentionally, especially something that is looking me in the eye. Plus, that very first night with Bryan and the spider, we were told that no spiders in Congo were poisonous. And spray in my bedroom is poisonous to me as well as the spider. So I found a tin bowl that we use for camping, and with a light held between my teeth I slid a paper under it. Of course the tin didn’t have the same effect as glass because I couldn’t see if I had succeeded or if the spider had escaped and run under my bed. In which case, I confess, I would be sleeping in a tent. I ran outside and threw the cup on the ground, my breath catching in my throat once again. I leaned down, hoping, please hoping to see the spider…and there he was…nonplussed in the bowl. Victory!
The next day my gardener asked me why there was a bowl in the middle of the driveway and I told him. He said, “whew, you are lucky, those spiders are as poisonous as the snakes, you would have been in hospital.”
As I reread this article the thought has occurred to me that what is actually catching in my throat is in fact a scream. Fear is defined as an unpleasant emotion caused by the threat of danger, pain, or harm. Each of the above experiences, however minor or imagined, have raised a sense of danger or alarm in me, the dark doesn’t help. However, over time my fear threshold here has increased greatly, I’m becoming bombproof.
In all honesty I don’t think I have ever been in danger in this tranquil part of Congo (except for maybe the spider), while there may be unrest in other parts of the country, what you mainly find here in this peaceful region of Congo is a lot of resting.


Monday, September 8, 2014

Sick in the Congo

I was awoken as per usual about an hour before sunrise, to the sound of a rhythmic drum beat not far from my tent. Often it is arguing, loud conversation, or chanting, so the drum beat was as welcoming as a wakeup call can be at 4:30 in the morning in a village of a few thousand.

My 2 month old Chinese made "Toyo" dirtbike had shredded the 4 bolts from the rear tire the evening before. Luckily I was in the village and going under 10 km an hour when it happened so I was able to stop easily and no harm done. Because of this, however, it meant my day would consist of walking almost 20 extra kilometers that would have been much easier on wheels.
I'm here in the village of Bikoro getting forest density/biomass information. We're tracking the rate of deforestation in an area of the same forest type as our project, but with an active logging operation by the same company that would have been logging if our project was not present. The impact of logging here is a stark contrast to the protected land of our project just a short 2 hour boat ride and a long 7 hour dirtbike ride away to the south.
Entering Bikoro
The work is actually a re - visit to "plots" of trees that were measured 2 years ago. By revisiting we can see how fast the trees are growing by species and soil type, but we can also see if the logging operation is removing the forest quickly, and if it is being done sustainably.  The Congolese Forest Practices Code (FPC) is actually quite well written. If followed properly, the DRC should be harvesting at a sustainable rate and be able to prosper in my opinion. Considering the incredible growth rates, and high valued species like Wenge, the forestry sector stands to be one of the strongest in the world if managed properly.
I spoke to someone recently who works for the Ministry of Environment about this. His job specifically is to visit harvest operation sites around the country and rate their sustainable harvest and adherence to the FPC. I asked him if any companies here harvested sustainably and he literally laughed out loud! They’re a long way from “Western” standards of logging, but It is good to see them moving in the right direction.

But now back to my day. Those extra 20kms of walking while my dirt bike was being repaired were compounded by an intense equatorial sun beating down overhead. No shade protection was offered as the walking was on the main FSR ("Forest Service Road" for you non-campers) out of town. By the afternoon we had visited 3 plots (I was hoping for 2 so lookin’ good!) - two of the three had been logged, leaving nothing behind, and no plans for re-planting. These sites were now cassava fields, which is the worst crop out there. lt is full of cyanide -seriously. It must be soaked in water for 7 days before preparing to eat. But also it is the main source of calories for most all Congolese. We've talked about this in other blogs so I will leave it at that.
On the walk back to the village, my legs were getting pretty heavy. The weight of the sun was heavier than my backpack (actually "cruise vest", but readers may not know what that is). I was starting to feel a little light headed and my stomach was unhappy. These were the first signs that I was getting hyperthermia, which is an umbrella term for a number of heat related illnesses including heat stroke (the opposite of hypothermia if you hadn’t pieced that together yet). For the purposes of this blog, I'll refer to it as "heat stroke" from now on.
Not actually my crew from this trip, but a cool pic of the crew
posing on a Riko tree
My crew consists of 4 Congolese and myself. As we walk down the main road, there are many people walking, biking, and motor biking on our same route as it the major road in the area. Most people feel compelled to comment that I am white. “Bonjour Mundeli” – “hello whitey”. "Mundele asimbi kopa ya vert" - “The white man is holding a green cup”. I imagine it's like being a celebrity, except here they feel no need to give the "celebrity" any personal space whatsoever. At this point I'm hot, sweating my a** off, dizzy, and my stomach is churning, but I still need to shake hands and make small talk in French and Lingala to a good portion of the hundreds of people who pass by.
In what felt like days later, we finally made it back to camp. I felt my forehead and it was burning up from fever.  My muscles ached and were cramped. My head was spinning. I've had heat stroke before, and it left no fond memories.
Our camp is right in the village with our tents pitched in the yard of a hotel. It sounds odd, but it's not a hotel that you want to sleep in. No protection from mosquitoes is the main problem. But the other problem for me this evening is everyone who sees the mundeli wants to have a conversation (and ask for money and get angry when I don't give them any). When you’re sick the last thing you want to do is try to explain to someone reeking of BO talking very loudly, and very closely to your face, that you don't feel good. That doesn't slow down the conversation because they need to know your symptoms, give advice, tell their life story, and ask for money.  One fellow came to meet me very aggressively.  He was a Congolese marine who upon hearing I was very sick, wanted me to give him money, and cigarettes, and beer…and money. And he wanted to show me his stereo at full volume.
Camp
Right in my face.
More than once.

One of the mama's showing off her son






I went to my tent at 7pm. The marine had his stereo blasting in the yard next door for everyone to “enjoy”. It was turning into a bit of a party as more people walked through the camp to join. By 9:00, the heat stroke had decided to force the small amount food I had eaten that day back out. Unfortunately the music wasn't quite as loud as I was, and I could hear some of the partiers commenting on my regurgitation and saying "mundeli". Shortly after my purge, the party crowd moved from one part of adjacent yard, to right beside my tent. The music was ear splitting, and terrible.  Some of the Congolese music is really good, but a lot of it is just awful.  And they always blow their speakers with the cheap Chinese stereos cranked to "11".
An hour later the small party of a dozen or so was in full throttle. The overwhelming need to exit my tent and again release what was left in my stomach took over. This time my considerate neighbors turned down the music so everyone could hear. They also began to cheer me on - "Mundeli! Mundeli!". The Cheers where inspirational, as was the laughing and sounds of high fives...assholes. When I was finished I got back in and zipped up my tent. Promptly the music went back up to 11.
Thanks guys. Goodnight.

Kids playing "carry your sister in a blanket"
After being sick through the night and waking with a worse fever, I soon realized that I did not in fact have heat stroke, but rather malaria. Often it is kick-started with another ailment so it is quite likely that I started with something heat stroke, and had malaria in my system. With a weakened immune system, the malaria takes over, and it takes over hard.
I’m happy to say that I of course recovered. malaria isn’t as bad you may have heard, similar to a bad flu. Aside from reeling in my tent, and a motorcycle accident on 300km+ dirtbike trip for a meeting - it was mostly uneventful. I was helped out by my crew and also some very nice locals (or "mama's" as they like to be called), who took care of me even throughout the night. They made sure I had lots of water and was comfortable, and had hot water in the mornings and cooked my meals. The hospitality was much appreciated and I was feeling fine after not too long.

That is of course until the parasite returned a few days later. But that’s all the malaria talk for now.
Made in China - not available in the developed world
Tune in next time for a new story from Jenn.