Alexa: Holidays

After 12 months of hard work, Carmen was off home to Spain for a well deserved rest. Coopera had arranged for another Spanish vet, Pablo, to take charge whilst she was gone. He is very experienced with primates as he works with them in Spain so was well suited to the task of looking after everything at Lwiro for 6 weeks. Pablo settled in well and workers and animals loved him. He organised a party for the workers the weekend before Christmas. We bought a goat, lots of spaghetti (they love spaghetti here!!) and beer and invited all the workers to the house after work. It was great fun! Everybody was up dancing and singing the sanctuaries ‘Sheriff and gentil’ song, even before the beer was opened. They wore their best clothes and smiles! The evening was thoroughly enjoyed by all.

Alexa: Noel

One day the rangers from Kahuzi Biega national park arrived with a young owl face monkey. They had taken him off someone keeping him as a pet. He seem friendly as he was being carried in someone’s arms. He had old scars around his waist from a cord, but the new cord around him was loose and plastic. He was very hungry and devoured a huge banana straight away. As he is quite young he doesn’t have his white stripe on his face yet, but his eyes are very big and he is very cute! As it was only a few days until Christmas we thought a suitable name for him would be Noel, and the keepers approved. He was put into a cage for quarantine and settling down, but because he is so friendly he gets lots of tickles and attention everyday.

Update on Kongo and Lume

Kongo has now finally settled in with the Kalume group. He is playing especially much with Flora and Clara. It took quite a long time for him to get back to the happy playful Kongo from the quarantine cage, but now he seem to realise that he is a chimpanzee and it’s fun to have someone to appreciate his rough games. For example pulling Clara by one finger down the concrete steps, and she can’t stop laughing!! Lume settled in a lot quicker as he is used to chimpanzees. He likes especially to play with Youngesa and Alsace.

Group photo

Today we took a group photo of everyone working at the moment at Lwiro. This is how one of the best ones turned out.