Wamba, Wamba

I had to dismount to safely cross this bridge!

My own lovely room for the next five months

Posted by Carol for Kirsty


26.09. (Wamba)
Mbote,

I arrived at Wamba field station on Sunday. To get here from Kinshasa it took a four hour bush plane flight to Djolu, where Shinya and I stayed overnight and sorted out the many payments to be made to various territory officials. Then we loaded up ourselves, our suitcases, and several boxes of supplies onto the back of three motorbikes, and rode for 3 hours to get to the station.

I've been out following bonobos for three days now. I wake up at 04:00, and we set off at 04:40 because the bonobos are quite close at the moment-which means they nested an hour away the night before. We reach them at about 05:40, while they're still waking up. Once they move further away I will have to get up earlier. I follow them until 12:00, when the trackers change shift.

When I was in Kinshasa, one night at dinner an economy professor told me that he thought women liked biology, especially primatology, because the animals remind them of babies. I just laughed and pointed our that we were sitting at a table with TEN biologists, four of which were primatologists and I was THE ONLY female. But now I feel pangs of guilt whenever I'm videoing baby bonobos and think about how cute they are.

Nalingi yo,

Kirsty xx