One of my primary roles here on the project is to take the chimps "en brousse" (French for "into the bush"). We lead them on long hikes into the forest to reacclimate them to their home, which they were torn from at an early age, before their mothers were able to teach them how to be chimps. Essentially, that is our role: to show them how to be a wild chimp. We point out specific trees that bear wild fruit, we show them how to fish out ants & termites from a hole in the ground or a tree knot, we have a particular vocalization (high-pitched hooting) to signify danger (alerting them to the presence of snakes, scorpians, leopards, or anything else than can injure or kill them), show them which plants are edible, and best of all, we actively play with them (when they are not foraging up in the trees). This is an activity to re-build their broken confidence to enable them to move forward and ressurect their lives. But we are careful not to meddle too much into their lives, for fear of humanizing them. We tiptoe on a delicate tightrope, trying to balance their need to repair a damaged childhood (manifested by physical and psychological wounds) with their need to become wild chimps.
This is the magic hour. The best part of my day and the reason I suffer, endure, tolerate life in this harsh environment, is the 3 hours I spend on forest walks with the chimps everyday. All of the anguish fades away and I am suddenly on primordial Earth, before humans evolved, controlled, and consumed the planet. To walk side by side with chimpanzees in a tropical forest in Africa, without a cage, fence, or any barrier between us is like walking with my ancestors. It's fascinating how much we can communicate without using a shared language. The experience humbles me and despite my role as teacher/mother, the hidden transformative element in the process forces me to re-examine my place (and theirs) in the universe and I emerge at the end of our hike feeling more like a student/companion. Ultimately, I think we are both learning how to be better primates.
During these forest walks with the chimps, which occur twice daily for 3 hours in the morning and again in the afternoon, the local African keepers who are on staff here serve as the disciplinarian father figure. They scold and punish them when they are naughty, using a makeshift slingshot. A piece of wood whittled into a "Y" shape threaded with a length of rubber cut from an old tire or inner tube. It's an effective non-lethal deterrent when they become too rowdy. The western volunteer staff (myself and all the Frenchies) serve as their surrogate mother figure and offer reassurance, hugs, support, and compassion. These chimps are all orphans and as such, come from broken families with tragic histories. Most of their parents have been killed (typically in front of them) while they were babies during an attack by poachers. Some of the chimps here were confiscated after being seen sitting by the roadside, chained to a tree, offered for sale, just next to a pile of rice or a stack of tomatoes. The demand on the black market for cute baby chimps is still high and the only way to obtain such an animal is to kill its entire family. There is, and probably always will be, some ignorant parasite who shops for wildlife on the internet. The illegal international pet trade still thrives and Africa is fertile ground to supply exotic animals. The extremely poor countries, primarliy West and Central Africa, are particularly vulnerable due to their lax or non-existant regulations and enforcement The majority of animals who end up for sale on the black market are generally from one of the Congo's, Cameroon, Gabon, Central African Republic ,Guinea, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, Liberia, or Nigeria. These are places where widespread bribery and corruption can easily circumvent any possible laws forbidding the export of wildlife.
Its difficult to gather reliable information regarding precisely where and to whom these animals are being sent to but from what I've gleaned during my time in Africa based on conversations with locals is that there are three primary culprits known to purchase and possess wildlife (mostly chimps & monkeys): Saudi Arabia, America, and expats (typically French) living in Africa. Many of our chimps arrived here after being confiscated from properties in Guinea owned by expats who live and work here. Robert, a 23 year old male, was owned by a French guy who lived here in Conakry. Thirteen years ago, someone anonymously dropped off a note on Estel's doorstep, informing her that there was a chimp lying on its side, motionless except for the occasional convulsion, in the yard of the house next door. The neighbor had discovered Robert and told Estel (the CCC project director) that the Frenchman had returned to Paris and had poisoned the chimp and left him to die alone. He fed him dry powdered bleach and then chained him to a tree in his yard. When Estel found him, Robert was asphyxiated, his mouth and lungs in a state of acidic decay. His tongue and lips were a moldy shade of green, his teeth and gums were rotting, and his windpipe membrane had burn wounds. He could not chew food for months and she liquified everything for him. It took him 9 months to recover. He is now a sweet, gorgeous boy who has 3 females at his beck and call and is just a few weeks away from being released back into the wild.
There are between 150-200 privately owned chimps here in Guinea, all of which are illegal. Local law prohibits private ownership of chimps. But this is Guinea. Anything goes, so long as you grease the short arm of the law here. Estel even knows some specific addresses where chimps are kept and could easily team up with local authorities to have them confiscated. The problem is what to do with them. We don't have the facilities here to accomodate much more and are already flirting with max capacity. If the police or government take possession of them, they will simply shoot them to eliminate the problem cost effectively. Technically, local law dictates that anyone caught owning a chimp must not only forfeit ownership, but also pay fines equivalent to $1000 USD per year for 7 years (its cost and labor intensive to maintain chimps and it was decided that this amount would adequately cover the expenses of upbringing a chimp). If the owner cannot come up with $7000, he/she faces jail time. One of the long-term goals of the project is to create and build a large sanctuary based in the capital, Conakry. It would be an educational center to sensitize the public about the plight of chimps and could serve as a facility to house unreleasable chimps. If the people could see first-hand, at close range, how intelligent, complex, social, and emotional chimpanzees are, we could make great strides in shifting public perception into an attitude of acceptance and compassion rather than fear and loathing.
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