kigoma continued and malaria

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Many things have been happening this week, some very interesting and i am following leads for unexpected research that i would rather not publish on the internet. in any case, firstly, i should mention that i have malaria. it makes life almost impossible, but i am on medication and i am sure will recover soon. high fever, muscle and joint pains, all of the symptoms i have and so my brain has not been working quickly lately. the internet is my one activity of the day so i am not stuck in bed all day. instead of taking the train back (which was almost impossible anyway since the 1st and 2nd class tickets were sold out), i am going to fly back to dar asap, which seems to be on monday. now i will continue about the chimp tracking in gombe national park,
while the chimps were munching and fighting over and peacefully eating the baby baboon, we sat under the tree and watched. all at once, they decided it was time to come down. as they moved in the tree, leaves rained down on us. they all came down in a rush, it is amazing how the large ones grab the tree trunk and so quickly climb down. scaps of baby baboon still hung from gimble's mouth, his lips red with blood. the baby chimps were screaming, their screams sound exactly like the squeek of a rubber duck. they wanted to take our place and we were in their way. imagine a pack of huge chimps trying to pass us. we all got up so quickly as we were not told what to do in a situation like this. the chimps brushed right past us, we were 6 people on a narrow forest path each of us trying to get to the inside of the huddle because they seemed very aggresive and uncompromising. natalie made eye contact with gimble, the baby baboon legs hanging from his mouth, he came within three to five feet from us. the group of us crouched down submissively with our backs towards them. my knees were shaking and my heart beating very strongly. it was incredible adrenalin. the park rules are to not get any closer than 10 meters from the chimps, but again, we were four feet. the pack of chimps spread apart but three went to a new tree and we followed. a large (HUGE) baboon came for what we thought was revenge at first. he sat on a log with his legs bent up and his hands crossed over one another looking very dignified for a baboon. his large nose and head pointed upwards at the chimps, watching them silently. we were then 8-10 meters from the tree with the chimps in it and that felt very far, to give an idea of how close we were before. the researchers told us that the baboon only wanted scraps from the chimps, of its own kind's baby flesh. the youngest chimp in the tree struggles with swinging on the vines. they are sometimes so clumsy and sometimes so graceful. we watched and
then we went to the gombe stream waterfall. the waterfall itself was not as large as i expected, but it was in a very unusual location and nice to imagine jane goodall and all the chimps chilling in it. we sat cooling ourselves in the mist. the size is just like a gallon bucket being constantly thrown down, but the force was strong. the stream was much more shallow than i had imagined. we drank from the stream and filled our water bottles, i tasted no difference between the bottled water and gombe stream water. clean and safe. a babbon came to sift through the rocks looking for something to eat. we then made a very fast very steep climb up a very large mountain and didnt see any chimps, but exhausted myself. on the way back, by jane goodall's feeding station, though, we saw a line of them grooming, the biggest in the back and smallest in the front. a group of four.

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