Endangered Mountain Gorillas

At around 6 in the morning my dad's two colleagues and I labored across the dirt parking lot of the Bird Hotel, a nice place we were staying in, that nonetheless had frequent periods without running water and electricity, to meet the four-by-four that had just pulled up. In less than two minutes we had stopped and were being directed toward a large green national park vehicle. It was a kind of army supply truck with an open air back and a canopy that provided cover for twelve seats arranged back to back and facing out so passengers could see the scenery pass by as the truck began the long journey to Virunga National Park. We left Goma behind and our guide Daniel told us that the flat stretch of land in front of us was home to a large refugee camp after the 1994 genocide, and the hills that flanked its far side were Rwanda. He pointed to a mountain that he said was cut in half by the border between Congo and Rwanda, where "Gorillas can cross border without visa! Hahahahahaha!" Both Rwanda and Congo offer trips to see the gorillas, as their habitat straddles the border. Rwanda, now considered a bit safer and more developed, is more popular but also several hundred dollars more expensive.
It was then that the mountain we were heading to came into view, with wisps of feathery clouds streaking across its middle and the morning sun just starting to rise above its summit. In the foothills of this mountain, Dian Fossey, the famous American biologist, had begun her 13 years of field studies of the endangered mountain gorilla, in hopes that they would offer clues about how our early ancestors may have behaved and organized themselves. An eccentric and talented woman who came to deeply love the mountain gorillas to the point of killing poachers who threatened them, she was killed by a disgruntled villager after a long and fruitful study in and around Virunga National Park.
Slowly the road turned into what cannot really be called a road. Rather it was a sorry streak of mud and rock, abused by rain. It was hard to imagine any other vehicle besides ours making the trip. The vehicle jarred violently to the left and right, to the point where I had to brace myself from striking my head on the metal poles supporting the canopy or being thrown from my seat. Once or twice I believed the truck might have tipped over, and I positioned my body in a way where I thought I'd manage not to get crushed. But I was in good spirits, with the violent ride triggering happy memories of a hellish bus ride in Bolivia, and a milk truck transport into the Corcovado peninsula in Costa Rica. Besides, I couldn't help but smile as our guide yelled, "Free massage!, hahahaha!” during the most violent bits, even while the kindergarten teacher Sarah, seated next to me, was doing all she could to keep from throwing up.

The scenery along the way helped me endure too. We wound are way through banana grove after banana grove, lush green fields, and houses constructed with sticks and filled in with dried mud. Smiling Congolese would look up and wave until I reciprocated, I must have waved a hundred times that day. Groups of children would explode into shouts of MZUNGU!, the Swahili world for white. Some followed us at our excruciatingly slow pace for maybe a mile, hopping on to the ladder in the back to hitch a ride during the calmer parts. At long last, around three hours, our journey was over and the truck rolled to a stop outside a simple national park station built just outside the dense jungle surrounding the slopes of Mount Mikeno, which was now quite close.
We set off paralleling the bush, picking our way through neat rows of crops and a smattering of huts that had been built up right to the edge of the park. The bush had increasingly been turned into agricultural land. To stem this process and protect the incredible lush, high altitude area, Virunga national park was included when the Africa's first national park was created in 1925. After about an hour paralleling the dense foliage, we took a sharp left and penetrated the wall of green for the first time. This time, only one or two of the soldiers carried the standard Kalashnikov. The main tracker said he knew where the gorillas had been yesterday afternoon, but there was no way to be certain if they had moved, and if so, where. In the beginning, we seemed to be following a path made by previous groups looking to make contact. And then suddenly, we emerged into a small open area, still surrounded by the jungle, but the underbrush had been pulled down and pressed flat. To me, it looked like several large deer beds, but I knew that was the temperate pacific northwest forest dweller talking. They were actually gorilla nests, and the family we were tracking had moved elsewhere beyond the deep jungle walls surrounding us. The guides signaled for us to follow and the machetes were put into action for the first time as they widened out hints of a path the gorillas had made during their departure.
The family we were tracking was named after the silver back in charge, Humba. Along with the silver back there was one adult male, the silver back in training, along with adult females, juveniles, and three or four babies. All in all a family of 16 I believe. I stumbled along, the occasional low hanging vine snagging a leg and sending me to the ground. Without warning the head tracker turned around and motioned for us to put our masks on. We had brought white hospital masks along to wear during our allotted hour with the gorilla. Apparently transmission of disease is one of the biggest risks involved when contacting the endangered species. We were directed underneath what looked like a tunnel made of bushes and vines and as I passed through I realized there was a small gorilla directly above me obscured by the trees, and not only that, he, (or she?) was pissing all over. I thought to myself, well of course he is, and continued out into the clearing, where I then heard a long fart. What a contrast! Here I was hiking in near silence for an hour and a half contemplating the encounter that lay ahead, prepared to relish the event in all its profoundness, and I was greeted by a large juicy fart, in the end a perfect and dare I say profound reminder that we are all animals that shit.
But the common animal act of excretion was quickly pushed from my thoughts by another equally fundamental animal experience: fear. There ahead of me was the boss, a four hundred pound silver back lazily reclining in a delightful bush bed he had made for himself and the adult female he happened to fancy at the moment. We locked eyes as he rolled onto his back and looked at me. I held his gaze for a moment, his black eyes fixed on mine, and then without thinking I diverted my eyes. I had lost. And of course I had. In his world, human knowledge and technology mean little compared to his ability to run across the forest floor and break me like a toothpick if it pleased him. I deferred, for I was certainly not the alpha male.
The hour the park rangers gave us with the gorillas was spent in almost complete, hot silence, breathing heavily underneath our masks. I stood there and tried to take in these magnificent animals, but could not open my eyes wide enough. Their hands are huge, but just like ours. They eat lazily, kind of like I chew on a tooth pick. Their children play, swinging on branches and climbing limbs that can't support their weight, only to fall or pendulum downward while hanging on for dear life. The adults grunt sounds of contentment to one another as they bathe in the sun and eat. As they walk on all fours, they reach up and pull down entire trees to clear the path. A massive amount of flies hang around their beds, hovering in the air. We came within a couple meters of many, able to see the outlines of their chests, their broad wrinkled noses, which apparently are as distinct as our fingerprints and is what field researchers use to identify them.
Then, as we were following an adult female along a narrow path flanked on both sides by dense bush, the silver back reappeared behind us, calmly walking in the direction of the female we had been following. The path was too narrow to let him pass, we were already walking single file, and he was not stopping. The guards silently motioned for us to push our bodies up against the dense jungle wall and attempt to make room for the advancing silverback, so we silently and with all the speed thought we could afford without alerting him, lined up against the wall. I was in back with one of the guards and thus the first person the silver back would pass. We stood motionless and watched him approach calmly on all fours down the middle of the trail. He came up to the point directly in front of me and just as I thought he was going to pass me by, he stopped. Another stand off. There I was, pressed against the bushes, less than two feet from a silver back gorilla, his profile almost completely still. He remained just long enough to show me once again that in his world he can do whatever he pleases, and perhaps also to say, "What are you doing following my woman?" I won't soon forget it.