WEEK OF 4TH OF JULY ACTIVITIES -- TA OFFICES, BOBOTO CRAFTS AND LIBRARY, DINNER WITH PRESIDENT COOK, BONOBOS

Employment Center resources for those who have taken the two day 16 hour course to learn interview, CV, and skills for job seekers.

Class room.

Library at Boboto center for crafts. The library was set up by Jesuits many years ago for the Belgians.

Upper level stacks in the public library.

Main level stacks.

Craft display area. Library entrance is to the left.

Building main entrance. It is open Monday Tuesday, Thursday, Friday 9-5, Saturday 9-12.

President and Sister Cook and Hugh Matheson

Cooks and Gates.

Cooks and Elder Smith left, Sister Gates foreground left.

TA classroom, Olivier at standing back of the class.

Sue at the Mandarin Chinese Restaurant on the seventh floor of a building on 30 Juin Boulevard.

View of the restaurant which has been here since 1971. We chatted with the owner whose wife and children live in Los Angeles. He travels often to visit. He is originally from Hong Kong and speaks English.

Spring rolls appetizers.

Gates arrived in time because the restaurant serves at 19h00 and we had arrived at 18h00 while they were stuck in traffic coming from Messina beyond the airport, but they made just in time.

At table in the Mandarin. Food was very good. We ordered a variety and shared. There was adequate, not the copious servings we are accustomed to in the US, but enough.

Ticket sellers at the entrance to Lola ya Bonobo, Bonobo Paradise where orphan Bonobos, only found in the Congo, are nurtured and educated until they can be released into the wild. Populations have declined from 100,000 in the 1980s to about 10 or 20 thousand today in the wild.

Delphinea Lotus, in a pond being prepared for crocodiles. They are removing all of this water plant, by hand.

The island for the crocodiles in the pond.

Bonobo babies would only survive a few weeks without nurturing by surrogates, seen here grooming the young Bonobo.

The youngsters wrestle and play with each other like human children. 

More wrestling.

Termite mound. They build a new chimney every month, according to our guide.

Nurturers with the youngest orphans behind glass in their enclosure. 

Flower along the trail during the hike.

Forest along the trail.

A flower along the trail.

Another flower.

Sue and others on the trail.

Guess what it is...

Forest.

Stairs on the inclines, treacherous.

Bonobos sleep in these enclosures  at night. They have each a hammock and they don't exchange. The spaces must be very clean or they won't use them.

Mature Bonobos in their enclosure.

They are often bipedal. Some threw dirt at us.

A group.

The oldest at 28 years is a large muscular male named Maluki  if I remember correctly, which means "Angry" because, according to our guide, he does not love others.

I took a few poses. He sat taciturnly alone for awhile before moving further down toward the group. Bonobos live to 50 or 60 years.

Another pose. Bonobos are six or seven times stronger than humans pound for pound.

We were alerted that during the dry season there are lots of ants and not to step on them, because they will attack. This group trekked across the path in a long trailing parade.

Ant parade.