Bonobo Ear Check

Lorel, a bonobo at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens gets her ears checked by a zookeeper, while her daughter Lucy looks on. Lorel and Lucy have complete trust in the procedure, which is part of a body check that the keepers do to keep the animals healthy. As part of the protocol for close contact, the staff wears gloves and masks.

Photo by M. Brickner

First Issue of Bleu/Blanc

The 32 page inaugural issue of Bleu/Blanc, the children's magazine that Kizito and I founded in 1996, featured "Honor for Mothers." There was a story about boyfriend/girlfriend relationships, a lesson on the importance of "thank-you," a French lesson, and an article "How to be First in Class." The natural history section was on chimpanzees and the bonobo, an ape found only in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo).

Bleu/Blanc was named for the colors of the school uniform -- a mandatory white shirt and blue trousers for boys and a white blouse and blue skirt for girls. The mission of the magazine was to teach literacy while providing educational messages on many different topics.

The politics of the time were so tenuous and the possibility of success so limited that Kizito and I printed the first issue anonymously. For the cover, we could not afford a four color process so Kizito separated them laboriously by hand on sheets of acetone. The results were less than good, but already better than anything students were used to.

We printed only 10,000 copies of the first Bleu/Blanc, for distribution through the schools. There were few takers, and we ended up giving most of them away. But there was a hook that was hard to resist; due to the numbered copies (right lower corner) we were able to give away prizes in a Tombola. There was also prizes given out based on correct answers to a quiz that students mailed in. These goodies created a desire to own something (something to read) that had not existed before in the school culture.

Monkeypox Field Work

Mungbau drove our team of three -- Zairian nurse, Zairian chauffeur, and me, a Peace Corps volunteer -- from Lisala, on the North side (the right bank) of the Zaire river to Kinshasa and beyond, by road. We traveled for six months, and lived entirely out of what we could carry in the short-bed Toyota Land Cruiser. In 1986, we were detached from the National Program of Vaccination to the World Health Organization to conduct field studies on the wild animal reservoir for the zoonotic disease called monkeypox.

We traveled light because we had to. Over half of the back of the vehicle was for our supplies, including a liquid nitrogen tank, animal live traps, tissue sampling supplies, and a battery operated centrifuge, pictured above. The centrifuge was needed to spin down the tubes for the serum that was frozen in the liquid nitrogen.

We also carried a big box of replacement parts for the truck, a chain saw, and tools. Our own supplies were limited to some kerosene lanterns, folding cots, cooking utensils, buckets, a card table, a short-wave radio with antenna, and a metal trunk full of money to pay people. The three of us each had a small duffel bag with several changes of clothes, a towel, and soap. We bought powered milk, rice, sugar, salt and coffee where we could find it along the way.

Mungbau was the most ingenious and talented mechanic I have ever known. When we were stationed working at a village, Mungbau would offer his considerable expertise to fix anything that had moving parts, especially generators, old trucks, and motorcycles. He used scrap metal, wire, and rubber. Once he jury-rigged a broken leaf spring by shoring the side up with wood chopped out of the forest and the driver was able to limp in to the next commercial center.

The Last Rhino

The graphics at the antelope/vulture yard at the Milwaukee County Zoo uses bones to comment on the rarity of rhinos. This "double duty" combines the natural history of vultures with a conservation message about rhinos.

Some guests may be repelled by the sight of the bones on exhibit, but it is a dramatic way to express the reality and rawness of nature.

Photo by D. Messinger

Housing for Orphaned Bonobos

This was the building for the orphaned bonobos in Kinshasa. There were eight cages (four foot by eight foot, by eight foot high), four on a side, and an open-air work space. Each unit had a metal roof that covered half of the space as well as a central hallway.

I loved living so close that I could walk to work every day. Immediately behind the bonobo building was a large tract of land -- probably five acres -- that contained a never completed guest complex, a meeting hall, the sheep pasture, and my studio apartment.

Photo by D. Messinger

The Bill That Fueled a Rebellion

This crisp, never spent five million zaire note is associated with the downfall of a country. Through the late eighties and early nineties, the double digit inflation was spiraling so quickly that an expatriate like me needed to get my dollars changed to Zaires (or "Zs") and spend them immediately on the same day, to maintain parity.

The price of goods climbed higher and higher, as the government printed larger and larger denominations to prop up the economy. As soon as the money was printed, it lost value, and most bills were worth only pennies, nickles, and dimes. Older bills (like the issues of 1, 5, 10, 50, 100, 200, 500, and so on) notes were used as scrap. At any time during this period, the most valuable bill was worth only about a dollar or so. I used to change dollars into "bricks" (a brick was 25 bundles of 25 Zairian bills, or 625 bills) and stuff a big sack with money, for groceries.

In late 1992, the government ordered up five million bills to replace the one million bill as the largest denomination note, and distributed it to the military as pay. When the soldiers went to the markets to purchase goods, the market sellers were incensed. They had had enough of Mobutu, the inflation, and their starvation lives. They joked obscenely about the five million bill, calling it a "prostate," because Mobutu was being treated for prostate cancer.

Finally, in January 1993, Kinshasha erupted into open rebellion again, because a few armed soldiers shot and killed market women who refused to take the newly minted money. The town went crazy again, turning their frustrations into vandalism and looting that swept the city.

That was the straw that broke many expatriate backs. For the second time, expatriates evacuated, embassies closed permanently (including Sweden, which affected the progress of finding a home for my bonobos in that country), and businesses that were just getting back on their feet after the "events" in 1991, collapsed. Non-governmental organizations went into hibernation for years, because of the distrust for any future stability.

The five million Zaire note was never accepted by the population and it never circulated. It remains a curiosity for collectors.

A Green, Green Roof

This is a wonderful sign and display with live plants, for the promotion of a sedum planted roof at the education building of the Milwaukee County Zoo. The zoo hosted the American Zoo and Aquarium Association national conference last week. Planted roofs are an old fashioned method of construction in northern Europe, but they are gaining popularity in this country.

In an increasing energy conscious nation, "Green" buildings are another way of looking at conservation. There are many ways to build a resource efficient building, depending on one's location. These can range from simple (orientation of windows, planting of deciduous trees) to complex (solar heat pumps, earth berms, geothermal energy, straw bale construction, locally produced, recycled materials).

The goal of an eco-building is to improve occupant health and productivity, while using resources more efficiently. The environmental impact should be reduced, while the value of the construction will increase. Although start-up costs may be high, there should be a savings over the life of the building.

For the Milwaukee County Zoo, the specific benefits of a planted roof is to reduce storm water runoff, decrease pollution, and lower temperatures. The graphic links the reader to a web cam where one can compare water runoffs and temperatures between the planted roof and a control section of roof without plants. For more information visit:

http://www.zoosociety.org/Education/GreenRoof.php

Stani, Bonobos, and Gorilla

Stani is grinning, while carrying fifty pounds of bonobo (five) plus a baby gorilla that is high-tailing it down Stani's leg, because she didn't like the others. In 1996, at the request of the Ministry of Environment, I flew to Bukavu to pick up a gorilla confiscated from poachers in the Kahuzi-Biega Park.

The young gorilla was a female named Kidole (for "finger," because she had a white digit) and we hoped that she would socialize with the bonobos. However, they did not get along. Kidole had multiple health issues and unfortunately, she succumbed to hepatitis after ten weeks.

Photo by D. Messinger

2008 AZA National Conference

Last week, I attended the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) annual conference, hosted by the Milwaukee County Zoo. A mecca for zoo professionals, this year's meeting had about 1,600 registrants. As could be expected, there are many sessions and posters covering research, record keeping, animal welfare, range country conservation, animal transport, behavior, zoonotic disease, and overviews of breeding recommendations. Examples of specific groups that met include antelopes and giraffes, amphibians, apes, aquatic interest, Aruba island rattlesnake, bats, bears, butterflies, cheetah, elephant, equid, giant panda, jaguar, koala, okapi, rhino, rodent, sea turtle, tapir, tiger, tree kangaroo, wild pig, peccary, and hippo.

AZA zoos are not all about animals. With the trend in reduction of governmental support and increased competition for non-profit dollars, marketing, public relations, development, volunteers, and membership were all topics. There were also sessions on educational programs, diversity, governmental affairs, the accreditation process, green practices, new technology, and climate change. Companies that provide specialized products or services to the AZA community displayed their wares in a large exhibit hall.

Presentation titles included "Frogs in the Crosshairs and Conservation at the Crossroads," "The Bricks and Mortar of Capital Campaigns," "Little Zoos -- Big Ideas!" "Hoof Care of Captive Wild Ungulates," "Ed-Boo-cation: The Horrors of Not Educating Your Event Guests," "The Good, the Bad, and the Fuzzy -- Spider City Comes Alive!" "New Media and Podcasting," "Social Behaviors of a Group of Female Nile Hippos," and "Go Green Without Turning Your Bottom Line Red."

My favorite conference session was about plants, offered by the field conservation committee and the Association of Zoological Horticulture. The basic premise was that successful animal conservation depended upon a healthy plant community. Four papers were presented on a reforestation project in Mexico (Oklahoma City Zoo), orchid conservation in Madagascar (Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha), plant propagation to rear rare butterflies (Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle), and plant conservation in Uganda (North Carolina Zoo).

Zoo people love visiting zoos, so there was a sponsored trip to the Milwaukee County Zoo, with many behind-the-scenes areas being open to the delegates. I enjoyed meeting with Gay Reinartz, the bonobo species SSP (Species Survival Plan) coordinator, and Barbara Bell, who is responsible for Milwaukee's excellent training program for their large group of bonobos.

One of the amazing things about the annual AZA conference is that it gives zoo people new ideas and a fresh enthusiasm for their own facility. The advancement of science, along with the networking rekindles the passion for an interesting profession.

Meet the Flockers

Modern times demand modern technology. At the Milwaukee County Zoo, a flamingo graphic uses young, tongue-in-cheek humor (from the Movie, "Meet the Parents"). The second flamingo sign, from the same zoo, uses a text message reply to educate.

Moving Day for the Bonobos

It was moving day, March 8th, 1998, and the six bonobos were being shipped to Holland. I am taking blood from bonobo Zuani (to accompany the shipment so that the animals would not be subjected to another anesthesia upon arrival). Ria, the keeper from the Apenheul Primate Park is trying to sooth baby Liboso that is seen as a black blob on the sleeping Zuani's belly.

The airline officials thought that the mother would get stressed and injure or kill the baby. Their recommendation was that we separate the two within a crate. I refused, saying the devoted ape mother would hurt her baby trying to pull it through to her. The Apenhuel officials signed a paper accepting the risk and the two were crated together. As we predicted, they both arrived in Europe in great shape.

Bonobo Lucy Eats Lunch

Lucy, a young female bonobo, looks over her smorgasbord of fruits, vegetables, greens, and nutritionally complete "primate biscuits" at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens. The zoo pays strict attention to the apes' diets, even checking for nutritional suitability by a special software called "Zootrition."

Modern zoos do not allow the feeding of the animals because foods like potato chips, bread, candy, chocolate, and pop corn leads to imbalanced diets, and even allergic reactions. In the case of primates, some illnesses such as colds and flu can be transmitted by human handling of food.

Photo by M. Brickner

Veterinary Workup: Bonobo 4146

Any bonobo or chimpanzee that was anesthetized for testing received a complete exam. Because the animals were housed at a human medical facility, I had access to physicians and quality laboratory diagnostics.

The paperwork above was for # 4146, an eight pound female bonobo that stayed at our clinic for three days. As noted, she was from Basunkusu, and had a small flat tail bud. She had a "cheeky" appearance with unusual fatty pads at the corners of the mouth.

Her temperature was subnormal, at 96.8, and she had swollen lymph glands below the throat, on the right side. She had no external parasites, the lungs sounded good and the heart rate was 100 beats per minute. As part of a simple test for long term malnutrition, I tugged on her hair to see if it came out too easily. Her hair was relatively hard to pull, but she did have puffiness under the eyes, indicating of lack of protein, as well as pale mucus membranes, a sign of anemia.

The erupted teeth were diagrammed. This showed that the bonobo was cutting her first lower molars, which meant that she was older than her weight would indicate. The bonobo had severe gingivitis, a common problem with malnourished baby apes, with exposed roots on three teeth on the upper right. This corresponded to the swollen lymph glands.

The owner brought the bonobo in an extremely small cage. He said that she had been losing weight, but had good stools. He said she coughed occasionally, and had no appetite, but drank water well. When she first arrived, she was very thirsty and drank a lot of liquids.

The bar code on the right side is the ten-digit number of the transponder that I implanted at the left shoulder, the same type of permanent identification that is used on cats and dogs. This was done to track the animals that entered the (illegal) pet trade; if they ever appeared outside the country and were scanned, their origin would be known.

Unfortunately, blood work was not done on 4146, but signs of parasites were found in the stool -- hookworms, roundworms, and whipworms. The animal was discharged with medications and advice.

One interesting comment is that reading back over these notes, I remembered that Zairians referred to animals as "it." In contrast, Americans often use "she" and "he," for known gender animals. For this post, I went back and changed the pronouns from "it" to the more personal "he" and "she."

Monkey Money for Gorillas

This was the 50,000 note used in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), from 1991, that depicted gorillas from Kahuzi Biega Park in Kivu. The silverback was named Maheshe, well-known as the patriarch of a habituated group for tourists. Maheshe was an eastern lowland gorilla, or Grauer's gorilla, Gorilla beringeri graueri.

Many local people were scandalized, calling the bill "monkey money," because animals were not revered in the culture. Only those communities living close to, and benefiting from tourism understood the importance of the gorillas to local economy and national pride.

While training as a Peace Corps vounteer, and then the following year as a trainer, I had the fortune to visit Kahuzi Biega Park ten times. We saw the gorillas eight times, and it was certain that I saw Maheshe.

The monkey money gorilla, Maheshe, was killed in November, 1993, during warfare in the region.

Theo and Baby Bonobo

Theo was a mild mannered keeper, well suited for his nanny job with the young bonobos. Physically, Theo was a stick-thin man much shorter than I. His stature was a trial for him because skinniness advertised “poor.” Theo had a nurturing soul, and he didn’t mind bottle feeding the babies and letting them hang from him so he looked like a moving bush with hairy fruit.

Photo by D. Messinger

Insurance for Texas

Insurance for my truck (named Texas, by the way, because it was a tough name, and Zairians were enamored with re-runs of "Dallas") was a joke. If you were in a accident, you never got a claim settled by the local rip-off insurance companies.

In a bizarre twist, the older the vehicle, the more expensive the insurance. I checked and was told something about the older a vehicle was, the more chance it had mechanical problems, would be involved an accident, and kill somebody. It had nothing to do with the replacement value of the vehicle. So, insurance for my 15 year old truck was expensive, about twice as much as in the US.

I struggled for years to cover the 850 dollar annual cost, and then discovered a brilliant option that the Zairians used. The "I lost my insurance" paper, featured above, could be had from any local gendarmerie. This cost three dollars and was good for 20 days. Do the math.

Footprint, Bonobo 4013

In Kinshasa, when I anesthetized a bonobo for an exam, I also tested ways to permanently identify them. I tried "fingerprinting," rather, "footprinting," for a unique identification. I used regular India ink, brushed it on with a paint brush, and then pressed the foot to a sheet of paper. I preferred the feet because of the anatomical abnormalities seen, such as the bent little toe above, that could not be straightened out.

The footprint was also a way to look at the webbing between the digits, a common bonobo characteristic. Number 4013 had webbing between the first and second toes, half-way to the first knuckle joints.

Bonobo Hairdo

This patch from the Frankfurt Zoo stylistically depicts a bonobo's face. The bonobo is known for its hair, parted neatly and exactly down the middle and small, delicate ears. This is in contrast to the chimpanzee, who has combed back hair and large protruding ears.

One of the interesting things about bonobos is that they often groom the top of the forehead (is this is a favorite grooming position because the groomer can see the eyes and facial expression of the groomee?) Sometimes, the part in the hair is no longer visible due to the groomed bald patch at the forehead.

Baby Bonobos: Oh, Sweet Innocence!

Zuani, a baby bonobo follows her biological program by rubbing against a male cagemate, while eating. In bonobo society, the tension of food sharing leads to such physical gestures, which diffuses stress, and leads to reconciliation.

With bonobos, sex is the glue of a peaceful ape society that is largely female dominated. In the case of Zuani and the male, even at a young age, he knew that he did not have first rights to the piece of bread. After rubbing, Zuani would usually share her meal. Psychologically, Zuani was a very well adjusted bonobo, in spite of her being an orphan who did not have the opportunity to learn the bonobo social norms.

In spite of that, and due to individual genetics, perhaps, or because Zuani was a quick study, she was the runaway favorite of the other bonobos. Zuani was always quick to offer a rub to the others, male or female, whenever there was any unusual situation, weather it was a treat, the play got too rough, or even something scary like an airplane flying overhead.

Photo by D. Messinger

In My Living/Dining Room

This was the outdoor room that served as my living and dining room in the on-grounds apartment where I live for ten years in Kinshasa, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). I am eating a treat, a local watermelon. The nets on the screens were fish nets collected on village trips.

My studio was a 1,000 square foot challenge. From Grains of Golden Sand:

"Others might have been dismayed by my on-campus accommodations, but for me, the primitive adventure boasted everything (including the kitchen stink). The apartment roof and entire north wall leaked dreadfully, and rainwater pooled two inches deep on the concrete floor. The false ceiling was varicolored with mold rings that expanded and retreated with the seasons. The place was infested with gargantuan spiders that stalked the moths attracted to the ceiling lights. (I had to explain to visitors, “I never kill them. We have different niches: I’m terrestrial and they’re arboreal.”) The hot-water heater was constantly on the fritz. I played “musical refrigerators” with the institute, and once I was nearly electrocuted by frayed wires inside the stove that shorted out on the metal. The kitchen tap slow-dripped into a graywater bucket that I emptied weekly. The bed slats were quite literally eaten out from under me by termites, and the only running water during the dry season came after midnight. My home was my hassle."

Okapi Skin

One time, some sellers at the animal market downtown in Kinshasa brought me something unusual. Wrapped in a dirty burlap sack, this stiff hide came from the rare okapi, a giraffe relative that only occurs in the Democratic of the Congo (formerly Zaire). The stripes wrap around the animal's buttocks and the base color is a dark chocolate brown. It was odd to touch the velvet plush of the same animal that I had once touched, alive, at a zoo.

The Congolese knew that the okapi was rare and special, and illegal to kill, so the men were being secretive about the contents of the sack, and said that it was worth a king's ransom. They insisted that we take it around back for photographs, after which I sent them on their way. The skin was of poor quality, like all of the hides I saw, because it had been salted and dried in the sun.

I had seen the okapis at the "Capture Station" of Epulu, between Kisangani and Bukavu, but this was the only time that I saw the evidence of a hunted one. I was probable that the animal had been poached for its meat and skin from the the forests surrounding Epulu. I never knew what happened to the hide.

School with a Beautiful Name

In 1984, I joined the Peace Corps to teach veterinary nurses in the center of Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). The name of the town was Omendjadi -- a pretty name for a village of five hundred people. The name was the only thing good about it, because there was no way to get to anywhere from there. There was not one telephone, newspaper, store, restaurant or bar. Also, the postal service was extremely sporadic, due to a government mandate that all mail had to be carried by the national airline. (It was called Air Zaire, but everyone called it Air Peut-Etre, or "Air Maybe")

The rusted roof building in the weedy yard above is the Administration Center of the "Technical Agricultural Institute" where I taught. The school offered agriculture and veterinary nursing as options. Most of the students lived on site and the school farm was managed by a few teachers, in part, to supply the dormitories with food.

Photo by D. Messinger

Location a Closely Guarded Secret

Here I was, In Kinshasa, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), standing at the entrance of a printing company, with the employees looking on. During that time, we never let leak where the children's magazine and school notebooks were actually being printed. There was a good reason for that. From Grains of Golden Sand:

"Donors astonished by our circulation and wishing to verify the numbers often asked where the thing was printed. “Oh, out in the cité,” was our hemmed and hawed response.

"“Why won’t you give us the name of the print shop?”

"Grin. “If we do, we will have to kill you.”

"In fact, the volume of work was so great that the printer was worried that if his name were broadcast, the company would become the target of more than the usual coterie of tax collectors. Like so many other businesses in Kin, it hid behind a blank wall with nary a sign. The whereabouts of Bleu/Blanc’s print shop was—and is—a well-guarded secret."

Bonobo: Here Fishy, Fishy

Sharp eyes will spot the "Here Fishy, Fishy" wording on the T-shirt that Kaleb, a bonobo at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens is wearing. He enjoys his rubber duck toy as well. The bonobos at the zoo are provided the maximum of enrichment outdoors, and this includes toys made of plastic, articles of clothing, and other man-made items.

Many zoos have a "natural only" policy for enrichment on exhibit, believing that the animals should be seen only with those things found in nature. Purists might be offended, but apes have a great need to manipulate objects for psychological stimulation. The Jacksonville zoo primate staff feels that the animals are healthier with a variety of both natural and artificial enrichment. This is interpretated by education guides stationed at the bonobo overlook.

Photo by M. Brickner

Bonobo Plays with Calf

Ngombe (Lingala for "cow") was a calf that I inherited from friends during the looting of 1991 -- she had been born to a mother that had had no milk and was to be euthanized. Instead, I took her and raised her on powdered milk. Here she is in the middle of a bonobo who is trying to pet her, a volunteer, and one of the cats that we rescued from departing expatriates.

Photo by D. Messinger

Papayas in a Storm

These three papaya trees (they all had fruit, nestled close to the trunk at the base of the leaves) were silhouetted against an approaching storm. During the wet season, a rain would blow up nearly every afternoon. From Grains of Golden Sand:

"There is an unusual rain in the tropics that is legend. This thunderstorm occurs only during daylight hours and begins with dramatic, tall clouds racing forward and darkening the sky to gray-magenta. Magnificently, the wind whips the treetops and shreds the tender new papaya and banana leaves. Ozone stings the nostrils sharply while lightening bolts crash to the ground. Then, moving audibly across the landscape like the thudding of thousands of tiny water bombs, comes a hard, driving downpour so sudden and heavy that all life—in villages, on the bare grassy hillocks, and along the dank trails of the great forests—scramble for cover. The fury roars through the land at antelope speed and rattles the metal roofs so that all conversation stops. In towns, pedestrians take shelter under eves, miserably chilled, backs flattened against the buildings, while the water pours from the roofs like Victoria Falls.

"Raindrops prance in the inch-deep microfloods they create, too fast for the astonished land to absorb. Mercifully, the shower is brief and tapers off abruptly as the storm thunders on. Just as it ends, the sun bursts out and the last of the rain falls through the slanting light that breaks the gloom of departing clouds. The raindrops glisten brightly like a billion beads of quicksilver."

Photo by D. Messinger

Theo with Three Bonobos

Theo was a bonobo keeper who took care of the youngest animals. From Grains of Golden Sand:

"Every morning Theo would prepare breakfast for the baby bonobos, and they would leap onto his shoulders for their ride to the bonobo building where he would close himself in a cage with them for the day. The baby bonobos socialized with Hani, Rosie, and Zuani, the adolescent bonobos next door until it was time to go to bed. On rounds at odd hours, I’d catch Theo sound asleep with a couple of bonobos snoozing beside him and another quietly playing with her toes on an overhead bench. That was Theo’s job, and he performed it admirably. He was also the most diplomatic of the keepers, and whenever the men had a work-related gripe, Theo was elected spokesman to present the case to “management”—me."

Photo by D. Messinger

Jane Goodall Visits Kinshasa

In 1990, and again in September of 1991, Jane Goodall visited Kinshasa, with the goal of convincing the Zairian government to confiscate apes being sold as pets on the open market. (Always ready for a group photo, my workers posed proudly in front of a monkey habitat built for a breeding pair of owl-faced monkeys, Cercopithicus hamlyni).

By a strange coincidence, Jane got caught up in the 1991 looting that paralyzed Kinshasa for three days. Holed up in the sixth floor of the USAID building apartment with Dr. Dumont, the U.S. embassy doctor and his wife, she watched the chaos in the streets below, and fretted about the fate of the chimpanzees at the Zoo at N'Sele.

It took three days for things to calm down enough for the embassy to evacuate Americans and also Jane Goodall. One evening at the Dumonts, I watched the video they’d taken, showing French commandos infiltrating in order to stabilize Kinshasa during the looting. From Grains of Golden Sand:

"Inadvertently, the film captured the death of one of the soldiers as he was shot in the neck at the intersection below. His comrades leaped to his aid and, as quickly, commandeered a pastel blue truck to carry off the body. It was sobering to observe from above, the looters running in and out of the back of the grocery store called SEDEC. The people came out with the goods piled high in shopping carts and quickly scattered down the side streets.

"I’ll never forget something else in the video—an overloaded military truck piled high with furniture that tried to navigate at high speed the circular intersection in front of the train station. Like a heavy-bodied goose slowly taking wing, the uppermost mattress lifted off. Narrating voices in the film’s soundtrack tittered as the wind gripped the bed and it flapped in undulating animation. It hovered in an air pocket over the truck and then gently lifted up and pitched over the side. That wayward mattress symbolized to me the irreversible path of self-destruction that Zaire seemed so determined to take."