Chimps and Culture

The first full day in the country of Uganda! I've been able to realize that the development has had positive and negative affects on the country. Not that long ago there was a confrence here called the common welfare confrence, it was only about one week but m,oney was rapidly poured into the country. As a result, the roads were able to be fixed, the airport improved, new buildings were built, etc. However once the confrence was over, all the building and improvements were done yet a year later the maintainace was poor and the hotels aren't getting cutomers and the roads are going back to the original matter. This simply shpws that people are happier and motivated but now they have been exposed to the modern culture and have been pressured by outside influences in buying unecessary things. For example, the average person wants a phone or new shoes. But they should really be focused on getting clean water, food, and a home. In addition to the development issues, private property have been a huge hit within local communities. It's the tension between two siblings wanting the left over of their passed away parent. Each person in their own community is on a hunt for private property, to show their power or wealth. All in all, Uganda has seen a lot of growth but it can easily fade away if they're not careful.

So earlier this morning I went to observe the Chimps! On the way to the location, we got a flat tire but uckily there was a spare tire on the back. As soon as we pulled off to the side of the road, local people came and rushed to help us. It was like an automatic reaction to help those in need. Now let's say this took place in America, it would probably take 20-30 minutes for a car to stop by, hundreds of cars would pass by without any worry. That's not the way it is over here in Uganda, people are eager to help and do it happily. I feel like everyone has each others back no matter what.

While visiting the chimps, I learned that they have 98.7% common genes to humans but the 1.3% is what seperates us from those amazing, smart, and beautiful animals. One difference is that Chimps are 5 times stronger as humans. Therefore when people go poaching for the Chimps, in order to get to the right choice of Chimp, you have to kill all of it's friends, it's mother, and father, just to capture one Chimp. This is about 8-10 Chimps per every Chimp taken. It's horrible to know that so many innocent Chimps are being killed for inapporpriate reasons. Anyway, once I was able to experience and see the Chimps I saw how similar humans and Chimps interact. The Chimps start off by calling to each other when food is present, they wrestle, jump around, and keep their food stach secretive. In addition to their food habits, the Chimps elect a leader and they all respect it and look for acception from it. As i was walking pass one of the cages, I put my hand down, made a monkley noise, and automatically the chimp responded, tried to grab my hand and communicated with me. It's truly amazing to see how much we are alike to these Chimps.

Later tonight, I was able to watch some local and traditional dances/music. The costumes are colorful and match the country's color. The music involves a variety of drums, instruments placed on their bodies, and their beautiful singing voices. The leader of the performance all kids to come down and stage and participate, of course I had to take the opportunity, so I went down with about 8 other kids. However, I was the only one from our group specifically. The music they played allowed me to just let go and free my dancing soul. We created a circle and went in the middle one at a time and just danced however we felt. The leader began to say that we are the kids, the future, and that everyone should look up to us like a ruler since we're the next generation. It's been one of the highlights so far!