sick day

waking up at 7am for breakfast is a big of a struggle - i feel horrible, my nose alternating between clogged up and sniffly, coughing my lungs out and my asthma starting to play up. i have 3 hot teas and am informed that sundays are pretty much free time as well as a town trip (which you have to put your name down for in advance). reassured i'm not missing out on anything, i crawl back into bed and pass out.

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i wake up in time for lunch, feeling a little better after my sleep. i hate being sick here and really hope it passes quickly.. i think the dust and the dryness out here aren't helping with my breathing troubles so at least i know to keep my ventolin close. i'm bored of doing nothing so i decide to pay the junior baboons a visit (there are baby, junior and adult enclosures).. i walk up near the cage and sit down on the other side of the electric fence. immediately two of them walk over to investigate. they make funny smacking noises with their mouths and tongues, a gesture i later am told is a friendly greeting. they're so cool looking and their eyes are amazingly expressive.. it's crazy to think that an adult baboon is so strong it could easily rip your arm clean out of it's socket!! i pick up a stick and start drawing and digging in the dirt, the baboon opposite me does the same and we sit there drawing in silence whilst her mate grooms her fur, occasionally looking up to grin at me through the wire.

after a while, a few of the remaining volunteers walk up holding bottles and ask if i'd like to help feed the baby baboons. obviously i say yes and leave the junior cage. the five kids are evidently pretty excited for their feed, jumping up against their cage wire, grunting and carrying on (: we stick the bottle teats through the holes in the fence and they all latch onto one and start suckling. it's probably the cutest i've ever seen them.. all we can hear is them sucking away at the milk, occasionally producing satisfied little murmurs. a few of them even close their eyes.. once again the similarities between them and human babies is astonishing. once the milk is gone, they're back to their usual antics and their calm demeanor vanishes completely.

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back at the communal area, the family of meerkats is running about. i sit down on the grass with a book and the bravest babies pause to sniff my feet before scampering off to dig for grubs. poor sylvie gets chased around the garden and the sight is quite ridiculous: she towers over the little devils, even with their tails sticking up into the air. as the sun starts to lower in the sky and the light softens a little, eric and lauren (a lovely french girl and her dad) offer to show me around the closest cheetah enclosure, home to three thus far unnamed cheetahs - a mum and her two cubs.

it's about a 15min walk and as we approach the fence, eric spots the mother laying in the shade of a tree. it's the first cheetah i've ever seen outside of a zoo and i'm literally breathless. the big cat is stretched out lazily and hardly seems to bat an eyelid at seeing us through the wire. we watch her for a moment, then call the other two using the standard "kom, kom, kom!!". a young one slinks out of the bushes not too far from his mum and pads over to stare at us, before deciding we're not very interesting and flopping back down into the shade. then his sister appears and begins licking his head as he yawns. even lazing around their enclosure, they're still such graceful beasts: long, slender and lean.. i don't think i can describe how amazing it is to be observing these guys from so close!! and to think they're just a few of the many animals at N/a'an ku sê is pretty exciting.. then we realise the sun's sunk a little too far in the sky and it's time to head back for dinner.

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as dinner comes and goes, i start feeling a little worse for wear again. i don't know if it's the evening chill that worsens my cold, but in any case i'm thinking an early bedtime is the way to go once again. before retreating to my room, however, i follow two of the girls into lorie's room as she's keeping rudie for the night. it's quite an experience - the little monkey is galloping around the room, swinging off the curtains and climbing up onto the wardrobe only to leap off again, bounce off the bed, snatch emily's cardigan she foolishly left beside her and race off with it. the 3 girls sit and chat but i'm mostly interested in playing with the raging ball of mischievous energy.. he's by this time managed to find 3 items he wants in the supposedly 'monkey-proofed' room: his bottle, the cardigan and a small piece of plastic ripped off god knows what (by monkey-proofed i mean EVERYTHING packed away and locked into cupboards). his mission seems to be climbing onto the wardrobe with all 3 things at once but every time he tries he drops one or two or all three of them and screeches in frustration. for the next half hour, i help him pick up the toys and offer my limbs as extra climbing frames to aid in his endeavors. it's a mission alright but in the end he gets there and, satisfied, proceeds to roll himself into the cardigan. unfortunately at this point i'm pretty exhausted and still feeling quite shit so i call it a night.


[p.s. i'm still finding it quite hard to set up my camera in dealing with the harsh, dusty light out here.. please excuse some of the photos looking washed out just not being of great quality and bear with me..]