Hadada ibis as alarm clock

They wake me up every morning. A sort of loud, nasal caw. Then the dogs start to howl, and sleep is out of the question... We used to have a hadada ibis at the Brookfield Zoo named Stevie. He would sneak up behind us while we were cleaning the exhibit and do that loud CAW, and he got me every time... now I think of Stevie every morning!

Today was filled with a community meeting addressing conservation issues, and bringing partners like NGO's (like us - MGVP), government (local and national), etc. We did some brainstorming in small groups - what are the issues, who are the players, what is the message we want to deliver and how to deliver it. The amazing thing was (in addition to the fact that Jan Ramer from Indiana was sitting in on these meetings) that the meeting was conducted in 3 languages. English (mostly for my benefit, and because it is now the national language), French (former national language) and Kinyarwandan (regional language). One person switched languages several times in one sentence! We Americans are so language challenged... but I vow to improve my French while I'm here.

I also spent several hours today helping Magda, one of the other MGVP veterinarians, put together a power point presentation about respiratory disease outbreaks in the gorillas over the past 2 years. Very interesting. Last year the outbreaks in gorillas happened 4 weeks after a similar rise in cases in the surrounding human population. We don't yet know if it was the same virus, but are working on that.

Sooo, 2 weeks at the office so far and tomorrow.... GORILLAS!!! Finally!!! I get to see them in the wild. See the reason I am here.

More photos soon!