Galician Rebeca Atencia has been the director of the Jane Goodall Institute for 16 years.
When you call the mobile Rebecca Atencia waiting birds sound. "Absolute silence does not relax me, I need to hear birds in the background." Like in the Congo. "At night there is a lot of noise in the jungle, you can hear a lot of animals, but you get so used to those sounds that you stop hearing them."
The Galician veterinarian has been in the Tchimpounga sanctuary for 16 years, working as director of the Jane Goodall Institute in this rehabilitation center for great apes victims of poaching. “I am waiting for them to call me to go rescue some chimpanzees in Angola…”.
We have taken advantage of one of her temporary stays in Madrid to chat with this defender of nature, dedicated to saving a species in danger of extinction.
Do you have news about the chimpanzees of Angola?
We are still waiting… They are in Cabinda, in the house of a man who trafficked with them; As soon as the Ministry confiscates them I will have to fly there to take care of their transfer to our sanctuary in Congo. Procedures between countries are always complicated...
It seems incredible that there are still poachers today...
Adult great apes are killed for their meat, which is highly valued and very expensive, something like shellfish in Spain. They attribute special powers to it: they think it gives strength to men; children have chimpanzee hair tied on their wrists to make them brave, etc. And the babies that don't have enough meat are sold as pets, because baby chimpanzees are so cute...
Chimpanzee babies are sold as pets.
But babies grow...
Yes, and when they grow they are very dangerous. An adult chimpanzee is gigantic, weighing 70 kilos; he is like a person but eight times stronger and very violent. In fact, in zoos they always tell you that they are the most aggressive animals, more than the lion and the tiger and any other.
And it's true, because they are very smart: if a chimpanzee escapes and has evil in his head, it is impossible to hide from him, and he can do you a lot of damage; they have a very long life, between 60 and 70 years, and you don't know what they've been through, maybe they hold a grudge because they've suffered mistreatment...
How many chimpanzees have you saved?
To much. I go out of my way for them… They have suffered tremendously… They are babies who have seen their mother killed, and they arrive very weak, with life hanging by a thread. You have to give them a lot of love and a very harsh medical treatment. At first they don't eat anything, and we have to find out what their favorite food is.
Lufino, for example, arrived very thin, weighing four kilos, with terrible amebiasis and more than three hundred fly larvae all over his body (that's why we call him Lufino, which in the local language means larva). He looked at us with a crazy face and did not eat anything. Until one day we gave him muesli to try and we discovered that he liked raisins, so… let's buy raisins for Lufino! Mambu is another baby who also arrived skeletal and…
Do you know the name of the 160 chimpanzees of Tchimpounga?
Sure, I've known them since they were little.
Chimpanzees have eight times more strength than a man.
Do you have photos of him on your cell phone? Who is your chimpanzee best friend?
Yes, look... This is Nfumbu, this Chimpi, Macu, Congui, Dorisí... I recognize them by their faces and also by their personality. With Tabish I get along very well. He is very big, he is very impressive, but he is very scared of the other chimpanzees. With humans he is more violent, he shakes them and throws them into the air...
What friends you are looking for!
But he has a special love for me... It's the chimpanzees who choose you, not you them.
Are you able to communicate with them?
Yes, I know how to communicate with any chimpanzee from anywhere in the world.
That is ease for languages...
I'll tell you how I began to understand them. When I arrived in the Congo, I was working in the Conkouati National Park, directing the Help Primates project (the only one that existed at the time) to reintroduce orphaned chimpanzees into their habitat.
Chimpanzees lived in the jungle, and we had to make sure that they were in good condition and adapted to their environment without problems. To do this, he had a team of ten or 15 observers who followed up from nest to nest...
nests?
Yes, chimpanzees make nests to sleep in trees. When they woke up there was already an observer waiting for them to take notes on their behavior every ten minutes, until they nested again at night. I, as a veterinarian, had to check that all the chimpanzees were in good health. One day I had to visit Emily, Tessy, Kuilo and Karim; they were wearing GPS collars and we found them two or three hours from the camp; but we were missing one.
Just then we ran out of batteries and didn't have a spare (typical!), so my companion had to go looking for batteries, leaving me in the jungle… alone! You don't worry, she tells me that you are with Emily and she will take care of you. What madness, I thought. But okay, I'm staying here with Emily, she's a chimpanzee, and she's going to protect me. Suddenly, I see how they stand up and start howling. Uuuu-uuuu-uuuu, Uuuu-uuuu-uuuu… Something strange was happening. I look to the side and see the trunk of an elephant.
If you run into an elephant, the smart thing to do is to run long and zig-zag.
Oh Mother! And what did you do?
Until then I had not yet faced any elephant… Flee behind the chimpanzees. They walked very fast, through brambles, on all fours, they crossed a river, I was falling behind… When I had almost lost them, Emily turns around, looks at me and stops to wait for me. A very rare thing!
She knew that she had to protect you.
Safe from the elephant, they stopped to eat palm stalks, spiked palms that Tessy loved. I was staying away, but Emily came up to me, grabbed my wrist and put my hand on her shoulder, on her shoulder! I withdrew her immediately, scared: Rebeca, you can't touch her, she's a chimpanzee, you're a person, you have to respect distances. But Emily took my hand again to put it on her shoulder. He wanted me to groom him!
Is grooming when you groom each other?
It is much more than that: it is the way to establish her affiliations. Emily taught me her language, to communicate through physical contact, with caresses. For me it was a very nice thing.
You've got me worried about the elephant… Are they dangerous?
Super dangerous. Some have seen how their family was murdered and they are very aggressive, they kill people. I myself have thought that I didn't tell it sometimes... In the end I always tell the same story, but it was my most critical moment with pachyderms.
While with LPC (La Petite Chimpanzé), an elephant came for us bawling, with its ears wide open and that liquid that comes out of its mouth when they are very angry. I tried to hide behind a very large log, but it saw me and was coming for me. He had me caught, and I with LPC hooked to my back, which weighed 15 kilos.
I didn't know what to do, it was five seconds in which my whole life went through my head; My legs were shaking, I was unable to coordinate, nervous, sweating, tachycardia. I already thought I was going to be crushed to death by that bug when I saw a hole in the ground in the bushes, like the ones rabbits dig but bigger, about forty centimeters. I went through there with LPC clinging to my back, crawling on the ground on all fours, and running, running, running, with the elephant chasing us.
Kefan in the Tchibeb jungle with Rebeca.
How should we act if we come across one of these beasts?
The first thing is to try not to find it, and in order not to find it you have to know where it is and avoid it. You have to learn to walk through the jungle without making a sound, stepping with your heel first, and with your eyes wide open, because, by not making a sound, the snakes do not hear you and do not move out of the way.
Oh, there are also snakes...
Dangerous are Gaboon vipers, green mambas in the trees, and some very large black cobras. You have to be careful because they attack; I have already given antidote to more than one chimpanzee.
I think I prefer elephants...
Those from the jungle usually go alone or in pairs, it is rare for more than three to go together. You can hear them when they eat, because they chew like a horse. If you hear them, you have to stay still, take the compass and get out of the way to avoid them: 30 degrees to the left, 30 degrees to the right. But if suddenly you meet them head-on and they charge you, run as fast as you can doing eses.
How can you like the jungle with so much potential threat on the loose?
I have been working there for sixteen years; what was new and scared me before has become my comfort zone.
How were your first days in the jungle?
Very shocking. Now there is coverage everywhere, but at that time there was no telephone, no mobile, no internet connection, nothing. We communicated with a radio (the phonie) at a certain time of the day (six o'clock in the evening), and when it broke down we were completely isolated...
At first I didn't understand anything, I only saw green; it was all sounds and smells he didn't understand. But, little by little, those sounds and smells turned into birds and fruits that have a name. Now I go to the jungle and I see many things that perhaps other eyes do not see. I hear a bird and I know if there is water nearby; by the fruits I recognize what time of the year it is and what animals will be in the surroundings...
Now the jungle is Rebeca's comfort space.
What fruits could we eat now in the Congolese jungle?
Well now the dry season is going to start, so there will be vitex doniana and my favourite: nauclea diderrichii; it is round and tastes like a mixture of pineapple, mango and peach, very sweet but with a hint of acidity, like children's candy.
Is there anything about the Congo that reminds you of your native Ferrol?
Well, apart from the humidity... elephants are a bit like Galician cows, you have to be careful with them...!
Did you have pets at home when you were little?
Yes, in Serantes we always had dogs, we also had a horse, and the neighbors, who raised sheep, left us little lambs when they were born.
That you like animals is understandable, but… why Africa?
Africa is a mysterious, scary continent, and I wanted to go see it. Being a vet, it's like your dream. After graduating, I specialized in wild animals, but had only worked with them in zoos and safaris. I dreamed of giving them freedom, that's why I went to Africa. Although later I realized that freedom is freedom of choice: there are chimpanzees that have been in captivity for a long time and do not like the jungle, because the jungle is very stressful...
Yes, I think we've got an idea with the elephant...
There they have to look for food, fight other wild chimpanzees… Some of them get so stressed that they die.
Ella Rebeca wanted to know the mysteries of Africa.
So… what is your opinion of zoos?
I do not have a negative opinion: they allow you to feel close to animals and inspire children. Many of the people who are now doing incredible things in Africa have the memory of when their grandparents took them on excursions to the zoo…
What happens is that there are zoos in very bad conditions; others, however, are doing a lot for the recovery of almost extinct species, investing a large part of their profits in conservation programs. In the end, the most important thing for a chimpanzee is to settle in an environment where he has the situation under control and a strong social structure. They don't like to be alone.
To what extent are they similar to humans?
There is a very nice book, First Cousins, written by Roger Fouts, a researcher who taught a chimpanzee named Washoe to communicate in sign language, something now unthinkable. The fact is that they had many conversations with her, and a lot has been known about how they think.
When Washoe found out that a girl from the lab had lost her baby, he comforted her by telling her how sorry he was for her, because she had also lost her two children. She makes your hair stand on end… She no longer recognized herself among the other chimpanzees, she asked: “Who are those black bugs?”.
Are they able to understand the…?
Oh, sorry, but they call me on the phone… Ali, dit-moi… Oui, oui… Exacte, exacte, c'est ça… Oui, exacte... Très bien, très bien… Et quand vous avez tout dans le paquetage, vous prenez une photo, d'accord?... Merci, à demain…
Sorry. Were you talking to the Congo?
Yes, even though I'm here, I'm connected to them all the time: we talk on Whatsapp and Skype, I have cameras in the offices and GPS in all the cars to know where they are and even how fast they're going. And if a veterinary intervention has to be carried out, I follow up on the Internet, although I have people trained there.
Rebeca with her team at the Jane Goodall Institute in the Congo.
Has it been difficult for you to direct a group of African men when you are a woman?
First they didn't accept it, I had to learn to deal with them and stand up two or three times in a very serious way to make it clear to them that I was the boss. I also appointed Congolese women team leaders; At first they didn't want to, because the men criticized and insulted them, but I supported them and now it's completely normalized.
It seems that Dr. Leakey also liked working with women: he chose Dian Fossey to study gorillas in Rwanda, Biruté Galdikas to study orangutans in Borneo, and Jane Goodall to study chimpanzees in Tanzania. Is it a coincidence that all three are women?
Dr. Leakey thought that women had a greater capacity for observation. What I believe is that women have evolved raising our children and we understand non-verbal communication very well, which is what the great apes use.
How do you feel being called the Spanish Jane Goodall?
Oh, I don't like that... It makes me insecure and makes me very nervous. I have my own identity, I am me and Jane is Jane, although it is true that she has inspired me a lot and that I admire her a lot.
Are there more Spanish women working in the field of primatology?
Many more. At the Lwiro Primate Rehabilitation Center are Itsaso Vélez and Lorena Aguirre; at the Tacugama sanctuary in Sierra Leone, Rosa Garriga… But, curiously, as I have worked with Jane, I appear much more in the media…
Jane Goodall with Rebeca Atencia.
You must know her very well, after so many years by her side. How is she?
Jane is a very young soul in an older body; she still has the innocence and passion of a child, but with the reasoning of an adult. She has turned 85 and is still thinking about how to improve a future where she will not be. She believes in people, and that we are the individuals, one by one, who can fix the world.
When she comes to visit us in Tchimpounga, she never sleeps in houses, she has to sleep in a tent and, moreover, in the jungle; at night we always make a fire and chat around the campfire, she loves it.
And now that she doesn't hear us... Who did you belong to before you met her: Goodall, Fossey or Galdikas?
I can't say that! Well tell us what each of them mean to you. Biruté Galdikas has devoted himself more to science; she created a sanctuary and has done a lot to make known the orangutans, who are the primates that are in the most critical situation. Jane is inspiration, an international reference in commitment to the planet, a living legend. And Dian Fossey is like the myth, he fought for the gorillas and died for them, his story is that of a heroine. I discovered it when I was little, because my sister was reading her book Gorillas in the Mist, and I wanted to have the experience of living in the jungle like her.
Fossey was killed by poachers, have you ever received threats?
Yes, and the Dian Fossey thing is on my mind a lot. She wanted to use black magic to intimidate poachers by disguising herself as a witch, and entering that game is very risky, because in Africa everyone believes in black magic; people are afraid of it and they continue to kill for it. They have come to accuse me of witchcraft; You have to be very careful and always make it clear that you do not believe in those stories.
When Jane visits Tchimpounga they always build a fire and chat around the campfire.
“The man who kills animals today – predicted Dian Fossey – is the man who will kill the people who get in his way tomorrow”.
What is happening is brutal. And in the end, everything is interrelated: the chimpanzees are running out of forest because we are deforesting it to meet the demand for wood, and this demand comes from Europe. We must act responsibly, demand product traceability and check whether a table comes from a plantation or from the jungle.
The same thing happened with palm oil and we have achieved it, people have stopped consuming it. Forests are burned for the production of these monocultures, in the same way that they are destroyed for the exploitation of coltan mines, the mineral used to make mobiles.
At the Jane Goodall Institute we address the problem as a whole: we protect the forest and the people who live around the forest, because if they cut down the trees it is because they have to live on something and they see no other option. We offer them alternatives: we buy eight hundred kilos of fruit a day for the chimpanzee rehabilitation center, and we buy it from the neighbors. It is about promoting sustainable local development, so that Africans themselves are interested in defending their environment. Our goal is to increase Congolese empathy for chimpanzees and other species, including humans.
Can safari tourism help in this regard?
I think that tourism can be something positive for these countries, it makes them want to see animals alive and not dead, at least...
Is it possible to visit the chimpanzees of Tchimpounga?
No, where we are, tourists are not received; but habituated wild chimpanzees can be seen in other places, such as the Ngamba Island sanctuary, in Uganda, which is also a politically stable country, where you can also see mountain gorillas and other animals, such as elephants or…
Better not elephants, thanks…
Oh, sorry, but I have a connection with the Congo now, they're going to call me and...
Do you miss the Congo?
I miss walking through the jungle. Simply walking through the jungle, with fear and joy at the same time. I am in my element there, but here I have a family atmosphere that my children lacked. They grew up in the Congo, and they love that, but they were excited about coming to Spain, especially because of the four seasons, because they still didn't know autumn or spring. They were impressed to see the leaves of the banana trees on the ground, and the other day, when it hailed, they kept the grains as if it were a treasure in the freezer.
They're like Mowglis!
Yes, they are a little out of balance, because they are already eight years old… They experience nature a lot. When they eat a mango they never throw away the bone, for them it would be like killing a tree, they save it to plant it. What happens is that in Spain they don't grow the same as in Africa...
Rebeca accompanies Likabou on her first trip abroad.