Gentle Giants – the Great Apes – D’s big, wide world

July-August 2018

Koko, the famous gorilla who could communicate using the American Sign Language died June 20 2018. I first read Koko’s story in a National Geographic magazine in the 90’s. So I showed little D a video of Koko, the celebrity Gorilla, his pet kitten and his caretaker of several years. There started out Great Ape study.

D has found his heroes! Here’s a rare picture of the three heroes of the ape world, or rather the Trimates of the Primates, in one frame!

Biruté Gladikas, Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey

First we read of Evan, the Shopping Mall Gorilla as he was called. Ivan was kidnapped from his family (troop) as an infant. Adult gorillas fiercely protect their young, so I’m guessing the rest of his family were shot down. The young one is a prize catch, as in the ’60s it was “stylish”‘to keep wild animals as pets or just as live prize catches.

Ivan was bought by the owner of a mall called I. B in the north west coast of USA along with another female infant gorilla who was named Burma. They were raised like human infants (which is cruel enough) though Burma didn’t make it long (probably post trauma stress being separated from her home and family in the tropical forests of Congo).

When Ivan grew out of control, he was “jailed” in a sunless, airless, friendless room in the mall premises as an entertainment feature or a novelty attraction item for 27 years. Until public and national protest grew and he was rescued from the terrible room to a gorilla enclosure in Georgia. He had to be acclimatised to the outdoor weather and to meet other inmates of his own species.

Quite a tearjerker story. And Outrageous indeed. This actual photo of Ivan shows what a gentle creature Ivan was. Ivan later made friends with other gorillas but lost his instinct to mate. He died a few years later.

I think Ivan did not suffer and die in vain. He has moved so many of us who knew him or read about him and cried for him. 27 years in captivity for no fault of his, and with not much as a whimper of protest from him (not that he enjoyed it).

Koko, Ivan.. they have all proved Gorillas are not at all the King Kongs we associate Gorillas with. They are gentle giants, sensitive and sensible.

Here’re two pastel works based on Ivan’s life. One, of him in the loving arms of his mother as a young gorilla and in the company of his father the Silverback and his brothers and sisters. A scene of familial bliss!

And the other, of him a few years later, all alone in a room in the shopping mall in America.

We watched some videos and read books about the American Dian Fossey, who was hired by archeologists Luis Leakey and wife. A pioneer in the study of gorillas she laid her life for their protect and conservation against poachers, right at her own lab lodge.

Then we read Jane Goodall’s biography and D was so excited to learn she is still around and leading her efforts to protect chimpanzees and other animals and their habitats around the world. He’s been begging me to reach out to her so he can meet him!

The third great ape we studied were the orang-utans who have the courageous and determined Biruté to be thankful for. She still lives in Borneo and is the third of Leakey’s Angels.

These three women have single handedly contributed to the study of their respective ape and shaken our previous misgivings and misunderstandings about them and their behaviour. It also proves that women too can live in extreme conditions of the forests and use the womanly powers of patience, compassion and innate motherly feelings to connect with these wild animals.