Donations since mid-March to end May - amazing generosity
Category: Rangers, Your Donations | Date: Jul 03 2007 | By: admin
Since my last post about donations on 15th March and until 31st May, I have received the following:
Open donations: $3,703.76
Salary Bonuses - 12
Patrol Rations - 12
Uniforms for Rangers - 7
Patrol Boots - 5
First aid kits - 6
The uniforms and boots are on order from South Africa. I have donations for 19 sets of uniforms and 41 pairs of boots now since I started the blog. I have ordered 50 sets of uniform and 100 pairs of boots from Manchester Outfitters in Nairobi and will make up the difference from the open donations. It is worth ordering in bulk because of the logistics of getting the uniforms to Congo. They have to be flown in ideally because the border crossings can be complicated when you have this kind of equipment. Basically the uniforms look like military uniforms - it is the badge of ICCN that differentiates them - but customs can be complicated because of this.
The patrol rations and salary bonuses are used each month to contribute to the support of the Advance Force of Rangers, who are 49 men in total.
The first aid kits are locally acquired, so that is easy. We provide first aid kits each time the Rangers go on patrol.
In June Chris A also made a $2,000 donation for the Rangers, following the attack of the gorilla sector in the north of Virunga park. Thank you Chris for your amazing generosity, as always.
And thank you to each and every one of you who reads my blog, comments on my blog, and makes donations. It makes the world of difference to have this kind of support both for me and for the Rangers of the Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature.
Medical supplies for Rangers and their families
Category: Rangers, Your Donations | Date: Jun 15 2007 | By: admin
Here are the receipts of the medicine we provided to the Southern Sector Headquarters of Virunga National Park, Rumagabo. I mentioned this on my post of 17th of May. The medicine was given to the nurse at the infirmary. This medicine will be used not only for the Rangers, but also for their families. Thank you very very much for your generosity.
Donations, gorillas and the boss visit in Congo
Category: Active Service, Mountain Gorillas, Rangers, Your Donations | Date: May 17 2007 | By: admin
Christof Schenck, Frankfurt Zoological Society’s Executive Director, arrived in DRC a week ago to see how we were getting along. Christof has been wanting to come and visit the Congo for three years now, but every time he planned to come over, renewed fighting would break out between different rebels factions, or between rebels and the Congolese military, thousands of people would evacuate across the border to Rwanda or Uganda, and the park in which we work would become impossible to visit. Furthermore, all Embassies would advise against all travel to the region, and although that advice may well still stand today, Christof did at last manage to find his window of opportunity. He made it to the Congo! He also brought with him three journalists - Michael, Sebastian and Norbert, who will be covering the story when they get back to Germany. For us it was a very special occasion and a huge honor to have the ‘Grande Fromage’ come and visit our project and different activities. The ICCN even sent over the Head of International Cooperation from Kinshasa to welcome him to Congo!
First up, of course, were the gorillas, but not before a quick trip to the HQ of the gorilla sector to hand over two vehicles (one of which was purchased with funds raised through Paulin’s blog - thanks again Chris!!), 5 desk tops, 5 lap-tops, three printers, a projector and screen, 11 office tables, 36 chairs, a conference table, 2 solar systems, and a large stock of drugs for the medical dispensary (which was also purchased through the blog). See photo below.
We spent two days in the company of gorillas… the first day with the Kabarizi family who has just had another newborn - just two days old - and we had the great luck to be joined by Anne Hammil from the IISD and Ellen Brown from WCS (who has a blog on her work up in Epulu).
This is Anne with the photographers behind her!
The following day we went to see Rugendo - very different family of 12 individuals - and a very different family dynamic. Rugendo means wanderer, and he wanders much further than any other family. In fact he wanders right out of the forest and into the community land where food is plentiful. This however causes problems with local communities, and so it is important to involve them in conservation activities.
Before leaving, we met with some Pygmies who live around the edge of the park. They have been marginalized from society, having left their traditional way of life in the forest but without having found acceptance by the Bantu, they have no access to education or health care, and although getting more ’street-wise’ they originally had no real concept of ownership over land or plants - it just didn’t figure in pygmy logic - so if they saw a banana plant growing somewhere they would simply help themselves. This got them a really bad reputation for thieves… despite the fact that this land that the bananas are now growing on, did once in fact ‘belong’ to them… Christof gave all the women skirts and tops, and for the men, two pairs of jeans… it is important for us conservationists to work with the pygmies as well as other local communities living around the park if we are to have a chance of saving the gorillas in the long term, and getting to know them over a song and a dance is a first step…
Next up was a flight to Ishango and then a hike up the active volcano to spend the night on the crater rim… to be continued…
Technorati : congo, drc, fzs, gorilla, virunga, wildlifedirect
Thank you all for your donations since I started this blog
Category: Logistics, Mountain Gorillas, Rangers, Your Donations | Date: Mar 15 2007 | By: admin
To all my supporters: THANK YOU FOR YOUR DONATIONS since I started this blog late last year.
Donations to date are:
Patrol Boots: 36 pairs
Patrol Rations: 58
Patrol Tents: 3
Salary bonuses for Rangers: 74
Uniform for Rangers: 12 sets
I would like to thank ICCN (The Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature), Paulin Ngobobo - Chief Warden of the Southern Sector of Virunga and WildifeDirect. The ICCN is doing a great job in protecting the park and its wildlife, and I am privileged to be collaborating.
More posts to come soon on the development of Camp Karema in the Mikeno sector - the new Gorilla monitoring station.
Myself and Urbain, my right hand man here in Goma and in the field!
Ndakasi, one of the Gorilla Monitoring team in the Mikeno Sector
Very best, Rob
Technorati : congo rangers, fzs, hippo, mountain gorilla, rob muir, wildlifedirect
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