When you were growing up you must have known them and when we are an adult you remember seeing them: that one child who drives their parents crazy by running around like an out of control firecracker and screams from the tops of their lungs just to make sure that each and every neighbor has heard them playing.
When we approached M-group that day there were about 20 to 30 members together in the bedding of the Kasia River. Young, old and everything in between. Our Mbali Mbali guide took us to get a good viewing spot and we positioned ourselves along the rocks of the dry river at about 10 meters from the closest chimpanzee. There were several adults grooming each other, a baby was suckling from its mother's breast as she was receiving a back scratch from another female, some other chimpanzees were just relaxing, almost sunbathing on large, smooth rocks. It all seemed to be idyllic; a peaceful and familiar sight that one might see on a warm sunny day at the beach. But of course there is always that one kid on the block.
In this case, it was a small chimpanzee of a few months old that wreaked havoc in the peaceful morning nap session of the others. He was hanging upside down from a small tree, having an absolute blast while practicing his hanging skills. But we all know that a game is more fun with others; he soon descended from his green hide out in search of a play mate. As often the case with small kids the first choice in play mate remains the same: mum. Down the tree he went until he reached the lowest branch he could still hang from and so the battle for mum’s precious me-time begun. He first started to dangle upside down while grabbing various parts of mum: her head, her arm, any part he could get hold of. While this all was happening, our camera’s were all going into absolute overdrive and behind the lenses we couldn’t help but laughing. The resulting photo’s will be pretty recognizable for anybody with kids. But mum was in no mood for any play time and after a few minutes, and the probable chimpanzee version of mum threatening to send you to bed without dessert, our little entertainer had to find himself a new victim.
A slightly older chimp was sitting on his own in the river bed and with a stick he was digging around in the riverbed. A prospective playmate for the young chimp? You would think there was room for one more in this fun game of digging and tasting? But it was no longer the playmate that was the focus of our adventurer. The prize had become a lot larger in the last seconds: the stick. Off to his friend he went and to claim his prize. Surely it will come as no surprise that the outcome of the stick conflict ended with two smaller sticks, as so many stick related disputes happen. After having his tool broken in half the grumpy youngster chased off the intruder but the price was won! Now it was time to show everybody the new awesome stick that this little one had. Chimpanzees are not known to roll their eyes, but they did not need to. As this little one got more excited and would make sure nobody missed the presentation of his new stick, the adults became clearly more annoyed and as our camera’s snapped away we became more entertained at this all too familiar, but even more hilarious display of childhood drama.
Our time with the chimps was soon running out and we would have to go soon but not before mum put an end to this little chimps game of “bouncing on every other chimp”. While dangling from another small tree, mum resolutely pulled him off, dragged him further from the rest with the typical “that’s it!” mum-face we all feared in our childhood. The picture we took away from that day alone are enough to relive the entire adventure and put a smile on our faces again as we think back to the cutest version of that kid on the block we have ever seen.