Monkey See, Monkey Bite

Yeah, looks cute doesn't he ;o/

The past week has been utterly crazy and I really can't catch up as well as I'd like.

On Saturday 17th I had my leaving do at New Cactus in Kiyovu. It was the best leaving do I could have hoped for - exactly what I wanted. I decided not to open it up as a huge 'everybody come' thing and just kept it to the closest of close friends I have, so that was: Cathryn & J, Guidi & Maxime, Martine & Ruairí, Rose, Pacific and D.

We ate plenty and drank three or four giant carafes of wine. Oh, we glutted ourselves. There were frogs' legs and grilled lamb, tilapia in honey sauce, everything yummy you can imagine.

After the meal each person gave a speech traditional Rwandan style, only a little shorter ;) 

It was such a touching experience and these were the people who really know me, who I've laughed and cried with over the past two years. Incredibly personal - too much so to repeat - but it is an evening I will carry in my heart always.

After, Cathryn, J, Giudi, Maxime, myself and D went to Cadillac and partied on the dance floor with tequila. I tied J's dreads in a bow under his chin then used up all my remaining concentration on trying to stay upright in high heels.

As for the corrupt Pastor, he's been dealt with. He pretended to give in, saying he would come to a meeting to agree to Rose becoming President, then went to other Committee members and tried to tell them not to turn up. It all got really silly. Everyone did turn up and listened to him demanding money and saying our members weren't really single parents! This man is off the scale, as selfish and unpleasant as they come. 'Man of god' in his case equates to 'man who can take anything he can get, even from those in need.'

I totally lost heart. I was ready to walk out after a meeting of around four hours, in which absolutely nothing was decided or agreed upon (a couple of the members seem to have been bought off by him!).

But Rose and our Secretary, Marie, really picked my spirits up again. Rose is one heck of a fighter and refuses to be pushed around by anyone. Our Secretary is also an extremely strong woman, with far more patience and reason than I've ever possessed. Between them, and D as Treasurer, it'll all be fine. The Pastor can go jump if he thinks he's going to undo all of our hard work.

So, after the leaving do and that little drama, I decided to take some R&R in Kibuye with D. We booked into Bethany, and travelled there by bus on the Tuesday.

Kibuye is one of my favourite places in the whole of Rwanda, and Bethany is kind of traditional. The scenery on the bus journey is out of this world - truly breathtaking - and we got one of the nice, spacious Sotra busses.

On Wednesday we had a leisurely breakfast and decided to take a boat trip out around the islands. It was all going really well until we got to Napoleon Island, when dark clouds drew in and Lake Kivu suddenly got a bit choppy. D was getting queasy, so we decided to forgo that island and head for Amahoro Island, which has a bar on it.

We got there and I decided to go for a swim whilst D and the guides went for a walk. It's only a small island and doesn't take long to circumnavigate. After I finished swimming I decided to go find them. The waiter told me which way they went, so I decided to go the other way and meet them in the middle, still in my swimming costume with towel draped over my shoulder. The sun was coming out by then.

As I set off down the path, I hear this shout and turn to see the waiter running flat out towards me. I stop, thinking he's about to tell me the guys are already back, but then I see he's running after a monkey (see above) called Mikey. This pet monkey was tied to a tree when I first arrived, and the waiter was flicking bottle tops at it to get it to do something interesting for me. Not a very happy monkey.

Anyway, its string got tangled in a bush and the waiter shouted for me to carry on walking, so I did.

About 20 minutes later, I'm over the other side of the island. It's beautiful, green and lush, with crystal clear waters. A real tropical paradise.

All of a sudden I hear a noise.

I look down.

Hello monkey.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!

Vicious little b*st*rd went for me three times, aiming for my face. I used my leg and arm to block it. Martine took some pictures three days later:

It took me the first couple of lunges to fully comprehend what was happening, then I started shouting every word in Kinyarwanda, French, and English I could think of for 'help!'

I'd passed a guy feeding turkeys literally a minute ago and said 'mwiriwe', to which he replied 'yego'. I expected him to arrive instantly but he must have sat there scratching his head, wondering if he was hearing things, or whether he should finish chopping the woodpile before coming to see what the matter was.

It was a shame because the moment he arrived, the monkey fled. If he'd only come a couple of seconds earlier my arm might have been a lot better. But D and the guys arrived at about the same time he did. They'd run all the way from the other side of the island.

In hindsight, you think of all the things you could have done, like wrapped the towel around my arm to stop it sinking its teeth in, or hitting it with a stick, but it was so fast and so sudden that all I could think was to keep blocking it with my arm so it wouldn't get my face.

The Belgian Doctor says the monkey is infamous for attacking tourists, and it's done it several times before, which is really scary as there were little children on the island too. If it went for one of them, it could be a lot worse. Lies says she remembers the monkey many years ago and it used to be such a sweet, playful thing; that it wasn't tied up back then, and had the freedom of the island.

By the time D got there I was dripping blood. He dowsed me in alcohol rub, really took care of me. I was shaking like a leaf, but grabbed one of his cigarettes and then, despite the shock, found myself laughing - which probably disturbed the tour guides a little. I was laughing because, really, how the hell do you live that down?

"What happened to you?"

"Attacked by a monkey."

I mean, honestly. You have to see the funny side of it, and laughing helped steady my nerves a lot.

I asked them not to hurt monkey. Monkey was just being monkey. It's the only monkey on the island, it's been tied up forever, it has bottle tops thrown at it - of course monkey is going to be pissed off, wouldn't you be? They should send it back to Nyungwe Forest where it belongs.

But they beat it pretty severely, then threw it in the lake a couple of times, then fed it.

That's one confused monkey.

I feel sorry for it.

Though it did mean a sojourn to King Faisal hospital with D and Martine on the Thursday, and starting the post-exposure rabies jabs. It's been a nightmare organising it this end, though. I've arrived in the UK on a Sunday with nothing open, so there's a day's delay in the series of jabs as I have to wait for the second until tomorrow. King Faisal said I need five jabs, NHS Direct say two - it's all very hazy.

Hassle I could have done without, and one of the bites seriously needs more cleaning as it's gone a bit gooey. But, it's an impressive anecdote for pubs, parties, and bar mitzvahs. I should have a couple of impressive scars.

A monkey.

A flying feckin' monkey.

Typical.

*sigh*

[NB 2013: A few days ago, a friend sent me some pictures for a website I'm helping him with. Guess who featured in the photos! Grrrr.]