This is how it went down.  Everyone was calming licking stones.  Faridu and I stood listening to the gentle clicking of stones dropping on top of other stones, baboons spread out on either side of us, the smallest children climbing and jumping off their mothers, playing some monkey version of King of the Hill.  And then someone got mad.  Next thing we know Morinda, who has a bad go of it as it is, being one of only two M’s in the troop (each group of related females have names starting with the same letter) is being hunted down by a mob of angry females.  She is screaming and running and they tackle her, sinking their–luckily–small teeth into her back as she bears her teeth.  Mikania, her only relative, sort of tries to help.  Then Augosti Moja (August One), lady killer in the bad sense of the word, decides he needs to join in.  I’ve had very little contact with Augosti Moja (and, yes, there an Augosti Mbili, August Two), but the way Faridu grabs my arm and starts pulling me away indicates that he is not a male to be trifled with.  See, Augosti Moja has the chip of chips on his shoulder and routinely takes it out on the women folk, tearing after them for no real reason, just because (or so Faridu says), “He’s very bad.”  Sufi, another big male, also decides to get involved, and suddenly there are a dozen individuals fighting and biting, focusing much of their malevolence on Morinda, but also giving a few juveniles the runabout.  It is chaos.  Eventually, Morinda flees into the lake, tail erect, teeth bared, SCREAMING, while Sufi and Augosti Moja stand on the beach, daring her to come out.  Faridu tells me some stories about Augosti Moja as we watch, stories I only partially understand, but ones that indicate he tends to direct aggression at researchers if thing don’t seem to go his way.  And he doesn’t let up.  Finally, things quiet down and most of the troublemakers have taken off, leaving a quiet few to lick some more stones.  Later we find Morinda, who is a little worse for the wear, but only a little injured, and she is being groomed by Weigira, one of the b****es who ripped her a new one that morning on the beach.  Morinda sits there and makes nice.  She’s low on the totem pole, and such is her lot, to turn the other cheek as biblically as she can, and hope Weigira chokes on a stone.

Incidentally, I also made a little enemy of my own.  A few days ago, I was watching White Lown and her spastic little baby, smiling and enjoying the weirdness of the little thing, when Wenimili, a teenage male, comes over and slaps at me.  He’s angry.  I’ve insulted him in some way.  See, HE wants to hold the baby, has been trying to hold the baby for several minutes, and how DARE I sit there and LOOK at her, when that is what HE wants to do.  So, just like a fourteen-year old punk who thinks he’s tough, Wenimili charges me, slaps the ground, dares me to take him on.  I look away.  He gets bored.  Wenimili and I are not friends.

(Side note: Perhaps I should just make the disclaimer now that these entries will be highly un-scientific in an effort to convey as much drama as humanly possible.  Un-scientific doesn’t exactly mean inaccurate.  Just a titch anthropomorphic.  A titch.  Rhymes with…)