Essay/Term paper: Congo

Essay, term paper, research paper:  Cliff Notes

The book Congo is about a group of people who go to the

African Congo to return a gorilla to her homeland and to find

type IIb blue diamonds. On their journey they discover the

lost city of Zinj and a new species of killer gorillas, which

they must overcome to survive. The story takes place in

June of 1979. The three main characters are: Dr. Karen

Ross, supervisor of Earth Resources Technology Services

(ERTS), Dr. Peter Elliot, a primatologist who trained a

gorilla named Amy to speak by the use of sign language, and

Charles Munro, the guide who leads the expedition through

the Congo. ERTS has already sent an expedition of eight

into the Congo to retrieve type IIb blue diamonds. They are

contacting them back at the base in Houston. The camera in

the expedition"s camp turns on revealing a destroyed camp

site: torn tents, supplies and clothing scattered everywhere,

and dead bodies. As the camera moves around scanning the

area a big gray object runs by the camera and destroys it.

Every at ERTS is in shock. They replay the footage and

freeze it on the big gray object. It looks like a gray gorilla,

but gorillas don"t kill people. Karen Ross decides to take

another expedition into the Congo to get the blue diamonds.

Because of the bewilderment over this incident she contacts

Dr. Elliot to find out what this gorilla is. She tells him that

their going to the Congo and he wants to come and bring

Amy, his gorilla. Amy has been experiencing bad dreams

because of her past which is unknown to Dr. Ross. She

begins finger painting which helps her sleep at ease because

tries to banish the dreams onto paper. Elliot realizes she

wants to go to the jungle because all the her paintings are of

it. The expedition leaves quickly because there is a

competing company that is also making its way to the Congo

to get the blue diamonds, which are an amazing source of

energy. The expedition is set to meet Charles Munro, the

best guide there is, to guide them through the Congo. They

discussed business matters and quickly headed to Nairobi.

From Nairobi they took their final plane to go to the Congo.

At that time a civil war had started in Africa and both sides

were shooting everything, including the expedition"s plane.

Every one had to take a parachute and jump out of the

plane. This was a major delay in the time the expedition had

to beat the competition to the diamond site. The expedition:

Ross, Elliot, Munro, Amy, and some African men; have to

walk the rest of the way to the diamond site. On their way

they encounter many dangers like: cannibalistic tribes, angry

hippos, crocodiles, and a volcano ready to burst. As they

are walking through the jungle Ross is informed on her

computer that the competition has already reached the site

and there is no point to continue. Later on they find the

competitions camp site destroyed and all the people are

dead. During their journey they have an encounter with

mountain gorillas. Amy runs of with them because she thinks

the group is mad at her. After all the troubles and danger

they finally arrive at a place to make camp, which turns out

to be the lost city of Zinj which contains the blue diamonds.

They are very excited to have made such a great

archeological discovery and go exploring the city for the rest

of the day. At night they set up and electric fence, sensor

guns, and sensor lasers. This is their first encounter with the

gray killer gorillas. The gorillas showed signs of intelligence

by attacking different parts of the electric fence to get in,

they also wheezed to one another and used hand signals,

which served as a language. The next day while studying

paintings in one of the houses of the city they discovered the

story behind the city. The city has diamond mines under it

and they trained gorillas to be like watch dogs to guard the

mines. These "watch dogs" turned on their masters and these

killer apes rule the city. The team dug a moat around the

camp because it is known that no gorilla will cross even the

smallest body of water. That night the gorillas came and the

same wheezing noises where heard used a tree trunk as a

bridge over the moat and some of them made a distraction

while others used a stick to lift open the fence and kill some

of the African people. Later the team studied the body of

one of the dead animals. It was a little smaller than a gorilla

and weighed less and it"s fur color was gray. The next night

the same thing happened: more gorillas slipped in unnoticed,

killed some of the African people, and made a clean exit.

The next day Amy returned to the camp site and told Elliot

that these gray gorillas are bad creatures and that she could

understand them a little. Elliot thought of a plan, he and Amy

went to the lair of these gorillas and focused on one. Amy

would explain to Elliot what each noise meant. By the end of

the day they had down the meaning of a few words. Elliot

made a tape with the words: GO AWAY, NO COME, and

BAD HERE. As the gorillas attacked that night he played

the message and they all left. The plan had worked. The next

day the volcano was ready to blow which meant they had to

leave quickly. On their way a cannibal tribe attacked them.

They managed to escape in a hot air balloon and Amy was

set free and lived with a gorilla troop. Ross got her blue

diamonds and went home happy. I liked the book because

of all the adventure. All the danger they had to go through

was very exciting and suspenseful. I was always waiting to

see what would happen next. It was also fun reading about

how surprisingly intelligent the gray gorillas are. In each

attack they do something smarter and waiting to find out

how the team would overcome them was very exciting. I

recommend this book to adventure loving people who also

want to learn a lot while reading. The book has a lot of "on

the edge of your seat" adventure and suspense and a lot of

educational material about primates, the history of training

animals to talk, and computers among many other things. In

conclusion Congo is a great book that doesn"t let you

become bored and teaches you a lot of interesting facts.