Almost Human. Alfred Fidjestøl

before falling back asleep. In his sleep, he sucked on his left thumb.¹⁸

      When he woke up in the morning, Julius appeared to have a high temperature. At first, Billy worried that the chimp had a fever but he soon realized that the floor heaters in the bathroom had been too turned up too high. Julius was healthy and content. He drank more, urinated as he should and appeared altogether safe. He quickly formed a bond with Reidun as his mother and preferred to snuggle in her arms at all times, while she patted and stroked his fur.

      Chimpanzee and other primate infants have an intense yearning for bodily contact. To show this, the American psychologist, Harry Harlow, conducted a heart-wrenching experiment in the 1950s. Harlow removed rhesus monkeys from their mothers directly following childbirth and instead placed them with artificial surrogates devised from steel wire and made to resemble their mothers. He put two different “surrogate mothers” into each cage: one mother was nothing but a steel wire contraption holding a bottle of formula milk, not reminiscent of any kind of animal, and the other mother did not have any formula to offer but was covered with soft fabric that looked like a stuffed monkey. The theory was that the monkey babies would prioritize the “mother” with the milk, proving that they only required nourishment and not connection. The results, however, showed that all of the babies prioritized the soft “mother,” the one who had nothing more to offer than her own plush. Harlow tried to correct the findings by fastening an electric bulb to the doll with the formula so that she would be at least as warm as the soft alternative, but the babies continued to favor the downy mother. They would drink what they needed from the hard “mother” and then return to spend most of their time with the soft doll.¹⁹ In other words, they craved emotional bonds as much as milk. They needed love as much as they needed food. Now Reidun had become a surrogate mother for Julius. The same human source offered him both milk and touch. He could recline comfortably in her lap and receive all of the physical contact, care and attention that had been absent for him amongst the chimpanzees.

       “IT IS AN ANIMAL”

      The Glad family quickly grew accustomed to the new situation. Billy was impressed by the ability of his sons to adapt to the new reality. Firstly, they managed to keep the fact that they were housing a baby chimpanzee at home under wraps, even though their hearts were nearly bursting at the seams with the world’s biggest secret. Secondly, they accepted the unknown. Their parents told them repeatedly that Julius was only an animal, that he might have to be put down eventually and that, in any case, he would certainly not remain in their home long-term, like a baby brother.²⁰ And thirdly, they were good with Julius. The two boys passed time sprawled out on the floor with Julius, trying to communicate with him as their father had instructed them to do. They would make soft “oo-oo” noises and receive squeaking communication attempts back from Julius. Just as human children, young chimpanzees play at taking turns when learning to communicate. The baby chimps and the adult chimpanzees alternate at making noises and listening. In this way, the young are able to learn the basic methods for communicating.²¹ The Glad brothers were simultaneously playing with Julius and imparting him with vital communication skills.

      Reidun bought human breast milk formula so that Julius would no longer have to drink watered-down milk. And they decided to dress him in disposable diapers so they wouldn’t have to keep cleaning up his messes. In general, they wanted to raise him as much as possible like a chimpanzee but on this one important point they simply had to compromise. Julius slept often and peacefully in his cardboard box, preferring to lie on his stomach with his legs pulled up beneath his body and his head turned to the side. After a few days, he became more animated, and it was easier to interact with him. He began to try out more noises and every now and then stretched his toothless mouth wide open. He was able to sit partway up in the box on his own and to follow sounds with his eyes. Chimpanzees’ sensory apparatus is much like our own. They have a similar sensitivity to light and the ability to distinguish between different wavelengths. Chimps have color vision, though humans appear to be more sensitive to the yellow-red end of the spectrum. In general, chimpanzees have a better sense of sound than we do and are better equipped to hear high frequency noises. They also possess a much better sense of smell.²² Julius watched and listened to the humans around him and could sense strong, strange and unfamiliar smells: the smell of humans, of clothing and furniture, milk and human food.

      Though his general condition improved, beneath the bandages his finger smelled of infection. Billy changed the bandages every day, rinsed the wound and administered antibiotics through shots in Julius’s leg, but still his finger refused to heal. For this reason, on February 21, after nine days at the Glad family house, chief physician Helge Svendsen from the West Agder Central Hospital arrived with his operating equipment. With nurse Reidun Glad assisting, Julius was given 2 milligrams of Rohypnol blended in milk and a local anesthetic before his fingertip was amputated on the Glad family kitchen counter.²³

      Though the surgery was a success, Julius remained completely limp after the operation. It was difficult to rouse and feed him. Four days passed before he became his usual self again. He began to eat and make noises, responding happily if provoked by someone. He now weighed 7 pounds, had built up muscles on his back and body and was able to sit up in his box by holding onto the sides. Over the next few days, his development picked up speed. If the Glad family held his hands, he was able to pull himself to stand.

      Naturally, the entire Glad family grew dangerously fond of Julius. For Reidun, who was at home with him during the day while the others were at work or school, the situation reminded her a little too much of the earlier period of her life when she was the mother of two small children. It was the way she held Julius and fed him his bottle, or changed his diapers, as well as the way in which he lovingly responded to her care. The last time she had carried out such tasks, her activities had been accompanied by an intense motherly love. Now she was required to go through the same motions while all the time reminding herself that Julius was only an animal in her arms, and not a human being. Billy struggled as well: “It is an animal. His time with us is limited,” he lectured himself.²⁴

      On February 28, zoo director Edvard Moseid arrived to take Julius to his own house in Vennesla. They wanted to see how Julius would react to a change of environment, and they also wanted to prevent him from forming strong attachments to a single family. But as Edvard carried Julius out to his car, the chimp began to howl. He howled all the way from Kristiansand to Vennesla. He was then apathetic for the entire first day in Vennesla, but when he began to understand that he was just as safe among these new humans as he had been with the Glad family, he started adapting to his new surroundings.

      The Moseid family was definitely animal friendly. Before moving to Vennesla, Edvard and Marit Moseid and their two young daughters, Ane and Siv, had lived on a small farm in Lillesand where they had had a standing agreement with the agricultural authorities that their farm could function as a quarantine zone for animals imported to the zoo. The family thus had a history of caring for snakes, crocodiles, hippos and lizards and even a fully grown sea lion.²⁵ Julius, however, was something else entirely. He was like a tiny infant and the Moseid girls were warned that they had to be very careful when handling him. They whispered when they were around Julius and gently petted his coat. Just like a human child, he loved to be rubbed on the chest or tickled under his arms and neck. A baby chimpanzee reacts to tickling in almost the same manner that a human child does—he laughs with an open mouth when he is tickled, displaying the same ambivalence as a human child, appearing as though it likes and doesn’t like tickling at the same time, and can even start laughing if one merely points at a sensitive area.²⁶

      Julius began to bond with Marit as a second surrogate mother. When she returned Julius to Reidun after one week in Vennesla, Julius again became confused and apathetic. But after just one day back in the Glad home, he returned to his usual behavior. Billy had doubted whether Julius would manage the shift but became more optimistic after seeing how the chimpanzee was able to flip-flop between the two families. Eventually, Moseid and Glad hoped to incorporate the zoo-keeper Grete Svendsen into the rotation, since she was the person who would take over responsibility for Julius’s daily supervision when—or if—he was returned to his chimpanzee community at the zoo.

       SKINNY’S “MURDER”