Loving something-other than yourself!

The definition of love is : "Strong postive emotionof regard and affection"

And I strongly agree to that statement.
On monday morning I helped out at the Wildlife centre where we had to herd two young giraffe's into a pen so that they could get their mid-morning feed.

After ducking from numerous wild kicks that would make even Bruce Lee jealous we finally got the youngest of the two to calm down enough so we could give him his bottle. And my job was to keep Matilda (The eldest of the two) from draining the baby's bottle as fast as she had her own- which proved more difficult than it may sound. After that I retreated to wash my hand from the milk and dribble, only to pass the two Rhino's ; Safrina and Dina. Whom I had previously fell in love with.

Many comments may have been made of Safrina (Above, the one with the horn, not the glasses) about her fiery temper. But that is one of the reasons why I love her. After many affectionate grunts and pats I said a brief goodbye so that I could help prepare her and Dina's food which consists of rice and milk mixture that then gets a few cups of water added to-to give it that watery taste that they love. Though, because Safrina is weaned, she only gets a light powdering of the milk whilst little Dina get two-three cups of it. Which Safrina steals in the end.

Once you have to start caring about not only yourself, your whole perspective on life changes. And I am happy to say that I have fallen in love with a young female Rhino with the name of Saffrina.

Human Resources.

Human Resources.

Today I spent my day entertaining and keeping a watchfull eye on a group of playfull and frisky children from the farm school on campus.

Lots of dancing, playing, roughhousing and the usual air of fun that you would expect from a group of children. I couldnt even stop myself from being taught how to bounce a soccer ball on my head from a smiling eight year old. We played a friendly game of soccer whilst half of the other students went on an educational gamedrive.

Many goodbyes were said with the posing for pictures and hugs from the kiddies, today I had learnt that having fun does not need a language to make itself heard.

Welcoming of the Guests.

Also known as "Torture in the sun"

Standing with my friends around a little table handing out Pancake vouchers was... a very intersting and educational activity to get through which proved to actually have some perks.
Waving, smiling, greeting and basically being as sweet and helpfull as ever was fun, believe it or not.

Waiting for my friends at the main gate to radio in that a guest with a White Silver BMW was about to arrive or any other colour proved to make me almost giddy due to the whole puppy dog effect. Smile, wag your tail and try and be helpfull. Every other, Frikkie Viljoen, or Bertie Aswagen would crack a smile back and make an almost witty response to our "Enjoy your Pancake, Sir"-Which was funny at times.

To round up the afternoon of "Hello'ing and Enjoy your Day'ing" a few of us (Leaving two of our men behind to man our table) we sneaked a few leftover pancakes. Succsess

Welcoming of the Guests.

My first day at Sondela's "Wildlife Centre"

"Bright Eyed and Busy Tailed"

That is how I would describe this young Nyala bull whom charasmaticly flashed me a buck-toothed (No Pun intended) grin just as the flash went off.

He is one of many Orphaned/Ill/Adopted young animals that can be found at Sondela's Wildlife Centre. I luckily got to spend my very first day there, where I got to meet many tame and not so tame animals. We also released a Water Mongoose who was causing havoc on a neighbouring farmers cattle who he then trapped and sent to us to release.We drove with the little guy to a green marshland type of field and tried to release him. But Mr. Mongoose decided he wasn't about to be pushed about by a group of simple humans, so hissing and spitting he stayed in his crate.

After various pushes and taps on the crate, this huge fuzzy cat-like creature sped out making us all jump and one or two of us yelp. The fuzzy little mongoose I had in mind turned out to be a huge growling animal who has found himself a great home with many friends. After that Episode we all drove back to the Centre to get the feed ready for the animals. Twenty-five minutes later I found myself hacking up bits of Warthog for the cheetahs and other wild cats. Bottles were made, meat was weighed and jobs were given out.
My next mission was to feed a mother Rhino and her not so little baby, I tried to play the distraction by thumping on an empty food crate as my friend ran in to grab the empty feeding buckets. But, instead of attracting the Rhonos as I had planned to, I had Cheeky and Layla the two tame Zebra's follow me, eager for a snack.

Trying to stop them from eating my jumper, and attracting the Rhino's proved to me futile so we gave up and bravely and calmly rounded up the buckets.
After bottle feeding the young buck and Zebra we tossed large chunks of meat to the cats, who just before dinner made their hunger known by spitting, hissing and performing jumps that would make a trapeez artist blush. Then the cleaning, wiping and scrubbing began. Everything has to be in prestine condition because these animals deserve the best.

And so ended my busy and exciting day of feeding, petting and fending off the Ostrich who decided that she wanted to eat my cell-phone. So, all in all my day was fantastic.