First Day at Zoo Negara (Khar Ching)

First Day at Zoo Negara (Khar Ching)

            On the 8^th May 2015, we woke up early in the morning and went to Zoo Negara. Since I have to wake up earlier than usual, I almost fell asleep when I was having my breakfast. By the time I finished my breakfast, it was almost time for us to meet up. At 6 a.m, we departed from our residential college.

            After an hour, we reached the Zoo Negara safely. We meet up with the staffs that will assign the volunteer jobs to us. They explained the rules that we need to follow when we were in duty. After that, I was assigned to the herbivore area. We followed the staff to take the besoms and dustpans from the store and we wore the boots before we start our volunteer job.

              After taking the stuffs from the store, we walked to the herbivore area. We saw kangaroo and deer over there. Firstly, we cleaned the cage of the deer then we went to the kangaroo cage. When I saw them, I felt like my heart was melting as I find them too cute. Most of them were just a small and tiny kangaroo. Their innocent face and eyes melts my heart deeply! They are all in grey and brown color. I really like them very much.

We started to sweat profusely while doing our volunteer jobs. Although this job was very tiring for me, but I endure it till the end as I gain a wonderful and amazing experience while I was at the zoo. For instance, I was able to feed the animals at a very close distance and I was able to touch them as well. After all, we were really lucky as we did most our job in the morning. Hence, we do not have to work under the vigorous sunlight.

Around noon, we had a break and we were given a chance to walk around the zoo. I noticed that most of the foods sold there were very expensive. If you want to buy a bottle of mineral water, it will cost you RM3.50! It is triple compared to the normal price! Normally, a mineral water will only cost about RM1. This really shocked me since I have never been to Zoo Negara before! I thought perhaps this was because it was a tourist attraction place.

After break time, we fed the porcupines. I was really scared of them because they have very sharp quills. I am afraid that if I was careless, I will get hurt. After feeding them, my view about them totally changed as I find them very gentle. Somehow they noticed we were not their predator. They knew that we won’t hurt them.

After that, we went to the cage of the bear. They were really huge, so for each cage there were only one bear. The greatest experience is we had a chance to feed the honey to the bear. The zookeeper put the honey on our hand, and he instructed us to place our hand near the bear’s cage. Although it seems really scary initially, but I give it a try as I want to create another new experience in the zoo. While feeding the bear, I can feel the warmness of their tongue as they licked the honey off my palm. I felt so honorable as I had the chance to feed the bear.

At 4.30 p.m, it was finally time for us to go back. Before we went back to our residential college, we had to fill in the feedback book that was given by the staff. We also had a photograph session with the staffs to cherish the memories we had there. Although it was very tiring, I was really satisfied and I had a rewarding experience as I was able to spend my time doing valuable things at Zoo Negara. As I was afraid of animals, one of the things I learnt was “brave”. I learnt to be brave after becoming a volunteer in Zoo Negara as I fed the animals at a very close distance.