Employer: Wildlife Friends Foundation, Thailand

Job Title: Volunteer

Skills Aquired (over three days of volunteering, two and a half weeks left to go, so expect this list to grow:

• Team Leader: due to insufficient personnel was promoted in a day to Bear 1 Leader: in charge of welfare of 17 sun bears, 8 lorises, 3 civits, and 1 binturang. 
• Negotiating with hostile forces: monkeys are not cute, even if you are trying to feed them, they will try and rip your face off, but if you appease them with a piece of papaya, then may let you do your job.
• Strategic Calculations: you have 6 watermelons, that need to be cut into 350 pieces to feed all the macaques and gibbons – so how many pieces does each watermelon need to be cut into? 60. 
• Creative Problem Solving: designing and making “enrichments” for the animals: peanuts wrapped in strings, bananas hidden in boxes: games to exercise their brains and keep them from getting to their food for an extra five seconds. 
• Enforcing and Maintaining Standards and Practices: sweeping up (leftover food and poop) in bear enclosures, and scattering new food.