Save the bears

Went to an exhibition opening with Tiffany of Friday night. It was organised by ENV (Education for Nature Vietnam), the organisation Tiff worked at before she became a VIDA and moved to IUCN.

The exhibition featured children's pictures about saving Vietnam's bears. They were just amazing - so many colourful, bold and beautiful pictures of their ideas about saving the bears and stopping the cruel bear trade that is increasing in Vietnam.

The pictures were selected from a drawing competition was held across the country by ENV and WSPA (World Society for the Protection of Animals). While they said they would have been happy to have received around 1000 entries, they ended up with 96,000! What a turnout eh!

The pictures have been printed in a series of postcards as well, so some of you can expect to get one in the near future.

It's a great cause to raise awareness about as well. Apparently there are around 4000 bears (The Asiatic Black Bear and the Malayan Sun Bear) kept in captivity in Vietnam and they are farmed for their bile, popular with Vietnamese men because it is said to increase their strength and virility, and for their meat and body parts, such as the bear paw in a jar I saw in the "torture chamber" part of the exhibition. Some bears are also kept caged as pets.

The night also featured a presentation about the micro-chipping of bears conducted by Rescue and Wildlife rangers and a small play about a bear visiting a restaurant in Hanoi where he wants to eat but doesn't realise the restaurantuer wants to capture him and serve his bile to a group of men sitting nearby. They don't succeed - the man that tries to put him to sleep accidently sticks himself with the needle instead - and the bear finds the bottle for bile and replaces in with nuoc mam (a popular dipping sauce of vinegar, fish sauce and chilli).

The play was put on by the ENV staff, and it was just wonderful. Met some interesting people within the "environment and nature" sector here in Vietnam as well, some of which said they'd received the MCD newsletter and were impressed. One even wanted to poach me to come to their organisation and work for them. :)

Afterwards Tiffany and I went to the KOTO training centre to meet Steve and I registered for the big bike ride before prepping at home for the big event.