Creatures

This Bear Kawasan, or Bear Center, which it is called for lack of a better name, is a small place. With all the work here and with it being ¾ of an hour into town, most time gets spent with a relatively small number of animals, primarily human, bear, and cat. Descriptions of which follow:

The people of the house are a hodge-podge of backgrounds and interests. “The boys” consist of GG, Bull, and Chabok, who live in the house, and Agus and Dayday who come in to take care of the bears every day. The boys who live in the house I described in my last post: they are the members of the Sun Bear Reggae Band, which has t-shirts but no gigs. Bull is also part of Epitaph, a metal band which is supposedly big in Balikpapan. He occasionally sings heavy metal growls and grunts under his breath as he walks around the house. It sounds like he’s growling. The other boys are all either vegetarian or vegan. Both GG and Bull have dreds, which is extremely rare here, and Chabok has one of his ears stretched, not anything to do with the Bornean Dayak tradition of stretching your ears, but a complete 360 around the world, self-adornment as a fuck you to authority. How did that happen? Agus and Dayday live on two of the nearby farms. Agus is a wonderful person and keeper, Dayday appears just to be quiet and I can’t seem to learn much about him.

Ibu, or mother, is actually Dayday’s mom who comes in everyday to clean cat boxes, make cat food, and make us lunch. She is lovely, although she only seems to know how to cook curried pumpkin and veggie soup. Everything prepared at the house is vegan.

The westerners are Gabby and Ali. Gabby was one of the first people to do research on sun bears, which was done in the near-by national park of Sungai Wain. She is Dutch, and intense. She also has internet access, so, hi Gabby! Ali also has internet access. She is a 25 year-old zoo keeper from Seattle who came here to volunteer for six months and ended up marrying Bull and now, it appears, will be here indefinitely. She is the bear manager, and arranges their feedings, their medications, training, etc. Both Gabby and Ali are volunteers, although also management, with their oodles of bear experience.

The furry creatures. There are currently 33 cats, all of whom who are old enough are getting spayed and neutered in the next couple of days. They are remarkable sweet and pampered; Gabby and Ali buy these guys real brand-name American cat food, which (I must say) I consider a little nuts. The cats also get baby formula milk. But if G & A want to pay for it, who am I to say no; the cats do look healthy and shiny. My favorite, right now, is a little black and white cow spotted kitten named Moo who came to us sick and now will eat any thing and everything it can get. You can see it getting bigger daily.

Then the bears. This place revolves around the bears and their many needs. Starting with the littlest first, Idot is a pudgy female with a huge amount of extra ruff around her neck. She wrestles with big boys and can squirm around in her own skin to get back when they latch on to her neck. When she was little, she was tied up with the metal wire under her shoulders. As she got older, the wire was never made larger, and grew into her skin. When she was released, she had to go through intense surgery to get it out; she now has a white scar all around her body.

The other female is Anna, who Ali describes as the most “bear like” of the bears. I probably know the least about her; she is little and shy. Very healthy.

Batik is the smallest of the males. He came in after all of the other bears, and is probably the youngest, at around 5 years old. He is a big, lean, sleek bear with a rather dark and dotted neck crest—the color of traditional batik. He had a big cyst under his chin which the visiting vets took care of yesterday and he is now miserably getting over medication in a small holding cage.

Bennie is the second largest male. When he was a pet, his owners pulled out his claws and filled down his teeth to make him less dangerous. What they left him with now are horrible finger infections and canines that have rotted to black pulp, with abscesses under the gums. The doctors gave him a full over medical treatment yesterday, and he is recovering along side Batik. Despite the pain that he must have been in, he is an incredibly sweet bear, and one of the first to be comfortable around me. Bears have incredible pain tolerance.

The last bear, also the most dominant male, is Harris. We have not had him weighed yet, but he is long and muscular. Of course, sun bears are the smallest bears in the world, with a huge adult male at about 130 lbs, so huge is relative. But they are so strong, and can be so ornery, that their smaller size does not make them any less dangerous. He also has a cataract in one eye because he was kept in the sun too long.

Up to now, in the little cages, the bears have been divided up so that everyone is with the other bears they like. Anna and Idot don’t get along. Neither do Harris and Batik. Bennie and Batik are on okay terms if they are in cages next to each other, but not in the same cage. Now, however, the bears will be moving into the one big enclosure with each other, so they are being trained to get along. Along with medical checks, the boys are all getting castrated, to both help ensure that things will be okay in the enclosure and that no babies will be born. There is a surplus of captive sun bears in Indonesia, and the enclosure is already too small.

We also have three flea ridden dogs and two horses that pre-date us here and have a keeper of their own, who does not really hang out with the rest of us. He used to be the bear manager before Ali took over, and did a horrid job, so he is out of the graces the people mentioned above.

And that is everyone. Welcome to my little world.