Shadow of the Bear by Brian Payton

Author:Brian Payton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Published: 2009-01-04T16:00:00+00:00

"DRUNK ON TERMITES?" Matt Hunt exclaims. "Where'd you hear that one?"

Hot wind whips our exposed skin. We stand in the back of a flatbed truck, speeding along the parched road out of the capital. We pass oxcarts, old motos, and shiny new World Food Program SUVs. We're en route to the Phnom Tamau Wildlife Rescue Center with a load of food for the inmates. Hunt is one of two British animal husbandry specialists who have been hired by WildAid to oversee the operation.

"Bears eat fruit, berries, pretty much anything they come across," he says. "If a bear finds a nest of honey, it will become totally obsessed with it. I could see how people would see them as aggressive if they were protecting a source of honey. They will spend ages just going for it, right to the last drop." Plus there's the supreme aggravation of all those stinging bees. But drunk? He thinks not.

Hunt has been working at the rescue center for two years now. The locals love him; he's forever teasing and cracking jokes. The freckled twenty-seven-year-old has a roguish smile and speaks Khmer well enough to hold a conversation. I am impressed and tell him so.

Between us in the bed of the truck are piles of long green grass and vegetables, along with shrink-wrapped chicken from the local supermarket. The only live animal we have on board is a tiny muntjac deer traveling in the safety and shade of a cardboard box that once held a color TV. Its legs are as thin as breadsticks; it barely comes up to my knees. Rescued from poachers, it will spend some time in recovery before being released.

Hunt began his career working with bears in a zoo back in England. He first arrived in Cambodia as a volunteer with Free the Bears, an animal welfare NGO that aims to live up to its name. Free the Bears founder, Australian housewife Mary Robinson, has launched a worldwide effort to "protect, preserve, and enrich the lives of bears throughout the world." When his volunteer contract expired, he was offered full-time employment with WildAid.

"I always fancied working with sun bears in particular because they're like the little Jack Russell Terriers of the bear world," he says. "They have so much character to them."

While most of the bears that end up here are former pets of rich and powerful Cambodians, some were bound for restaurants. One little emaciated sun bear was found tied to a stick waiting to have his paws cut off. A few were brought to the rescue center by local people who saw them for sale in the markets. They know they shouldn't pay money for wildlife but say they can't stand seeing bears being mistreated so they buy them and bring them in. So far, only one rescued sun bear has been the victim of bile farming.

When I declare that I am excited—at long last—to be laying eyes on a real, live sun bear, Hunt has words of warning. "Even though most of the bears were pets, you can't trust them," he says.

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