Elie Mundima

Category: Happy Hollow Zoo, My Rangers | Date: Jun 21 2007 | By: admin

Samantha at WildlifeDirect has just told me that Kevin, a man in England who works in the music business, has agreed to sponsor Jules Aloma, the leader of Troop 1 of the Advance Force. This costs $244 per month and is split the following way:

Salary supplement: $87

Accommodation: $15 (this is in Mutsora in the park)

Patrol Rations: $33

Basic Equipment and Uniform: $37 (this includes boots, tent and backpack)

Ranger Pension Scheme: $15

Medical Cover: $20

Transport: $37 (this is part of the cost of 3 dedicated vehicles for us)

Thank you very much Kevin. This makes a big difference to the Advance Force. We are 49 men, divided into 3 Troops. I am the Commander. Jules is the leader of Troop 1, his brother Joseph Aloma is the leader of Troop 2 and Honore Balikwisha is the leader of Troop 3. Each Troop is comprised of 3 Sections, and the leader.

At the moment WildlifeDirect pays our salary bonuses and supports our patrols with rations, transport, equipment etc. They are trying to get all the Advance Force sponsored by people in other countries. For example I am sponsored by Happy Hollow Zoo. Joseph is sponsored by Stratton Elementary School. Delphin is sponsored by Georgina. Deo is sponsored partially by Rachelle and her friends. I have asked WildlifeDirect for a full list - because Kavusa, Isaya, Mwaka and Emmanuel are also partially sponsored. So that means that now 4 of us are totally sponsored, out of the 49.

This photo was taken of Jules in the Tshiaberimu gorilla sector earlier this month.

This is Jules, again in Tshiaberimu, with his uncle Bukala who works in the area.

Here I am on the left, with Joseph (sitting), Balikwisha and Jules (in white).

Thank you for all your donations to the Advance Force.

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Category: Happy Hollow Zoo | Date: Mar 31 2007 | By: admin

Vanessa from Happy Hollow Zoo has kindly sent me more photos of their very successful evening, when they managed to raise more than $13,000 to pay for the wages of my men in the Advance Force of the Congo Rangers.

I am still so amazed by the tremendous support that can come from those outside Congo, and truly feel we have stepped into a new era here in the park.

The rest of this post is from Vanessa:

To give you more of a feel for the area, this is the outside of the Historic Hotel, with the two WildlifeDirect posters outside on stands:

And inside is the entrance to the Historic Hotel Lobby:

I want to show you the array of auction items we had available:

On the left (orange) was a painting of an Orangutan, Cheyenne, at the Houston Zoo -their Pongos Helping Pongos Program. The basket was donated from a local group - Virunga Artisans Group. The Masai head piece and necklace - from Elena one of the Zookeepers. The purple and blue painting was created by our resident group of Meerkats -it was a very popular item.

And here is Mike, the auctioneer, and Elena holding up the Jaguar oil painting for the live auction portion:

Kelley and Monica bartending - this is actually a sweet and ice-cream shop at the hotel that we converted for our purposes.

Janice with one of the many animal cookies. Kerry, Zookeeper, made an incredible array of animal cookies and hand decorated all of them at night after work. They were a huge hit, in fact, guests offered to buy them! There were hippos, giraffes, crocs, kudos and a monkey with a red bum!

Oriki Theater Drummers. Awesome!!

Jonathan’s handy work at the end of the auction table;

A better idea of the poster placement:

Jonathan, I think we could have even auctioned off your mounted posters - the guests loved them and it really brought the story home.

And finally, here is Jesse, Mark and Monica.

The event was over and a great time was had by all!

Technorati : Congo, Congo Rangers, Happy Hollow Zoo, WildilfeDirect

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Category: Happy Hollow Zoo | Date: Mar 29 2007 | By: admin

We have received such great news from the team at Happy Hollow Zoo. I am so overwhelmed by all that they have done and can’t wait to share with you all this email from Vanessa:

Hello - Good Morning!

We had quite an evening for you all last night!

The only thing that could have made it any better was to have you all there with us - I have to say, many guests commented that they felt the Rangers were with us - I know you were all there in spirit. The energy level surrounding this event was very high - wow!

I’ll give you a quick overview:

6:30 - The event started, silent auction items were available, live steel drum music filled the hotel, our Zoo Curator made several West & South Africa recipes that the guests enjoyed tremendously and the old historic hotel quickly began to fill up with guests.

7:30 - The guests were called to one area by a trio of West African drummers - they brought people to their feet and with wild cheers from all, brought the sounds and rhythms of Africa to our event. I then spoke about the Advance Force and the incredible work you are all doing to help save the animals and communities of, and surrounding, Virunga.

After I was done, Mike (husband of a Zookeeper) began the live auction and sold 5 items, which included experiences with sea otters at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, a trip to San Diego that included a special encounter with the Cheetahs at the Wild Animal Park in San Diego, a beautiful jaguar oil painting and a very tasty bottle of tequila, which was bought out right and then donated back again to be resold in the auction - that one bottle brought in $500!

8:30 - The silent auction closed and the guests scurried to get their final bids in on an incredible variety of donated items (the community was very generous and in asking for donations we had the opportunity to let many people know about the Advance Force and WildlifeDirect).

By the end of the evening - friends, family, and colleagues had donated more that $11,000 and I also had over $2,000 back in my office from other donors! So, I don’t have an exact figure yet, not everyone has paid and we have a few expenses - but I can’t tell you how excited I am about how successful it all went and how generous everyone was.

It was an incredible evening…

My best to All!

Happily Yours,

Vanessa

The team:

From top left down the stairs:

Valerie Riegel (Zoo Curator), Monica Welker (Zookeeper), Jesse Welker (Sister of Monica), Violet Staat (Former Employee), Kelley Walsh (Zookeeper), Mike Leyva (Husband of Zookeeper Pat), Heather Vrzal (Senior Zookeeper), Pat Leyva (Relief Zookeeper), Kerry Dunham (Zookeeper), Elena Seto (Relief Zookeeper), Barbara Coats (Former General Manager)

Off the stairs, from right to left:

Mark Riegel (Husband of Curator Valerie), Victoria Johnson (Development Director), Vanessa Rogier (Me!), Todd Shaeffer (Facility Manager where we had the event, and husband to me!), Adam Hyde (Zookeeper)

This was just about all the people that run the Zoo and even some that used to work here, who came back for more!

Thank you so much everyone for all that you have done. Your money will go far in paying the wages for many of my men, and for that we all here are eternally grateful. I am so proud to now be part of such an amazing group of people.

Technorati : Congo Rangers, Happy Hollow Zoo, WildlifeDirect

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