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After some drunken persuasion in La Paz we had convinced Criag that it would be more worthwhile to join us helping animals than to stay and work in Loki- the infamous party hostel. And so the three of us set out to a small village set on the outskurts of the jungle to get funky with some animals. This wasn´t before a bus trip that included stringent milatary drug checks, getting dumped in the town at 4am in the rain whlie the bus skidded off to its destination of Santa Cruz, and a passport being lost by Craig-who unilke any other human on that bus was able to fall into a deep sleep. We managed to find our way to the sanctury thanks to the pure luck of an old time volunteer also being on the same bus. He led us to a storage shed which had straw beds and many an unidentifiable bug. After a couple hours of kip we woke right in the mix of it: animal kictchen to our left, volunteers running about the place, monkey screeching to the back of us and a hell of a lot of rain. By the end of the day, which involved alot of waiting around and getting bitten by sand flies we were joined by another Aussie couple and we were all told which area of the park we would be working in ( in the meantime Craig the lucky bartard was told his passport was found in Santa Cruz) . I was with small animals which consists of lovable but ugly racoon looking things, snakes, an adorable nocturnal honey bear and turtles. Basically everyone else was with the monkeys including Dan who was in the clinic with the more recently introduced animals. We were then taken to our staff accommodation (which a lot of others avoided and paid for a hotel). The room was pretty dismal with mould everywhere, nothing dried, the bed was pretty dirty and there were cockroaches, but unlike other volunteers we had a bed that didn´t have a straw matress so we were happy enough. After a hot, wet, first day of leaking gumboots and picking up s*** I was ok with the routine given that small animals really had less to do then some of the monkey departments, but I was still sure that the two weeks would be the longest of my life. Some days were defintely hard at the start as I was still getting used to my Coati creatures that kind of smelt, had funny noses and could be really vicous especially around food time. It was also a catch 22 in that when it rained you were saturated but when it didnt rain you were sweating and there were a bazillion mosquitos (which had free reign to our blood as we weren´t allowed any repellent). The redeeming factor was that afterwork was a hoot as everyone there were total charchters from complaining drunken pommes, to beyond human Germans, to hippy Texans, hilarious Dutch, a computer nerd from Washington that loved Miley Cirus and a larger than life punk/plastic chick from Barcelona. We would sit arond playing poker, doing trivia, going to one of the three only edable places in town, having taco nights and generally drinking over stories of who had been bitten that day or who was down from parasites. The thundersotms were insane, I have never seen lighting stike so close to me so frequently. One night it woke everyone up (except Dan who could sleep though armageddon) and literally shooke the accomodation. One night we were out for dinner and it stuck in the street just outside the restaurant which was like a bomb exploding however I didn´t realise that my head was backing on to a fuse box that completely freaked out and short circuted when the lighting hit. If I had of been leaning back it would have been BBQed Gita.
Towards the end of our time I wanted to throw in the towel and just have a lie in which was fuelled even more by the water in the entire town turning off for 24 hours. This meant that after sweating like a w**** in church all day, the only shower I could have was down at a local waterfall ( which actually was quite cool, showering with the locals). It also meant that our communal toilet had an unflushable s*** so big that we we were convinced only Baloo the park bear could have done it. This also coincided with Dan being bitten on the plam of the hand by one of the psycho monkeys and having a cut so big it needed stitches without anasethich by the vet. He was virtually out of action for the next couple of days and had also got the s***s from some unhygenic food during the water outage. By the final few days, with no dry socks, smelling like a mixture of Coati s*** , BO and unclean clothes and people so sick they were going down like flies around me I decided two weeks was definitely enough. Having said this, the time did fly by and I grew to know and fall in love with all my little Coatis (except the ones that would literally tear your head off if you went near them) and especially the Honey Bear (Cuchi Cuchi called Sid). It was a unique experience to work so closely with these animals and fullfilling to help out such an amazing and worthy cause. It allowed us to meet such an amazing bunch of people- both locals who dedicate their lives to the cause and other likeminded travellers.
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