Rhino Weekend

It's only the first week of March and already my schedule is pretty hectic. This weekend was no exception; however, it was certainly one that I will never forget.

Unlike every other weekend so far, this one seemed to have a theme: saving rhinos. For instance, although I spent Saturday morning doing homework the evening was quite different. I wore my Rhino SA shirt and rhino badge as usual but since I would be attending a formal event I wore a black jacket, pumps and black pants as well. The change from my usual jeans and t-shirt made me feel slightly older and more professional, so when we arrived at the Protea Archery Awards Ceremony I wasn't as nervous as I originally expected.


Once there we enjoyed the ceremony, applauded the archers who received their Protea colours and flushed with pride as they stood next to the South African flag. They all seemed to be very excited and those we spoke to were keen to explain their sport to us.

Just before the desert buffet opened I took off my jacket and walked onto the stage. There I congratulated the archers and thanked them for choosing Rhino SA as their charity. I then told them more about the problem of rhino poaching, wished them luck in Estonia and showed them a video depicting the life of one of the lucky orphan rhinos. After I had spoken to them, their team captain told us about the secret members of the team, their mascots Rhinny the Rhino and Papa Smurf. The stories that went hand-in-hand with the mascots were very entertaining. However, the event soon ended and when morning came around I had another rhino event to attend. This time my family drove all the way to Askari Lodge in Plumari Game Reserve. There we bonded with the other Rhino SA Champions, brainstormed various ideas and drew our hand prints around the sketch of a rhino. When we were finished with the first part of the day we were lucky enough to go on a game drive where we saw eland, giraffes, elephants, impalas, wildebeest, zebras and two white rhinos. Whilst we were taking photographs of the rhinos we noticed that their horns were cut off; we asked the game ranger and he explained that Askari had hired a vet to cut off their horns ao they would not be poached; these horns were then burnt so they would never fuel the illegal rhino horn trade.

All in all, this weekend was thoroughly enjoyable and I would like to thank everyone involved for the amazing experiences I had! I hope you all carry on spreading the word about the rhino's plight!