“My name is Maya, I am a 19-year-old French girl and I decided to volunteer at Daktari for three weeks. I decided to come here by myself to improve my English but also because I wanted to discover South Africa. I started thinking about volunteering a few years ago, but I never had a precise idea of what I wanted to do, so when I discovered the organisation on Lea Camilleri’s channel, I signed up immediately.”
“My name is Emmelien, I’m 19 years old and I’m from Belgium. I also volunteered at Daktari for three weeks. I’m studying medicine but because I’m not able to do anything medical yet, I decided to try and help others in a different way. Daktari became the project I chose because of the combination of working with children and animals.”
“We arrived at DAKTARI on the same day from two different places of the world, strangers to each other and now, we are the closest friends. When other volunteers told us that Daktari is a place where you become real friends in a very quick time, we didn’t believe them (we are not the most sociable people). But Daktari isn’t just a place where you do your volunteering, it really is a family. Every time someone is leaving, the goodbyes are painful but the memories are amazing.
The kids arrive on Monday. Most of them are really shy at first but you will see that they open up during the week. One of the good things about Daktari is that it is not just about knowledge. Indeed, we want them to learn about the environment, poaching, and the animals, but we also encourage the improvement on politeness, respect and having fun. The way we teach is a lot different than we are used to but we have different forms of teaching like socials talks, going in the bush… You’ll see that sometimes you will be the one learning
We also had the opportunity to get out of the reserve and see a part of South Africa. Indeed, there are many activities that you can do during your stay in order to discover other beautiful places. During our first week, we went on a Homestay in the Oaks village, where we lived for 24 hours. It was a beautiful way to experience the South African way of life. But we also did a lot of other excursions. We went to see the elephants and cheetah, spend two days in the Kruger Park and walked in the Blyde Canyon River. Once in a lifetime experience!
We talked about it a lot and we agreed that this adventure has really changed our life in so many ways. We now know how lucky we are to be given so many chances in life that other people may not have, depending on where they were born. We discovered ourselves here and grew more confident. Thank you Daktari! Thank you Ian and Michele, staff and other volunteers for letting us be a part of this family. We love you all.”