On the 11th of May, Rawai Park School celebrated pets day. This day was used to educate our students about pets and how to care for them as well as to raise awareness about street animals and the correct ways of helping these animals. During the morning lessons, the younger students made informative posters about animals and created exciting and colorful animal masks to wear throughout the day! The older grades’ lessons were planned to revolve around pets and the different kinds of animals that we keep in our homes. Student’s eagerly informed their peers and teachers of the pets they had at home, their names, and all of the exciting and hilarious things that their animals had done at their homes. Leading up to this exciting and fun day the different years' donated different types of pet food and raised money to donate to Bodhi Dog Rescue and Shelter who would be coming to speak to us.
The second half of the day was filled with a lot of fun and excitement for two reasons. Firstly the students of Rawai Park School were given a presentation by two lovely ladies who joined us from Bodhi Dog Rescue and Shelter who rescue and look after the sick, neglected, and wounded or abused animals around Phuket. The school was not only greeted by Tina and Kim representing Bodhi Rescue but also two of their adorable and very well-behaved dogs came to say hello! The main lesson taught in the presentation included what to do as a child when you see a dog or cat on the street that needs help and assistance from a human. Importantly it was said that if a student was to come across an animal that is hurt or in need the student must not approach the animal by themselves but rather should tell their parents so that their parents may decide what the best course of action is to help the animal.
How to approach an animal and how to behave around an animal were also discussed and explained to the students. Kim let us all know that dogs and cats do not like it when children pull their tails and ears and that if we do not know the animal we must not immediately try to pet the animal but rather put out our hand for the animal to sniff and allow you to touch them. If you do not do this then the cat or dog may bite your hand as it is afraid of you and may think you want to hurt them. After this lovely presentation, our head boy Vladimir Rudi presented Tina and Kim with all of the donations collected from our students.
Secondly, once Bodhi Dog Rescue had said their goodbyes our students were allowed to bring their own pets to school to show off their uniqueness! For a couple of hours, the school was alive and filled with excitement with Miron’s budgies, Pau’s guinea pigs, Gerard’s hamster, and dogs from Rodion, Georgii, and Arina as well as the Gafurov brothers. All of these animals became a part of the Rawai Park School family for a couple of hours.
We are very grateful to all of the students, parents, and staff, and most especially to Tina and Kim from Bodhi Rescue for all of the hard work that was put into the day to make it such a big success!
