Work In an Elephant Orphanage in Sri Lanka

Project At A Glance

Location: Kegalla Arrival point: Colombo End Point: Colombo Duration: 2-12 weeks Hours: 30-40 hours per week Food: Local meals (3 times a day) Room: Host family, shared housing or motel Date: First and Third Monday of each month

Project Summary

The sanctuary to take care of injured and sick elephants was established in 1999 and since then have taken care of over 60 elephants. The sanctuary is spread in 15 acre of lush area. Elephant orphanage volunteers will interact directly with the baby elephants: bottle-feeding them and walking alongside these curious, wondrous creatures as they lumber lazily down to the river for a twice daily, splash-filled bath. Like human children, these almost-helpless young elephants also need love, care and attention. The elephant orphanage center is resource-poor and able-bodied volunteers to provide optimal care for these gentle giants are desperately needed. This project is a rare and amazing opportunity for hands-on experiences with elephants.

Skills/Qualifications Needed

No specific qualifications are required to volunteer in the elephant orphanage project. However, volunteers should have a deep love for animals. Volunteers need to be physically capable and content to spend much of their workday outside.

Volunteer Responsibilities

Volunteers work directly with the “mahouts" (elephant handlers) and act as their assistants. Volunteers spend a lot of time interacting with the elephants, providing mental stimulation and the ideas for this interaction are usually left to the volunteers with some guidance from the "mahouts”. Volunteers will also take the elephants to bathe in the river twice a day, clean and maintain enclosures in the morning, wash and feed the baby elephants and help with general construction or maintenance work as needed.

Room/Food/Supervision

In Sri Lanka, all volunteers stay with well-screened host families. Our host families are socially respected and are well versed in the art of hosting international volunteers. Host families offer a safe home, private rooms (occasionally rooms will be shared with other same-gender volunteers) and shared bathroom facilities with running water and a “local” style toilet. You receive three prepared meals per day. If you will be out of the house during lunch hour, you can request a lunch "to go" that you can take with you or eat out on your own. Host families provide typical meals that are traditional to Sri Lanka. Rooms are shared, as are bathroom and kitchen facilities. For a small additional fee, volunteers can opt to stay in a modest seaside motel. Please note this preference in the initial volunteer application.

Throughout the volunteer project, our local staff stays in contact with volunteers with either face-to-face visits or via email/telephone and volunteers have 24/7 access to our in-country staff. With longer placements, we visit our volunteers every two weeks (when possible) and volunteers are always welcome at the local office. If project placement is local, we request that volunteers stop by the office once a week to keep us posted on how they are doing with their home stay and project. If project placement is very far, then our local staff members maintain communication by either email and/or phone.