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Première : Howl Night in our WSC
Diary entry, 07.06.2011, Sigrid Schmutzer
Pictures of the day (10 images)
The rehearsal for this night took place already last year.
Because of the very positive visitor response we decided now to have our "Howl Night" - Première on the first Friday this June.
It was exciting till the end.
Alex prepared two beautiful and very decorative stakes and several Swedish light-pilars.
The place was perfect. A beautiful clearing in the gamepark, sheltered by a roof of gorgeous old, giant trees.
Susanne and our students organized everything around with big enthusiasm : comfortable seats, tables with various barbecue ingedients, beverages and more....
To ensure that our narrator Sabina can be understood clearly by everybody, it was necessary to protect the electronic material by a canopy beside.
Better safe than sorry.... and that was a good thing : Because about two hours before the beginning - it was scheduled for 7 p.m. - it started to rain. First pretty heavy, later rain was getting down.
But the enthusiasm of our team was great enough that no one was deterred.
A few minutes before 7 p.m. I met Kurt at the parking place. He was in a very good mood and he had just started the first tour to our wolves with a group of visitors who had already arrived.
When I arrived at our campfire, I was surprised that everything was dry - protected by the magnificent old trees.
Sure - a few visitors had been deterred by the rain, but most of them did come. The anticipation was simply too great....
Alex was a true master of fire. His campfires enchanted the place and created the right background atmosphere for Sabina, our narrator.
Sabina is a communication scientist and in her introduction she illuminated old wolves myths in the light of different cultures.
She talked about the very scary mythological story of "The Fenris-Wolf" ( Edda, Nordic Mythology ).
The second story had a higher level of awareness to our visitors and was not such horrible : The Founding of Rome by "Romulus and Remus".
And finally we could listen to an Indian fairy tale "The Bone Woman".
Questions and discussion were desired, but the visitors should be be more encouraged to do so - next time ....
Questions and discussion were desired, but the visitors should be be more encouraged to do so - next time ....
After all - Kurt at last had laughes on his side when Sabina asked him about his opinion that Romulus and Remus were suckled by a wolve's Mum.
Kurt's joking response ( he was in the audiance - together with his wife Rosemarie ) : " Well, with us - it was different..."
In the meantime, the daylight had turned to the darkness of the night.
And our "Wolf Performance" started in the enclosure behind.
The WSC had selected the puppy enclosure, because it was close, not too large and could be enlighted very well.
Actors :
Our Wolf Researchers Friederike Range and Zsofi Viranyi, our Wolf Trainer Rita Takacs and - last but not least - our American Wolf Pack with Nanuk, Yukon, Tatonga and Gironimo. A little bit more than two years old now.
Prof. Kurt Kotrschal's position was outside of the enclosure in the dark, together with the audience. He was giving his comments to this great performance .
The audience was so fascinated by the extremly trustful relationship between our wolves, researchers and the trainer that they did not hesitate any more to ask many questions and got all requested answers from Kurt.
And finally there was the Howling of our wolves.
Of course : therefore we called this night "Howl Night".....
Some impressions of this night are captured on the attached pictures. The most beautiful ones were taken by Walter Vorbeck, who kindly provided them to us. Thanks , Walter !
But those who want to have their own experience of this lovely atmosphere of our "Howl Night" - they should come personally on one of the next first Fridays of a month.
The Howling of Nanuk, Tatonga, Yukon and Gironimo reverberated still a long time through the darkness.
And slowly a slight idea seeped into the consciousness of all of us : Why exactly it was the wolf between all animals who inspired the people to such a huge number of myths and fairy tails over thousands of years.... ?
And that's exactly our Scientific Project is looking for....
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