Meet Mona

Spanish volunteer Paloma introduces Mona, a rescued orangutan at International Animal Rescue's transit centre in Ketapang, West Kalimantan.

Mona is a female of about 9 years old who arrived at the transit centre in January 2009 and she has been here ever since because all the rehabilitation centres were full - and still are.

A family bought her when she was a baby and she lived with them until she was rescued. She was in the garden of the house, tied by a chain to a metal collar with a lock.

When she was rescued it was really difficult to get the collar off her.

Mona has been at the centre longer than any other orangutan, and she managed to open her old cage on numerous occasions.

She has some human habits like washing her arms when we give her a bin full of water.

She is very observant too and her eyes are always looking at the movements we make when we prepare or we put new enrichments in the cage and later she tries to take it apart and many times we have seen her using branches or enrichment material to try to open the lock on the old cage.

Right now she is enjoying the extra space in the new enclosures that have been built recently and she plays a lot with Nicky, the orangutan in with her. She is very curious too about the new neighbours Jojo and Jingo but so far she is content just to watch them without actually interacting with them.