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Heather caring for tiny orphan mona monkey 'Precious
Love' |
This tribute to Heather is written by Claire Coulson, CERCOPAN Deputy
Director in Calabar:
Heather MacIntosh arrived at CERCOPAN from Scotland on 7th February for
a 6 month contract as a Primate
Rehabilitation volunteer. With a strong background
in Wildlife Veterinary nursing, she excelled in her role and in no time
at all began taking on duties above and beyond those allocated in her
original job description. After only a few months, Heather had assumed
almost all of the responsibilities of a vacant General Manager position
As such she was quickly promoted to Vet Nurse Manager
and asked to extend her stay to 12 months - she agreed and we were
delighted! Utterly reliable and
dedicated, she was always available to cover when needed and was
prepared to provide assistance to anyone requiring help; be that with
veterinary operations, accounts or even truck repair. In addition to her
outstanding performance in her work, Heather was very well liked by all
of the staff, volunteers and management; if anything maybe a little too
much judging from the number of people who have begged me to make her
stay!
She will soon complete her year
of volunteering, when she will return to the UK on 15th February to
prepare for a new job at a rehabilitation centre in Canada. We are very
very pleased for Heather, but also very sad to say goodbye. Having sat
opposite Heather for twelve months, eating all of our meals together,
working together and socialising at night, to say that I will miss her
is something of an understatement.
I am sure that when she reads this
Heather will be extremely embarrassed as she is always very quick to
downplay all of her own hard work and effort. Nevertheless, I would like
to take this opportunity on behalf of everyone at CERCOPAN to say that
it has been an absolute pleasure working with her, that we are very
grateful for everything she has done and that we wish her every success
in her new job. I hope that one day she will find the time to come back
and visit us, no matter how far in the future that is, she can be sure
that her friends in Nigeria will not have forgotten her.
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