The tender encounters between the human being and the wild animal continue to move. In the last few hours, the video of a woman hugging two huge lions would have returned viral after 7 years without seeing each other.
The clip has already been seen by more than three million people and has had the “likes” of at least 134 thousand users.
The tweet from @Naturalezaymas_, an account that replied to Tansu Yegen’s video, states: “In Switzerland, a woman raised a pair of lions. Authorities confiscated them for a zoo. 7 years later the woman went to see them… “.
The description makes it much more exciting than it actually was. In fact, most tweeters refer to this in the comments. The real story behind the images is another.
The video is from April 2017 and went viral for the first time in the middle of that year. The story at that time was the same as it is now, that’s why the owners of the lions have come out to deny it on their social networks.
“I don’t care if the video is shared, but if people make up stories about it and don’t give me credit,” they explained from the official account of Malkia Park (@malkiaq), an animal “rescue station” located in the Trnava region in southwestern Slovakia.
The setting for the hug is Slovakia, not Switzerland, and the woman hasn’t been separated from lions for seven years. Quite the contrary: he raised them from an early age and hugged them every year he was with them.
“Malkia (this is also the name of one of the lionesses) was my first rescue animal. Michaela, the girl in the video, helped me from the start. That’s why she and they know them. Only three people are like that. close to the lions These hugs do not happen every day, only when they are in a good mood “, they added from the shelter.
“We never force them to do anything. And Malkia is the best hug (sic) since she was a puppy!”, They wrote on the Instagram account, where they also clarified that the cats are 3 and 4 years old (today they would be between 8 and 9). The animals were rescued from a circus where they were kept in dire conditions.
Malnourished and forgotten about their fate
In these hours, the details of the test experienced by a group of lions left to themselves in an abandoned zoo in Armenia, in 2016, were also known.
Wild animals were locked up behind bars in tiny, cramped cages, unable to access the vast outer space, describes The Mirror.
The bears had neither water nor food on hand. Nervously, they walked around their little enclosures.
The lioness, who had once been strong and powerful, watched with her cubs, even behind bars. Her head was lacerated and riddled with scars. It was that the anguish of her confinement had made her bang her head against her cage.
The landscape was as hideous as it was gloomy.
It later emerged that the poor animals were once owned by Armenian billionaire Stepan Vardanyan, who used them to entertain his guests at themed parties, local media recall.
But the man had financial problems and the zoo had to close in 2014. They say, among other things, that he abandoned the animals and left them to rot.
Luckily, the story had a happy ending. The three lions were eventually rescued by the World Veterinary Service and now live in a private zoo with an enclosure built specifically for their needs.
Source: Clarin
