LDK IN BURGERS’ ZOO, ARNHEM

By: II SMP (Basyir, Annisa, Iko)

LDK stands for Basic Leadership Training. This activity is organised annually by our OSIS. And for this year, the LDK took place on Tuesday, 25 November 2008 and was concentrated in the Burgers’ Zoo, Arnhem. The city is relatively famous in Europe through its role as one of the 2nd World War’s fighting theatres between the Allied Forces against the Nazi Germans just before the Great War ended.

For the activity the students were randomly divided into groups. There were 5 groups altogether which each consisted of 7-8.

The city of Arnhem is close to the Netherlands’ border with Germany and situated about 100 km from Wassenaar and around 1.5 hours driving by bus. We departed at 09.15 A.M. and arrived there at 10.45 A.M.

After arriving at the zoo, each of us separated and went around with our own group because we were in different groups. Basyir was in Group 1, Annisa in Group 2, and Iko in Group 5.

In the zoo, there were lots of places and the areas were divided by the animals and the plants habitats. They were safari, ocean, desert, mangrove, bush, and rimba (jungle) areas.

Each group had to have pictures with the animals in the background of areas where they had been told to visit. Group 1 was assigned to study the Safari area and the animal is giraffe. However, we could not find the animals because it was snowing so they were placed in the Bush area. Group 2 was instructed to visit the Ocean area and to find out the biggest fish in the huge aquarium. Group 5 explored the Desert area and sought the bobcat.

All of us in each group could find and completed the assignments. We were required to work together, having leadership: to lead and to be led, improving our sense of responsibility during the whole programme.

We completed the activity at 04.00 P.M. and while waiting the other groups that were finishing their tasks, we played with the snow. Together with other groups we built a snowman.

We left Arnhem at 04.30 P.M. and arrived in our school at 06.15 P.M. It was already very dark in Wassenaar at that winter time.

That is our story about our LDK to Burgers’ Zoo in Arnhem. Thank you.