Site visit to the Red River

Today, staff from TPG and I met with some of the partners from Chuong Dong School, Blue Dragon and Mr Hao (the biologist). 

We met early and it was great to see the place for the first time, having seen it in photos and videos before.  One big reason was to check for safety and to do another round of the risk assessment. 

We walked along the trail and Mr Hao talked about how different leaves can be eaten by humans. There is competition for what to use the land for - some people want to clear the land so that they can farm on it.

 We saw how a pond had disappeared because someone had made a ditch so that the land could drain bettr for farming - but perhaps not so good for the wildlife. 

We saw bird traps which are used to trap birds which are sold at pagodas and other spiritual places, so people can buy them and release them.. 

I also thought about questions or ideas the kids to think about, like: 

• who eats who (rats dig holes in the riverbank, snakes eat the rats and move into the holes and eagles or owls may eat the snakes) 
• what do they think the birds are saying when they are singing? 
• who makes the holes or the bumps in the leaves

• what will encourage people to come and relax in this space? 

At the end we looped back to the beginning of the trail and looked at where we will run the workshop in the afternoon. We need to think about weighting down the models that the children will make because it is a little bit windy and they will blow over otherwise. 

And we looked at some play equipment that TPG have made - a piece of play equipment and 'Bird Shelter' where AI is used to recognise a bird song and then play a recorded piece of information about that bird.