At Animals Asia, moon bears rescued from bile farms can finally find peace away from all of the cruelty they’ve faced. The organization has sanctuaries in Vietnam and China and has rescued hundreds of bears over the years.
Recently, British rockstar Rick
Wakeman decided he wanted to give back and provide a little joy to the rescued bears. He went to one of Animals Asia’s sanctuaries in Vietnam to play a concert exclusively for over 150 moon bears.
As Wakeman began to play, many of the bears listened from afar — but others came right up to the piano to investigate.
Eleven bears, including Georges and Hector, secured themselves a front row seat to Wakeman’s concert. They listened intently as he played and watched him closely, joy all over their adorable faces.
“We’re here really to celebrate the rescued bears, to celebrate those that have been rehabilitated, rescued, looked after and saved in this wonderful sanctuary,” Wakeman said in a video for Animals Asia.
For Wakeman, the concert was a dream come true. He has a history with Animals Asia, as he once wrote and performed a song for a bear named Dawn while she was still trapped on a bile farm waiting to be freed. Ever since that moment, he’d been waiting for the day he could perform for an audience filled with bears rescued from the same ordeal.
Wakeman was thrilled to see how much the bears enjoyed the concert, and had just as much fun performing as they did listening.
“We know music affects humans, so I now know it affects bears too,” Wakeman said in a press release.
125 bears are still trapped on bile farms in Vietnam, and thousands more remain trapped across Asia. The bears are kept in cages for years, sometimes decades, while their bile is constantly extracted from their gall bladders. It’s a terrible way to live, and Wakeman hopes his music was healing for the bears who have been through so much.
It was made illegal to extract bile in Vietnam in 2005, and Animals Asia is working hard to free the remaining bears and put an end to the industry.
