Xavi, the Elephant Whisperer

Monday, 23 September 2024 08:00

By Sara Whatley

This remarkable young man has fundraised nearly £5000 to help Wildlife SOS look after rescued elephants, and in the process has turned his own life around as well. Sara Whatley found out more

Since Xavi discovered his love of helping elephants his whole world has changed for the better. And his mum, Alison, couldn’t be more proud.
Before, Xavi hated going to school. He has autism and ADHD and spent a lot of his days in a room on his own. He was so unhappy, Alison told me, that he used to come home and bang his head against the wall and say his brain didn’t work.

Trying to find a way to engage Xavi with maths, he and his one-to-one teaching assistant started to measure parts of an elephant’s body, as Xavi has always loved animals – elephants in particular. They got in touch with Wildlife SOS, a conservation and non- profit organisation in India, who sent Xavi some elephant information packs and films of Raju, the bull elephant rescued in 2014 by Wildlife SOS, that Xavi fell in love with.

“We also sent him a cuddly toy Raju elephant, and a sweatshirt and a cap with our elephant logo on them, which he refused to take off for weeks!” said Debbie Haynes, the UK Manager of Wildlife SOS. From that point forward Xavi’s life changed. He instantly recognised the struggle and mistreatment these elephants were facing and felt compelled to fundraise for them. “He did a Freedom Walk to help support another rescued elephant, Jai.” Alison said. “Xavi decided to walk 50 kilometres because the Wildlife SOS team had to drive 500 kilometres each way to rescue Jai.”

Xavi decided that as he is a 10th of the size of an elephant, he would walk 50km. He designed wristbands to sell and his Facebook fundraising page reached all the way across the world. When he did the walk people the world over joined him with their wristbands on. It was amazing.”

Xavi has also organised a ‘Wear Grey for Elephant Day’ at his school and came up with inventive activities for his classmates to do. “He bought lots of coconuts for a tactile station, as that is what elephants would feel like; he wrapped a 2kg bag of sugar in a pillowcase for people to feel the weight of an elephant’s tooth; and he made spot the difference pictures illustrating when an elephant is being mistreated,” Alison explained.

Part of Xavi’s passion is educating other children about recognising the mistreatment of elephants, for example, if they are on holiday and see elephant rides on offer, to understand that that is abuse for the elephant. He has made elephant packs to sell – which include a fact file, poster and footprints of the different elephants Wildlife SOS care for, so people can collect them all if they want. All the money he makes is donated to Wildlife SOS.

So impressed are Wildlife SOS with Xavi’s fundraising efforts that they invited him out to India to meet Raju his favourite elephant and the founders of the organisation. “Meeting Raju was better than my birthday and all Christmases put together,” said Xavi. “I was so overwhelmed I cried.”

When the founders of Wildlife SOS found out Xavi, his sister and mother were coming on a volunteer trip to India they insisted that Xavi stay as their guest – so remarkable is the impression Xavi has made upon this organisation. “When he went to meet Raju the elephant, he was personally escorted by Katrick Satyanarayan, CEO and co-founder of Wildlife SOS and Xavi’s second hero, ranking just below Raju,” explained Debbie. “He is already talking about taking animal husbandry at school when he gets to 14, and has told Katrick that he’s planning to take over Katrick’s job as he is getting a bit old for this job!”

Debbie told me about the remarkable difference between the first and second promotional videos that Xavi made – he turned from a quiet boy unable to make eye contact to a confident upbeat lad joking with the camera. “It’s great that he’s helping the elephants, but the change in him is even more amazing,” she said.

Xavi’s gargantuan efforts are being deservedly recognised by others as well – he has appeared in National Geographic Kids, was awarded a Green Blue Peter badge, and this year he won the Environment Award at the More Radio Child Of Sussex Awards.

Our heart-warming conversation finished with Alison reiterating how this newfound passion for fundraising has turned Xavi’s life around. “Now he says his autism is a superpower as it helps him save elephants. It’s changed how he thinks about himself – his brain is no longer broken, now it works for the animals. All the ideas are his own, I’m so proud of him."

Xavi, the Elephant Whisperer

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