"Lin Ping" prepared for flying to China

CHIANG MAI, August 27 (TNA) - Lin Ping, a panda born to a pair of loaned giant pandas from China, Xuang Xuang and Lin Hui, has been prepared for her one-year trip to China late next month. The four-year-and-three-month old panda, the first-ever born in Thailand at the northern Chiang Mai Zoo, is now a grown chubby panda weighing 106 kilograms. Executives of the Zoological Park Organization under the Royal Patronage of His Majesty the King have announced that Lin Ping is scheduled to leave the Chiang Mai Zoo for China’s Chengdu between September 27 and 29 via a special flight from Chiang Mai. According to the executives, Lin Ping will be in China for one year to find a mate before being returned to Thailand and when she arrives at the Chiang Mai Zoo with her mate, her parents, Xuang Xuang and Lin Hui, will be sent back to China after being on a loan contract as China's animal friendship ambassadors to Thailand since 2003. Veterinarians at the Chiang Mai Zoo have trained Lin Ping to get familiar with her new environment in China and to be ready for her travel, namely eating the same type of bamboo growing in China and staying in a cage designed for air travel, which she has done quite well, as she is able to stay in the cage for up to 16 hours. Living in a panda house at the Chiang Mai Zoo, Lin Ping has been very popular among international visitors traveling to catch their glimpses of her, as the cute and fluffy panda has always brought about peope's smiling faces. (TNA)