Qiyuan Memorial 柒愿 · Blessings for the Living · Remembrance for the Departed

Grandpa Feng of Kaili Zoo: A Living Story of Care, Duty, and Quiet Love

High in the mountains of Kaili, a retired teacher has spent a decade caring — almost single-handedly — for a small, modest zoo and the many lives inside it, from monkeys to tigers. His story reminds us that devotion can be quiet, practical, and faithful.

Some stories spread not because they are dramatic, but because they remind us of something we feared the world had forgotten.

The story of Kaili Zoo and its director, Feng Yuanyong, is one of those stories.

A Small Zoo on a Hillside

Tucked into the mountains of Kaili, in Guizhou Province, Kaili Zoo is not a grand or polished place. It covers only about five mu — a little over three thousand square metres — and for a long time, few people outside the area knew it existed.

Yet within that compact, unassuming space live more than twenty kinds of wild animals. Not only smaller creatures, but protected species that require serious, daily care: Siberian tigers, a Bengal white tiger, leopards, bears, vultures, and monkeys.

What moved people, when a short video of the zoo went viral across Chinese social media, was not flashy infrastructure or exotic display. It was something far simpler and harder to fake: the animals looked healthy, well-fed, and calm, and the modest grounds were clean. In a place so plain, the care was unmistakable.

The Retired Teacher Who Became Its Keeper

Before he became known online as “Grandpa Feng,” Feng Yuanyong spent his working life in education. He was a teacher.

In 2016, he came to Kaili to take charge of the zoo, and over the years that followed he gradually became almost everything it needed: its director, its caretaker, and its feeder, often filling those roles at once.

This is the part that gives the story its weight. It is not simply that an elderly man is fond of animals. It is that, for roughly a decade, one person has carried the daily responsibility for keeping a whole community of creatures — including tigers and leopards — alive, fed, and cared for.

Care Measured in Daily Work

Grandpa Feng’s love for the animals does not live in beautiful words. It lives in labour.

He prepares the food. He cleans the enclosures. He handles purchasing and the repairs that any aging facility constantly needs. He notices the small things — whether an animal has eaten too much or too little, whether its coat looks healthy, whether its eyes still carry spirit. He knows these animals not from a distance, but through the work of being near them every day.

When money was tight, he did not cut back on their care. He used part of his own pension to help keep them fed. He planted grass and vegetables to stretch what he had. He found ways to continue.

This is the kind of love that wakes up early. It carries buckets. It washes floors. It checks fences. It shows up again the next morning, whether or not anyone is watching.

Why the Story Moved So Many People

The world today often feels hurried and hungry. So much of it is measured by money, speed, and attention. Many people are quietly tired of seeing everything turned into traffic, performance, and consumption.

That is why a small hillside zoo, cared for by one aging teacher, could feel unexpectedly bright.

When the videos spread, people did not respond only with curiosity. They responded with affection and respect. Visitors began to make the climb. Support arrived. A place that had been almost invisible became somewhere many strangers wanted to protect.

What touched them was not novelty. It was recognition. They saw that responsibility can be quiet. That compassion does not have to stop at the boundary between human and animal. That an ordinary person, doing necessary work faithfully, can hold something together that the rest of us assumed no longer existed.

A once-forgotten little zoo became a place where many people could place their kindness.

A Living Form of Care — and Remembrance

At Qiyuan, we believe care has two faces. For those still with us, we offer good wishes — a way of honouring a life while its light is still shining. For those who have gone, we offer remembrance — a way of keeping that light from fading. Blessing for the living, remembrance for the departed.

In East Asian culture, both are usually shown through action rather than declaration. A bowl prepared on time. A floor swept before anyone notices it was dirty. A fence repaired so others stay safe. A life protected because it was entrusted to you.

Grandpa Feng’s daily work carries that spirit. It is not religious, and it is not a promise of any spiritual power. It is something simpler and more universal: a human being choosing responsibility, again and again, and letting that choice define the shape of his days.

A person is more than a name, a date, or a photograph. A person is also the work they continued when no one was watching — the animals they fed, the paths they repaired, the small lives they refused to abandon, and the warmth they gave to a world that often forgets how much warmth matters.

Source note: This article is written as a respectful tribute based on publicly reported information about Feng Yuanyong and Kaili Zoo.