PETALING JAYA, MALAYSIA - Supermodel Amber Chia did not mind sitting still for three hours to have her body painted with tiger stripes.

“This is the first time I am being body-painted but it turned out all right,” she said after a media photo opportunity at a photo studio yesterday.

“It took a long time, but I’m all right with it since it’s for charity.”

The media opportunity was arranged by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) Asia Pacific.

Amber’s “tiger image” will be featured in a new anti-captivity advertisement for Peta with her photos appearing on posters and newspapers across the globe early next year in a campaign against zoos.

Amber will pose in a jungle setting and also in a steel cage.

She is the first Malaysian celebrity they have roped in to help their cause urging people to boycott zoos.

Senior Peta campaigner Ashley Fruno said Amber was chosen because she had a compassion for animals.

“Wild animals belong in the wild. An animal who lives a long and healthy life but dies in the wild is not worse off than animals who spend all their lives pacing in enclosures.”

Fruno added that despite claims that zoos taught people about animals, Peta still wanted people to boycott them as animals were being exploited for entertainment.

The campaign is urging people against visiting zoos as no zoo could recreate the animals’ natural habitat, she said.

She also said no matter how much a zoo took care of its animals, it would never be able to offer the space animals needed.

Fruno also visited Zoo Negara last Septem-ber and observed that the animals at the nation’s oldest zoo were living in old enclosures which did not provide enough room or stimulation for them.

An article on Zoo Negara has been put on their website www.petaasiapacific.com.