A wild koala is seen in the bedroom of a couple in Adelaide, Australia.- FRAN DIAS RUFINO/ INSTAGRAM
SINGAPORE: It is not every day that you will find a koala spending koala-ty time in your bedroom, but that was exactly what a couple in Adelaide came home to one evening.
Sharing the surprise encounter in an Instagram video, Fran Dias Rufino said she and her husband, Brunno Rufino, returned from work at around 12.30am on Nov 13 to find an adult koala sitting on the floor beside their bed.
Busted, the fluffy intruder turns to look at the couple, before climbing onto a bedside table, and then hopping onto the bed.
In the video, which was posted with the caption “Only In Australia”, Brunno is also heard asking repeatedly: “What can I do?”
Speaking to CNN, Fran said that she was “scared, happy and excited at the same time”.
“I was nervous and worried about how we would manage him to go out,” she added.
Additional video clips posted by CNN show Brunno trying to coax the koala out of their bed with a sweater.
The koala eventually hopped out of the bed, ran through a hallway and out of the house through a door.
While Fran described the koala as “aggressive” in her Instagram post, social media users said that it was not apparent in the videos that she had posted.
However, she later explained on her Instagram feed that the koala had tried to bite them.
Yet, many were quick to come to the cuddly marsupial’s defence.
“His face is like, ‘Why are you so dramatic?’” said one user, noting Fran’s panic-filled and loud reaction to the koala.
Another one commented: “I know they can be dangerous but that’s the cutest thing.”
Fran said in an Instagram video on Nov 15 that the animal had likely entered her home via an unlatched pet door, and stayed in their bedroom for about five hours.
She noted that koalas have been spotted along her street or atop eucalyptus trees in her neighbourhood.
Koalas have previously been sighted straying out of their natural habitats and into urban areas.
In October 2024, a wayward koala led police on a low-speed, early morning chase through a Sydney train station.
A video provided by Transport for New South Wales showed the koala ambling through Casula station on Oct 4, and then checking out an elevator before opting to descend a stairway.
It eventually hopped the station fence after police officers were dispatched to chase it away from the tracks.
Koalas are mostly found on Australia’s east and south-east coasts.
But their numbers are dwindling in New South Wales, Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory, mainly due to disease, drought, bushfires and land clearing, according to CNN.
In South Australia, where the Rufinos live, koala numbers are stable. In some areas with a healthy koala population, the animals are being managed to protect their habitat. - The Straits Times/ANN
