From Grits to Chopsticks

Southern Folks Living in Southwest China

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Sunday at the Zoo

January 15th, 2011 · 3 Comments · Uncategorized

(Note: I wrote this a few months ago and am finally getting around to posting it).

Life can be pretty overwhelming when you have 175 students, allowing you to be busy 24/7.  To avoid overload, we’re working hard to block out Sunday afternoon for a time of rest and refreshment, often heading for the mountains or a local park to explore together.  On a recent Sunday we found ourselves at the local zoo:

The zoo is located on a grassy knoll in the center of town, allowing easy access via bus by most city residents.  Not only does the zoo have quite an assortment of animals, it also has carnival rides for the visitors.  We took this overview shot from the ferris wheel:

One of the novelties of this zoo (and others in China, we assume), is the degree of interaction between animals and visitors.  Namely, the visitors are constantly throwing things into the animal pens to stimulate a response.  Although it probably isn’t healthy, these animals will certainly not die from boredem.  Here, you can see some monkeys drinking the last few drops of an unknown beverage and scraping the residual from a can:

Susan looks on as guests throw whatever they can find into the mouth of a hungy hippo:

The animals get quite used to being fed by the patrons, often coming up and expecting you to stuff a dandelion through the wire:

There are also a few animal performances on the schedule here, including a bicycling bear (which seems reasonable, since almost everyone in Asia rides a bike):

Of course, no trip in China is complete without a construction project and an associated chinglish warning sign:

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