i do go to the zoo

there is a story in edition number five of lula magazine about kirsten dunst not wanting to go to the zoo.

called 'kiko doesn't go to the zoo'.

its a series of annotated drawings by simon pegg, which describes how kirsten, or ‘kiko’, is hungover after a party, where she was “weaving her way through revellers at a noisy bash, holding two glasses of fizzy stuff.”

she wakes up, croakily, and tells her friend lulu that she would rather go back to sleep instead.

in obscure watercolours and scratchy, black-lined sketches.

yesterday, unlike kiko, i was not hungover, and did want to go to the zoo. so we went, to the recently re-branded national zoological gardens in boom street, pretoria.

with my black cooler bag backpack, yellow and red vitamin water and takeaway beef sandwich and thai salad from woolworths.

and two castle lagers.

once we’d negotiated the parking touts, taxis and honking craziness outside the zoo, parked, and declined the offer of a car wash, we walked through the brick, H-shaped archway, and went straight to the aquarium to avoid the midday sun.

after we’d seen the komodo dragon in the reptile section, and watched a rhinoceros iguana defecate in its moated enclosure.

conversely, in the quiet, meditative inside of the aquarium, we were entranced by the variety of creatures floating behind the glass, like the long-horned cowfish, that swam up and down in it’s vertical tube.

from below it almost looked like a bright yellow, argentinian empanada, with fins.

there were seahorses too, with scaly, black, mini elephant-trunk like tails twirled around the branches of sea plants.

ragged-tooth sharks, platannas, piranhas and replayed porpoise background noises.

blind arabian fish, as well as sightless mexican cave fish, and one of animal planet’s weird creatures, the rare, half developed and dreadlock-gilled axolotl. 

only visible by it’s eel-like tail, which was hidden behind a box-mess of underwater plants.

it was still hiding later, when we tried to see it again, so we decided to move on to the outside section, and eat our pre-bought snacks in the shade, by the sammy marks fountain.

a cast-iron water feature that used to stand in church square, before it was replaced by the bronze statue of suited-up paul kruger, his top hat, and four soldiers.

it was so hot that we contemplated swimming in its clear water, which was populated by slow-moving, circling koi.

but we walked on instead.

for five hours solid, and saw almost every animal in the zoo.

except the okapi, the forest giraffe I’d been hoping to see. it must have been hiding from the oppressive heat in its shady ‘night room’.

i did see a giraffe flicking out it’s freakishly long, twisting and squirming blueish tongue though, which looked like the tail end of a wriggling snake, trying to get out of its mouth.

we also watched as an elephant repeatedly butted the stub of its tusk into the bottom of a palm tree, sending ripple vibrations up into the tall grey trunk, ending in the shaking, ssh-ssh of the fronds.

there were indigenous animals, familiar from previous 4x4 seat sitings, and ones that i had no idea existed, like the takin, a goat-antelope referred to as the “bee-stung moose” which was mellow, relaxed and fat-facedly friendly looking.

i liked the scenery the most though, the surrounding rocky ridges and bushveld, and the range of indigenous and exotic trees.

an enclave of greenery in the  city centre, literally.

less than a kilometre away from where i work. 

i can actually see the zoo from my eighth floor office window, a green outline of bushveld koppie, behind the giant red block of the obstructive batho pele building.

i’ve looked out this window several times before, to watch the early morning sun filter through the hazy, hilly distance.

but I’d never thought of the animals that lived there until now.

animals like the amazon rainforest tapir, trying desperately to hide from the dry heat in its concrete room, a lonely, long-snouted pig like the one they caught with the spiky swing trap thing in apocalypto.

or the hyenas, pacing their enclosure, looking bewildered and trapped, but curious when a child threw water on them from the other side of the metal railings.

it is obviously sad to see many of these animals confined to a limited space, especially the lions, who i think are even more lazier than usual on their slopey, stone-stepped hill.

not that I have anything against zoos, they’re important for awareness and research, and are nothing new to humans.

according to pictures, on display near the elephants in the old 1902 building, there are records of zoos as far back as the late BC’s.

and at least the animals and birds in the pretoria branch of the NZG are well taken care of, even in their limited structures, and deco-style aviaries.

plus they’re not so confined that they can’t fling their snot on you, like the grunting, wobble-bodied hippos, which snorted and bellowed below us at the hippo lapa, while eating their evening grass.

the zoo is also not so sealed up that it prevents birds like mossies filtering into the cages, or the squawking hadedas from pooing a little bit on my face.

from the air.

so, after being shat/snotted on, and a bug got stuck in my hair, i didn’t feel too bad for the beasts as we left, just before closing time.

out past the brick, H-shape gateway, and across the mucky street to the parking lot next to the dilapidated, victorian-style house.

past the people jamming to blaring taxi speakers, holding bottles of beer and dancing, arms up, and smiling.

past the withered, skinny, leathery skinned lady who tried to sell us dinner mints in plastic packets, and told us about her predicament in what sounded like a british accent.

and then i felt sad again, that she was so lost, and forlorn, and possibly a long way from home.

similar to some of the animals that spend everyday behind glass and grid-fences, and perhaps only find a relative degree of comfort in their carers' attentions.

but unlike the poor, desperate-looking lady, at least they have the comparable warmth of their night rooms to escape to.