Lions and Tigers and Bears

Our daughter is trying out a new blog address, and we may do the same if this one does not behave any better. Of course, it is not the blog's fault nor ours either, just the censor's. Ah, well.Classes have started well. We were surprised that Rich would not be teaching his junior teaching major class again, but instead would have sophomore oral English classes, as do I. Last year, when we lived on the Xing Hu campus, he traveled on the school bus every day to teach his classes in Hong He. This year, of course, now that we live on the Hong He campus, he rides the school bus three times a week to teach some classes in Xing Hu. So much for logic. However, there are some benefits. Being forced to travel to beautiful Xing Hu is not so bad, especially on the school bus which bypasses the city and especially on the newly paved road. Also, we still have many good friends at the old campus, and Rich has many opportunities to seem them. I think I will try to go back one afternoon a week just to check in with some of my friends.

Wednesday afternoons are free at the moment, and last Wednesday we decided to go back to the zoo.

You may remember that we visited last year albeit without our camera. This time we were determined to make a pictorial record of our sight-seeing adventure.
You may also remember that the zoo, which is the largest in China, has two parts -- a walking part and a riding part. This time we started with the safari section. After being asked to "wait a moment," a standard phrase here, we were supplied with a driver and a translator, and a van. For about 45 minutes we meandered through several fenced areas populated by lions and tiger and bears and many other animals. The driver was terrific. He knew where all the animals liked to snooze, so when we could not see anything, he would bang on the side of the car and Presto! an animal would appear. The animals roam over large areas, most of them fenced. However, the bears can come right up to the van.

When one poked his/her head through my window, I thought that was a little too close for comfort. We wouldn't have minded a little closer look at the majestic mountain goats and gazelles. When we arrived at the giraffes, we got out of the van and we were close enough to feed them. Have you ever noticed how beautiful the giraffe's eyes are, almost as if they were wearing makeup?

After the conclusion of our trip with lots of photos to show for it, we proceeded to try to fulfill our second goal, to see some live animal shows. Last time we missed them all. As we approached an information counter, someone drove up to us in a tram. It turned out to be Song Bi, a young man we had met last winter on the 501 bus. He invited us to hop aboard and let him be our guide. The first stop was a performance of tigers and bears, a wolf and some chimpanzees. The tigers and the wolf jumped through hoops of fire. The chimpanzees had a tea party with Western style knives and forks. The bears danced, but we could not believe they were really bears because they had such a human shape, like someone dressed in a bear costume.

Maybe Chinese bears are a different body type that we are used to seeing.
We stayed around for awhile and watched the attendants play with a baby chimp, and then rode off to the next show, the seals. There were five of them in the act, but one was rather contrary. We could not decide whether it was trained to misbehave or perhaps was just being introduced to the act. They did some clever tricks, but the performance needed a climax. It just ended.
This time when Song Bi picked us up, he asked if we would like to see the zebras. We had been thinking that we should head toward home, but why not see the zebras first? Were we glad that we did! The zebras turned out to be a baby zebra, only one month old. He was being tended in a small enclosure under the shade of a tree by two young men. One of them the zebra clearly regarded as her/his mother. We were invited in to stroke the baby's coat. Sooo soft, like silk. While we were there, some young ladies happened by for a look. We decided that the baby zebra could be something of a babe magnet.

We then drove by the hippos and a few more beautiful tigers, and it was time to leave. What a lovely afternoon.
Students here like to comment that the weather in Chongqing is "changeable." No kidding! 90 degrees one day; 65 the next. Today is rather lovely but in the sun it is hot. One week it was nearly 100 degrees; no one moved if he didn't have to. We do miss spring and fall. And all of you as well.