For reasons that are not entirely clear, I decide to make the 45 minute journey to the Khao Kheow Open Zoo. It is has the word “open” in the name, not because it is open and will happily take your 100 baht entrance fee, but because many of the animals are in open enclosures which theoretically should make for happier beasts; even though they would probably rather be thundering majestically across the plains and being eaten by predators.
It’s a while since I last visited, and the impression I get is that there is now more concrete and fewer animals; and that nothing has been maintained in the year or so since my last visit. I sure as hell didn’t risk going to the toilets. Even so, if you have never been, it’s worth a trip.
You can drive round the zoo in your own car, or sit in an open bus along with dozens of sweating tourists. So I took my car, and first stop was an area full of deer.
Nervous animals at the best of times, they were in full “oh fuck, we’re all going to die” mode, thanks to the zoo vet who was firing tranquiliser darts at one of their number. As the second dart thudded into its target, the drugged animal staggered and stumbled across the park, bumping into trees and generally doing stuff that would never appear in a Disney film. Just as the deer’s legs wobbled for the final time and it slumped to the ground, a bus full of chattering schoolchildren appeared in the park. The chattering stopped and you could see that the little darlings were now traumatised for life.
Also traumatised was slender and rather beautiful Russian girl who was standing near to me. “Is it dead?” she asked me in a slender and beautiful voice, her soft eyes looking a little teary. “Oh yes”, I replied, “they kill one every week for the staff BBQ, its a local tradition”. This was intended as a witty response, to which she would respond with a slender and beautiful laugh; and then perhaps touch me on the arm, as if to say, we are friends now.
Instead, the tears started to flow and I suddenly realised that she was not a slender and beautiful Russian girl, but an emotional bimbo wreck whose Russian Mafia boyfriend with a neck bigger than my stomach was making his way across the park to find out who had made his woman cry. I beat a retreat, which an independent observer would define as being “hasty”.
Next up were the monkeys, always good for a photo opportunity:
Then the giraffes; an interesting example of evolution, or something that God made after too many drinks if you happen to have an imaginary friend and believe in creation. Either way, they are extremely cool and I would love one as a pet if I had higher ceilings. I also really like this first photograph:
A mountain goat, sitting on a very obviously concrete mountain:
A bear, that whispered “come on in, the water’s lovely; and I will disembowel you”:
A hippopotamus, with a need for a dental plan and no desire to chew food:
Lastly, the meerkats. In the wild, a meerkat stands sentry while the rest of the group forages for food. In the zoo, presumably sentry duty is only required to amuse the visitors, while the rest of the gang sleep in the burrow waiting for the zoo keeper to bring round the free insects. Whatever the role entails, the sentry portrays a wonderful mix of arrogance, fear and bewilderment.
A fly! I eat flys. Or do flys eat me? I forget. Oh dear. Well, maybe if I just stay very still it will leave me alone.
Major General Ponsoby-Willis Meerkat reporting for duty.
What?! Who?! Go away! Help!
This sentry duty is a killer on the legs; and so unnecessary my dear.
Comments 🔗
2010-03-04| Jock saysOh DEAR … bring back the red and yellow shirts …
or maybe some monkeys in red and yellow shirts !!
2010-03-05| Qon sayspoor little russian girl. was she wearing short shorts with her butt cheeks ever so slightly peeking from the bottoms?
2010-03-05| Spike saysJock, I have no idea what you are on about.
Qon, if that is how you would like to imagine her; then that is how she was. You are a bit of a perv aren’t you…?
2010-03-06| Qon saysa little… but that’s how all the russian babes do it in pattaya. its a trend :-D