the zoo!
the journal of Michael Werneburg
twenty-seven years and one million words
Today we went to the zoo to watch a panda sleep.
We started the day with a visit to what I suppose was a greasy spoon. It was a noodle place that served big servings of surprisingly good soups. Ordering was a comical affair, made successful in the end only because they had some plastic displays of the different foods available. All part of the show when you can't speak the language.
Getting to te Shanghai zoo is no easy task (getting anywhere in this city is no easy task), and we wound up sauntering in a fair bit later than we'd wanted to. But they had a panda, which is Kenny's favourite animal, and we were determined.
Actually, part of the travel problem in this city is that we're thinking like Tokyo people: avoid expensive cab rides at all costs. But it's not necessary! Taxis here are cheap, and while the bus we took was extremely cheap, it also turned the trip into a forty-five minute trek. Dumb!
So the panda was of course asleep when we got there, but the trip was worthwhile. Because I managed to reprogram Kenny's brain around large animals. He's no longer panicked at the sight of any random non-human animal.
It started, curiously, with the ostriches, emus and cassowaries (I'd thought the latter extinct!). Kenny took one look and began to panic, hanging on tight and whimpering a plea that we should head in another direction.
We figured that this was going to be a problem when we got him to the panda exhibit. But we also had tickets for the elephant show!
Naturally, he freaked out entirely at the elephant show. For the opening minutes of the show, he would hang on for dear life and scream at the top of his lungs at random intervals. I took him away to a higher row of seats (the place was nearly deserted) and as the elephants performed their tricks Kenny cowered and whimpered. His poor little heart was racing, you could feel it hammering in his little chest.
At one point, I handed the boy to his mum and bought a bag of sugar cane. I fed most of these to the elephants, then went back to fetch Kenny. With the last piece of sugar cane in hand, I took the boy down to the edge of the floor. Kenny's attention was riveted on the giant in front of us, and he watched as the thing snatched the sugar cane from my hand.
The demonstration of peaceful contact seemed to work. Kenny calmed down, and at the end of the show told the elephants "Bye bye". For the rest of our visit to the zoo, he was unafraid. He seemed delighted to see the panda, even if it only lay there dozing (and occasionally waving a paw like a sleeping dog).
After the trip to the zoo we went back to a yuppie market we'd briefly visited on the motorbike tour. Mari was looking at scarves and jackets, but nothing suited her taste (or our budget). It was a fine place to hang around as the sun went down, as it's built into a collection of interesting French Concession homes where people still live.
For dinner, we cheated and had hamburgers.