Bittersweet Memory

Monday I had the rare opportunity to do a behind the scenes tour at the SF Zoo. The highlights included riding around the zoo in a VIP cart, seeing the 3 new tiger cubs play while the mother groomed them, feeding celery and carrots to Gahati the asian rhino, bottle feeding Rosie (aka Barbro) the newest baby giraffe and getting 'kissed' by Carolina, another giraffe. The picture to the left shows Carolina reaching down to 'kiss me' and take the banana from my mouth. What an awesome experience!

It was so amazing to see these animals up close, pet them and feed them. Getting the hands-on tour was just incredible and I learned things like Bulldozer, another baby giraffe, was almost 6 feet tall when he was born last year or that a lot of the animals have two names--one given by the donor and one that the keepers call them. However it was an odd feeling of seeing animals that are meant to be wild kept in captivity, and to see some of the larger animals in smaller spaces. There are definitely nicer exhibits than others. For instance the bears area seemed particularly small while the giraffes spend their days in an expansive African Savanna and their nights inside a well-heated clean barn. Overall though the animals are cared for by really knowledgeable and loving keepers and the zoo's focus is on rescuing animals as opposed to plucking them from the wild to showcase in the zoo.

The sad news is that after having experienced such a thrilling day I found out that one of the giraffes, Gezi, died unexpectedly on Tuesday. Gezi was Rosie's mother and died suddenly of a heart attack but after further exams was found to have had other complications as well. Unfortunately she was also pregnant. I still can't believe the timing of everything and my heart goes out to the keepers. Sad.