Ok. I have officially had an experience I will never forget, for the rest of my life. (Yes, Thailand as a whole has been absolutely amazing, but this one was a little further off the beaten path. And you too can travel that path when you come, if you’re willing to risk it!)
Allow me to build up to it.
Today was my last official day off before I head home, a fact I briefly mentioned on the last post. April and I had been talking about doing a photo-journey, where we essentially just wander around all the cool places and pretend we are tourists. Or rather, just succumb to the fact that we are, or at least I am, a tourist. (How I loathe the word.) So we grabbed our cameras and rented a song-tow (Thailand's version of a taxi) for the day.
Our first task was finding a bar-b-que place called 'Hell's Kitchen' which somehow seemed like a very appropriate place for missionaries to go to. The food was good, the owner a great guy and the price wasn't too bad. A little spicier than I prefer, but we all know how picky I am. Most people would have probably loved it, I give it a thumb and a half up. (Duke's ribs, on the other hand, get two thumbs up, and two big toes also. They weren't kidding when they said: meat falling off the bone. Best ribs I’ve ever had! Too bad the restaurant is over here.)
So after we had eaten (this was on purpose) we headed to the Day Market, and played tourist. We us busted out our cameras and wandered around, trying not to look too lost. We had a lot of people condescendingly smiling at us as we asked to take pictures of our food, but they were all very friendly about it. A few times we had some Thais laugh aloud at our foreigner antics. (Especially when we were grossed out for any one of a number of reasons.)
I did get a lot of pictures, some cool, some just ok, from the Day Market. If you are wondering, this is NOT where I buy my food. I'm too much of a chicken. However, the house parents at ZOE buy their food from here. The Thais don't get sick on their own food, and I do trust the house parents completely, so I know they aren't going to buy from a shady vendor. I have eaten the food that they've cooked, food that they bought from the Day Market. But I do have to admit, I am very grateful for the normal grocery stores where I do my shopping.
After the day market we decided that we needed to relax and make sure we didn't get too tired and ruin the rest of the day, so we went and got a foot massage. This will make some of you drool: an hour long foot massage (which also includes a little shoulder and neck) is less than $10, including a generous tip for the masseuse. And that's at one of the nice places, too! To top off our relaxing break, we went and bought Starbucks (price for 2 Starbucks drinks = price for 1 massage!) then went to a shopping center to wander for a while and get an early dinner.
So here comes the good stuff!
After dinner, we went to a place called 'Night Safari.' I had heard mixed reviews the whole time I've been here, or I would have gone earlier with Jonathan. It's not as cool as it sounds; it’s really only a zoo that's open at night. But they do have a lot of predators, so that was very cool!
For example:
We were walking along and we came up to the pen that said 'black panther.' As we approached the glass, I saw a leopard stretched out on a log, about 50 feet away. Feeling silly, I waved my arm at it and told it to get up, much as one waves at a garage door and says ‘open sesame.’ Almost immediately I jumped back from the glass because a black streak had shot towards me, jumping six feet up the glass divider wall, only about three feet from my face. It turns out there were 3 panthers in that pen, and one was very tired of being caged. It was a still cub, though mostly full grown.
Of course, being mature adults, we tried to get it to 'play' with us. I don't think it was playing though. We did get it to jump at the glass quite a few times, which I caught on video for your benefit. It was truly amazing. We did start to feel sorry for it, and realized that we were really just teasing it, so we stopped. Maybe we were being cruel, but it did get some good exercise, and that was very incredible to watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw-VpRXt_Uc Hopefully you'll have mercy on us if you think we were too cruel.
April had an interesting moment watching the turtles, but unfortunately what they were doing was too graphic for me to describe here. …Turtles can be pretty racy, you know. And this is Thailand.
Moving on then…
So it was your typical Zoo experience, but cooler because most of the animals were awake and moving around. We rode the tram and enjoyed ourselves. April got to see the giraffes, and that made her a very happy person.
But here’s what made it a life long memory:
In third world countries, they allow you to do things they wouldn’t dream of letting you do in America. (For instance, we got to ride dolphins in Mexico on our honeymoon.) I had heard that at this zoo, they have a ‘photo room’ where they take your picture holding some sort of animal. So I was thinking it would be a monkey, herbivore or snake, or if we were lucky a croc or a very young predator of some sort.
When we arrived, they had two options, both of which blew my mind: either a black panther cub, or a male lion cub! How can you choose between two of the coolest predators on the planet? Well, the choice actually came pretty quickly to me, because the panther cub was so little, it looked like just a black cat. The lion cub on the other hand, was as big as a good sized dog.
You can guess what I picked.
There was no one waiting, so April went to the lion to pet it and I went to the panther. I actually got to hold it for a little bit. Though it was all black, you could still see the pattern of the spots on its fur, and you could tell by its paws that it would grow much larger than any house cat. I heard them say it was three months old. It was somewhat sedate, but we could see even at that young that this was not a domesticated animal.
The lion proved that fact for us. It was much older than the leopard and I don’t think it really liked its modeling job. It was playing/fighting with the keeper (both of these animals were in the enclosed room with us, two keepers and the photographer) and it wasn’t calming down. Someone produced a milk bottle from somewhere, and the keeper began to feed it. April jumped on the opportunity immediately and asked if she could feed it. They smiled and sat her down, slowly transferring the milk bottle to her hands and stepping just out of the camera’s view. It was standing on its hind legs, with both paws on the bottle, which was resting on April’s knee. The photographer started to snap away. Then suddenly, to the surprise of us all, the lion swiped at April’s face!
The keepers were instantly there, but April said she was ok and calmly stayed there with the cub. It worked on finishing the bottle and was pretty calm. After a little while April moved away because it was my turn next.
The bottle was finished, and the cub still wasn’t calm. I sat down to wait for him to calm a little, and I must admit that I was seriously having second thoughts. I didn’t have anything to sedate it like April had. The cub was still playing/fighting with its handler, and now seemed even more aggressive than before. The keeper must have been used to it, because there were moments where his hand was in its mouth, and it claws were unsheathed many times on his arm. He never once jerked away though, and I didn’t see any blood or even any scratches. Maybe I just wasn’t looking hard enough.
They gave it a towel, which it instantly grabbed and gnawed on, picked him up and brought him to me. I though ‘what the heck,’ and reached for him, pulling him onto my lap, something that April had not done. The handler let it keep the towel, placed one of my hands under its chest and the other on its shoulder, then carefully took the towel away.
You know, I could just stop writing right now, and force you all to wait until I get home to hear the rest of the story…
…But I’m such a generous person that I won’t. Don’t you love me?
The camera snapped away and the keeper kept shaking the towel to keep the cub’s attention. Imagine the towel was just a big cat toy and you’ll get the idea. After a little bit April sat down beside me so we could both be in the shot together.
Then the cub turned and snapped at my face.
I think April nearly wet herself, but I can honestly say that I wasn’t that scared. I was actually more afraid of the claws than the teeth. (I suppose that’s not quite logical) The keepers sprung and made sure the lion didn’t do anything. They wouldn’t have been able to stop him from biting me, but would have been able to prevent any real damage. Thank God they didn’t have to. They saw the lion was interested in the towel again and backed away.
Then the lion snapped at my face a second time.
A few seconds longer and I decided I was finished. I passed off the cub and stood up to see that April had two red welts on her face where he had scratched her. I hadn’t thought that he had actually connected. I was suddenly extremely glad he hadn’t hurt her any worse or been able to bite me. …On my face.
April on the other hand, was absolutely delighted she had been scratched. Not because she delights in pain or anything like that, but how many people can say they’ve been scratched by a lion? Now she can. The marks are already gone as I’m writing this, but still, it happened! She called and told everyone she could in the first five minutes after we left the photo place. And she was telling everyone that I almost got my nose bitten off.
I think I’m a little calmer about this whole thing because I was holding him pretty firmly, and his neck could only reach so far. ‘But he’s a lion!’ you say.
Yes, but he was only the size of a dog, and I’ve been around, fought and wrestled with dogs all my life. He got within 8” of my face, but I’ve had dogs snap within 2”. He would have done about the same amount of damage as a dog.
Still, I guess that could have been a lot of damage. If he would have spazed, then I would have been in trouble. But that’s what the keepers are there for, right?
Anyway, I’m extremely glad he didn’t spaz, glad April got her adventure without any permanent damage, and glad that I was able to have an experience of a life time.
Go and check out the photo page for more pictures, including some blurry ones of the lion snapping at me. And if you’re wondering, lion cubs are not as soft as you would think. Fluffy yes, but not soft. It felt kinda like sheep’s wool. And no, they didn’t smell at all. The milk that leaked on April’s pants did, though.
