That day, we woke early since we will be going somewhere far from the city. Our guide, the helpful Mr. Alex actually arranged a van for us to use to make the trip much more comfortable and faster. I got breakfast from Cafe Fresco with Effa and wow! the breakfast set is 6 USD excluding my cappuccino.. Even so, I still ordered a healthy breakfast of mixed fruits. With the prices we were paying for meals, we started really feeling at that time that Cambodia is expensive for tourists.
Anyway, everyone piled up on the van and we got to meet another member of Mr. Alex's family, the driver who happens to be his brother too. He was too talkative for my own liking but I guess he is just fine for the other girls.Halfway through the ride, the girls at the back were sleepy but the mood suddenly turned partyish when we discovered this field of lotus and the driver opened the top of the van. Everyone had a blast shouting and greeting people along the road.
We got lucky to have a car like this. It was so much fun riding through the countryside.
As we approached the foot of the mountain leading to the zoo, we were surprised to see this long line of people begging. The guide explained about poverty in the countryside which led to people turning beggars to earn a living. Most of them are old people and some children. I think, families also use them to appeal more to tourists since they look so much more pitiful. From being cheerful, the five of us became silent as we passed the stretch of people begging along the road. It was like a kilometer of beggars just a few meters apart.
The long line of beggars. After living in third world countries my entire life, I have never seen such display of poverty. Even when Baguio was hit by an earthquake in 1990, at least people tried their best to survive and did not turned to begging. It is still a memory that is disturbing to me.
So, we got in Ta Mao Zoo and it is a mountain with cages. I wasn't really expecting something very good but it is obviously new and needs a lot of funding to fully operate better. As someone who saw Taman Safari in Indonesia where animals are left to roam free, I feel it would be better if the animals are also let out of the cages but I guess it would cost a lot. The impressive thing though about Ta Mao Zoo is that the animals are all from Cambodia and nothing is taken overseas. We had fun checking out the animals at the zoo and there was this one incident where me, Ritchell and Nikki were checking out the monkeys on one cage. I noticed that one was swinging happily on a tire and I noticed it's shit coming out. With just one scream to the other girls, we were away from the cage in a matter of seconds. Who knows we could be the recipients of a "flying shit" and I don't want to remember Cambodia as somewhere I got hit by a monkey poo.
The sun bears. There were signs not to feed them but sometimes I don't understand people why they just need to do the opposite. They are small bears not as we expect of bears and according to Google, they are the smallest bears. The shape on its chest is really beautiful. It is another work of art by nature.
It is the smallest kind of monkey in that zoo that I had seen. I was disappointed though because they snubbed the banana that I was giving them. I guess they were so tired of bananas all the time. This one was happier to munch on the sugar cane.
One of the beavers in the zoo. They were bathing at that time when we passed by their cage. Beside was the tigers cage. Talk about unlikely neighbors.
The other tiger was hidden out of view. Chilling under the midday sun.
Another kind of monkey. I was giving the banana but it ignored me again.
It was also fun feeding the elephants. They love the sugar cane. We didn't had anything else anyway.
I don't know exactly what is this but it was one of the hundreds of birds in the zoo.
Ah..the lovely parrot...there were probably fifty or more of them.
The poor owl had one eye missing. They should probably put an eye patch over the bad eye.
There were at least monkeys roaming free around the zoo on our way out. There are I think a hundred or more of monkeys in Ta Mao Zoo.
It was really fun having to go to the zoo without having to drag children or children dragging me around. I hope that the zoo will improve the next time if I will ever visit it again.
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