Lingering smells of the caged life

Noah's Arc Cologne

Considering how this blog began to form in my mind earlier today, it is a pleasant surprise that I find myself in olfactory proximity to much zoological defecation.

I boarded the Zoo Express shuttle which had seats that would make traditional church pews feel like comfortable feather-bedded loungers as we tried to set the record for the longest possible time to complete a journey to the zoo in tortoise-drawn carriages. No wonder, I saw no tortoises at the zoo, they had all conked out, the poor things.

The main notice within the zoo declared the place Cologne's Noah's Arc, well, I did not see any animals going in two-by-two and it was well and truly beached. Much as one can be entertained with wildlife from Australia, Madagascar and nether lands, the jury is out on the complete work of conservation since the flood wiping out animals is the human race and their effect on earth, than anything else.

Truly inspired names

In two hours, I had just about seen that almost extinct and endangered orange-nosed, red-breasted, yellow-beaked, black-handed, blue-bottomed, pink-toed, green-eyed, fluffy-haired, three-fingered picinini and everything else.

Somehow, the politically-incorrect names we once used to describe fellow human-beings are now lavished liberally on animals in the zoo.

I am sure when Adam in Genesis had the task of naming animals he must have done a better job.

Now, I have nothing against zoos but one might have to don a gas mask next time one visits a zoo.

That was a day out in Cologne. In the end, when I saw a big stop sign barring people from going down a path, one surmised, great fiery dragons be there - it is a zoo after all.

Pictures of the visit are in the Cologne Zoo Set on Flickr, I did not tour the whole zoo, so no elephants, seals or penguins.