Today was our schedule visit to the Beijing zoo. We had a light breakfast before departing to the zoo at around 9 AM. The ride didn’t take too long and we got there in about 20 minutes to a half hour. We saw many of the animals in the zoo but the big attraction was the giant panda exhibit. They were quite big and fluffy but looked very tired and lazy, as they didn’t do a whole lot of moving. After spending some time with the pandas, a large group walked around and saw more of the animals the zoo had to offer. Some of the other big attractions were the bears and the big cats. I found that the bears were very used to people and were use to being fed by the zoo’s visitors. They spent all of their time near the walls looking upward and waiting to be fed. And as if on cue some of the local visitors would throw some bread or popcorn to the bear, which would then scramble to find where it had landed. Right near where the people were throwing food into the exhibit, was a sign asking to not feed the animals. I found this to be quite interesting because it shows that many of the Chinese visitors have trouble behaving themselves when asked for self restraint. I don’t mean to sound harsh or judging, but it seems that the Chinese have difficulty obeying signs.
As we moved on further into the park we visited the monkeys and some of the birds. There was nothing that was too out of the ordinary or particularly mentionable until we entered the big cat house. In a rather dark and desolate building, the zoo houses several big cats such as a white tiger, leopard, black leopard, and lion. The cages consisted of a small wood and concrete cell which up to two cats occupied at once. The building smelled of urine and feces. There were zero attempts on the zoos part to make the cats feel at home minus one tire swing which none of the cats there had access to. This is a great opportunity to point out the gap between western standards and Chinese standards. Where western zoos make a very good attempt to make the animal habitats close to the animals given area of origin, the zoo was quite content to leave the animals caged in a prison of concrete and wood. Most of the cages were also compromised with litter such as water bottles, from people’s obvious attempts riel up the animals. I found that this zoo to be a detriment humans treatment of animals. It’s a wonder PITA hasn’t attempted an all out assault on the zoo for its inability to provide proper housing for its animals.
After the zoo we had a quick lunch at the Chinese fast food joint near the zoo and a bit of Dairy Queen Ice Cream afterword. Then we headed across the street for some shopping at the giant market-like complex that had a maze of vendors selling mostly cheep apparel. I bargained for a cheep addias shirt, and mostly just perused the isles looking at what other people in the group were buying. We spent 2 or so hours looking through the thousands of vendors, before getting back on the bus and heading for the hotel.