New Zealand is a peaceful country and
Christchurch is a beautiful city full of flowers everywhere; that’s why
Christchurch is often called the Garden City of the world. Just roam in and
around the city and you will be greeted by vast area of parks within few
kilometers surrounded by various types of flowers and trees. The roads are also
well-maintained with separate pedestrian path and bicycle strip by the side.
People here often say that riding bicycle is the most dangerous thing and that
the highest accidents are due to people carelessly riding bicycle. However, ever
since I reached here, I have been relying on bicycle and it has been pretty
much convenient. Thanks to almighty, there has not been major accidents albeit
minor ones at the beginning when we were just getting used to it. Otherwise
even if we take metro bus (to institute), we have to walk about fifteen minutes
from the nearest bus stand and fifteen minutes is hell lot of time.
Anyway last Friday started our second mid-course
break for ten days, we five of us and
Ugyen sir decided to take further the service of bicycle to Orana animal park
(Zoo) which is about 20 km from place of our residence. Ugyen Namgay sir is the
only Bhutanese who has PR here and works at here in Air New Zealand. He
previously worked in Drukair Corporation Ltd. He has been here since 2008 and
we are in fact very lucky to have met him. He is jolly and full of humor and
has been very good to us. He has helped us with everything and we are indeed
very much indebted to him. Last Friday he was day off from the work and he took
us to the zoo and we decided to ride bicycle. It was a wonderful and memorable
trip.
Orana animal park is a beautiful park and there
are lots of animals of which most were the first time for me to see in real
including the tiger, lion, giraffe, gorilla, zebra, cheetah, rhinoceros and
most special one- the Kiwi bird. I was particularly fascinated by the stories
of tiger and the Kiwi bird which I would like to highlight. The two tigers at
the park are Sumatran (Sumatra Island in Indonesia) tigers which are listed as
critically endangered species. There are brothers brought to the zoo at the age
of two. It was feeding time for tiger when we reach and was such a good scene
to witness how it walks and the way it roars. It was captivating to see how
tigers try to defend their territory by urinating, a sign of the demarcating
the territory. They live alone unlike lions who dwells in groups.
Then it
was the kiwi bird which has a special connection with New Zealand. Kiwis are
the significant national icon; you know New Zealanders are called kiwis by the
way. It is a small flightless bird which normally comes out at night
(nocturnal) and is the only bird which has nostril at the end of their long
bill. They have very strong smell that attracts dogs that kills them. So dogs
are the worst threats to their survival. It is said like the kiwis hatch
hundreds of eggs but only two to three percent of it survives.
We weren’t that lucky to watch closely the other
animals as they all lazily busking sun after heavy meal, but still, it was a
memorable and adventurous day. We came back exhausted and weird enough I was
thinking if keeping animals in such way- captive as in zoos is any more good or
bad I mean if one is to weigh between pros and cons? What do you feel? Seeing most
of the animals lying under the warm sun, i thought like they are lucky in one
way as they don’t have to hunt although their freedom is limited. Nevertheless
I hope that people who visit such places will think beyond the adventure and
fun to protecting the species some of which are critically endangered and
others threatened.
some of the pictures I took in my mobile phone:
 |
| Lion |
 |
| Sumatran Tiger |
 |
| Giraffe |
 |
| Emu |
 |
| Rabbit |
 |
| Gorilla |
 |
| Tibetan Yak |
No comments:
Post a Comment