animal trippin'

i never had a pet growing up. unless, you count the time when my mother raised some pigs to help augment the family income when i was in grade school. then, i helped feed the one or two pigs we had with leftovers mixed with finely chopped "kangkong" and "tahop". anyway, i have nothing against animals, but i never developed certain fondness for them. curiously, in some of my travels, visiting a zoo seemed to become part of the itinerary. personally, i could have skipped the zoos, but i was glad i didn't. some of those zoo visits actually brought some form of exhilaration that i could only imagine what animal lovers feel being with their beloved pets.

tarsier. bohol, may 2006.
the tarsiers are considered the smallest monkeys. by the look on my face, i couldn't quite make up if they're cute or horrible-looking animals.

fish, jellyfish, penguin, sea lion. ocean park, hong kong. december 2007
this is one of my most memorable experiences as it's my first foreign travel. i couldn't contain myself looking at the beautiful fish/jellyfish in the gigantic aquariums. i also remembered feeling ecstatic watching the sea lions. nope, there were no penguins in ocean park, hk. but at that time of travel, they had an "ice world" (can't remember exact name) where the temperature is set below zero, and several animals carved in ice are on display. sadly, the penguins were only props. i remembered asking line to take a picture of me with this penguin as i thought i could never be in the north pole to actually see live penguins. but who knows, right?

horse. intramuros, manila. december 2008
haha. i couldn't get myself near the horse. i wanted to take a picture near it, but the scaredy cat me, thought against getting nearer the animal.

horse. wright park, baguio. december 2008
i thought you said you are scared of horses,? you ask. well, i am. but apparently not "literally" scared. my travel companions urged me to hop on the pony. they had me at the argument that my trip to baguio wouldn't be complete if i didn't ride on a horse. so, i did only to bleed profusely after the ride.

fish aquariums. manila ocean park. july 2009
if you've been to ocean park hk before manila ocean park, and you compare the two, then you'd be disappointed. however, there is something about gigantic fish aquariums that never fails to delight.


fish. giant crab. glowing jellyfish. underwater world, singapore. august 2009
see? fish in huge aquariums never fail to amaze young and old alike.

zebra. giraffe. night safari, singapore. august 2009.
i could still distinctly remember my night safari experience in singapore. it's actually here that i first saw many animals that i've only seen in books (lions, giraffes, leopards, tigers, etc). my reaction upon seeing the long-necked giraffes was truly priceless. i just never imagined seeing these animals in person.

elephant. ayutthaya, thailand. april 2010

elephants. bangkok, thailand. april 2010
haha. see the distance i kept between the elephant and myself?

camel. bird. baluarte, ilocos sur. june 2010

bear. everland, seoul south korea. september 2010

birds, birds. street somewhere in seoul. september 2010

giraffes. calauit island, palawan. august 2012.
hold on tight to those branches. them mighty giraffes are actually powerful. don't be fooled by the picture. it's a fake smile as i was thinking the giraffe would eat my hand by mistake. but the guide reassured us that the giraffes will only eat the leaves. even then, it didn't reassure me. but true enough, once all the leaves are eaten, you're actually left with just the branches, and the giraffes would just be done with you.

zebras. calauit island, palawan.
according to the park guide, zebras don't attack unless disturbed. you can actually get near them, but just not near enough that they might attack.

well, these are just the few animals i encountered in my travels here in the philippines and neighboring asian countries.

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