A repeat performance of the microbus saga later, we arrived at the zoo, paid, and went in. The zoo was apparently lacking in funds, but even so, the logic of those charged with completing the zoo seemed to verge a bit too close to the possibility of personal danger for the zoo-going public. The management had apparently made a decision to reduce staff numbers to that of an anorexic skeleton staff. No doubt this was intended to save money, money which could be put to better use in completing the construction of the zoo. Here they had obviously come across a bit of a dilemma – namely who in their right mind will come and visit an empty zoo? What are these fools going to look at for a start?

The well-kept pristine cages? That said, isn’t it a bit dodgy to open a zoo where the cages for the wild animals aren’t 100% finished? After no doubt minutes of discussion, they’d agreed to risk it, and here was the result: they’d bought some animals and stuck them into cages and enclosures. The money raised from the ticket sales was added to the money the zoo saved by not employing anyone other than the ticket booth person, and the combined sum was then no doubt to be employed, at some point in the future, in completing and making safe the cages and enclosures that still presented a risk to the public.

It all seemed a bit wonky, but that’s how it was – animals were enclosed and caged but if you fancied, you could quite easily stretch across and grab a couple. The point was rammed home rather effectively by a family on a day out in front of us. Even though the zoo was, as zoos tend to be, liberally coated with signs instructing you not to feed the animals, there were no employees of the zoo apparently in existence. Thus, there was no one around to enforce the zoo’s policy of not allowing people to feed the animals.

The result was that families and courting couples were gaily tossing whatever food they had to the animals without stopping to consider if perhaps the flamingos were not fed up to the back teeth with sticky buns and cheese and onion crisps or whatever. The family in question were ahead of us in getting to the bears. Unlike some of the other enclosures, the sign for this one was correct: it said “Bears”, and inside the enclosure there were a few bored-looking bears. So far, so good. The odd thing was that although you could argue and probably win the argument that public safety was little compromised by say, a hole in the flamingos’ enclosure – I mean, how much danger to the general population does a rampaging flamingo fleeing hither and thither within the zoo grounds actually pose? Presumably they’re about as offensive and dangerous as rabbits.