I took a leave to return to my home town for three days this chinese new year. I realize that i am forcing myself so much just to say good bye to my friends. But this leave is a well deserved leave. When i reached Bandung, two gigantic dragon statue greeted me on Bandung Super mall. This mall is one of the few big malls in Bandung. The first place i visit when i step my foot back on my home town.
some singaporean still believe that indonesia have its own grudge against chinese and chinese new year. But as you can see, although we dont celebrate them brazenly on public, even local javanese also enjoys this celebration. Cultural diffrences enriches our knowledge.
Furthermore, i am quite shocked to see this rickshaw within Bandung Supermall vicinity. similar to the ones i saw on china town. I dont find this so often before. you can see my post on singapore's china town within "all about singapore" blog
Bandung is famous for its cool weather, and beautiful natural view. I went to lembang for the first day of my leave with my two very best friend edo and ester. I take this photos when we have a short break to refill my motorcycle's fuel
I spent the second day with my grand daughter, ivanna.. she was actually my former student, but since our age diffrence is quite significant, she likes to call me "nkong" which in english literal meaning is grandpa..
As far as my memmories can take me, i didnt remember if i ever visited bandung zoo before. and since she once promised me to go there together, we went there to pay respect for these zoo dweller.
A huge tree greeted us by the entrance. since this place is situated on a higher ground, this is a nice spot to have a break and see the zoo all around us.
the first animal we saw is this crocodiles. ivanna is armed with some chicken heads , and lots of vegies to face these animals. and the crocs seems to be on their agresive mood that day. the first chicken head she threw, is like a drop of water for a bunch of thirsty desert creature.
since we are a bit far off the crocs, we cant see them clearly in action. and so we move on to the comodo's lair. this one is much closer to us, and we hope to see a good "chicken head trashing" action from it. but to our dismay, the big lizard ignores the chicken head, and just stares at us with its dumb look.
next we visit tigers cage. there was this one very elegant white tiger on display. and she nibbled the chicken head we gave her calmly. we are so close to those bars, that somehow i feel like extending my hand and pat the cute tiger in the head. the thing is, cute creatures become very frightening when they come in great size.still we wanted some action from these creatures, dissapointed, we walk on forth.
we have what we asked for, and even more. this tiger on the next cage seemed to have a mood swing or something. that time, there were alot of visitor that went to see this tiger along with ivanna and me. when ivanna tossed her the chicken head, this tiger roars so loudly at her, that she stepped back in shock and become very pale indeed. the chicken head misses the gap and fell outside the cage. the poor hungry tiger got even more irritated because she cant get the chicken head she wanted, and roared even more furiously. this time, everyone around us had their attention to this 2 queer couples being roared at by the hungry tiger. none of us dares to come close to the angry beast to push the chicken head inside the cage, since the closeness of the cage can make the tiger literally nible any hand that come near.after i manage to push the chicken head inside, the tiger looked pleased, the crowd cheers and we walk away.
a similar thing happened when we visit this honey bear den. its very funny.. at first, we tossed them fruits, like oranges for them to feed. they seemed smart enough to catch the fruit with their mouth before the fruit touches the ground. after we ran out of fruits, ivanna tossed them the remaining chicken head that she have. thinking that we have no more surprises for the day, we move on.turned out we were mistaken. after a few distance away, loud fighting noise is heard from this bear cave. we rushed back to see the bears fighting for that one chicken head that we toss.. visitor started to gather round to see what happened. worrying we might get caught in trouble, i quickly pushed her away from the crowd.
and so we went on to visit other places of the zoo.
after that excitement, we went to cool down a bit. we greet our early ancestor.. the apes. this one greeted us back. i believe if that orang utan can speak human words, it would most probably say "howdy there stranger.."
monkeys are cute.. like cats.. since it comes in small sizes. tigers are scary, due to their roar. but the funny thing is, the tiger cage is so much closer to us than the monkeys. this is a picture of both ivanna and the monkey with their effort of reaching each other. very funny.
I think someone ought to teach this monkey to use pants.. somehow i dont find it polite to expose that "thing" so openly in front of a young innocent maiden like my grand daughter.
the next one we visit is the poultry field. ivanna commented.. "why does the peacock have to be placed on the same cage as the chickens? they arent exactly the same species.." well.. maybe the zoo keeper is running out of funds. even these chicken isnt that well fed. this white chicken jumped so high above ground just to peck on the food that we gave. too bad i cant take a picture of it in action
deers were also quite hungry. they flocks on trying to get a bite of anything that we passed thru the cage.
deers are nice, but deer with eye brow are scary.. dont u think?
this trip is much fun for both ivanna and me. this one, i guess she must have tried her tarzan language ability to call that elephant out.
she's been kind and generous to every animal inhabited the area. she also admits that she likes going to the zoo much.
on this pic, she is posing with a camel. i sure will miss her much.the last day i spent on bandung was on sunday. I used to like going to vihara (temple) to meditate, and that was my last chance to have one.
too bad i havent got the chance to say goodbyes to my dance troup friends.. it was raining the whole 3 long days.. bandung felt much more cold than i last remember.
After that short 3 days heart breaking goodbyes and a beautiful farewell memories, its time for me to head back to reality to live another day of my life. i looked out the window of the plane and think. life sure feels like honey on top of a very sharp knife. I wasted my time chasing a dream that never become a reality, only to get my feelings hurt. what can u say, everyone wants to be happy at least once in this long life. that is the risk we have to take when we desire something.
one part of life have passed, the next one is to come.. hopefully better than the last one.
