Happy Valentine's Day at the Zoo.

I spent my Valentine watching birds and animals of all types, and loved them all, especially the sweet felines. I particularly wanted to see "Luna", sweet moon so endearing and mother tiger who recently gave birth to three twins at the Metropolitan Zoo in Santiago. While she lied there she had her tail bouncing, which for me was a good sign. Then she looked at me with that piercing blue eyes in a very informal way like saying, "see what I did? Aren't they cute?" said sweet Luna moon/mom, while talking about her kittens, and so very proud of her achievement. Women looked at her and they couldn't help but let a "Oh..." coming off their mouths as a term of endearment. I approached and I took a pic with the zoom (didn't want to disturb her coming too close). Then I left. And as the moon with both bright and dark side, all of a sudden Luna rose from her lethargic almost entranced state and looked up very attentively. I was far away when I took the other two pictures of her. Couldn't see her babies though. They were already gone for their siesta, they were probably taking a nap after all the surely furor of having them there with their mom (The Zoo allows only one hour in the morning and one in the evening for the visitors to see the three tender tigers). Then this morning I went hunting/haunting in the heights the mountains of Farellones, a marvellous environment to also do some Yoga training, with the tree pose as the epitome (although the higher you go the less oxygen you will get), but at least a few miles away from the city, with dazzling views of the Andes, and not that suffocating vial of encaging buildings. Not comparing, though it reminds me of the Grand Canyon so much that sometimes I have to remember me, baby, but you are not in "California, ooh-ooh, I've got to warn you" (I love that rhyme, any-who!;) especially when in the radio there was the music playing, "Welcome to the Hotel California..."
Back to the Zoo, or we never left there, just by walking on the streets and looking around, with a honking driver with a resonant sound characteristic of a wild goose, or a woman talking over her cellular phone and sounding like a parrot, what was my exasperation to see the afectionate polar bear covering his eyes for the unbearable light and in a-morose state with the hot Chile pepper which we have been experiencing this summer. So sad to see the Arctic and Antarctic with the effects of the global warming too. We are now suffering the consequences. Dry weather leaving animals with lack of food and in danger of extinction, and we are no less vulnerable. I wish San Valentine could make this summer not so hot (but only in our hearts:) And the penguins who were desperately trying to get the heck out of that warm water. I am so glad that the efforts of the Zoologists were rewarded by the little endangered tigers (which got them effervescently constructing to the new family a realm with cascades and a wider place similar to their own habitat which, as I witnessed, will look pretty wild!:) And the five new born flamingos, which I also eye witnessed, they are really cute, especially while mommy flamingo gives food. I wish I could see all of them in a free environment and not in a cage. Of course, that would be a little too risky, or I would better be in a safari for that. But I mean in a sense of letting them having a bigger place so that they may enjoy the life they were meant to live, and not being only an attraction for us. I guess they would be well maintained and would have more possibility of reproduction if they really have that kind of natural habitat. Such as the elephants, I know they love to be in the water, getting refreshed by the mud. And I have never seen that happening in any Zoo. Funny though that this Valentine's "El Mercurio" also wrote about the animals at the Zoo:
http://blogs.elmercurio.com/cienciaytecnologia/2008/02/14/conservacion-los-secretos-amor.asp

And here are some pics I took the same day they were talking about the loving birds... The pictures tell for themselves (and they're worth a thousand words:)



"Born Free..."

Three Tender Tigers

Today there was an Afro-Peruvian Folkloric music presentation at Anahuac (which means, in Indian language, "the land surrounded by water"), the Cultural Center in Cerro San Cristobal. One of the musicians played once with a very odd instrument, a jaw from a rustic animal (by the obstinate sound I believe it was from a donkey, the bony structure, not the percussion;) which resonated in the entire room. The percussionist and also singer took an old lady up to the stage (she'd invited him to dance with her) and made her hip hop, then other two girls joined the "Buena Vista Social Club" in reference to the rhythm which were very similar to the Cuba's band. There also was a "viola" like an electric guitar that I had never seen before, without a body or acoustic box, and only the strings in the middle and the structure that surrounded it all open in the air. No need of a claustrophobic sensation, when you can deliver the message with the maximum of transparency. In a green tone that could well be a nice allusion to the hydroelectric attempt, which they plan to construct in the south, when there are so many other less drastic and clean solutions which causes no environmental impact, such as the wind energy in the north. After all, America is a continent surrounded BY not ON water (let's not forget "Atlantis"!)
Metropolitan Park this Sunday afternoon

At the same Metropolitan park there is the Santiago Zoo, where a white tiger named Luna, who came from Mexico in 2004, gave birth to three triggered tigers (try to say that three times without sounding in-triguer;) who were recently released to be exposed to the public. The white tigers are an endangered species, there are only 200 in the whole wide world which makes this news of a sublime touch.



So sublime indeed is the view of the Cordillera, like a spinal structure that, in the middle of the summer, keeps the snow on top. Let's pray this scene keeps itself as a beautiful reminder that the sun shines but there are a natural resource of clean water that cover our back. Let's pray for this winter to be of a no cataclysmic no catalytical or no-catalytical (because it doesn't matter if the vehicle contaminates less, if it does anyway), with no greenhouse effect, but a green-cause fact of a sole or solar solution (you better leave the car at home and go by foot, or use solar energy) so that we may see the sun shinning over the hills, and not that sad scenario of smog smothering us and hovering over all.

Andes Mountain's view from my terraza.

Andes Mountain viewed from my window this morning...

and the same Mountain viewed in the afternoon Anna ci sarò
fino a quando tu
non avrai la forza
per cercare un giorno in più
Anna io non so se vuoi che sia così
ma non mi arrenderò
per questo dimmi sì
Anna dimmi sì.

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