why visit zoos in china

I think the obsession started sometime in early 2008 after a friend lent me John Berger’s About Looking. I was particularly struck by an idea in the essay, Why Look at Animals, that zoos gained popularity as the industrial revolution drove more people into the cities, contact with animals became less frequent and more distant.   If you raise cows, looking at buffalo in a pen just isn’t all that interesting.   But having grown up in the city, a trip to my uncle’s dairy ranch was a treat, and a trip to the zoo doubly so.

Elephant and Crowd, Kunming Zoo, 2009

Women and Peacock, Kunming Zoo, 2009

At some point I picked up a copy of Winogrand’s, The Animals, and resolved to start visiting the Lisbon zoo.  I was about 16 the last time I had been there and I had vague memories of chasing guinea foul and having my thumb nearly pulled off by an enraged monkey.   I wanted to go back there, not so much for the animals, but for the people in who might lurk there.  The ticket price of near €20 quickly put an end to that idea.

Garry Winogrand Couple at Zoo Looking at Each Other, Wolf in Cage, New York, from "The Animals" c.1962, silver gelatin print, 11 x 14 inches

Garry Winogrand, from "The Animals" c.1962, silver gelatin print, 11 x 14 inches

Fast forward a year, I’ve moved to China and a friend of mine and I are trying to figure out what to do with ourselves in Kunming after a failed trip to Garze and an epic series of bus rides into Yunnan through the mountains along the Tibetan border (that story warrants a whole other post).   All I knew about Kunming was what I could find on Wikitravel.  Among the parks listed was the Kunming Zoo which was described as “a pleasant enough place but with a slight air of weariness and decay about it.  Local people also use it as a place for performing exercise or playing cards and mahjong.” A quick bus ride and a cheap ticket later and we were in.   The place was a mix of zoo and amusement park, where employees dressed as Donald Duck strolled passed the wolf cages, where the elephants were clearly disturbed, and where giraffes languised under the log ride.   To say the least, Kunming Zoo was terrible, but the kitsch brought back that old idea of visiting and photographing zoos.   Here was a rapidly urbanizing country (especially out west) where the animals were one of several attractions that got people to visit the park.   This was not the educational/conservational institution that zoos are in other places.  It was freak show.  This is not to say that zoos in China are bad, or that zoos elsewhere are any better.   During my remaining time in China I visited zoos and safari parks in Chengdu, Xi’an, Beijing (the Beijing Zoo was divine) and other places.

Crane and Matching Blouse, Chengdu Zoo, 2009

Children and Fish, Chengdu Zoo, 2009

Polar Bear and Couple, Chengdu Zoo, 2009

So, why visit zoos in China?  I don’t know if I’ve exactly pinpointed the attraction, but a few experiences have stuck with me.  For one, zoos in China are accessible.   First of all because entry is so inexpensive.  Barring the safari parks, ticket prices are generally under US$5.   Not only does this make it possible to frequently visit many zoos, but it also means they will be packed with the most various human fauna.  From young families with eager children, to retirees playing cards–everyone is there.   Hunting people who looked like the animals they were looking at became a favorite sport (leopard woman, giraffe woman, bear man…).  And then there were the juxtapositions that would not happen elsewhere.  The old men hanging their caged birds in the trees next to the aviary, or the men herding goats just beyond the gates of the petting zoo.  It can be surreal.

Seals and Audience, Qinling Safari Park, 2009

Circus Tigers, Qinling Safari Park 2009

Hippopotamus and Windows, Qinling Safari Park, 2009

Visiting zoos became my thing, often to the consternation and confusion of others.   People often discouraged me from going.   My students would invariably warn me that a zoo ‘wasn’t that great,’ and that I wouldn’t enjoy myself.  Western colleagues would recount third-hand accounts of the terrible conditions at an unidentified zoo.  Once, upon being interviewed for the local paper in Baoji, I was asked I liked to do in my free time.  I answered that I liked to visit zoos, and the following question was about what animals I had seen.  I began to list some favorites, but then stopped and said that I didn’t go to the zoo to see animals, I went to the zoo to see people.  The interviewer stared at me blankly.

Lion on Road, Badaling Safari Park, 2009

Elephant and Crowd, Badaling Safari Park, 2009

Man and Camel, Badaling Safari Park, 2009

Maybe the attraction also had something to with life in China being something like living in a zoo.   I’ll illustrate with a short anecdote.  Towards the end of my stay in China, I visited the Xi’an safari park.   It was a rainy day in late August, and zoo was unusually deserted.   I found a small crowd at the elephant house.   One little girl, about 4 or 5, was crying out dà xiàng! dà xiàng! (elephant! elephant!).  She turns and stares at me in disbelief, pointing and slowly exclaiming wài guó rén (foreigner)! I couldn’t help but laugh.  Only in China could a random stranger generate more awe than a full-grown elephant.

Man and Bear, Badaling Bear Garden, 2009

Zebras and Crowd, Beijing Zoo, 2009

Girl and Arapaima, Beijing Aquarium, 2009