... and then I saw a dead turtle.

Okay, not really. The turtle REALLY wasn't dead. But it sure looked like it.

Today, after waking up at the crack of noon (late night last night), I found myself on the subway, headed towards 대공원 (also known as the exit on Line 4 that takes you to Seoul Land) and the ZOO!

So, aside from birds, puppies, and stray cats, I haven't seen an animal in nearly two months. After spending a large chunk of my life on a farm, I was getting kind of sad. Add that to the fact that there is hardly any green grass or open spaces near where I live, and you get a slightly morose Marcie. It's funny the things you can take for granted, like having open space. Or green fields. Or ...

You get the picture. But today, I saw green grass AND animals AND open space (okay, that was where the lions were penned up, but I'll take what I can get). Granted, it was also one of the hottest days I have ever experienced, but after downing two bottles of water and an ice slushie, I hardly noticed (okay, tiny lie. I noticed).

There were lions and tigers and bears and elephants and giraffes and snakes (ew) and crocodiles and hamsters (among other things) and we even watched a dolphin show! Oh, "we" refers to me, Angela, and Angela's friends - Ruby, Ruby's husband, and their daughter Becky.

My favorite part? The dolphin/seal show. By far. It was so cool to watch (and the fact that it was all in Korean didn't detract at all). My new belief is that the coolest job in the world would be to work as a dolphin/sea animal trainer. Not that I could do that. But it would still be wicked cool.

Least favorite part? Well, you know me. I hate snakes. So, looking at pythons and anacondas and whatnot ... not the icing on the cake. But not wholly bad, either.

So, the turtle comment. We were in a room with different exhibits, and I wandered away to look at ... something. I can't remember what. Maybe it was a crocodile. And Angela walks over, and was like "there's turtles there, eating chicken. And there's a dead turtle." So, me being me, I walked over to look. Sure enough, there were a dozen or so turtles knawing at various raw chicken parts in a tank of water, and there was one lone turtle just kind of floating on it's own. It looked dead. Really. As in, it wasn't moving. At all. But I just couldn't believe that the zoo staff would leave a dead turtle floating in a tank. I mean, REALLY. So I stared at that turtle. I mean, I REALLY stared at that turtle. Finally, it blinked. Then, it blinked again. And then it moved it's little head. So it wasn't dead. Really. Just a little dazed.

The zoo was fun. Really, really fun. It was hot out, but once you got past that, it was a great day. The zoo wasn't the best - I felt really bad for some of the animals and the size of their imitation habitats. But it wasn't the worst zoo I'd ever been to.

PS, you know you're not in the States anymore when you go to a zoo and they have an exhibit dedicated to raccoons. No lie.

Pictures to come - I have to recharge my camera battery first so I can turn on my camera so I can upload photos, haha.