I should explain now that my parents forbid me ever journeying to the Zoo.
At the age of six and three quarters I declared myself an animal rights
activist. It was directly after I’d watched an advert that asked viewers for
£2 to save the Mexican Donkeys. A Donkey will not do something if they
consider it unsafe. I gave my mum two of the five pounds I had saved
and I’ve sponsored a Donkey named Honda ever since. I knew that mum
and dad would be upset, angry and even disappointed if they knew I had
come here but I couldn’t understand why.
They’ve always said
‘You just won’t like it Hen.’
And
‘It’s not for you.’
I knew they would think I was just at Gran’s. At Gran’s and definitely not
at the Zoo.
Mum’s 1:30 phone call was looming. Only the opening sentence wouldn’t
be ‘hello love, its only me’ but rather ‘what the hell are you doing to
my nerves Henry Phillip Carmichael’. I’d predicted it would probably be
worse than when Dad screamed ‘why aren’t you just a normal boy’ at me
during a family BBQ two summers ago or when my electric toothbrush
died in my mouth.
After what felt like much longer than a forty-seven-minute journey, the
driver screeched myself, Lind, Sharon, and other hopefuls to a halt. By
which time, the premature standers were in full swing. Ruck sack straps
flailed about invading personal space. My personal space. They danced
to a symphony of dings produced by over-pressing of the ‘stop’ button,
courtesy of the small grubby hand of Sharon’s youngest. I relocated my
green shades from forehead to face then picked up my Panda rucksack
I got at the WWF convention with mum last September. Did you know
that by the year 2050, the world could lose 30% of Polar Bears to Global
Warming? That’s 271560 hours the Polar Bear has left.
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