Eyes Wide Open at the World's First Nighttime Zoo

After being caged in class all day, learning about Singapore's industrialization and future economic prospects, a group of us hopped in a taxi to visit the zoo!

This zoo was not just any old zoo. Just like Bruce Wayne, its nighttime identity is a whole different story. Singapore's Night Safari is the world's first nighttime zoo open to the public. To showcase its nocturnal animals, the zoo built a cunning series of lights and stages along a tram track.

You remember what it's usually like at the zoo for those poor nocturnal animals:

Little Boy: Mommy, why's the bat sleeping in the daytime?
Uneducated Parent: It's lazy, honey. C'mon bat! I paid money for this! *taps on glass furiously* Wake up wake up!


And so the story goes, until many poor animals go crazy and run in circles. But here in Singapore, the nighttime experience is one in which flash cameras aren't allowed and visitors get to see those often-snoozing creatures strut their stuff.

I loved it - especially the unusual animals, such as tapirs, which look like pigs crossed with elephants, and capybaras, giant rodents!

We got an extra show featuring humans, not animals. A team of barely-dressed young guys hooted and danced to the beat of drums. Then they started to chug beer, spew it and set it on fire, that's when we started backing away!



Dinner was chicken satay, a delicious twist on the ol' shish kebab. Rice cooked in braided bamboo leaves was ehhh.

We were disappointed in only one thing -- where were the adorable bush babies?!?! After wandering around after the tramride for quite a while, we came to grips with the fact that the sweet little marsupials were nowhere to be found. The zookeeper informed us that the sweeties had been "transferred to above" and we shrieked, "THEY'RE DEAD?!?!" Actually, he just meant they had been sent to another zoo for a while. Bummer. At least they aren't dead.

This is the only bush baby we found, waaaaahhh!!

Finally, as we left the park, we saw people placing their feet into large tanks of tiny fish. Turns out they paid for this pleasure! $10 for 5 minutes of little fishes eating the dead skin off their feet as a spa treatment!