I always love to go to the zoo. Since I was a kid, Surabaya zoo was always my favorite place to go. I remembered when I rode an elephant. My little feet was pushed away by elephant’s wide feet. So happy memory.

Unfortunately, when I was grown up, I was rare to go to the zoo. My childhood zoo was not interesting any more. Moreover, a couple years ago, there was some bad news about the zoo. Many problems arouse from bad maintenance until the death some of animals. Therefore, Surabaya zoo had a bad image. It said that the zoo was dirty, smelly, doing animal bad treatment, corruption, etc.

I was so sad to hear that. Fortunately, the zoo was taking over by the local government. From there, I heard that the zoo was getting better. I wanted to go there again.

The chance was come to me this April. I took my son to the zoo because he liked animals. It was his first time to visit zoo. He was one year old. We went there with my parent’s in law. From their house, the zoo was near. Therefore, we just walked with my son in his stroller.

We walked in the morning, so that the weather was still nice. Even it was Sunday, the zoo was not really crowded because it was still early morning. I heard that this zoo now open since 5 a.m, so that people can jog here. Cool!

When entering the zoo for the first time, I heard some noise. I looked up the tree. There were some monkeys (or their “family”) hung and moved from branch to branch. What a welcoming voice!

I walked slowly and saw komodo, the icon of this zoo. Then, we saw some animals such as flamingo, bear, birds, hippopotamus, deer, crocodile, kangaroo, tiger, elephants, etc. The animals was quite many.

My son was really excited to see animals. He liked to walk and saw animals. When in deer’s cage, he even put his fingers near the deer. You know what the deer did? They licked my son’s finger. My son was not afraid, he just laughed. Perhaps it felt like tickling.

Our personal favourite was elephant. Therefore, we rode it. I noted the hour of the attraction. My mother in law had stood in front of the locket, ten minutes before it was opened. Therefore, we did not wait too long for the line. Thanks Mom. The ticket was Rp 25.000.

Finally, we rode the elephant. There were about four persons in each elephant and three elephants to ride in one round. We just went around the area. For me, it was so short. I thought it was longer when I was a child. Hahaha. As long as my son happy, it was okey.

Then, we continued to walked. I found out a library. I loved library and from outside, the library was looking good. I decided to come, since my son slept on his stroller.

Waa, the library was great. After the heat from outside, I felt the cold of AC. The books was placed on the animal or tree shelf with colourful painting. There was an open space in the middle, so that you can read with laying or sitting. The collection was not only about animals, but also general knowledge. When you are tired to go around, try to take a rest here.

As I walked, in some area I still smell something bad, but it was not in whole area. I thought that the animal might be too crowded. Too much animals in one cage, such as in flamingo cage.

However, the best transformation was aquarium area. Formerly, it was dark and dirty. Now, the wall was all blue just like sea. Many aquariums with various fish were there. I thought like I entered a little Sea World. No wonder the visitors was really crowded, even we should pay the ticket to see the fish.

Sadly, I did not see a dugong. When I was a child, except elephant, I always remember with dugong. The big fish that eat so many sea grass. It was wonderful to see its giant body coming up and down from the water. I did not know where it was.

In my conclusion, the zoo was getting better. Of course it was took time to made it perfect. However, they are going to there. Let’s support it by visiting Surabaya zoo.

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