Sikkim Flowers & Zoo 錫金花園和動物園

來到錫金，忽冷忽熱的，受了風寒，今天上午台灣師兄給了兩包葛根湯，一喝下去，果然好了些。

I caught a cold since coming here and felt pretty ill last night. Good that someone from Taiwan gave me some Chinese medicine stuff which to my surprise relieved a big part of the syndrome within one hour.

趁著太陽很好（昨天下雨），拉了一位新加坡師兄一起去動物園——實在是問了一圈後，大家都對動物園一點興趣都沒有。當地人還說，他住了一輩子，只去過一次動物園～～真是人人喜好不同，話說回來，我除了小時候跟學校去校外教學時去了一次動物園，之後就再也沒有去過台北動物園了。這就是居民和觀光客的差別，身邊的東西比較容易忘了要珍惜。

Then I finally found someone who also wants to go to the zoo, so we took off for a short excursion before lunch.

途中先在一個花園停了一下。雖然錫金號稱蘭花種類繁多，但是現在不是季節，蘭花不是太多，倒是各色杜鵑開的紅紅火火的。
On our way, we also asked the taxi to stop by the Flower Exhibition Center. It is a rather small place so it only took us 15 minutes to browse through the site.

然後去了動物園。當地人説，這裏的圈養範圍很大，所以動物往往會躲在什麽隱密處，除了小熊貓外，其它的不是很容易看到，大吉嶺的動物園會比較容易見到動物。
Then we went to the zoo.  The locals warned us that the enclosure here is rather big so often it is not easy to see the animals. Darjeeling zoo is more recommended, but somehow I just feel like seeing red pandas and snow leopards here.

我們運氣很好的。一到黑熊區，就見到一隻黑熊坐在面前的樹下，小小的，很可愛，比較像是隻坐著的河馬。它看了我們一眼，然後就轉頭繼續凝望天空。還真沒有看過動物這樣注視天空的，像是繪本的畫面。
Yet we were pretty lucky. The black bear literally sat right in front of where we stood. It is not giant, but a bit like a sitting hypo, plus it spent most of time gazing at the sky, as if it were contemplating on something very profound.

豹兒也很賞臉。又是跑到圍欄前正中央躺著給我們看，還嘴裡咕嚕咕嚕的嘟囔著，表演各種睡姿。我很懷疑是不是這邊的遊客會亂餵東西，不然它們怎麽都這麽賣力演出。
A leopard was also pretty engaging in his duty. It stayed right in front of the fence, showing us all sort of sleeping postures with snoring sounds.

反而是小熊貓不太配合，躲在叢林裏或通往寢室的洞口。但是臉真的很可愛，和大熊貓是有些相似之處。
Then the red pandas with very really cute face 🙂

西藏狼則看起來像是某一品種的大狗。簡介上説有可能是全黑的，但是我們看到的兩隻都是白白的。
Tibetan wolves also came out for the sun. Though they look more like dogs to me.

最高興的是看到了雪豹，雪白雪白的大貓，真是可愛。另一頭的一群喧鬧的印度學生使得它直直朝我們這邊走過來，呵呵。
And we were lucky enough to see the snow leopard as some noisy Indian students in another side of the enclosure caused it coming towards us. 

舔爪子的樣子，跟貓一樣。Licking claws like a big cat.

要不是牌子掛著是雪豹，我可能會把它當老虎～
If I only see its face, I might think it were a tiger instead of leopard.