Meat on the Hoof and Plate

Today was simple but nice. A couple of days ago the POSSLQ and I had accidentally walked home from lunch near the Spanish Steps via the Borghese Gardens. Today was the day we formally went up there. 46 bus to Venezia and then POSSLQ and I walked out while the parents took the 119 bus. We wandered around for about an hour or so, and then decided to go take a look at the zoo.That picture of the lion is only included here because he has a plant growing out of his head and we all thought that looked kind of cool. Also a nice sculpture, I suppose, but there are so many of those in Rome that your eye learns to tune them out after a while.

Interesting zoo, as it is clearly on its way from one kind of zoo to another. Some of the displays were frightening in that old-fashioned "eff the animals" kind of way. The giraffe was on concrete, as were the elephants. The black bear was in one of those old "slice of cliff" concrete layours with a moat, that zoos used to use. He looked like he wished he were dead. This approach to live animals was shown out in particularly odd light when you consider the fact that the statue of baby Noah being launched into the river (above right) was planted with papyrus and other plants native to Egypt. It seemed weird to treat the statuary with more ecological respect than the live animals. But the newer exhibits (particularly the retilarian) were all about treating animals right. And the bear exhibit (which I think was second newest) intentially worked at the distinction between old models and new models. Outside of an outstanding mini-environment was a picture, from 1935, of a bear actually being baited. Then a window into the underwater and land area of the new exhibit. To the right was a picture of the bear exhibit only 7 years ago - same old concrete and cage approach. So they are clearly making progress, and the bears were entirely digging it. It was also about 72 degrees and clear, so they were in exactly their kind of climate.

Possibly the oddest exhibit was in the "old" bird section. With thousands of seagulls flapping around the zoo and park, some genius had gone to the trouble to trap on unfortunate individual and create a "seagull" exhibit. As you'll see, they apparently maimed th poor thing in the process. Noticing all the pigeons in the park I asked a groundskeeper where the pigeon exhibit was, but he just looked at me as if I were completely mad. Our lack of a shared language made this difficult for me to explain, so we let it trickle out before fisticuffs were commenced.

The newest exhibit was the reptile/conservation one. It started off in an unpromising fashion. We were forced to enter a fake commercial airplane and watch a movie with two older and demented Italians dressed up as a flight attendant and captain. They went through a bit of really cruddy shtick that was rendered extremely hard to follow by the subtitles, which moved around the screen fairly randomly. But after that there was a cool exhibit of birds and reptiles and the only thing that made it miss perfection was that POSSLQ and I were not with Baxter when the bird in the aviarium shit on him.

Can't have everything on a vacation.

After the zoo the POSSLQ and I ate something from the Bibite truck while the parents, unfortunately, ate in the zoo cafeteria. The whole concept of a cafeteria next to a zoo concerns me, and the parents said the food was quite awful.

POSSLQ and I sat on the lawn, alternately napping and reading, for a couple of hours, and then we caught the bus home.

Dinner was odd, but outstanding. The usual place was closed, so we wandered up a different street and into a restaurant that only looked provisionally open. The front door was open, but no tables were out and there was no one working at the door. We wandered in and seated ourselves as a guy ran up to us and said "no pizza tonite" and then ran off as abruptly.

He was the owner and the place really only was slightly open. This was the one night a year that he comped the friends and family of all his staff. So the menu was limited, but this restaurant was the real deal. Just outstanding food.. probably the best I've had here. I had some kind of broiled chicken that was Italian and also reminded me of pressed Chinese duck -- but no grease. Bax had pasta vongole that actually had vongole in it and POSSLQ had the best ravioli I've ever tasted, Great service as well. The owner was a middle-aged guy with a bit of stubble, a gold chain and an outstanding attitude. We were one of only two tables that paid, the other folks had kind of snuck in as well.

Just a really nice way to end a half-assed day.