Maruyama Zoo

We went to the Maruyama Zoo on Monday with Mom, Jared and two other visitors from the States, Hannah and Sid.  It was a great day, sunny and warm.  The Red Pandas were out eating their bamboo shoots and leaves.  They are awfully cute.  For my non-native english readers out there there is a funny english grammer joke involving a Panda who eats shoots and leaves.

The joke goes something like this:  A Panda walked into a cafe, ordered a meal, then took out a gun and shot up the place.  As the Panda walks out the surviving waiter asks in a trembling voice, "why did you do that?"  The Panda responds, "don't you know that a Panda eats, shoots and leaves?"

At the risk of killing the joke I will explain that with a comma removed from the last line like so: "don't you know that Pandas eat shoots and leaves." changes the meaning of the sentence so that it now means Pandas eat the shoots and leaves of a plant.  With the comma in place it signifies a new idea or action.  So with the comma in place it means that after eating, the panda takes out a gun and fires it (shoots) and walks away from the cafe (leaves).  In this joke you can only tell whether the Panda is a gunman, or an eater of bamboo by the placement of the comma.

I took this photo of Jared watching a crocodile.  The glare from the window was too much to get a good photo of the crocodile.  I like how it looks like Jared is hugging the crocodile in this photo.

This guy is a Water Monitor.  She seemed to be keeping a close eye on me.

Here is the water monitor's cousin, a Cobalt Tree Monitor.

This turtle was my favorite animal at the zoo.  I think he is a broad shelled turtle.  You can see a video of him swimming (taken by someone else) here.

The ever humorous Japanese/English signs.  In this case the sign is warning you of the deer that may turn into dangerous dinosaurs and bite your fingers.

This sign needs no translation.


That's all for now,

-Kyle (and Bre)