I went to the Barrows Conservation Lecture at the Zoo Wednesday night. After my CREW event committee meeting. The lecture was actually supposedly sold out, but my Mom and my sister were going (they already had tickets) and since I was already at the zoo I thought I would stop by and see if maybe, perhaps there were any no-shows. Well I was hanging around will-call and someone else asked if there were any more tickets. "We have three tickets available." Woo-hoo. Luckily this person only needed one so I got in line behind her. Another woman walked up to me and asked if I was waiting to buy a ticket. I said yes and I was thinking no way is she getting ahead of me. There is only one more ticket after mine and I am not risking it. Then she asked "You don't have a ticket?" "No, I'm waiting to buy one." Then she handed me one and said she had bought a ticket for her grandson, but he got sick and couldn't come. I already had my wallet out, so I tried to pay her for it (it's only $10) but she didn't want it. Nice! My sister was already saving me a seat, just in case.
The lecture was GREAT. I'm so glad I got in. Gerry Ellis has been a wildlife and nature photographer for almost 40 years. He has traveled everywhere on the Earth, loves looking at the world from different perspectives and appreciating all the diversity - in human cultures as well as plants and animals. He had some good stories to tell and he is a good storyteller.
Interesting the definite majority of the audience was over 60 years old. Why don't younger people go to lectures? Another thing about the speaker that I liked, he made an off-hand reference that many people in the audience had probably traveled extensively. And he was probably right. No show of hands or anything. At one point in his talk, he was telling about his visit with Dian Fossey's mountain gorillas and he said "Those of you who've been to Uganda or Rwanda know…" There most likely were people in the audience who had been gorilla trekking. I haven't yet…but I want to. It's on my list of Things To Do. He also convinced me to add Antarctica to the List. I never cared about going there, no matter how magnificent it is, because it has to be so darned cold. But I’m changing my mind.
Coincidentally, when I went in to look for my Mom and sister, before I had my ticket, they were sitting next to Fred, who works in IRS Appeals on the same floor as me! His wife was there also and they have traveled a lot. She was telling us about this amazing trip she took to South Africa and Botswana.
Of course his photographs and short videos were terrific! Made me want to run off and get a job at a wildlife sanctuary somewhere. He had spent a few years at an elephant orphanage in Kenya! They raise baby elephants who have lost their mamas! It was so great. He was so excited because they had some Kenyan schoolkids visit who had never seen elephants! He also told a similar story about kids in China who lived next to a Giant Panda sanctuary. So he started a foundation which has this website www.globio.org Their mission is to connect kids in different parts of the world.
There were some Buddhist monks from Mongolia in the audience. They were visiting the zoo for some program. At the end they chanted a blessing over us. I got blessed by Buddhist monks! What did you do?
