GB No. 5-6, summer-fall 1991
- Some gentleman is fighting with bears - two boys run warn the zookeepers, saving the imperiled man's life in this way. It wouldn't be difficult to foresee the possible result of such a fight.
A brown bear weighs about 300 kg, has powerful paws with sharp claws and moreover large animals' instinct of fight and survival. Stanisław J. is a middle sized, not very imposing looking man in his twenties. He might know karate or boxing only from popular films. But still, just after twilight the man jumped over a deep ditch full of water and found himself in the territory of the rapecious animals. He encroached on their territory, their realm.
The relief team armed with froth she five-extinguishers, arrived literararly at the last moment. The place of this extraordinary fight was covered with blood. Stanisław J. was almost dying with a broken-back bone, breathing very hard under a large she-bear, who was licking her victim's face. It is a kind of bear's ritual before they finish definitely with the enemy. Fortunately the froth-stream managed to prevent the bear from finishing definitely with the enemy. Fortunately the froth-stream managed to prevent the bear from finishing the job. The heavily injured man is still staying in a hospital.
Two young railway workers were treating themselves to beer. They drunk a lot and got drunk in a sad way. The evening found them in the ZOO. One of them without thinking too much jumped into the pool with the hippopotami.
The four tons leader of the group had swum in the opposite direction. Fortunately the pool is quite big and the animals had space to more. It might have been worse. You should know that hippopotami tead to became terribly aggressive whe they feel beset upon.
It is no use to live, salaries are so low. There is no prospects of a better future - explained the railway worker to the ZOO staff when they had taken him off the pool. They prevented the second man from following his friend in his friend in his suicidal bath.
About 2 a.m. a 42 years old inhabitant of Leszno visited the Wrocław ZOO. He carried ironwork tools intending to rip up the cages' bars.
- You know, there are too many people in the World - he confessed to Mr. Antoni Gucwiński, the chief of the ZOO.
- Tell me. please, who would kill more people, a viper or tiger?
In company of the tigers and with their help a student of Wrocław University wanted to finish with herself. She entered the tigers run but the beasts hid themselves in their rooms. The shapely girl got so angry that she got undressed. Someone from the staff ran to the rescue, keeping a spade, because it was the only thing that the tigers were really afraid of.
One of the animals' keepers almost fainted of fear when he looked into the space for wild boars, where there was among the others a large 200 kg person with enormous tusks. On the floor there was a man in his thirties. He had lit a fire. The man was sitting down, keeping a long blood-stained knife in his hand. There was a big sack near him. It was established that he made a bet with his friends that he would bring a slaughtered boar for the feast and a bet is a matter of honor...
Another gentleman made a bet that he would stroke a tail of a sleeping panther. The threatened animal showed a typical animal reflex. As soon as warm hand touched the fur, sharp teeth tore a big piece of meat from the man's arm.
It's a real pest that so many visitors want to impress their girlfriend or their friends. They treat ordinary stupidity like courage. They mix death-danger with exciting risk.
A teenage boy ran among giraffes. He was so happy with it that he was cheerfully waving his hands to his classmates.
- This kid was really lucky, that there was no male giraffe nearby - says one of the ZOO-workers.
- The bull can kick in the distance of three meters in every direction. A giraffe's kick kills a lion. A man might fall apart into pieces after something like this.
A man who thought that he could tear the antlers from a deer's head was less lucky. He lost a few fingers.
The humans' and the animals' worlds intermingle one another in a very strange and unexpected way. Here is a grannie instructing her grandson how to deprive a freely walking peacock of his beautiful feathers "Press the bird's tail to the ground with your foot and I'll hurry him with my handbag". A mammy of two little children sticks her pointed umbrella into a lion's cage. She jabs a wounded paw of the animal which gives a loud howl of pain and helpless anger. "I've paid for a ticket and this beast doesn't even move its body!" - says the woman cough red-handed.
Near the ZOO a llama with bound legs was famd. It was established that it had fallen a victim to collective rape. The animal had been stolen from the ZOO at night. The perverts are like patient, cool agents. They watch the animals' guardians, they know their plans of work, their habits. They attack unexpectedly and efficiently. In the history of the Wrocław ZOO also a female-deer has been raped. The prevent her from trying to defend they hit the animal's head several times. The wounds proved mortal.
It is not rare that animals are just stolen. The temptation is the opportunity of selling them abroad. It's just a way to earn quite a lot. Some of the thieves say that they just wanted to own their own domestical pet. In such a way an ex-worker of the ZOO was trying to justify himself to the police. He had taken the job only to see how to steal cultures and anaconda-snakes. He did what he had planned but he was denounced and he had to give the trophy back. After a few weeks he tried a burglary. This time he put into his sack a five meters long python. The reptile might have strangled him, the ZOO workers say.
A twenty year old man stole six parrots. He's going to be imprisoned for this. He would lose on the business anyway if he wanted to sell them for 50,000 zloties each one when in fact they were worth 10 million zloties.
The fishes from the aquarium vanish too. They are of different value, from 500 to 50,000 zloties. Something they are the only persons in the whole country, which, of course increases the lost.
For completely different reason they didn't manage to keep gold fishes in a beautiful pond near the gorillas' pavilion. The visitors have a habit of dropping coins into the water for good luck, and to come back to the same place.
After some time there is pretty much money, so some people collect it. They seem not to cave about the metal bars surrounding the pond. Some of the fishes were stolen, the rest of them were crushed under the searchers' feet, just like the wonderful nenuphars, by the way.
In one of the show-cases in the ZOO administration you can see a remainder of some searcher. It is a leather military belt.
Human greed also didn't spare the polecats. A fame that they could be kept at home was spread by the television and the result was that they were all stolen.
It hasn't been established yet, who and why someone had a grudge against antelopes. First the anti-fire equipment was stolen from the pavilion. It increased the guardians' watchfulness. It was found soon that someone had made some preparation to set the structure on fire. Fortunately he wasn't successful and didn't manage to back the innocent animals.
"Don't feed animals!" - signs on the plates nearby the cages and the animal-runs say. Why not if an ostrich chokes in such an amusing way trying to swallow a leather glove.
A mountain talapoin was treated to an apple with over a dozen of 12-16 millimeters long nails. Somebody tried whether crocodiles were fond of spectacles, a gum ball, ballpens.
A polar bear was given a bottle of fruit-vine. The animal broke the bottle and swallowed a bottle-neck. Medical treatment was needed.
Some man put a rubber gasket on the beak of a white stork making the bird die of hunger.
We cannot blame only crazy, psychically unbalanced lunatics and perverts for everything that has happened in the Wrocław ZOO.
Facts like in a carve mirror remind about the dark side of human nature, deeply hidden desires, deep complexes, unrealized dreams about power.
Jan Rubin
"Nazajutrz" No 4
translation: Olgierd Dilis