Ada goes to the zoo - Ibadan Trip Continued.

September 19, 2017

Eventually we got to Ibadan and headed to University of Ibadan. The zoo was our first stop. I remember visiting the zoo once but I was quite young at the time. I was probably 8 or 9 at the time. I don’t recall much from that visit but a few memories stood out. There was a gorilla there at the time that was definitely not camera-shy. It knew how to pose for a picture and kept giving the person taking its pictures different styles and postures. My brother, Kachi who was about 4 or 5 then, was terrified of the gorilla and refused to walk beside the gorilla enclosure. On the other hand, my other brother, Ifeanyi who was about 2 years old or less then had engaged in a stare down challenge with a lion whose roar was shaking its enclosure to the foundations, making grown men fret.

As we got closer to the zoological garden, I knew a lot of things were definitely going to change as it had been 12 years since I was there last but I hoped it would be for the better. The walls looked newly painted. That was a good sign. It meant they were maintaining the place. There were shops in front of the building selling all sorts of edibles. The turnout that Friday was massive. Families with kids, student couple who wanted to go for sightseeing, newly married couples – they were all there. We paid for the entry fee which was about ₦2500 for the five of us and we were given these old coins, which I originally thought were souvenirs. Turned out the coins weren’t souvenirs. They were meant to be used as a kind of toll fee to go through that this very archaic gate I saw. You insert the coin and push these frightful looking rotating iron bars to get in.

I paid my ‘toll fee’ and got in. At first it seemed like the place was dead and long gone. The birds cages seemed empty, some contained dead birds. However, as I moved from one part of the zoo to the other, I realized first impressions can be quite deceptive. Here are some of the pictures I took at the zoo.