Read Online Babylon's Ark by Lawrence Anthony - Free Book Online Page B

from each animal.
    While this may seem odd to some, anyone working with wild animals knows positive communication is possible and a physical presence, using body language and words, pays absolute dividends. It’s uncanny how even the most feral creatures respond to persistent care and communication. This doesn’t mean you get into a cage with them; it’s no warm and fuzzy Disney movie. It means genuine rapport respecting the fundamental tenets of the natural world. I had no doubt the shell-shocked animals sensed what was going on and that things would now get better. It was this message I wanted to project to them simply by being there … acknowledging them … letting them smell me. If the zookeepers remained upbeat, that optimism would rub off onto the animals. Those who scoff have no idea of the settling effect on wild animals of a positive, caring frame of mind.
    Obviously I had no illusions that this rapport was going to happen quickly. The animals were in terrible condition, listless, starving, and stressed beyond belief, and their sole fixation was food and drink. They, understandably, could barely react to any stimuli other than those basic cravings.
    But I knew my persistence would pay off. And from that day on, no matter what happened, I took time to speak words of compassion to them, soothing them and watching for acknowledgment.

    The vets by now had done their rounds and came to give me a situation report. The lions would be okay if we could get enough water trickling in. However, the bombed wall of the den needed instant repairs. The giant cats had already escaped on two occasions, and once they got their strength back there was no doubt they would again break out to forage. Three had already paid for that with their lives.
    I was aware of this and said that after we had filled the water troughs we would gather debris to plug the hole, binding it with bits of wire we could scrounge from the rubble. I said I would later ask American military technicians to fix it properly.
    The two Bengal tigers were also dangerously skeletal, but like the lions they would survive as long as water kept dribbling in. Apart from their raging thirst, they also needed extra water to cool them down in the scorching sun.
    The bears were ravenously gobbling vegetable scraps that had been tossed into their cages, the old blind brown bear that I had just spoken to, Saedia, pausing occasionally to gaze vacantly in our direction. In the adjacent cage Saedi, the other bear—the Ali Baba killer—watched us warily as he munched moldy gray cabbage leaves. His water trough was dry as dirt, and I instructed the staff to get containers of the precious liquid into the cage immediately.
    In short, the vets said that although all the animals were in awful condition, they were satisfied none were irrevocably on the verge of death. The key question, of course, was how long could we provide food and water?
    It was a question none of us could answer.
    I drew up a mental balance sheet. On the credit side, I had a few willing workers, some U.S. dollars in my pocket, some meat and vegetables from Kuwait—although much of that was turning rancid—and a trickle of water.
    On the debit … well, I didn’t want to dwell on that. It was simply too huge to contemplate. So I compiled a list of absolute essentials.
    First, I needed food for the staff. Without that, they would understandably just grab what we had for the animals. Their families
were starving, that much they had made plain, and even the wages I had given them didn’t count for much, as shops were either being ransacked by looters or boarded up.
    Second, we needed proper buckets to haul water from the canals until we could get the pumps working.
    And third, we needed to fix the pumps. Urgently.
    The pumps … they were the key to everything. Just getting a consignment of water to the cages in the heat on that first day was a forerunner to how cruelly