Interview 24641 – Caption Index: 556
He said, “Well, Lawrence, what I want to talk to you about is a science museum.” He said, “I went to one in San Francisco called the Exploratorium,” you ever been there?… Read More
He said, “Well, Lawrence, what I want to talk to you about is a science museum.” He said, “I went to one in San Francisco called the Exploratorium,” you ever been there?… Read More
He went in 1983, he circled the planet in the shuttle. He was an astronaut. So he was pretty Westernized. And he came to the zoo. I met him at the embassy, then I invited him to come to the zoo. He came over there. Read More
And he said, “That was fascinating. And I think it would go over well here in Saudi Arabia, but I don’t know that. And I would like to build. We’ve got a big building out in the diplomatic quarter that isn’t being used, a lot of empty buildings.” They always… Read More
Sure. After the zoo, the zoo was an experiment in many ways. They had had a zoo, but it had been closed for a long time. And they thought it would work well. And my bosses really thought we could have at least a few family days. We finally lost… Read More
But one of the people that I met at the American Embassy, there’s, you know, it’s the capital of the country. And we have an embassy, huge embassy, huge, with big battlements to keep anybody from driving in. I met a prince there, Prince Abdulaziz Al Saud. He was the… Read More
So you were able to go to the United States?… Read More
Would you explain the Science Oasis Museum, why it started?… Read More
Oh, I went to the United States, took half the animals that we were, you know, they were surplus, you know how it is. They wanted to get rid of them. We pretty well hired a Saudi freighter to carry all this stuff. And I got my, hired my son… Read More
Well, first the parents are there to claim the kid’s body. And you know, they were pointing to me, “He’s an American. Well, he didn’t try to save our son, because our son is a Palestinian,” you know, and all that kind of crap. And they did bring, take the… Read More
Ran back to the car and there was my briefcase. Opened it up, there’s the $100,000. There is really a minimal amount of crime in that country. And one of them is, you know, if you do certain things, they’ll behead you. And every Friday at the main center, city… Read More
He was talking about baseball, of course. But anyway, it was a great experience. Read More
I mean, we did everything we could to bring him around. And it didn’t work. He was dead. We took him to the nearest hospital, and they pronounced him dead. And his family was then there and they were Palestinians. And the biggest, the only problem I ever heard over… Read More
So you went to the United States with $100,000?… Read More
And that’s what they think, and to a great extent it’s true. And outside of that, no problems, no problems. But those Palestinians, they didn’t like Americans. They’re prisoners of the Israelis there. Read More
The night before kids were coming into the zoo. We had these pools, a lot of large pools and were swimming. And I had the, my boss, the smart one, had gone to the bank and had $100,000, in a briefcase in, I don’t remember, $100 bills, I guess. And… Read More
They could never could deliver anything. And I said, “Look, American zoos, I can go over there, and probably in 30 days I can get the rest of these animals.” “Yeah, but how much will it cost us?” “Some of them they’ll give to us.” “Why would they give them… Read More
I had my tickets and all that, still three or four hours to go. And we got a call from the watchmen, watch people, that there was a kids swimming in the pool, and one of them looked like he was in trouble. So we drive up there, I get… Read More
Is that a hummingbird again? Yes it is. No, that’s a moth, I think. Anyway, that went on for about four days. But I did get some people, and I hired the zoo director, ’cause he’d allowed me to come in and raid his people. And went to India and… Read More
So I hired them, real nice guys. And they played Scrabble with in Swahili. But when, once a week I would, they would invite me and we would have a feast, and we would play Scrabble in English. And they always beat me. They’d use these little three letter words… Read More
The Australian company, they were gonna just take them to the cleaners. They had already delivered one giraffe. And I think they wanted, they got $25,000 for that giraffe. Now the city paid that, paid to the company. Now then the company paid him about five. I told them, I… Read More