But they still do it. But it’s more shows, which is like elephant shows, primate shows, small mammal shows, sea lion shows. A lot of people do them and call them presentations and think that it makes it more palatable if you call it presentation. Well, I say, I mean… Read More
You had talked about breakfast and tea, and I might say, or people might say, does this type of presentation still have a place in zoos?… Read More
But you don’t like the word presentation?… Read More
What was your relationship with her?… Read More
Well, up until that Dr. Ong incident with the tourists, very good, she was fine. But after that, God, she hated me because she said, “Well, it must have been your fault. It must have your fault that I didn’t go out on rounds of the tram.” And so after… Read More
She had 5,000 people came to her funeral a week or whatever it was. She’s buried next to… I don’t know where they buried. I think he’s buried next to Dr. Ong, who was also buried in the zoo, I mean his ashes illegally. Ah Meng was…… Read More
She would do. And so she was built up, not purposely built up into a sort of a star, but she became a star. And she’d met Michael Jackson, Björn Borg. Bo Derek used to come and drop off in Singapore, take a taxi up to the zoo, see Ah… Read More
And basically, she was just a mega star. Read More
I mean, okay, to get the things in the context, Singapore decreed in the late sixties that nobody is allowed to own an orangutan as a pet. Now, there were a lot of orangutans coming in as pets on ships from Borneo and Sumatra and being sold in the pet… Read More
And so we actually had like, I don’t know, I can’t remember now, but I mean at least 15 young orangutans all at once. So they were handled, they were managed, they were kept as a social group. And that’s why we were able to keep a quite a big… Read More
And then when Susie got pregnant, when she was about nine or something, we took her down to the gynecologist because she was suffering from what we suspected was some kind of pregnancy toxemia. We took her down to a gynecologist and actually just hilarious, just sitting in the waiting… Read More
I mean, you could see. Look at her. Look at her in the enclosures, her hair standing up.” Was just looking at her. Ah, it’s okay. And then one day, she was out on a mountain taking photographs. I mean, let’s go and say hello to her. I said, “I… Read More
We will go over and say hello to her.” And he goes up to her and she’s just all her hair standing up, and she’s like looking at him. And I said, “I don’t think you should go and touch her ’cause she’s gonna bite you.” And he said, “Really?”… Read More
Okay, this is a story. Every Tuesday and every Thursday of the week, he would come and visit the zoo and we’d sit on a tram and we’d go around the zoo. And he would ask for Ah Meng to be with us. And we would sit on both sides. Read More
And Ah Meng is a very famous orangutan. She’s movie star. I mean, she’s appeared. Everybody in Singapore knows who Ah Meng is. So the president of Singapore once came to meet Ah Meng and he said… Apart from Lee Kuan Yew who is our founding prime minister, Ah Meng… Read More
I mean, she’s like treated like gold. So she’s sitting there, her handler is sitting behind her. And we do this for years. It’s twice a week, Tuesdays, Thursdays on the tram treats, looking around. And then one day, Dr. Ong said, “I don’t wanna see Ah Meng today.” I… Read More
Singapore Zoo before you?… Read More
Why’d you think you could do it?… Read More
Oh, well, because I was pretty early on. I was a pretty pioneer. Actually, I didn’t know I could do it. But I’m the kind of person who if I… I don’t think anything is impossible. So I think if you put yourself, your mind to it, you can do… Read More
Sorry, say that again?… Read More