Animals Are Gross

(I've been meaning to post this for a week, but couldn't get the photo to upload, so sadly - no picture of a giraffe licking it's nose!)

Sunday at the zoo I witnessed two chimps "grooming" each other. Yes, imagine one chimpanzee orally "grooming" the other's genitals. This was then followed by the troop patriarch exposing himself to the others, and then manually "relieving" himself. Yeah, just a bit awkward. These lovely acts were followed by a giraffe (in a different exhibit obviously) licking the boogers out of it's nose, which - in comparison to the before mention actions, seemed almost cute.

Of course I'm an adult and aware of what people and animals do, but I still have to say, I'd rather just not see it going on in the zoo. No, I'm not a prude, but I think my brain has been permanently tarnished in some way now! What I mean is, when I am at the zoo I tend to appreciate the animals for NOT being humans, and here they were doing very "human" behaviors (yes, I know animals breed too and that some have sex for fun, etc, etc...). Still, I guess I wish to envision the world's animals as majestic and not subject to human behaviors, whether they're good, bad or normal!

Needless to say, I did my best to avoid contact with the "oohing and ahhing" children that surrounded the scenes in efforts that I (as a volunteer educator) would not have to explain what was going on! Thankfully, no one approached me on those particular behaviours! Instead, when pointing to an empty turtle shell, I got asked by a small child to explain where the animal had moved to? And why didn't he like his current home? Sheesh.