When I was Younger, I Wanted To Be...

When I was younger, I wanted to become a scientist. I started dreaming of being an astronomer. I was fascinated with the solar system and beyond. It's easy to feel small when you think of space. Then it changed to being a wildlife biologist. Right up until 4th year high school, I thought I would choose biology. But I decided against it when I was choosing college courses. This walk down memory lane was inspired by our visit to National Museum of Natural History. I'd like to think that my dream to become a biologist was inspired in the spaces I grew up in and the games we used to play.

On this blog, a few posts down, I enumerate the many homes I've lived in. And right now, I'm on my tenth home. And we're building my 11th (our 3rd) and hopefully last home. I grew up in houses with gardens. We didn't have to play on the streets because we'd always have the space to run around in. And having many siblings and living with a cousin, I grew up with built-in playmates. I also grew up with a lot of dogs and cats - the usual house pets.

Gardens

One of our houses had a big garden where we played with mud, plants, and got chased around by wasps. We'd "bake" brownies: with soil for flour and mix "ingredients" in with water. We ate aratelis from trees near the house and wait for the Indian mangos in the summer. We used to have this bahay kubo where we had jars of "experiments." Despite my current fear of cockroaches, we used to hunt them and fill jars with them. Some jars were filled with water, others mud, some even filled with detritus from the canal.

In this same garden, we had a towering tank that was the home of a giant spider. In my memories, it's huge and scary! Its body is black and yellow and seemed poisonous. And looking up from the ground, its web was huge. We would throw twigs at its web and watch how it would spin a new one in a matter of seconds. We'd marvel at it trapping insects and wrapping them up in silk. I used to catch lizards around the house and marvel at the severed tail left behind, wondering why it keeps moving long after the lizard has escaped. We used to keep those lizard tails in envelopes for luck.

The rainy days would bring in the cacophony of croaking frogs. The next day, we'd search for eggs left behind after their mating in the rain. I used to catch frogs, too. I remember one time in high school, we went to the city park. I saw a tiny frog and chased after it, intending to hold it in my hands. Imagine my dread when we had to dissect cute frogs in high school and again in college.

Mice, crabs, birds

We also had a pet mouse: it was white and it had red eyes. We didn’t put it in a cage. Instead, we'd lower it into a drain with a string and a shoe when we're done playing. I'm not sure what happened, but that mouse got lost. Kuya Pabs, our kasambahay's husband, introduced us to a lot of pets. He brought home hermit crabs from his province in Quezon: tiny baby ones and giant scary ones. We would feed the crabs rice in their ice cream tubs with sand and some rocks. Being enterprising kids, my cousin, brother and I brought them to school. And sold hermit crabs to other kids who wanted them at school (price range: P1.00 - P10.00). We got caught eventually, though.

He also took care of a couple of chickens: Maxx, Joy, Edu, Texi, and their chicks. I remember hearing Joy's vocalizations when she was laying her eggs. And my dad giving Edu biogesic when he was sick (which isn't really helpful for birds). I also recall that they cooked Texi when she died. :( We also took care of a dozen quails. I still don't know why they died one after the other. We staged formal burials for the last ones: complete with an improvised coffin: those small display boxes for jewelry.

And of course we'd have the usual pets: we were never without dogs or cats. Since I was born, we'd either have a dog or a cat or both. Even when we were broke and living off our neighbors' electricity, eating maling and noodles almost daily, we'd always have pets and we'd always come up with something to feed them with. I used to hate cats before. But now I'm so fond of them. (That's a story for another time). And I still love dogs!

Zoos

Zoo visits have always excited me. I remember taking our younger cousins to Manila Zoo. I felt so happy I got to go at that time. It's only now that I realize how sad it is to keep large animals in cages and get them used to human presence. I visited the Ueno Zoo in 2018. Most animals lived in passable enclosures. The zoo was huge. But then I saw the polar bear: it looked so sad. Large hippos had their own pools. But imagine its life if it were in the wild! I admire the zoo's efforts in Panda conservation, though. In 2019, we went to Ocean Adventure in 2019. It's amazing to see dolphins and sea lions doing tricks. But it makes me sad that they're put to work as entertainment.

Now what I want is...

I'm still a fan of wildlife conservation efforts and rescue organizations. You just have to be more conscious of what to support and where to go. I realize now that I probably won't survive long excursions in forests or mountains - which is what I imagined I would do. I guess over time this dream has evolved into building an animal shelter and rescuing animals. :)