Monkeying Around in Munich

It was still light when I arrived in Munich for the second time. I stayed at a youth hostel near the Tierpark, which is unfortunately quite far from the city center. The commute to my accommodations involved rides on multiple U-bahns and a walk that lasted ten minutes once I figured out where I was going, and almost half an hour when I didn’t. This meant that although it was early evening when I reached Munich, it was dark when I had finally checked in and freshened up. “Dark” in Germany translates to “all places that provide calories in non-alcoholic forms are closed, and yes, even on a Friday night” so I had to have beer for dinner.

I was staying in a 6-bed dormitory that night. The room had been empty when I dropped my luggage off that afternoon, but stacks of Japanese books and several laptops left sitting on the table hinted at both the national origins and the trustworthiness of my roommates. At about one in the morning, I returned to my room to see sleeping heads of long dark hair peeking out of all the other beds. One girl was awake and texting—she looked about 14 years old in light from her Iphone, and she glared at me as I made my bed as quietly as I could. All my actions seemed uncharacteristically loud in that room full of sleeping Asian women. I sounded like an elephant trampling around on the hard-wood floor, the zippers on my duffel bag sounded like nails on a chalkboard, and my locker slammed despite my effort to close it gently. The next morning, I rose up early and crept out before anybody else awoke so I wouldn’t have to feel like That Awkward White Girl.

I left the hostel and followed the signs to the Tierpark. I was the only non-jogger/ dog-walker on the sidewalk that morning. The locals probably knew something I didn’t, as it started raining as soon as I paid my seven euros to enter the Zoo. Even with the awful weather, I knew right away that the Munich Tierpark was going to be one of the most pleasant zoos I had ever visited. Judging by the view from the entrance, I could have been heading down a forest trail, surrounded by old trees, little rivers, and underbrush too thick to see through on either side of the path. I had been walking past the first exhibit—tarpans and aurochs—for some time before I noticed the area containing the animals was any different from the forested areas composing the rest of the zoo. I just glanced through the brush and saw the Paleolithic-looking creatures standing in a clearing. As I understood it, both species were extinct—the tarpan for about a century, and the auroch since the Middle Ages. Therefore, I can only assume that some mad scientist had cloned those creatures back to life Jurassic Park-style, and I will be severely disappointed if the Zoo doesn’t have mammoths and glyptodons by my next visit.

At this point, it was raining rather heavily, so I got to see how different critters reacted. The wisents placidly chewed their cud as water dripped off their backs. The European wolf curled up like a bored German shepherd and would occasionally raise its head and check if it was still damp and miserable before dozing off again. It lay by the fence despite having at least two dens in the enclosure that would be drier. Some of the ducks that roamed freely through the Tierpark sought shelter under bridges or tree limbs for the worst of the rain, others dived and scrabbled over food oblivious to the weather. The Siberian tiger continued to pace between his outdoor yard and inside den—rain and cold could not deter him from patrolling his territory.

The primates fled to the inside areas of their enclosures. Lemurs slept in massive multi-tailed bundles, baby apes played restlessly, adult apes and monkeys picked at their food calmly. I was near the mandrill exhibit when the weather cleared, and the smaller mandrills—I don’t know if they were females or juveniles—erupted in a frenzy of glee. They swung back and forth across their outside enclosure and bounded over their jungle-gym like fluffy balls of energy.

The primate exhibits were truly awesome—all species had expansive areas to play, both inside and outside, and they were contained not by fences, but by moats or other natural barriers that blended in with the landscape. Inside, their environments had dirt floors, not concrete, and they had a wealth of enrichment objects. One baby orangutan had been given a bed sheet, which she would wear like a low budget ghost Halloween costume and sidle around the habitat. When she tired of that, she would throw her sheet over a branch and swing on it like a rope. In another primate house, a gorilla sat half-buried in a pile of straw. She had straw on her shoulders and a tuft of straw on her head. When I looked closer, I saw that she was doddling a baby gorilla in her lap. Mother and child rolled around in their nest before settling down for a nap, the baby clutched protectively under its mama’s huge hand.

Squirrel monkeys are called totenkopf-something in German, which makes sense given their light faces and dark eyes and mouths. Being in a room full of skull monkeys sounds so much cooler than being surrounded by chattering monkeys named after adorable little tree rats.

The Villa Dracula was also pretty cool. Spear-nosed bats flew freely throughout the building. I flinched as they flitted past my face and shoulders, and I could feel one hit my ponytail. I could have batted them out of the air if I was an awful person. Several exhibits appeared to be run on the honor system—animals were close enough to touch, and any carelessness by the guests could injure the creatures. I winced in the free-flying bird exhibit whenever I saw little kids chasing the birds around to get them to fly.

In short, the Munich Zoo was the nicest, most pleasant zoo I have ever seen in my life. All the habitats were wide and open-looking, greenery was everywhere, and there was nary a cinderblock to be seen. The next day was going to be quite a change of pace from that agreeable five hours I spent wandering amongst the critters. On Sunday I planned to visit the Dachau Memorial.