Soylent Green is...

The creatures interred at the Lao Zoo are a sad looking bunch. Limping deer with matted hair, depressed macaques in cages that reek of urine staring off into space like they're stoned, a psychotic baboon pacing back and forth in an endless fury in its cage, angry cockatoos hellbent on pecking each other to death, and the star attraction, a geriatric Asian white elephant with what looks like a bad case of psoriasis.

It's a huge facility, with spacious, well adorned habitats, but many of them sit empty. With an admission charge of 2000 kip a person, or about twenty five cents, the zoo can barely afford the upkeep on the animals. There used to be two hippos there, but they both died recently, and the rumor is they starved to death because the zoo couldn't afford to feed them. There are a few signs posted that say not to feed the animals, but it's hard to take them seriously when they're outnumbered by vendors selling bananas and radishes to throw over the fences. Perhaps it's the zoo's way of dealing with their financial difficulties.

Because of the sanctioned feeding of the animals by visitors, the animals have become trained to trot up to the fence at the sight of any human, open their mouths, and wait. Deers, monkeys, elephants, ostriches, porcupines. They all do it. Even the crocodiles. And let me tell you, you haven't experienced creepy until you've stood on a walkway over a crocodile habitat and looked down at ten perfectly still crocodiles in the water below, all of them with their jaws propped open, waiting.

Yes, ten, and there would have been more had there been room in the water. There are at least three huge crocodile habitats, maybe more, and probably over 100 crocodiles resident at the Lao Zoo. There are so many they're literally crawling on top of each other. It was weird. Here's a zoo with this tragic collection of decrepit creatures, except for the crocodiles. Maybe that's what happened to the hippos.

It wasn't until later that I heard a plausible explanation of what the hell is going on. I have no idea if it's true, but the rumor is that the Lao Zoo, in order to stay solvent, has surreptitiously turned itself into a crocodile farm. They raise the crocodiles to slaughter them and sell the meat and skin. It's like a zoological version of Soylent Green. Crocodile meat gets good money here, and the skin can fetch a good price too. I can't see how they can afford all those crocodiles otherwise. It's not like it's cheaper to feed them than it is to feed the monkeys.