I hate good-bye

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Up early today because I was taking care of the tiger babies. I wasn't taking this as my day off, and it was nice weather outside so I would actually be able to walk them! YAY! Once I got up there, I discovered that we would actually be taking them to an empty enclosure to let them run around. Just as awesome. I went down to feed Ruby her bottle while Tams put the harness on. I then took her up the boardwalk and helped her into the truck. While driving, I had to hold her by the leash and the harness. Easier said than done, because that leaves no hands to steady yourself during the bumps and I had Judah jumping on my back. It was worth it though, once we got to the enclosure. They had so much fun! The grass was nice and tall, so they could actually stalk one another without them noticing. Something that can't be done in their own enclosure, that's for sure. Ruby is usually the worst one and she totally took Amber by surprise and pounced on her! So adorable. Once we got back to the restaurant, everything was done for the morning. The other people in my group had cleaned out the tigers and done Shadow, so I could just go in and eat breakfast.

Project time was cleaning out the leopard enclosure. It went so much faster this time because we had about ten people working on it instead of 4 like last time. As soon as we were finished we got called up to do some handlings. When it's project time we always keep some people at the restaurant for handlings but there were too many and they needed some help. I went up and did some lion handlings. They were being well behaved and the tourists got some great shots. I love it when that happens, because other times people don't get any which is no fun. I lead most of the handlings that I'm involved in. Not like its anything special I just tell them all the rules at the beginning. "No running, screaming or yelling. Be careful of the fence, because it is electric. When you approach them, follow our lead, it will be either from the back or the side, never from the front. Only approach them when we tell you its okay because we work with the animals and can read their expressions. Lastly, when we ask you to do something, please listen to us right away because it is for your safety." Some people still don't listen to us so the lion will grab their leg or something and then the tourists are like ow that hurt. I'm like well yeah, that's why I told you to step back.

In between handlings, we had to say goodbye to Gemma and Shani who were leaving. They both got here two weeks ago, but I hate to see them leave. Most people hate Mondays because that's the start of week, I hate them because its the day we say goodbye.

Afterwards I went in with the hyenas. I finally got them to chillax and I had Edison on my lap and someone comes down to tell us that there is more project time. This time we had to go clean an empty enclosure. This is my least favorite job of all time. This time, the people weren't really working very hard, they just walked around aimlessly picking up bones, which means they probably missed a lot. They also kept trying to through them into a bucket, but they missed so they had to do it again. Not so helpful when you have to pick everything up twice.

We quit a little before one because it was time to go up for lunch, but first we had to check ourselves for ticks. Thank god I didn't have any. I hate ticks. They aren't like the ones at home though, their head doesn't attach to you so you can just pick them off. For lunch we had chicken with veggies. After lunch, Katrina, Delano, Yara and I left. Katrina and I had to go pick up our money wires, and Delano was taking Yara to the airport because she was on her way back to Holland 😞 She was the last one left of all the people that were there when I got here, so it was really sad and I cried. I was crying about all three of them leaving really. I just wish everyone stayed for the same amount of time and no one ever left.

I picked up my money, which wasn't too bad, probably because Katrina was helping me and knew what to do because she's picked up a wire before. We then had time to kill because Delano was also grabbing someone at the airport and we had to wait for him so we did a little shopping. I had just been to the mall so I really had nothing to buy so I bought some bubblegum ice cream instead. Not bad, but nothing like the stuff in the states. Delano came back and grabbed us and drove us back to Seaview, the new guys name is Yoav and he's from Isreal. I feel like we have more people from Isreal here than the states. Only three people here are from different countries. When I first got here, there were people from all over Europe and other places.

I spent some time with the lions again, but only like an hour because then it was time for food prep. Since I was on tigers, we also have to take care of Shadow the black leopard and Melissa said I could feed him! he's so adorable and I love him even though I haven't been in with him 😞 I got back up to the restaurant in time to grab a bottle to feed a tiger. They really are so cute when getting a bottle. They arae supposed to be so powerful and yet they still get a bottle.

I wasn't feeling hungry, so I went back to my room. Said Hey to the giraffes again, my favorite part of walking down early. I also get to shower with no one else in the room which is always nice. I actually did my hair today and straighened it because we're going out tomorrow and I want it to look nice. We were having a party outside, but no one had bought any alcohol recently so we had all the leftovers of whatever we had, so there was a lot of mixing going around. I had vodka, wine, whiskey, beer and wine coolers. I am not an alcoholic, we were just playing drinking games, which I happened to be really good at so I had like a shot of each. Katrina also had us try this shot where you squirt chocolate sauce into your mouth and take a shot of peppermint liquer and swish it around. It did not work well though because they didn't have the right chocolate or liquer so it basically tasted like a shot of toothpaste. Gross.

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