11/8/21: I’ll update the title later when I think of a good animal pun

Classes have been moving slowly. Sherrill and I do not have the same level of background or motivation. I’m not sure what to do about this, but I’m kinda tired of breezing through all the exercises only to leave class and find I still can’t understand the taxi driver. Perhaps I will talk to our teacher (whose name I have finally learned! It’s Tayde). I feel like otherwise, my frustrations will only grow.

After class I took a colectivo (a big van that operates halfway between a taxi and a bus) to the city of Tuxtla to go to the zoo. I generally have mixed feelings about zoos because I like seeing animals, but sometimes you can tell that the zoo just isn’t a good place for the animals to live. That said, the Tuxtla zoo had me pretty impressed. All of the wildlife was local to Chiapas, and as a result, none of the habitats seemed too artificial. I got the sense they didn’t design a bunch of habitats so much as lay down some fences and a path around what was already there. Toward the entrance, I was greeted by some uncaged, free range agoutis (who could be seen all over the zoo. I think they just let them run loose and go wherever they want). Imagine a cross between a rat and a pig, but without a tail, and the size of a large rabbit, and cute somehow. That’s an agouti. They were probably my favorite part if the zoo; I’ve never seen one anywhere else, but here they were everywhere and you could get really close to them. Some other animals I’d never seen anywhere else included coatimundis (like a brown, alternate-universe raccoon), grey foxes (which look like fancy house-cats), ocelots (bigger than I expected, but sadly one of the few animals that was sleeping while I was there), and so many really big birds (including a raven the size of a turkey). They also had some very active raccoons (which, although they can survive pretty much anywhere people live, are technically native to tropical climates like this). All of the signs had Spanish on one side and English on the other, plus there were lots of small children yelling things, so I think I picked up a fair amount of words. It tool me about three hours to get through on my own (though admittedly I skipped the Bug House) and I had a great time, after which I took a nap and haven’t done much since. Pictures are below.