Goodbye to a Polar Bear

I woke up to the news that Knut, a popular polar bear suddenly died young in the Berlin Zoo.  They are still investigating why; some contributing it to the stress with his stardom.  He was at the center of controversy a couple of years ago because he was deserted by his mum and to keep him in a zoo was not natural, according to some animal right advocates.  So they actually suggested killing him right away.  Of course, he wasn’t killed and stayed in the Berlin Zoo, where he grew deep attachment to his keeper.  According to the news today, that keeper died some time ago from heart attack.  I don’t want to dramatize the story by linking the two deaths, though.

At that time, they described the situation as  “Each time his keeper leaves him, and he can’t follow, he will die a little”.  This somehow struck me deeply.   This is the blog i wrote in 2007:

http://gaohuan.wordpress.com/2007/03/25/%e5%b0%8f%e5%8c%97%e6%9e%81%e7%86%8a-%e6%98%a5%e5%85%89%e4%b9%8d%e6%b3%bb-2007-3-24/

唉

看到凤凰台新闻，在日华人纷纷回国。在机场，一个东北口音的女人边哭边说，“我们澡也没洗，饭也没吃….”，伤心得不能自已。

我当然应该同情她也是受害者，可我为什么还觉得她特别可笑、甚至有点可鄙视呢？

那么多人的失去了生命，她应该觉得自己大难不死，这就是福气了。遭遇这种大灾难，应该是对人生产生新认识的时候，理解到很多事其实都不重要。至于有没有洗澡，有那么严重嘛？

日本人在灾难前这么淡定，秩序还这么好，这样一比，就看高下了。

另外，我特别看不得强壮的女人作小鸟依人或楚楚可怜状，真是吓死人啊。