White Christmas 2009: VIII

Thanksgiving dinner?!?
In Australia we visited a wildlife park full of native species, where we could pat Koalas and Kangaroos and generally mix with the continent’s more harmless fauna. The park allows visitors - in a small, fenced area - to feed Kangaroos and Emus. The Kangaroos simply sit and wait to be served, but the Emus, like kiosk vendors in a mall, have to work a little harder for attention. How hard we didn’t realize until Ella came around the corner of a low wall in a full sprint with a look of sheer panicked terror on her face. Less than a second later an Ella-sized Emu came skidding around the corner, legs working frantically to maintain balance at top speed in full pursuit of Ella. Or, more specifically, in pursuit of the ice cream cone full of tasty, park-supplied Kangaroo-Emu food. The Emu, in a Darwinian moment of clarity, stopped dead in its tracks when it recognized the momma-bear look on Kristin’s face that said, “you know it’s Thanksgiving today back home, you look a lot like a turkey and unless you want to be stuffed, back off!”