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ever since she watched Zoro on TV, she’s been wanting to ride a real horse. not the hoppity kind nor the rocking kind. the real one, she said.

that was the reason for going to the zoo. i heard, they have pony rides there. during our visit to the bird park, aina and i bought the 3-1 park tickets. it costs $45 for adults and $28 for children, and we can go to all three parks (Jurong Bird Park, Singapore Zoo and Night Safari) within a month of the date of purchase. so, perfect!

after a quick lunch at the KFC nearby, we entered the park. aina asked if we could rent the red wagon that she’s been eyeing during the lunch. we thought, why not. all we have to do was drag her around the park.

and she was very happy that she’s allowed to ride on the wagon

we passed the big apes… lutungs and orangutans.

aina wanted to see hippos but ended up meeting rhinos. she kept getting them mixed up: rhinos and hippos… i guess they do look a bit alike.

the highlights of the day were the giraffe-feeding and the pony-riding (of course)…

aina has been a huge fan of giraffes. you can imagine how excited she was when she found out not only that she got to see giraffes, she also got to feed them carrots.

she kept asking if she could do it again, over and over… the giraffe was very gentle and aina thinks that giraffes are cute.

the other fun thing was the pony-ride. we got to the kiddy petting zoo a little late, so the pony ride was almost closed. thank god we made it. i was a bit worried that aina would be too scared to ride, despite all her big talk of pony riding on the way to the zoo. but amazingly, she wasn’t scared at all.

during the ride, she kept patting the pony’s back and her face was beaming with happiness. honestly, i was very happy, because i looooove horseback riding. seeing her being happy on the back of the pony makes me feel… nostalgic.

and as an extra treat, we got to see Candy, the pony that aina rode, taking a bath and drying herself by rolling around the sand. aina was amused. so were we.

it was rather unexpected to see her being so brave during the giraffe-feeding and pony-riding. and another unexpected thing: aina was very interested in reptiles… she asked over and over again if we could see the snake enclosure.

she wanted to pet frogs… and hugged them (well, only the big statue available for hugging).

i thought she would be more interested in furry things like squirrels and lemurs, but she wasn’t.

anyways, now, she can’t wait to go to the Night Safari.

more pictures in the singapore zoo - oct 2010 album.