No children were harmed in the making of this blog post

I think I have aptly proven that I cannot be held responsible for the care of fish as pets.

I tried really hard to be a good caretaker. I changed the fish's water in the less-than-24-hours that she was a member of this household. I fed her. I spoke to her in what little Mandarin I know. I've felt like a failure since the incident, and took a little hiatus from reporting live from Beijing.

To pay homage to our little fishy friend, Z and I went to the Beijing Zoo & Aquarium over the weekend. While I thoroughly enjoyed the day, I would not choose this location as a "top 10 things to do and see in Beijing." I'm not even certain that we have seen 10 sites yet, but, sorry, friends and family planning any future visits, this will not be one of your stops on the AtoZ tour of Beijing.

For one thing, the Zoo was a bit sad. The grounds were beautiful, though; they were lush with shade providing trees, dotted with well crafted animal sculptures and beds of flowers, and chock full of happy families. But, does everyone have the same internal struggle and feelings of guilt when they visit zoos? I'm sad for the animals locked behind bars in dirty cages, pacing back and forth. I'm also thrilled (thrilled!) to see the rare-almost-extinct-vividly colored-wild animal-native to some far off land I'll never visit-right before my very eyes.

Aside from these mixed emotions, my experience at the Beijing Zoo was unlike one I have ever had at any zoo in the United States- and I've been to my fair share (obviously, I don't feel guilty enough to stop frequenting zoos): National Zoo, Kansas City, Baltimore, Bronx, Philadelphia, Boston... . Anyway, what I noticed is that most Beijing Zoo patrons have little regard for zoo rules and regulations. There are plenty of signs declaring, "DO NOT FEED ANIMALS," "DO NOT TOUCH ANIMALS," "DO NOT CROSS." More than at any petting zoo I've ever attended where you are actually allowed to interact with the animals, I saw adults and children,"FEEDING ANIMALS," "TOUCHING ANIMALS," and especially "CROSSING" over boundaries and bars to get to the Zoo's inhabitants. Plenty of areas were strewn with plastic bottles and trash thrown by humans attempting to entice the animals. One kid repeatedly jumped over the guard rail to get closer to the elephant missing his tusks, and an elderly couple brought their own carrots to feed the Australian birds a few pens over. Not one person was reprimanded or scolded or given the stink eye by any Zoo official as they were breaking the rules.

I'm not a rule breaker. When I was in the sixth grade I got caught cheating on a vocabulary test by the school's deaf and blind 87-year-old English teacher. Jacob (whose last name I will not mention, but still distinctly remember to this day), who sat in the back of class each day and cheated on everything, sticking needles under his finger nails and flipping back his eyelids while making farting noises, never got caught once. OK. So, I'm not good at being a rule breaker. Which is why I was getting anxious for all these folks at the Beijing Zoo, breaking all these rules, taking their lives, or at least their finger tips, into their own hands, so to speak. My anxiety for the animals' diet and well being even superseded my anxiety for the masses of school children on their Saturday field trip crowding out my view. So, what did I do to combat all of this injustice...Nothing. I don't speak Chinese; also, I don't think I will change the attitude of millions of zoo-goers during one afternoon trip. I did, however, document these incidences for your viewing pleasure.

So after we ooohed and awwwed over the sleeping pandas (they are cute, aren't they?), and had our fill of the zebras, giraffes, monkeys, tigers and lions, we moved on to the Aquarium which is attached to the Zoo. The entrance fee to the Aquarium is the greater cost of the combined admission ticket and it is not difficult to see why. The home of fishes, dolphins, beluga whales, sea turtles and sharks is stunning. I won't list the number of aquariums I have frequented - as an adult, mind you -- but I will tell you that the Beijing Aquarium is one of the more impressive I have visited, even if Mom and Dad allow their son to grab starfish out of the tank at random. Take a look: