Marco Polo

I walk to work and I pass Chinese people, mainly seniors, walking the other way. We smile and nod and say, 'Good Morning.'

On Monday, our events programmer at work said,
'I need someone who walks to work in Richmond to write a short piece about walking for the paper,' I pretended to look around, but I knew there was only one candidate for this. And I had to write it there and then. Then I had to have a photo taken.
I can hardly contain my excitement until the eight page spread on walking comes out in our badly written local rag. So we have a rag whose standard of journalism is somewhere around what a year seven pupil could come up with, doing eight pages on something that many people may think is about as exciting as watching paint dry, and in it there is a hastily penned piece by me, in which I say that walking helps me to keep my weight down, accompanied by a picture taken from a bizarre angle that looks up at my stomach which seems to approach the camera like a huge, wobbling beer belly. Well, disproportionately large at any rate.

So this morning, as I walked to work, and smiled, and nodded, a Chinese man approached me with a dog on a lead and the dog looked exactly like Tintin's dog Snowy. Well, apart from the fact that this particular dog was black. But it did look exactly like Snowy otherwise.
'Oh, your dog looks just like Tintin's dog!' say I, thinking as the words passed my lips that the man wouldn't have known the old-fashioned Belgian hero and his trusty canine companion. I needn't have worried, the man only knew the word 'dog', however, we managed an entire conversation of nods, smiles and pats on the dog's head.

Around ten, I got my wellies on to walk one of the quite overgrown trails. I got just outside the Nature House and encountered a group of Chinese people, standing stock still as though hypnotised by something invisible in the air.
My 'Excuse me please,' broke their spell, and one woman must have noticed my wellies and realised I was a member of staff.
'Oh,' she said, 'you work here?'
I nodded,
'Please, is this hummingbird?' I peered at where she was pointing. I listened, but could neither see not hear anything. They all pointed and there, finally, I could see hovering in the air, a tiny wasp-like hoverfly.
It was funny, but I felt bad, only two years ago I had never seen a hummingbird, never heard one either. I showed them the hummingbird feeder and took them into the Nature House, I knew I had a dead one in my kit for one of the programmes. They were enchanted to see the dead bird, they took pictures of it lying in my hand, I showed them a picture in one of the books. They photographed the dead hummingbird lying on the picture. They were such a lovely family, with very little English between them, but very game.

Later, a boy who had been at one of the school programmes, brought me in a baby Northwestern garter snake.
'He's called Slither,' he said,
'We used to have a snake called Slither,' said Kris,
'Well he has a back-up name,' said the mum, 'Marco Polo,'
'Marco Polo it is then,' I said.

Kris and I decided he should go into the tank currently being occupied by Freckles who had to be quarantined after Annie tried to eat him. I picked Freckles up but he hung limply in my hand, I fear he isn't going to make it. Well, dammit, I know he isn't. His wounds are necrotising.
But now we have Marco Polo and we'll keep him away from the big old girl snake, however intrepid an explorer he may turn out to be.