The lion is hungry

The zebra lies half-gutted under a stand of acacia trees. Two black-tipped brown points peek from the dry grass -- if she hadn't twitched her ears we'd never have known the mama lion was close by, lounging after having gorged herself on the entire inside of the zebra, plus the eyeballs. Twenty people crowd to one side of the bus, silent, cameras clicking -- and now, here come the cubs from the bush. Four four-month-old babies emerge with another female adult, walking slowly, passing Big Mama, who has rolled onto her back like a huge, sleepy pussycat.

The second female sits down astride the zebra and begins ripping into what's left of its insides -- and the hind leg. A hipbone emerges. She licks her lips with a twelve inch tongue. The largest cub has the gumption to join her while the other cubs do not, though they stand watching, drooling, wishing they could join the feast too but unwilling to take one step closer until told to do so.

Plotnik didn't know zebras have stripes on the inside too. He thinks, not for the first time, that he's happy his own pussycats back home weren't any larger than they were.

The lions are kings of the kingdom, but the giraffes are the cutest. An hour later the group is staring at a stand of elephants fifteen feet away, feeding on the leaves of a thornbush. A giraffe pokes its head up above the canopy. Crocs, hippos, rhinos, millions of antelope, two leopards stalking impalas -- this is the real stuff here.

The next day, on the bus back to Jo'burg, a student gets a text message from her boyfriend in London, telling her about suicide attacks. This is the real stuff too. No one on the bus says much. The Great Plotnik thinks: "At least the lion kills because it's hungry."