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You would not believe how many times I got slapped to see these birds. These birds, by the way, are the scarlet ibis, visible in Trinidad and Suriname. These particular birds I saw in Bigi Pan, an Everglades-like (so they say, I’ve never been to the Everglades, but I hear you can get slapped there, too) area just outside of Nickerie, Suriname, which is way over by the Guyanese border, which I did not cross, but one day (maybe soon?) will.

The slapping is due to the mosquitoes, the red color of the birds is due to the awesomeness of nature, and the lack of more and better pictures is due to the fact that despite really loving visiting birds (even though sometimes they smell, or you get slapped), they are not my best photo samples. I think and think about pitching stories about Suriname, and all it makes me think is how curious I am about the eclipsing on 100% of Suriname that I still know nothing about, and how much I’d like to go back.

In other positive animal-related news, look how cute!

Dogs will be dogs in Santiago. And they will sleep wherever they please, and this one even has a nest of cardboard under it, which the drinkstand guy probably put there for him, but he is not his owner, which I know because when I was laying on the ground grabbing my torn pants around my calf yelling, “whose dog is this?” he distinctly said, “not mine” (this was months ago, btw). Because this lovely muffin of cute is the dog that bit me. Sweet little pumpkin. Trained me out of skating past him, and didn’t seem to recognize me on the bike yesterday, though I thought I saw him pawing his cell phone when he spied me taking a picture of him. I think he was calling his lawyer.

I do not believe I have any more animal-related news. This weekend in Santiago was insane, with tons of activities, an air show, the marathon, marches, ecofairs and more. It’s like Santiago is trying to wring the last bits of summer out before Easter this weekend. It’s on its way up to you now, northern hemispherians. Might take a while though. It’s a long way.