I occupied one of
these rooms during my stay here.
The Irula families live in a separate area close to where the Snake
pits are located. The permanent staff which includes the Director,
Deputy Directory and others have their own individual houses located in
various places within the Croc Bank.
During my stay I became good friends with many of the people at the
Croc Bank including the six foot tall Director, Romulus Whitaker, whom
everyone calls Rom; his wife, Zai Whitaker; their sons Samir and
Nikhil; Harry Andrews, the Deputy Director who hails from Kerala;
Romaine, his wife and their son Tharak, Gerry the snake-catcher from
Bangalore and many others.
My stay at Croc bank was exciting throughout and I learnt a lot. For
the first few days, I was given my first assignment i.e., treating a
2-foot long turtle with infected skin. I used to apply ointment to its
feet and then put on some bandage. The next day, before repeating the
treatment, I had to feed the turtle with cabbage in water.
From turtles, I moved to big lizards i.e. monitor lizards and Green
Iguanas. The Green Iguana I handled was quite big-about the size of an
average dachshund. His tail measured two to three times the length of
his body if not more. From head to tail, he must have been about two
and a half metres long.
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