Published Messenger Newspapers, Adelaide, Wednesday, March 27


MY WINGFIELD VISION SPLENDID


WHAT Adelaide needs is a new theme park that will make us different, something beyond Magic Mountain, more cutting edge than the Haigh's chocolate factory and more entertaining than the National Wine Centre. Already I have a vision for Wingfield Tip. Think about it: The tip is due to close in 2004 when it reaches a height of 27m, which is only 700m lower than Mt Lofty. Hardly any difference at all on the global scale of mountains. So let's keep dumping our rubbish there, and dumping and dumping and do not stop until the tip reaches a hundred times higher at 2700m, taller even than Mt Kosciuszko. It can be our contribution to the International Year of the Mountain. Let's create our very own Mt Wingfield - an unrivalled theme park offering snowfields, mountain climbing, a reliable water supply, wind power and methane production to meet our energy needs for centuries. OK, OK, I'm OK, I'm OK ... Actually my favourite Adelaide theme park is the zoo which I visit at isolated intervals even though I feel guilty about keeping animals captive. Adelaide Zoo has its charms and for some reason I am always drawn to the enclosure containing the solitary male orangutan, with the marvellous scientific name pongo pygmaeus abeli and the sign that says it all: ``No, I am not lonely.'' Quite. So why look like a jilted lover in self-imposed exile? Next, I always check the Regent Honeyeaters to make sure they are still there, just in case, to see if the mystery of their love lives has finally been solved. Their cage sign cryptically reads: ``A mystery surrounds the disappearance of most Regent Honeyeaters after the breeding season.'' That's all. I find it hard to believe David Attenborough does not know the answer by now. The zoo is full of all sorts of improbable human creatures, too. Such as the mum I saw who deliberately tried to scare her wimpering toddler son with: ``Look at the baboon, go on, get up close to the window, closer, ooh, you're not scared, are ya?'' Scared enough for the kid to have nightmares and grow up to be a sooky Crows supporter with a trembling bottom lip. Heh-heh. The zoo is also a favourite spot for sad dads with weekend access to the kids; a gathering of Jasons and Jades, baseball hats on backwards, who are so familiar with the place by now they almost know the Barbary sheep on first name terms. Still, better for them to be here than spending Sunday arvo at the pub which is where dad likes to spend his spare time on the punt. And where else can kids watch tamirs in their mock rainforest having sexual union for less than the price of a cinema ticket? Meantime, glimpsed through the trees, glinting in the sun, a snow capped Mt Wingfield rises above the plain...