A Small Community

I did some field work in both the Omaha zoo and the Lincoln zoo within the same week and I found them to be extremely different communities even though they are essentially the same thing. The Lincoln zoo was much smaller than the Omaha zoo and I found this to create a much more compact and tight-knit community. Not just with the workers, but with the families and people visiting the zoo, one could feel a connection with the others visiting the zoo when at the Lincoln zoo in the smaller community.

When I was at the Henry Doorly zoo (one of the largest zoos in the country) many of the visitors seemed to be in a rush, stressed, making sure all of their kids were cooperating and staying close by since there was so many people there they didn't want their child to get lost. I conducted my own little experiment while at each of these zoos. I walked by people and sometimes made comments on the animals and observed their reactions of me doing both. At the Omaha zoo when walking by, many people would not acknowledge you or they would put their heads down immediately after making awkward eye contact. 

On the other hand, at the Lincoln zoo the atmosphere was much more calm, there were not many people there which caused for a less stressful and hectic environment. It seemed as though the families there were more willing to talk to you and after passing the same families around the zoo multiple times, you felt somewhat of a connection with them as you are both enjoying the same things that day. You just don't receive this type of connection with the families at larger zoos. The Lincoln zoo was much more enjoyable when having younger kids so that probably put the visitors in better moods so they were more happy and willing to talk to you than the families at the Henry Doorly in Omaha.

The outcome of this experiment was just what my hypothesis was, people would feel less connected to others and there wouldn't be as much of a response when making comments such as "Wow that tiger is so beautiful!" and there being no response. When at the Lincoln zoo, I was laughing and talking with a family about how funny the bats were behaving. Looking deeper, the family I was associating with at the Lincoln zoo could have felt the need to make a comment and respond to mine for the mere fact of socialization and to seize the awkwardness that could have appeared. Because of the non-existent commotion such as there would be at the Henry Doorly, the dead silence almost requires one to speak because only few humans can stand the awkward silences in life.

At Henry Doorly, it is much easier to pretend one didn't hear the comment I made because of all of that is going on around us and it be forgotten, but at the Lincoln zoo this is not the case. Did the family at the Lincoln zoo really want to have that short conversation with me? Or was it a form of a weird psychology most of us will never understand? Knowingly, we were most likely never going to see each other again; it is not as if we are at a dating site or someplace where we are trying to become one another's friend, so why have the conversation? There really is no outcome or relationship I made with these particular individuals, but somewhere inside of me I felt as if I made a connection with these strangers that would have been an abnormal thing to happen in a larger community at Henry Doorly.