Amphibians
Amphibians never interested me more than reptiles but there are several species of toads and frogs I kept in my house and they not only were a source of interesting observations, but also fascinated me with their physical beauty. Their colors, patterns, shapes, and poses can be extraordinary. I can spend long hours just looking at and admiring them.
One of the most beloved species for me is the red eyed tree frog - Agalychnis callidryas. I like all of the tree frogs but this particular one totally caught my heart. For me, it is one of the best symbols in ultimate beauty in the nature. In the past I kept six adults of this species in my house in the special big terrarium with the little 'pond', live tropical foliage, filtered running water and fresh circulated air. My goal was to breed them and watch hundreds of those little gems grow up. I remember the first night when one male started the breeding call, and then the second male followed.
Two pairs were in amplexus that night. I was in the heaven. The next day my ex-girlfriend came to visit me and I left her unattended near a terrarium, next to the air pump, for a moment. That moment was long enough for her to start cleaning her nails with acetone cleaner. All of my frogs were dead in matters of several hours. After that accident I never could mobilize myself to start my red eyed terrarium over again. Maybe one day in the future I will make my mind to take the risk again.
Much more interesting events happened in my life because of my "snake connections", but frogs and their allies are also responsible for a few "adventures" as well. In fact, they almost caused me to lose my freedom forever. All of it started so simple. I was planning my second trip to southern Bulgaria mostly to collect' insects, but because I brought some interesting reptiles from the first trip, a few Zoos that wanted some specific species contacted me. The largest order was for European pond turtles (Emys orbicularis) - as many as I could catch. One Zoo was taking part in a national program to reintroduce this species in Poland as it was vanishing in most parts of this country. The last request was for a few specimens of Rana dalmatica, a rare species of frogs living in a limited range in south Europe. I was advised to contact Dr. Vladimir Beshkov, who was at that time Head of the Zoology Institute at the Bulgarian Academy of Science in Sofia, and ask him to help find that frog. In case he couldn't help, I was provided with a map of the possible locations. The whole expedition was a huge success. I collected many very rare species of reptiles including one snake never found in Bulgaria before. I also fulfilled the task of collecting turtles taking a few tens of them with me to their new home. On the way back I stopped at the Institute of Zoology to contact Dr. Beshkov. Lucky for me I found him, and he even made an offer to take the trip to catch frogs with me, as he was afraid I might not be able to find the place where the frogs lived. He turned out to be not only an excellent herpetologist but also a man with a great personality and an excellent companion on the field trips. We ended up publishing a few articles together. He was also right; I probably would have never reached this secluded place in the middle of nowhere to find the frogs. We traveled on his BMW bike deep into the country with no roads while taking a shortcut through the huge field of growing corn already quite tall. My helmet didn't have a strap so I just had to hold it with my hand while we were driving on public roads. The whole trip was a blast. I collected six specimens to take with me and after we came back to Sofia I was ready to take the train going back home. Now I started to worry about all of the warnings I was getting before the trip about traveling by train through Soviet Russia. Even though I was covered by permits on both sides of my trip, I still had to travel 'transit' across the Russian territory. By having live animals with you a severe punishment was risked, including the possible trip to Siberia, and I really hate the cold weather (one minor reason I left my country to live in the subtropics now). I could not see my family for a long time if not ever again. Well, 'It is a transit'; I tried to make myself feel strong. 'I have the right to do it' - I tried even harder to believe my rights and not to remember the many cases I heard about how 'rights' were taken away from the individuals. I packed all my reptiles very carefully, and taped the turtles across to keep the legs inside the shells. I packed the frogs in a nice bag filled with moist moss. I was ready to go in good spirits. I crossed through Romania with no problems at all. Entering Soviet Russia - usually routine: a few hours of changing the wheels, lacking the outside doors, windows. I was always wondering why the windows were locking. Was this problem with getting a foreign air out of the train or letting the communistic air in the train? I still don't know the answer. Custom declaration, so far everything is fine. It is just a transit, right? We are packed like sardines in can ready to be 'transited' through soviet country - no stops at all. My luggage is huge; several travel bags, big backpack, tent, and hiking stuff. Everything contains mostly live reptiles, a lot of them. My stuff is taking most of the space for luggage but it looks OK as I am traveling with four friends who wanted to take vacation in the areas I was doing research. They were traveling very light. Now, the soviet soldier is showing up. Special check out. I can smell problems. Usual noise from people talking dies out, as nobody feels too sure in company like that. I can't believe my ears. I try not to believe. It frogs! They start calling themselves inside the bag. Without any other noise it sounded powerful. I start to feel my hair rise up. Endless panorama of snowy, unfriendly land is showing in my mind. I already start feeling the freeze. It is all over. I am finished. I think my brain is working on its own - pure self-defense. I reached the small transistor radio and put it on windows frame and turn it on. Russian folk music fills the compartment. A soldier shows a sign of disapproval and asks me to turn the radio off. Well, I can't say no. Radio is off. I can hear the frogs very clearly and now not only the frogs, but turtles also. Maybe I didn't put the tape right. I feel the end of the world is coming. I turn the radio on again. Now the soldier is really pissed off. He asks me why I am turning the radio on after he asked me a few minutes ago to keep it off. "Well" I said - "I love Russian music". That truly made him mad. He starts yelling something about me to trying hide something from him (if he only knew!). I make a face as innocent as I can. It doesn't work well and he yells for help. Several more soldiers are coming filling the train compartment as they asked all of us to leave and wait in the hall. They all make enough noise now to mask the frog calls and turtles scratching, but danger is still there. All they need to do is to open one piece of my luggage and I am finished for the rest of my life. I never understood how all of that happened. For the next hour they were taking apart everything in the compartment, they did not even look at my luggage. They completely took apart every seat! Every screw in it. Whole walls paneling. They tried to go to the ceiling - that did not work very well as they only had a one small screwdriver. Finally they gave up and left with angry faces without even saying 'Sorry'. For the next hours I was meditating, waiting to cross another border and enter the more friendly land. Fortunately the rest of the trip didn't bring any more surprises. My later trips to Bulgaria were always by plane, non-stop, and no transits.
After that treatment by soviet soldiers I did not feel sorry anymore for what happened in the first part of the trip on the train when we were coming to Bulgaria. As I mentioned before, when you were to enter Russia they have to change the axles in your train, as their train roads are wider then the rest of the world. Don't ask me why - there are too many bad jokes on that subject. It takes them several hours to do that. At that time everything is closed including the restrooms. One girl in our group developed a very strong urge to visit a restroom. She begged the conductor to open the restroom door, even starting to throw threads of what may happen if he won't. Women usually win - the conductor was only a man. He ask her to swear that she will not tell anybody about it as he will lose his job on the spot if somebody finds out what he did. Can you imagine that? Losing a job for letting somebody taking a pee? In the restroom!
Well, he took her with him and opened the restroom for her. A few minutes later we see her running very fast in the hall, coming back to our compartment and taking her seat in a hurry. Her face was all red :). "What happened?" - A few of us asked at the same time. "Nothing - please don't ask" was her answer. Well we didn't even have time to try to repeat the question when we saw a Russian soldier running from compartment to compartment with the white-faced conductor behind him. "Who did it? Who did it?" He was screaming constantly. When he got close we could see the reason for his madness. His cap, face, and chest were all wet. I really have no words to describe the expression on his face and the madness and hate in his eyes. Fortunately for us, he was to close to losing control to stop long enough to notice the red face and panic in our girl's face. The girl did not want to talk about it; conductor was acting, as he never talked to us when we started the trip. The adventures of that trip had just begun.
P.S. I don't want anybody to have a wrong impression that I don't like Russian people. It was just a wrong moment in the bad times we had in our past with the governments we did not vote for. I have met a lot of wonderful Russian people and some of them I have the pleasure to call my friends.
