As a child, I was filled with wonder by my trips to the old Stanley Park Zoo in Vancouver. Mesmerized by animals, I spent hours in front on the monkey and polar bear enclosures. Zoos are probably the first place where I developed a keen interest in our relationships with animals.

After a number of trips to zoos in Japan and the United States of late, I have begun to wonder how much, well, one's wonder translates into a legitimate concern for conservation issues promoted by high-profile zoos. Of course, zoos today are now made out to be much more than places that display animals. The common argument made by zoo administrators is that zoos are centers of serious science, one of the few places where people can connect with animals safely.

This is a valid point. Even though I grew up on the edge of a fairly wild place, seeing a wild animal was never easy and never risk free. Zoos are normally pretty safe places, and Stanley Park was my first opportunity to see a large animal up close. From my side of the moat or a glass wall, I would stare, mesmerized at the resident animals, unaware of what was going on around me. My parents couldn't drag me away. Nothing could keep me from having my moment with the animals when I was child.

My zooless streak of 20 years was broken last summer when my wife and I spent a day at the famed Asahiyama Zoo in Hokkaido. Many people who live in Japan are familiar with the images of seals shooting up and down Plexiglas tubes and polar bears munching on giant ice cubes filled with tasty, meaty treats during the summer months.

I was taken in by these images. The zoo looked like it was a lot of fun, and I wanted to believe that the animals were enjoying putting on a show for the paying customer. Once I entered the admission gate, passed the gift shop and saw the amusement park in the background, I realized the zoo's image has been carefully managed. There was plenty of green surrounding the animals but also plenty of concrete. And it was small, about the same size as the Stanley Park Zoo, and just as artificial.

Despite the zoo's best intentions to reproduce natural surroundings with mortar and green paint, it is hard to believe that seals come across Plexiglas tubes in their natural habit. The tube might simulate a certain environment in their habitat, but it is unlikely that the skills seals learn in the enclosure in the zoo are going to translate to the skills and practices that are going to keep the seals alive in the Arctic. The same goes for polar bears, which are not munching on meat-filled ice cubes on Arctic ice floes.

In fact, unless you consider watching penguins feed from a bucket "natural," there isn't much that is natural about the animal-watching in the zoo. With clear sightlines built into most of the exhibits at Asahiyama Zoo the animals were served on a plate to be visually consumed by the groups of visitors that crowded around the enclosures, and there was no way that any animal at the zoo was going to avoid the gaze of a visitor determined to see it.

In the past, visitors to zoos complained that the animals often hide out of view or seemed lethargic, sleepy at times. A lot has changed. The public feeding has helped to bring the animals more in the open, and the architects took care of the sightlines. The enclosures have been designed for clearer viewing and a determined visitor can always get a glimpse of their favorite critter. And you can see a heck of a lot of people.

Most of the people that watched spent only a couple of minutes in front of the enclosure, unless there was something cute and feeding in front of their eyes. Before going to the zoo, I assumed that the openness of the exhibits would encourage more intense gazing. However, most of the people that I watched skipped from exhibit to exhibit. Oohing and ahhing, many of the younger visitors I watched ran from exhibit to exhibit to see the scheduled feedings. First to the Japanese macaques. Then moving on to the penguins. It's 2:15; time to see the polar bear feed.

For the most part, it seemed to me that zoos are going to stick with what brings the busloads of visitors in: entertainment. There is much showmanship at Asahiyama Zoo and the zookeepers do their best to make sure that the paying customers get their fill of fun.

The writer, a longtime resident of Japan,
is completing his Ph.D. in history in the United States.