Swaggomancer
11-09-16, 11:39 AM
Today I had a weird/bad encounter with a shopkeeper here in Tripoli, and I kinda want to vent my feelings a bit.
Basically, there are shops here in Libya which sell reptiles to be killed and used for traditional medicine. The reptiles are kept in pretty tight environments and in abysmal conditions. Even though I hate that they are taking advantage of the desperate and the ignorant (their main customer demographic), I often visit one of these shops just to get a feel for the native herpetofauna, and to have a closer look at the specimens.
A few weeks ago, on one of my visits, I noticed that they were keeping some Psammophis schokari. I was with my old man, and I told him "These guys aren't gonna last long in bottles like this, they need some UV light and they get stressed easy." Sure enough, fast forward to today, and there isn't a single Psammophis to be seen except for one dead one in a bottle, and it probably died recently or I think they'd have removed it.
We, me and my dad, continue looking around. Eventually I see a colubrid in a bottle that I can't recognize (calling me a layman in herpetology would be far too generous) and I just kinda pick up the bottle and rotate it a bit, in the hope that I can get a better look through the foggy plastic. One shopkeeper sees this and is somewhat surprised, so he comes over and asks us if we need anything. My dad just asks him what it is and he goes "its a snake." Before my dad can start banging his head into a wall, the guy asks what we need and I tell him that I'm just looking around. He just walked back to continue his smoke after that.
Anyways, later on my conscience starts acting up and I decide to tell the guy about the Psammophis and why it might have died. Now, I'm pretty introverted and scared of people I don't know, so it took quite a bit of effort to walk back to that scary shopkeeper, with his big mustache and cigarette. Still, I manage and I just kind of go up to him like:
"Hello! Are you responsible for those snakes over there?"
"Hmmm..."*he points to one of the other shopkeepers* "Hey! Go help the customer out."
And I'm like "Err, no, I don't want to buy anything...Ummm, one of those snakes in the bottles is dead and I...Uhhh...Those types of snakes need some..."
*the man stares at me super intense-like*
"...I, Uhhh...they need UV light....or, uhh, they don't really last long."
After that, he just continued to stare at me before nodding me away without saying a word. Like, if "f*** off" could take the form of a stare. I somehow kinda felt like I offended him or something. It might have been the fact that my Arabic isn't exactly perfectly fluent, and I tend to jumble when I'm anxious (you know, like when someone tries to melt my brain with his eyeballs) but I thought I'd gotten my message through. I mean, I think the warning signs were all there - the tortoises piled on top of each other, the tightly packed chameleons, and the bottled snakes, the lack of knowledge about reptiles, as well as the shady **** that they do with them - these guys clearly don't give a ****. I just wasn't expecting that sort of response. I'm pretty sure that I'd just spent too much time around normal people who give a damn and I kinda forgot where I was. Won't happen again.
Maybe this is just my paranoia kicking in, maybe I misinterpreted the guy's silent stare. But that guy made me feel hella uncomfortable. I wanted to bury my head in the ground so bad. This is the last time I visit them, I think. I sure as hell will never buy anything else from them (I have two toads I got from them previously). I'm pretty sure I know why snakes aren't popular in Libya, with that sort of attitude.
On another note, I think it is a blessing - seeing how the pet trade has played a huge part in damaging the reptile populations in neighboring countries. There is no such demand for them here and most reptiles seem to be doing kinda OK. This means that, if I do ever get into snake keeping, I will need to be very careful. There are no regulations on reptiles and, even if some were made, I doubt anyone would enforce them. The last thing I want to do is trigger the wrong sort of demand, where people just start frenziedly collecting wild reptiles.
Basically, there are shops here in Libya which sell reptiles to be killed and used for traditional medicine. The reptiles are kept in pretty tight environments and in abysmal conditions. Even though I hate that they are taking advantage of the desperate and the ignorant (their main customer demographic), I often visit one of these shops just to get a feel for the native herpetofauna, and to have a closer look at the specimens.
A few weeks ago, on one of my visits, I noticed that they were keeping some Psammophis schokari. I was with my old man, and I told him "These guys aren't gonna last long in bottles like this, they need some UV light and they get stressed easy." Sure enough, fast forward to today, and there isn't a single Psammophis to be seen except for one dead one in a bottle, and it probably died recently or I think they'd have removed it.
We, me and my dad, continue looking around. Eventually I see a colubrid in a bottle that I can't recognize (calling me a layman in herpetology would be far too generous) and I just kinda pick up the bottle and rotate it a bit, in the hope that I can get a better look through the foggy plastic. One shopkeeper sees this and is somewhat surprised, so he comes over and asks us if we need anything. My dad just asks him what it is and he goes "its a snake." Before my dad can start banging his head into a wall, the guy asks what we need and I tell him that I'm just looking around. He just walked back to continue his smoke after that.
Anyways, later on my conscience starts acting up and I decide to tell the guy about the Psammophis and why it might have died. Now, I'm pretty introverted and scared of people I don't know, so it took quite a bit of effort to walk back to that scary shopkeeper, with his big mustache and cigarette. Still, I manage and I just kind of go up to him like:
"Hello! Are you responsible for those snakes over there?"
"Hmmm..."*he points to one of the other shopkeepers* "Hey! Go help the customer out."
And I'm like "Err, no, I don't want to buy anything...Ummm, one of those snakes in the bottles is dead and I...Uhhh...Those types of snakes need some..."
*the man stares at me super intense-like*
"...I, Uhhh...they need UV light....or, uhh, they don't really last long."
After that, he just continued to stare at me before nodding me away without saying a word. Like, if "f*** off" could take the form of a stare. I somehow kinda felt like I offended him or something. It might have been the fact that my Arabic isn't exactly perfectly fluent, and I tend to jumble when I'm anxious (you know, like when someone tries to melt my brain with his eyeballs) but I thought I'd gotten my message through. I mean, I think the warning signs were all there - the tortoises piled on top of each other, the tightly packed chameleons, and the bottled snakes, the lack of knowledge about reptiles, as well as the shady **** that they do with them - these guys clearly don't give a ****. I just wasn't expecting that sort of response. I'm pretty sure that I'd just spent too much time around normal people who give a damn and I kinda forgot where I was. Won't happen again.
Maybe this is just my paranoia kicking in, maybe I misinterpreted the guy's silent stare. But that guy made me feel hella uncomfortable. I wanted to bury my head in the ground so bad. This is the last time I visit them, I think. I sure as hell will never buy anything else from them (I have two toads I got from them previously). I'm pretty sure I know why snakes aren't popular in Libya, with that sort of attitude.
On another note, I think it is a blessing - seeing how the pet trade has played a huge part in damaging the reptile populations in neighboring countries. There is no such demand for them here and most reptiles seem to be doing kinda OK. This means that, if I do ever get into snake keeping, I will need to be very careful. There are no regulations on reptiles and, even if some were made, I doubt anyone would enforce them. The last thing I want to do is trigger the wrong sort of demand, where people just start frenziedly collecting wild reptiles.