A Holiday Food Chain

by Marharyta Makovetska (Ukraine)

I didn't expect to find Ukraine

We packed quickly and chaotically, not quite believing in our luck. Winters were long in Ukraine, and this particular February we were going to the tropical land of Sri Lanka. My family slept almost an entire trip long, forgetting about the usual stress. The hotel had a strong resemblance with a garden - open reception was decorated with plants, and with two peaceful ponds. Water in ponds swirled and moved, revealing friendly yellow fish, which was asking for snacks. It already ate every leaf it could reach, leaving the water plants nibbled and uneven. I liked the place and came there every evening. It was the only time when the water was still and dark. Fish was probably dreaming about food, and I enjoyed sitting on the warm marble platform, in between ponds, looking at the water. That evening I was observing a surprisingly large piece of wood that slowly drifted towards me. It was looking at me too, with a cold, bored expression in the eyes. Only when it crawled from the water, I backed up. In front of me emerged a comparatively small but fat crocodile, that clearly expected something from me. A pat on the back? A delicious hand? I am still not sure, but the animal soon lost interest in me and jumped in the other pond. In the morning, I brought my disbelieving parents to the receptionist. "Do you have a crocodile in your pods?" - I asked. "Of course not", - indignantly replied the receptionist. My parents looked at me with exasperation. "It is just an alligator, miss. It leaves over there, in the garden, and comes here for fish". Thanking the receptionist, we retrieved. A weird story, but everything seems to be under control here. After a long swim, we were resting. There was a beautiful woman nearby, reading something on her tablet. She had a somewhat Slavic appearance. Maybe it was her flirty polka-dotted swimming suit or her way to braid hair, but she seemed to be either Russian or Ukrainian. In retrospect, it can not justify me, but I thought she would understand Russian. I do not know anymore why I looked away from my book. On the ground, under my Mother`s chaise longue, I saw an enormous black snake. Its head slowly appeared under my legs, as the snake was moving to our pretty neighbor. I said in Russian "Змея” and moved across the chaise longue to stand behind it. My parents opened their eyes and reacted immediately. These days they took me seriously. Our neighbor remained on her seat. She looked away from her tablet, glancing at us incredulously. We were staring at the reptile. The woman followed our glances and spotted a snake. She screamed and quickly moved to us - the serpent did not care. Our neighbor started to film the snake, and its entire way to the thin yellowish grass nearby. Miraculously, the snake hid in that inconspicuous grass, with a clear desire to surprise anyone who would want to clean their feet from the sand. Our pretty neighbor showed us her video and graciously accepted my apologies. She was Polish and did not speak Russian at all. Excited from adrenalin, we approached one of the hotel managers and reported about the snake. His reply was short, yet somehow reassuring: "No, of course, it is not poisonous. It just came to eat chipmunks." The manager could not understand our shock. He saw snakes before. If he would visit the Carpathian mountains in Ukraine and face a bear, he would probably find it much more exotic. But he reacted nevertheless: later that evening, three hotel employees with a big butterfly net carefully approached that little oasis of boring grass. The manager did not lie. That snake was not poisonous at all. On the contrary: it was quite a delicious one, or so claimed the locals. We expected to find peaceful rest in Sri Lanka. Instead, we brought back unimaginable emotions, and a strong desire to come back. We returned to the same hotel several times, always keeping our hearts and eyes open.