During my stay at the snake park I was bitten on several occasions by a variety of non-poisonous (but hot-tempered) snakes and when I left after 3 weeks I had at least about 15-20 bites on my arms. Some of the bites were quite painful and one was so bad that my wrist had swelled up and I couldn't wear my watch for quite sometime. However when you remember that the snake gets damaged much more than you-it loses quite a few of its teeth in the bite-then you don't feel too bad. At any rate there was no question of using anti-venom as the snakes were all non-poisonous. And I learnt to think of the bites as injuries and wounds rather than the much feared `snake-bite'. Besides snakes, the Park also has a number of other animals. Some had been rescued, others found injured and brought to the Park for rest and recuperation. At the time of my stay at the Park it housed a wild boar, a civet-cat, a leopard, a Shikra bird, a jackal, three mongooses and several owls and eagles with broken wings. The eagles and owls were in cages with the top end kept open. Once they were able to fly again they could fly out if they wished. There were also many types of exotic fowls, guinea pigs, white mice, rabbits, monkeys and a pair of turkeys. And of course there were Ganges soft shell turtles, starback tortoises and melanac turtles. All these animals had to be fed daily and their cages cleaned regularly. The snake park has a system through which people in Pune city can call up the park if they sight a snake. Someone from the park will then go to the site with the caller, after taking directions from him/her, and try to get the snake. This ensures that people do not unnecessarily kill snakes. It was on two such occasions that I went with the boys on "calls" and returned without a snake. You see when the distance that the rescue team has to travel is long, the snake may not necessarily remain in the same spot till it gets there. The snake park has a lot of visitors daily and people are always looking for someone knowledgeable to answer questions. I used to feel quite proud to do this and would gladly answer all the queries like, "What is the name of the snake?" "What does it eat?" "Which is the male and the female?" and so on. At other times I would be pestering the staff to answer more complicated and detailed questions about the habits of snakes. Workers are a mine of information and all of it is knowledge gained from practical experience.