Cairo’s Aging Zoo an Oasis in a Crowded City : Egyptian heritage: Animal-keeping tradition dates to early 19th Century. Everything now stands in need of modernization but funds are limited.

The Giza Zoo, built as a royal playground a century ago, is a rare patch of urban green that delights children and gives their parents respite from the crush of a teeming city.

On holidays and festivals, at least 150,000 of Cairo’s 14 million people escape to the tree-lined walkways of its 88 acres.

For harried residents of the chaotic megacity, the zoo is a paradise. For the management, it is a constant worry and administrative headache.

Everything about the zoo is old, and there is too little money for modernization. It has millions of dollars worth of animals, including apes, condors and a rare black rhinoceros, but the budget for new animals is limited.

“It would be much easier to just tear down the whole place and rebuild it from scratch, but we don’t have the money,” said Mohammed Hussein Amer, the zoo director. “We ask for several million pounds and only get a few hundred thousand.”

Like all zoos, the Giza fascinates people of any age but especially children. In return for a small tip, guards let them feed sweet potatoes to the elephants and giraffes, fish to the seals and peanuts to the monkeys.

Some even throw big chunks of turnip into the gaping maw of a hippopotamus.

“I save my pocket money and try and come a lot,” said Hussein Ahmed, 9, watching spellbound as a guard entered a cage of evil-looking vultures.

The management claims one pair of the large birds are 30 years older than the zoo.

Inside the cage, one vulture spread wings 6 1/2 feet across as a spectator approached, and its pink head rose from a collar of ruffled white feathers. Seeming not to appreciate the close encounter, the bird flew abruptly to its nest.

“I’ve been here for 34 years taking care of them,” said Abdel-Aziz Ahmed, the vulture keeper. “They were here before I came, but I don’t know exactly how old they are.”

Two other aged residents are Saadeiya and Nadia, elephant tortoises believed to have been presents from Empress Eugenie of France to Egypt’s ruler, Khedive Ismail, for the inauguration of the Suez Canal in 1869.

Ancient Egyptians were among the first people to capture rare wild beasts for display, long before the Chinese emperor Wen Wang established the first real zoo in about 1000 BC.

Egypt did not have zoos until the early 19th Century, when they suddenly became fashionable.

Modern Egypt’s founder, Mohammed Ali, loved things European and raised lions in the empty moat around his Cairo citadel. People came from throughout Egypt to see and feed them.

In 1826, Mohammed Ali sent giraffes as gifts to King Charles X of France. They traveled to Europe by sea, then by foot to Paris, causing a great stir among people who had never seen the gentle, long-necked animals.

The Giza Zoo was begun in the mid-19th Century with Khedive Ismail’s private collection of 1,000 wild creatures.

Ismail wanted to put his collection on display as part of the Suez Canal celebrations, but was exiled before he could do so, largely because his expensive canal festivities left Egypt virtually bankrupt.

His son Tewfik became khedive, took up his father’s plan and built the zoo in part of the queen mother’s personal gardens. It was formally opened on March 1, 1891.

In those days, the intricate flower designs of its Italian-made cobbled pathways were reserved for royalty. Princesses held tea parties and musical recitals in an outdoor maze and playhouse, both fashioned from coral.

Guests strolled across the hanging bridge, built at a cost of 1.5 million gold pounds and designed by Alexandre Gustave Eiffel, of the Paris tower. They were rowed across man-made lakes and canals.