Beyond the Tall Grass: Kaziranga National Park

By Kalyani Candade. This article was originally published in the New Indian Express, Chennai on Sunday March 25th 2009.

He tossed his head vigorously and pawed the earth, twice. Then, magnificent horns arced inward in a wide curve, nostrils flaring, he took one tentative step towards us. Again, he drank deeply of the fresh morning air, breathing in every new message the wind brought. It was early, still time for the alarm bells to go off when the tourist convoy began. “Don’t move”, our driver whispered and we froze, sitting, standing, on the seat, half off the step, hanging on with bated breath in the open jeep…

Finally, he decided we were worth investigating. There we stood, wildlife enthusiasts and wild water buffalo, face-to-face across a distance of thirty feet on a narrow forest road. Slowly, cautious step after cautious step, he closed the gap between us, majestic, proud, curious. And then a camera clicked. ALARM! A toss of head, a lightning turnaround, and off he went, thundering down the road he had just come up.

We were in Kaziranga National Park, Assam, more famously known as home to the highly endangered Great Indian One Horned Rhinoceros. Located at the edge of the Eastern Himalaya Biodiversity Hotspot, covering 430 sqkm in the districts of Golaghat and Nagaon, the National Park has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and attracts visitors from across the world. The morning was young and we hadn’t yet seen rhino, but this was a bonus; encountering at such close quarters the magnificent ancestor of the domestic buffalo, the Wild Asiatic Water Buffalo. Also high on the IUCN Red List of endangered species, estimates put the total population of his kind at less than 4000, with just about 2500 mature individuals.

We left him watching us from his hiding place in the tall elephant grass, curving horns a dead giveaway. The mist was clearing, and we could see stretching on all sides the vast grassland that Kaziranga is famous for, the early rays of the sun slanting across to tint the tall emerald blades with red-gold highlights. The air was chill, and a light wind made us even colder in the open vehicle. Expectations ran high as we scanned all sides for a glimpse of rhino.

Suddenly our driver pulled to a side. “Listen”, he whispered, pointing to the sky. For a moment, nothing, and then, a distinctive thud-thud-thud, like a helicopter flying overhead. HORNBILL! I had heard the noise before, made by the wing-beat of the Great Pied Hornbill, heralding its approach from almost a kilometer away. And then, we saw not one, but two of the large, majestic birds as they flew languidly overhead. One of them settled on a tree nearby, giving us plenty of time to look at his brilliant yellow and black casque. I felt strangely privileged.

By now, the sun was fairly high in the sky, and in the river along the track, tortoises were making their appearance, jostling and shoving for prime basking locations on dead tree trunks. Frequently we surprised swamp deer browsing on the track, and jungle fowl busily scratching away at huge mounds of rhino dung. We hadn’t seen rhino yet, though.

“The visibility is bad this time of the year,” explained our guide. “The grass is high, that is why you can’t see them.” We kept peering hopefully into the tall grass, and caught perhaps a flash or two of grey. Small consolation.

And then we rounded a bend and pulled up to a side, along with four or five other Jeeps, all attention trained on a clearing with a large mound of rhino dung. What were we waiting for, I wondered. “Rhino” explained our guide. “He’ll come now.” And how did he know that? Was the rhino such a creature of habit? “He does potty in the same place every day”, I was told. “He comes here every morning to do his job”.

Sure enough, within minutes, the rhino arrived. He looked at the battery of Jeeps rather unhappily, then proceeded to do what he had to do. Cameras clicked and whirred to record the moment. Then, as silently as he came, he melted away. I didn’t know whether to feel happy that I had seen rhino, finally, or to feel ashamed at what we had collectively just done. Was my need to see rhino so great that I was ready to deny him his dignity? The uneasy question refused to go away.

We saw more rhino on the last lap of our drive, scattered, browsing unconcernedly in the grass. The highlight, however, was a large herd of wild water buffalo resting on a sand bank, bulls, cows and calves, resting, sparring, cavorting… It helped bring back the joy of the earlier part of the morning, and the feeling of enrichment.

As we drove out of the sanctuary, I understood why Kaziranga was a World Heritage Site. Not just for its flagship species, but for the vast and diverse wealth of flora and fauna it protected. And I made a silent promise to the rhino. Next time, I would not lie in wait near his toilet. The piles of dung would be enough indication that he was well and thriving.

This article was originally published in the New Indian Express, Chennai on Sunday March 25th 2009.

Elephant Sense

He froze, trunk poised in mid-air, and looked straight at me. I turned around to see what had disturbed him. Nothing, except a mahout leaning lazily against the wall with a slight smile playing on his face. I turned back in time to see the brilliant shot I had just missed – molten afternoon light playing with the cloud of dust that the magnificent tusker had just sprayed over his back.

Not to be outdone, I raised my camera and focused once more. He froze again. From behind me, an unmistakable chuckle. “He’s posing for you”, the mahout explained, grinning at my puzzled expression. “He loves the attention, and wants to oblige”.

I looked at the elephant in disbelief, and noticed that he had even stopped swaying. I made a big show of handing over one of my cameras to a friend, discreetly stuffed the other into my jacket, and moved away. Maybe if I hid behind a wall or something…

No go. The sequences went something like this. Frame. Freeze. Sigh. Frame. Freeze. Chuckle from the mahout. Frame. Freeze. Guffaw from my friend. I gave up and took a picture of his magnificent tusks instead.

How many human beings he had studied, I wondered, and how much did he know about us…

We were in Coorg, at the Elephant Interaction Centre of the Dubare Wildlife Sanctuary. I was fascinated at how much interaction was possible, with opportunities for even getting into the water and giving a massive hind quarter a good scrub! But the highlight for me was watching the feeding.

Hungry after the bath, the elephants began queuing up to be fed almost half an hour before feeding time. One after the other they lumbered up, and immediately got into position, with trunk draped over the wall in a posture of infinite patience. Delicious smells wafted in the air, of ragi and jaggery. There was a definite pecking order, with the dominant males being fed the gigantic balls of ragi first.

My favourite, however, was the pregnant Mythili, a gentle giant with a two year calf next to her. Her mahout had his hands full feeding the mother and calf; every time he put a ball of ragi into Mythili’s open jaws, the little calf would send a snaking trunk in and wiggle out a sizeable portion! The mahout did everything he could think of to get her to swallow fast; cajoling, threatening, tricking…

Nothing worked. Indulgently, Mythili would hold her jaws slightly open to allow the calf to dribble out the food. “How do I ensure she gets the nutrition she needs,” despaired the mahout, “she has another baby growing inside her”. Back he went once more to the kitchen, distracted the calf and deftly sent a lump of jaggery down her throat. One down to the mahout. But Mythili won my heart.

We left Dubare without having seen any elephants in the wild. But it didn’t really matter.

Rainforest Moments

It came in a dark brown, almost black bamboo wrapping that was a work of art in itself, and for that reason alone it stayed unpacked for over a year. A long slim cylinder of bamboo sheath in which, my intrepid trekker husband told me, was an exquisite tribal tea that had been smoked over the fire for god knows how many moons. The top was crossed over and tied with a thin sliver of bamboo ribbon, carefully tied into a bow. It was a ceremonial gift, from the village elder to an honoured guest.

Tea? From the rainforests of North East India? I was curious. Whatever was inside was rock hard, you could have knocked me over with it. Oh, you just need to shave off how ever much you need, I was told indulgently. I put it aside, rather fascinated with the whole thing, not too curious to experiment.

And then one languid Sunday afternoon, I discovered we were out of coffee. It was the perfect moment for the rainforest tea. Gently, with much curiosity, I opened up the bamboo sheath, and scraped off a small amount into the water I had put to boil.

Within minutes, the water turned a deep orange-red gold, and a thick woody aroma filled the air. On the point of pouring the milk in, I changed my mind. It would be a shame to mask the flavour. Lemon? I wondered, then decided to leave that too, for another time.

It tasted of the rainforest. Intense, rich, with depths and notes I wouldn’t have imagined in a tea. Notes created by an assortment of forest herbs, gathered at just the right time and blended together in just the right proportions, and then hung over the fire for months to let steam and smoke do their job… Each family apparently had their signature blends, and this was surely from a connoisseur…

The TV seemed a sacrilege, and I turned it off. I needed silence, and solitude, to savour this. And space… Quietly I picked up my cup, and went outside to the green of the garden.

Light years later, I reverentially wrapped the bamboo sheath back in place, wishing I had a strip of green bamboo ribbon to tie it up with.

It held my own private stock of rainforest moments.