A day in Kaziranga

We spent 4 days in the plains of Assam, before venturing towards Meghalaya. The break was intended to give us chances to bathe, wash AND dry underwear (as well as other clothes). Our host in Kaziranga was an affable young Bengali. He welcomed us “Yeh resort mera pappa banaya na. Pappa bola tum bhi business seekho”. He was then taught a few lessons in business negotiations by TG. TG explained the concept of marginal pricing to him and obtained a discount of 25%. The bong then proceeded to give us extensive details about the park. That done, we planned for the next day, washed clothes, bathed, watched some TV, debated Kejriwal’s Nagpur rally……zzzzz……..

The elephant ride started on an exciting note. On this rare occasion it came out of Khujli’s pocket and was given to the park office as fee for the ride. The elephant stonewalled our chirpy infectious enthusiasm. It looked quite indifferent and bored. It had just been woken up and it found the idea of a fat AAPster mounting it revolting. But then somebody has to bring home the sugarcane. She thought about her family and we climbed up.

The mahout tried to cheer the elephant and us up. He explained about the brake and clutch systems, gearshift pattern, signaling, nitro boost and other things installed on the ride. One James Bondish feature was a secret foot tap, which made elephant fold up its trunk. Then suddenly the mahout was excited by something

“ I smell a dead animal”

“No, that is just Khujli. He last bathed in Bangalore”

“Really!!?? How many days is that”

“9, by Earth’s rotation. TG had to purchase a headache medicine after he shared room with him”

The rest of the ride was humdrum. We spotted rhinos and they spotted us. We took photographs and they gave us some crap. Like literally. Everybody was explaining to everyone else what everyone could see.

“Look there is a Rhino”

“Yes”

“It is with its mother”

“Yes”

“It is wallowing in mud”

“Yes”

“It looks a little bit like an armored cow”

“Yes”

“Do you think it was used in battles, like they show in 300?”

“Yes”

“Do you think it can outrun us”?

“Yes”

“Its rear looks like it is wearing shorts”

“Yes”

“Don’t you think it is seductive”?

“No! Definitely Not”

This was the standard conversation amongst all riders in all elephants. The last sentence was, however, unique to Khujli. The elephant then turned back. Since we had already scared away all the sleeping, grazing, wallowing rhinos, I wondered what would people in the second round of elephant safari see. I was sure elephants also knew about this.

“Did the elephant just fart?”

“No, that was the bong uncle burping on the elephant behind. I think we can ask him to take our pictures.” Which, the bong uncle happily did.

Meanwhile, Manisha kept wondering how an actual elephant fart would sound like. He had some raw data with him, which he could possibly extrapolate. He had shared a room with Khujli in the initial days.

Human digestive system goes on a sleep mode, soon after you hit the bed. This is like French railway stations closing at around 11pm. But, just because the trains ain’t running, that does not mean passengers don’t arrive. They do, and accumulate at the station entrance. Huddling, sleeping and defending themselves from thieves. When the stations open early in morning, these smelly sleepy sluggish passengers get into the first trains. Similarly, things that collect overnight in various digestive systems in a room would get out in first few rounds of flatulence in morning. Some days, they were a perfect substitute for morning alarms. It was so every day in Khujli’s room.

We went on a Jeep Safari next. This was like watching a well-promoted 100-crore film. There was a ticket counter, a long line, lots of seats and lots of hype. We were excited by the prospect of getting to see scenes straight out of Discovery/Nat Geo wildlife documentaries. Romila had various titles in mind for the videos he was going to shoot. “Tiger hunts a rhino”, “Tiger versus crocodile”, “Tiger eats leopard alive”, “Tiger devours an AAP supporter” etc. The jeep’s rickety structure and the ability to hold itself during the ride was a cause of concern to Manisha’s brain, which was still doing a simulation from the raw data.

We entered the park boundary and everyone was excited. A few hundred meters down the road, as the jeep slowed, Shruti was suddenly hugely excited. He jumped from the moving jeep and scurried towards a narrow path. We wondered for a while. All of us owed money to Shruti. The safari could not have started with a better portent. Each of us started to plan how to spend the money we would have otherwise paid to Shruti.

After 3 hours of ride in the wild, the most interesting animal and animal-cry we had seen and heard, was our jeep driver, when he was poked in ear by a branch, Khujli had picked up on the way. That, along with some more Bong families. That was pretty much the wildlife we saw in Kaziranga. To increase our excitement and anxiety level, the driver agreed to let us pee near a place where we saw some tiger tracks. Romila and I preferred to stay back, since this might be our one chance to get a YouTube worthy video.  We waited, they peed and the tiger did not appear. Finally they ran out. We restarted our exciting and fun filled journey.

Few minutes later we saw the Nepali guy with a tiger track stamp.

Tarung Upta Photography had meanwhile collected enough shots of elephant grass, dry lakes, crows, spiders, an odd lizard, eagle, monkeys, Bong uncles (aunties and fat kids too), dead dogs, cows, dead burnt trees, forest guards and firangs to keep updating for an entire year, the album titled ‘Kaziranga’.

We returned back and sadly found Shruti again at the ticket office. He looked utterly disappointed. Apparently, he discovered that the board, which said “Wild Indian Asses” did not exactly mean what, (the pervert that he is) he had expected.