Touching an elephant
It was mid summer in Udaipur, Rajasthan, India. We were in a rickshaw. Not the bicycle kind, but the motor kind, with a sort of bubble on the back of a motorcycle, so there is room for passengers! We had just got in, and were about to leave… when all of a sudden my friend I was with, Duvel from Israel, stopped in the middle of his sentence and gasped, while looking across the street- I turned around to see an elephant, smack bang in the middle of the busy city scene that we had been about to take off from.
I had seen elephants before, maybe once or twice, so the presence of this glorious animal did not amaze me as much as it did Duvel. I could sense his nervous excitement, I said ‘come on, let’s go over there’… we thanked the rickshaw driver and apologised for wasting his time, pointing at the elephant and quickly leaving the vehicle. When we got to the other side of the road, we could see clearly as we walked up to the elephant, that people were handing it fruit to eat, bought from a stall, made of wood on wheels, the sort that you see everywhere in India, selling fruits, vegetables or some of the most delicious street food! Something I’ll go into more detail about in a later blog entry. It really is worth talking about!
When I think about this moment that I am going to explain, I still get goosebumps on my skin, I had been increasingly interested in animal consciousness on my travels… it was with great excitement that I realised as I watched this elephant in the middle of the city – a horrible scene for such a wild creature, I was thinking to myself! – that when I walked over to it, I could talk to the animal through sense! As we approached, I sent through the eyes, as much love and compassion as I could, to my amazement, the beast stepped forward and into my path!! Giant! Overhanging it’s head and long trunk right in front of my face, it stared into my eyes and absorbed my message. Duvel was standing next to me, saying ‘Kat, what’s happening? He’s looking right at you!’ I knew, in myself, it could understand me. I wasn’t scared despite its size and attention on me. It was pure peace between us.
I put my hands up and the elephant moved it’s trunk into my hands – a glorious moment. I smiled… it was beautiful.
I knew elephants had a mega consciousness, because I’d heard a story about a ranger in South Africa, he was much loved by the elephants and had worked long days, months and years bringing safety to the area where they live. He retired and moved to a little house, quite far from where he’d worked. When he died, the elephants intuitively knew and walked several days with their heads bowed low to get to the house where he had been living. They stood outside with their heads bowed, in mourning! It is truly remarkable how much we are connected to the animal world – could it be that they are more intelligent, instinctively speaking, than humans are today? We’ve complicated our world so much, with technology and machines… and we eat caged meat. Where is the instinct?
It is because of this question that I travelled without technology, staying close to the ground and always asking people for directions! It is when asking this question that I turn off my central heating and put on another jumper, the human instinct has been to create comfort, it is destroying our ecosystem. We are melting our polar ice caps! With heat from homes and technology. I don’t like what we do! It has scared me. Animals before the tsunami in southeast Asia in 2004, all went to higher land, they felt it coming! Over 200 000 people died! We are waiting in ‘comfort’, like those people, while the waters around our planet rise! Some people sense more, I think those less obsessed by words! It is with much intensity that I have sensed! Words for all their power, have been the focus of most people’s lives, importantly so, for they guide and direct us. But do animals use words?
I know they can be trained to understand commands, but in their herds and flocks, their intelligence deserves some form of superiority, for it is beyond word and more connected to the ecosystem. I feel an innate sense coming from nature which says go, though it does not say it. Going forward at such a fast rate, I felt this. It is my innate sense that drove me to travel, I was brought up on organic food from the soil outside my house. I feel connected. And it is this connection that I long for in all human kind.
Where do I see the future?
Wild
Turn off the gadgets. Let body and mind rest in nature’s sense!
I still feel elephant’s consciousness, it is sad. Mother like. They are Matriarchal. But they have been chained. It is time to stand tall and be with nature! Unchained.
