Borocon, quintu bor bahal....
So, 5 days to go in Kaziranga, 5 villages, 15 interviews, 500 trees, five goat-blocked, breezy drives across the beautiful Assamese landscape in search of people with interesting stories….about elephants, alcohol and distant relatives.
Just to recap on the last week or so….I’ve been in a bit of a daze the last few days, mostly because of the heat, I think, since it’s been almost a week since we had rice beer. (This was rice beer Take 2 – we were invited by a friend of Nekib’s, into his uncle’s home, to drink rice beer in one of the villages we were surveying. Like the professionals that we are, we declined until we’d finished our work in the village, so strategically planned the interviews so that by random chance we ended up in this very same house for our last interview of the day, and rounded off the social survey with a good glug (and a good half) of some freshly brewed rice beer. The most white and yeasty brew I’ve ever had, but surprisingly tasty. So funny watching the deterioration into laughter, but as the only woman drinking, I must’ve been the most light weight of all of us. We decided to abandon the surveying of a wildlife corridor that we were going to do on the way home, purely because the birds we were meant to be surveying had gone home for lunch - nothing to do with the fact that everyone was feeling a bit dizzy by this stage, and trying to identify moving objects from a way off, and spending a long time looking upwards at the edge of a busy road, probably wouldn’t have been a good idea. Oh, I love being a student!
Apart from that experience (which all happened before midday last Sunday!), we spent last Saturday at a college in Tezpur, giving a short lecture to some WWF Conservation students. I was so unprepared, even more so when we found out the electricity was down, so we couldn’t use our power-point presentations, and nearly sweated all the water out of my body in the 20 minutes that I waffled on for. But I survived and even had one question asked afterwards. Whether I answered it or not is another question. Perhaps I was not born to be a lecturer.
A few days ago, I saw an elephant. It took me a good while to realize that it wasn’t a wild one, just a domestic one, enjoying a bit of ‘wild’ grass, dragging a big rope behind it! (I didn’t have my glasses on – the usual excuse.) I think the boys thought I was a bit gullable (more so than before, when they almost convinced me that they’d seen, in one pond outside the Park, elephants catching fish with their trunks).
Today, I had another bizarre but fantastic experience. We went for our last interview of the day in a village nearby, and there was a wonderful “Aunty”, who took me off after the interview (and after she’d given up trying to teach me Assamese) to her loom and taught me how to weave. Then, once I’d broken one patch of the beautiful sari weave she was making (I felt so bad) she decided she must have a picture of me in the full shu-bang. So she dressed me in this beautiful sari and then dressed up herself and we had a photo session. I’m not quite sure whether the boys were delighted or disgusted, but I was certainly a good entertainment for a while. It was very amusing, and I felt very privileged to have been taking in and dressed up in such riches. What wonderful people. What an amazing country. I’m not sure this experience can get much more special.
Thoughts of dissertation have temporarily gone on hold really, as there seems far too much to experience and think about out here without getting distracted by thoughts of statistics and write-up. I am however trying to get as big a picture of the human-wildlife conflict as I can so that I do not produce a report that is too naïve and hopeless. We’ll see.
But for now, I’ll enjoy wading through the mud in search of beautiful trees and beautiful people. Oh, and I saw the most stunning man/god the other day whilst I was trying to understand another epic local drama performance that we were invited to. Unfortunately I didn’t get to meet him, just enjoyed staring at him for a few hours.
Right, bed time before another one of those big mosquitoes eats me. Love to you all. Blotchey-Lyd xxxx
Just to recap on the last week or so….I’ve been in a bit of a daze the last few days, mostly because of the heat, I think, since it’s been almost a week since we had rice beer. (This was rice beer Take 2 – we were invited by a friend of Nekib’s, into his uncle’s home, to drink rice beer in one of the villages we were surveying. Like the professionals that we are, we declined until we’d finished our work in the village, so strategically planned the interviews so that by random chance we ended up in this very same house for our last interview of the day, and rounded off the social survey with a good glug (and a good half) of some freshly brewed rice beer. The most white and yeasty brew I’ve ever had, but surprisingly tasty. So funny watching the deterioration into laughter, but as the only woman drinking, I must’ve been the most light weight of all of us. We decided to abandon the surveying of a wildlife corridor that we were going to do on the way home, purely because the birds we were meant to be surveying had gone home for lunch - nothing to do with the fact that everyone was feeling a bit dizzy by this stage, and trying to identify moving objects from a way off, and spending a long time looking upwards at the edge of a busy road, probably wouldn’t have been a good idea. Oh, I love being a student!
Apart from that experience (which all happened before midday last Sunday!), we spent last Saturday at a college in Tezpur, giving a short lecture to some WWF Conservation students. I was so unprepared, even more so when we found out the electricity was down, so we couldn’t use our power-point presentations, and nearly sweated all the water out of my body in the 20 minutes that I waffled on for. But I survived and even had one question asked afterwards. Whether I answered it or not is another question. Perhaps I was not born to be a lecturer.
A few days ago, I saw an elephant. It took me a good while to realize that it wasn’t a wild one, just a domestic one, enjoying a bit of ‘wild’ grass, dragging a big rope behind it! (I didn’t have my glasses on – the usual excuse.) I think the boys thought I was a bit gullable (more so than before, when they almost convinced me that they’d seen, in one pond outside the Park, elephants catching fish with their trunks).
Today, I had another bizarre but fantastic experience. We went for our last interview of the day in a village nearby, and there was a wonderful “Aunty”, who took me off after the interview (and after she’d given up trying to teach me Assamese) to her loom and taught me how to weave. Then, once I’d broken one patch of the beautiful sari weave she was making (I felt so bad) she decided she must have a picture of me in the full shu-bang. So she dressed me in this beautiful sari and then dressed up herself and we had a photo session. I’m not quite sure whether the boys were delighted or disgusted, but I was certainly a good entertainment for a while. It was very amusing, and I felt very privileged to have been taking in and dressed up in such riches. What wonderful people. What an amazing country. I’m not sure this experience can get much more special.
Thoughts of dissertation have temporarily gone on hold really, as there seems far too much to experience and think about out here without getting distracted by thoughts of statistics and write-up. I am however trying to get as big a picture of the human-wildlife conflict as I can so that I do not produce a report that is too naïve and hopeless. We’ll see.
But for now, I’ll enjoy wading through the mud in search of beautiful trees and beautiful people. Oh, and I saw the most stunning man/god the other day whilst I was trying to understand another epic local drama performance that we were invited to. Unfortunately I didn’t get to meet him, just enjoyed staring at him for a few hours.
Right, bed time before another one of those big mosquitoes eats me. Love to you all. Blotchey-Lyd xxxx
posted by Lydia Cole at
00:31
3 Comments:
It may not be cool for your Mum to post a comment but I just wanted to say 'You're a wonderful Lyd'
XOX
How brilliant Lyd! Sometimes I come here and hope you have posted the 'next installment'! It is so lovely reading about all your adventures. It really does sound like you are soaking every last ounce of the experience up! :)
Enjoy the last bit! And hope your return journey is safe. Take care and much love, Bex xx
princess of borneo, stop disturbing those poor leeches in their homy swamps and get out of the jungle!
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