All creatures great and small
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I was thoroughly enjoying an article in the Sunday Times Lifestyle section about the Knysna Elephants. The writer, Tiara Walters, went into the Knysna forest for a week in an attempt to spot one of the few elephants that are believed to be living in the forest. Apparently the last sighting was in November 2004.

Tiara was off to a good start and, after going through a brief history about the almost mythical existence of the Knysna elephants, decided to introduce the team to us..

STOP!

I'm sorry, but I simply CANNOT go on without telling you about something that happened to me about five years ago whilst living in London. It has to do with elephants and always comes up when I talk about elephants. I forget about it for a year or so and then suddenly remember it when people around me start talking about elephants.

You see, I had just kissed this girl in London and she had a special love for elephants. Now we all know that elephants have a very big fan base. You get people who have their MAIN animal that they care passionately about. Like people who have THEIR special breed of dog that they love. My Grandmother and Mother have had a smorgasbord of Yorkshire-Terriers during my time. One after the other.

You get West-Highland Terriers claiming a very large following too. Their owners refer to them as "Westies". My favourite family friends in London, went for the "(Cavalier) Lord Charles Spaniel". His name is "Dettori", after the jockey, Frankie Dettori. YourPureBredPuppy.com website tells us that although the King Charles does suffer from "separation anxiety", they "Adore comfort, cuddling in laps, and snuggling on soft pillows, yet have more athletic and outdoorsy instincts than you might think". I must say, Dettori does have a certain spring in his step when he wanders outside.

A Lord Charles, similar to Dettori

So anyway, just like each dog breed has its own human fan base, so do various animal types (please don't write in and tell me that I should have used another word, instead of the word animal "TYPES". Please. Don't. Let's keep our eye on the ball here).

The animals with the big fan bases are generally the animals that are said to be more intelligent than other animals. Man connects with them. Dolphin freaks are a good example. We all love dolphins........but then you get the people that believe that dolphins can cure AIDS, if we could just somehow get the God-knows-how-many infected people to swim with them. Stories of dolphins leading humans to safety in stormy weather only spur these people on. Traits include spending vast sums of money on Swarovski crystal dolphin figures.

My gran had Swarovski owls. My aunt had Swarovski ducks. My Mother didn't have Swarovski Yorkies (Yorkshire Terriers), instead she went for over 1,000 porcelain dolls. The collection includes limited edition Prince William and Prince Harry porcelain dolls which were created at the time of the birth of each child. Only a certain amount of the royal dolls were made; hence "limited edition". To make it even more hectic, the people that make these dolls SMASHED THE FUCKING MOLDS so that no more could be made. How hard core is that? As an only child, I feel more should have been done to ban the movie 'Child's Play' before it hit South African shores. (I was, however, banned from watching the TV series, "V").

[The previous insight into my family does not form part of, what I refer to as, "The Jerry Springer Collection". That will form part of my great novel.]

Back to the elephants. Back to the story that happened to me in London. Ok, so I came right with this beautiful girl in London. She really was gorgeous. Brunette with a mouth that can only be compared to that of Claire Forlani' (the essence of beauty). For those of you who have not yet found the image next to the word "beautiful" in the dictionary, she's the girl from the movie 'Meet Joe Black', featuring Brad Pittstonlie. I must just go on to say that, thinking about it, the girl in London is one of the most beautiful girls I have ever kissed in my life. I'm not sure what happened to her. Or to Beth, for that matter. Beth was so sweet. God, she was gorgeous.

Claire Forlani - has lookalikes who love elephants

So this girl in London, Angela, was a MASSIVE elephant fan. (Her real name is not Angela, I have changed it to protect her true identity, Helen). Come to think of it, she actually had an all-round resemblance to Claire Forlani. Not just her lips, her face too. I was really over the moon with myself.
So while I am kissing her in a lounge, at someone's home, somewhere along the Thames Whale Sanctuary; we somehow get onto the subject of elephants. I can't for the life of me remember HOW we got onto the subject, but we certainly did.

Angela (Helen) gave me a quick heads-up on the state of the Elephant Kingdom throughout the world. This obviously included the mistreatment of "the gentle giants" in certain parts of the world. (Her tears were welling up). We touched on stories of elephants being involved in actual miracles, as well as a stint reflecting on their great intelligence. Honestly, I am touched by these stories and I am a big elephant fan, but I'm just saying that I don't have a MAIN animal fan base that I am a part of. Angela clearly did; hers was elephants. I showed ENORMOUS interest, naturally.
So I was pretty much in my element - in the arms of one of the most beautiful girls I have ever kissed. But now she is on the verge of tears. I'll be honest, it's not ideal.

Angela recounted a story which involved a herd of elephant roaming somewhere along a desert plain of sorts. There was a severe drought and the herd of elephant, led by the Matriarch , had been walking for days. These stories always involve something that Man has done wrong. I'm thinking it was something along the lines of the watering holes being empty because of something that Man did. Something like that.

So the story went on. Elephants walking in the desert. Walking, walking walking. Starving. Thirsty. Struggling to walk. Baby elephant (calf) dies. Other elephants collapsing daily, randomly. They haven't had any liquid for WEEKS. Absolute carnage. (The tears are in full flow now. I have fetched some tissues from a nearby bedroom).

And then.......... the climax of the story...

THE MATRIARCH ELEPHANT STARTS CRYING AND THE YOUNGER, MORE DESPERATE ELEPHANTS, GATHER ROUND AND DRINK HER TEARS.






OH





MY






GOD

Angela is now sobbing uncontrollably in my arms. I am holding the most beautiful girl I have ever kissed in my arms, and she is in an ABSOLUTE STATE! I held her close to my chest and, rocking backwards and forwards with my head hung down over hers, (with lips pressed down against the top of her head in a perma-kiss, breathing through squashed nose), told her to "shhhhhhhhhhhhh....".

So that was the end of that. I collected my wingman somewhere else in the house and caught the first tube out of there.

FUCK!

(Sorry about that. I really never thought about getting into that story when I began this story. In fact, the real story was meant to be particularly short. The real story I wanted to do was about something I read in the Lifestyle Section of the Sunday Times.)

A herd of elephant

Back to the original story.... So the writer decides to introduce the team to us. These are the people who are going into the forest with her so she can do a story. She mentions Geoff Daglish, a photographer. Standard stuff for a story like this. But then she introduces elephant search guide and Sanparks forester, Hylton Herd.

HYLTON HERD

Whaaaah ! Like a herd of elephant! HYSTERICAL!

Do you know that she never made one mention about the hilarity of his surname in a story featuring animals which claim the same spelt word as their given collective noun! I just think it's rude to not make even the slightest mention of the coincidence. She could have even said something like, "I had heard of him before". Or, better yet, forced a spelling error and said, "I had herd of him before". ANYTHING!

She couldn't have NOT spotted it and she MUST have laughed about it on her own. Or is it possible that she didn't spot it? Surely not! You see, this is why she HAS TO mention it. Because to us, as the reader, it looks like she didn't spot it. Even if it is not meant to be a humorous story, something even remotely suggestive should be said. The context of the 'piece' is irrelevant. Otherwise you are one of two things, (A) Boring, or (B) Clueless. You could be both, mind. I don't like either, so I stopped reading the article and started writing this one.

Where did the day go?

Seth Rotherham
Editor
2oceansvibe.com
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