Still in the News: Elephant Poaching Continues

Friends and colleagues know that among Mr. Guy's favorite things in life (aside from his family, it goes without saying), elephants rank high up there, probably the result of his thrilling experiences living in Kenya and spending as much time as he could going off with his driver Charles to look for elephants. [More about that in the posts noted to the left, dating from late 2009 to early 2011, with one dating from January, 2014.]

No need to go into a lot of description here except to note that in Africa, according to the World Wildlife Fund, the splendid African elephant comes in two sub-species, the Savannah (or bush) elephant and the Forest elephant. I love them all, and I've decided that — for a gentle re-entry back into the world of "Sharing Guy's Journey" — I'll share a few elephant-related thoughts for those who join with me in thinking about this magnificent animal (which the WWF refers to as "the largest animal walking the Earth).

And a little later I'll get to telling some sweet stories to top up part of what I've told earlier (and encouraging anyone reading this to look back at my favorite elephant story about the old-lady elephant who came to mean so much to me).

But first I want to tackle a problem that seems to keep coming back. Despite a certain tendency toward some level of optimism over the last couple of decades or so, the news about elephant poaching continues to be bad. I'm not sure what's going on, but there is surely some lack of motivation, probably having to do with the times we're living in. We have the international situation with Syria and terrorism news from all over the world. Then there's the attention given to attempting to deal with some version of post-Brexit governance and in the United States we have distractions of what purports to be a political campaign.


So is it any wonder that this particular subject — which worries so many of us — is "out-of-bounds" for most media? Certainly we were all pleased to read about President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya repeating a poached-ivory burning ceremony originally performed in 1989, with an impressive monument later built to commemorate Kenya's President (at the time) Daniel arap Moi's burning of some 12 tons of elephant tusks. The monument (shown here) is a popular tourist site within Nairobi National Park, attracting visitors at all times of the year. And the poached-ivory burning ceremony was an action that seemed to have given new attention to changing global policy on exporting ivory. So this past April 30 President Kenyatta oversaw a similar ceremony, which National Geographic described as the destruction of 105 tons of elephant ivory and 1.35 tons of rhino horn, "the final remains," the National Geographic news service reported, "of some 6,500 elephants and 450 rhinos killed for their tusks and horns."

That's a very noble response to what is an amazing — in the literal sense of the word — endangered species destruction. But it is also troubling to think that an additional 105 tons of illegal ivory was confiscated between 1989 and 2016. To my way of thinking, it is almost inconceivable that as our society becomes more and more civilized (as we hope is happening) such damage occurs. I recently heard from a good friend who follows these things with more scholarly (and personal) background than I, that Avaaz — an apparently well-known global civic campaigning community — reports that "Every 15 minutes an elephant is brutally slaughtered for its tusks, and at this rate they will be gone forever in just a few years." The report from Avaaz goes on to state that "momentum is growing for a complete global ban on ivory" but notes sadly that the European Commission in a position paper released last month (according to The Guardian) has indicated that "rather than an all-encompassing ban it would be better to encourage countries with growing elephant numbers to 'sustainably manage' their populations."

Doesn't this seem like an odd response to a problem that is clearly recognized throughout many countries? Over the past couple of years, The New York Times has been running a very informative series of articles about elephant poaching and the dangers of extinction for this remarkable species (just search "elephant poaching" in The New York Times). I think all civilized peoples recognize that the elephant-poaching crisis is heartbreaking. Some 29 African governments have predicted mass extinction within 25 years unless a full-scale ban on any future domestic ivory trade is enacted. What possible reasons could there be — other than greed — to oppose a ban on the sale of ivory?

These are questions I'm not qualified to answer but that does not mean I don't think about them. And as I spend a little more time thinking about elephants in future blog posts (happier stories I promise) this sad situation has to be kept in mind. It was aviatrix Beryl Markham, in West with the Night, who provides us with a closing thought for today for this subject:

"It is absurd for a man to kill an elephant. It is not brutal, it is not heroic, and certainly it is not easy; it is just one of those preposterous things that men do...."

Preliminary Thoughts about Mr. Guy's Elephant "Infatuation" (and Some Preliminary Photos)

Despite the first post (yesterday) referencing the FOGs/FOAs safari, I realize now that I didn't give any "preview" for what the later posts might include.

I wrote that one of the purposes of the safari was not only to experience the Great Migration with my friends, but to also share with them Mr. Guy's great infatuation for the African elephant. So it seems appropriate to send along a link to some of the photos, a "preview" you might say, to what I hope to share on this blog. If you would like to see the photographs, go to 2013 Preliminary Safari Photos here.

And my friends seem to agree that infatuation is probably the best word to describe my enthusiasm for these magnificent creatures. Indeed, at the birthday luncheon, this excerpt from Karen Blixen's Out of Africa was shared, and I came away with a new nickname.

In this section of the book (1937), Blixen writes about the value of the opinions of white visitors/expatriates, the value that is found, as she put it, by the Natives "in their mythological or theological mentality":

.... The Europeans have lost the faculty for building up myths or dogma, and for what we want of these we are dependent upon the supplies of our past. But the mind of the African moves naturally and easily upon such deep and shadowy paths. This gift of theirs comes out strongly in their relations with white people.

You find it already in the names which they deal out to the Europeans with whom they come in contact, after a very short acquaintance. You have got to know these names if you are to send a runner with letters to a friend, or find the way in a car to his house, for the Native world knows him by no other names.
...

And there is magic in words: a person who has for many years been known by the name of an animal in the end comes to feel familiar with and related to the animal, he recognizes himself in it. When he is back in Europe [back in America?] it is strange to him to feel that no one ever connects him with it.

Once, in the London Zoo, I saw again an old retired Government Official, whom in Africa I had known as Bwâna Tembu - Mr. Elephant. He was standing, all by  himself, before the Elephant-House, sunk in deep contemplation of the Elephants. Perhaps he would go there often. His Native servants would have thought it in the order of things that he should be there, but probably no one in all London, except I who was there only for a few days, would have quite understood him.

So perhaps I am beginning to think of myself as Bwâna Tembu, as my friends seem to be doing. However, as one Kenyan friend pointed out, Blixen's spelling appears to be incorrect, since tembu is the Ki-Swahili word for "beer." The word for elephant is tembo (confirmed in the online English/Swahili dictionary). Even though I would like to have my new nickname spelled as Karen Blixen spelt it, Blixen seems to have been mistaken. Or - more likely - perhaps that's how the word was spelled in 1937 by expatriates living in Nairobi.

Please join me in enjoying the 2013 Preliminary Safari Photos.

Flat Stanley Goes to Kenya (4): Masai Mara Game Reserve

Masai Mara is one of the most famous game reserves in the world, a great place for a flat boy who wants to see some of the wild animals he has read about. I've had two previous adventures in Masai Mara, so I was pretty excited when I was going to be visiting the game reserve again with my partner. The others joining our big safari will be with us later, but for this visit it's just Andrew and me and Charles (our wonderful driver and good friend).

There's much to see and do, and the whole Masai Mara idea just seems to cry out to be shared with someone else (and so as not to repeat, if anyone wants to read about my earlier visits, go to the posts for my first trip to Masai Mara in May, 2010 and the migration safari, written about in September - see links to the left).

I'm a great fan of the famous (and well-managed) Sopa Lodges in Kenya, and Andrew and I opted to use them for this trip. One reason of course might have to do with my great love of the elephants, which the Sopa Lodge folks seem to share. Their decorators include images of elephants in the lobby's wall decorations, giving Flat Stanley and me an appropriate background for our first Masai Mara photo op.

One of the reasons why Masai Mara is so well-regarded is the variety of wildlife. Some claim that lion sightings are almost guaranteed, and perhaps that's so, since we had pretty good luck seeing the lions.These were resting in the sun when we first spotted them, and they were not at all concerned about having a vehicle stop nearby for some photographs. I continue to be intrigued with how docile lions can be when they are not hungry and looking for food. They really are just great big cats, perfectly content to lie in the sun and observe what's going on around them or, with most of them, just sleep the afternoon away.

We also were very lucky with many other animals as well, and Flat Stanley had a good introduction to wildebeests (which I don't think we have in America), hippos, the African buffalo, and all sorts of other animals and birds, including topi, gazelle, eland, and the ostrich and the kori busturd. There are plenty of zebras, great herds of them, and they make a pretty impressive picture when seen from a distance. The zebras, too, don't seem to mind when they are close to the track and a van or 4X4 comes by and stops so the visitors can have a better look.


At Masai Mara we got to see plenty of elephants which pleased me and, I'm happy to say, pleased Andrew and Charles and Flat Stanley as well. The African bush elephant is definitely my favorite animal now, and there's just something about their grace and their huge size that intrigues me. They are very social animals and it is always interesting to watch them moving about in groups and try to figure out what the relationships are. The bulls are often off by themselves, but not always, and as friends and I found out when we was on the migration safari, bulls can be extremely possessive parents.


While at Masai Mara, we had the good fortune to have Tomas as our guide. A member of the Maasai community, Tomas had been our guide when Charles and I visited in May, and it was Tomas who arranged for us to visit a Maasai manyatta, the family compound where he and his relatives live. He took Charles and me there on the previous safari, and he agreed to take Andrew and Charles and Flat Stanley and me there this time. It was a pretty exciting trip, and not only did we and Flat Stanley get a chance to go inside a Maasai hut, the men and women of the community danced for us, demonstrating some of the ritual dances that have become almost a trademark for the Maasai.

The men of the Maasai community are easily recognized by the brightly colored toga-like wrap they wear, the shuka (also now one of the cheapest and most popular souvenirs a visitor can bring home from Kenya). They color their hair with henna, giving it sometimes a rust-colored tint, and they wear a great deal of jewelry, both metal and beaded jewelry. They measure their wealth in the number of children they have and, perhaps as important, the number of cows (they don't use our plural word "cattle"), with a man not being considered wealthy unless he has at least 50 cows. The manyatta is not only the family compound, for at night when the cows are brought in from where they've been taken to graze during the day, it becomes their home for the night, shared with the people living there.

Africa: The Migration (3) - Our Safari and Our First Elephants

The Best Four took off for Masai Mara to see the migration, and we were hardly out of the campsite and into the game reserve before we were amazed at the numbers of wildebeests, zebras, and other migrating animals that had made their way to this magnificent grassland. We were immediately excited, and expected to spend quite some time driving around looking at all the animals that had come looking for food (and yes, probably more than those two-and-a-half million talked about by the experts), but we had an immediate distraction. And our first adventure.

When my pal Tom Rink read my first post about the up-coming safari to see the migration, he had written: "I think this would be awesome to witness, but don't get too close!"

So guess what we did on our first afternoon. We got too close!

Okay. Perhaps we are a little over-awed about elephants, and I'm happy to admit that of all the animals I see, it's the elephants that sort of win my heart. So even though we weren't particularly looking for elephants as we moved into Masai Mara in the mid-afternoon, Mr. Charles - elephant-spotter extraordinaire that he is - had hardly driven twenty minutes before he suddenly turned off the road, off the tracks, and was moving slowly and carefully down toward a gully and up the other side. He admonished us to be quiet and as we drove across the grass (now very short - unlike the visit last May, when it was shoulder-high, the grass now having been "mowed" by the many wildebeests and others who had come north looking for it), it was obvious we were heading for something special.

Charles got us back on another track and we moved - still as quietly as we could move - up the hill to what he had spotted: as you can see in the first photo at Migration Safari - Our First Elephants, we saw - we thought - a single elephant munching away at some green branches in the bush.

So we drove a little closer, turned off the engine to watch a while, and we were surprised to discover that it was not just one big bull elephant but apparently a group. It had been a trick of the light and the placement of their enormous bodies that had tricked us into thinking it was just one elephant, so not wanting to disturb them, we switched the engine on again and began to move slowly on the track (you can see how close we got in the photo showing the track).

It was then that we realized we had perhaps made a pretty serious mistake. At this point Mr. Elephant began to look up at us, not pleased with our being so near, and as we looked to the right, that big brown blob - which we had assumed was a rock or a big tree or something (we obviously had not paid any attention to it) was in fact a young elephant. We were suddenly not too happy to be there, and as Charles put the vehicle into reverse, we saw that Mr. Elephant wasn't very happy either, and he was moving in our direction. Those elephants milling about behind him - which we had first thought were just him alone - were in fact his family. For all we knew Mrs. Elephant was there as well and who knows how many other young ones - perhaps from other families as well - were there in that herd. We tried to move away gently, and we were really frightened now, for Mr. Elephant was clearly moving in our direction. In fact he was getting pretty close, but I couldn't resist one last zoom shot - determined as always (and foolishly I now realize) to try for one memorable picture.

It was memorable all right, and muttering to ourselves about all the stories we had heard about how fast an elephant can move - and remembering that we had (accidentally, to be sure) broken one of the inviolate rules of game by coming too close to a parent's little one - we got away as fast as we could. We other three kept looking back while Charles drove across the grassland, gradually picking up speed until we got past the ravine and up the other side. Now we could see that Daddy Elephant had turned around and gone back to join his family, so we felt safe, and we all promised not to get too close for the rest of the safari.