Elephant Riding and Buddha Birthing

I have officially passed the half way point of my trip, and like a good all-you-can-eat buffet, it’s only once you are “half way” done that things start to get interesting.

So, I present to you a buffet of interesting things I have done recently.

Royal Chitwan National Park:

It was time to leave the horn-honking capital of the world, Kathmandu, and venture south to the Royal Chitwan National Park, located in the Terai region of Nepal. In the eyes of devout Nepal tourists (whose bible is the Lonely Planet guide book) there are certain things one must do in order to have “done” Chitwan properly. To receive your Chitwan Boy Scout Badge, you must visit the elephant breeding center, go on a canoe ride, take a jungle walk, see elephants being bathed, ride an elephant, and see a cultural dance show. If you miss even one of these attractions, then “ooooh boy, you missed out on the beeest part, what a shame, you are going to burn for eternity, blah blah blah.” Lucky for me, and my soul, I did all of the above… PLUS MORE! (I got sick and lost my voice.)

Me and my pet elephant skull

The elephant breeding center is accessible only by canoe, and one must walk through a field of grazing water buffalo who seem less interested in you, and more interested in their grassy meal which is growing out of a perpetually replenished supply of fecal waste. Before seeing the elephants, we took a brief visit to the center’s museum which proudly displays an elephant skull (~ In the 80s, the elephants tried to unionize, so a park ranger cut off the biggest elephant’s head ~) as well as a photograph of a man riding an elephant, as the elephant rides another elephant. Unfortunately, the breeding center itself is not nearly as exciting as the museum makes it out to be. There are a number of mother elephants chained to posts (they sometimes receive congenial vists by a male elephant from the forest) surrounded by a baby elephants who run around freely and are harassed by camera-touting tourists, like yours truly.

Marsh Mugger

We took a canoe ride down the Rapti River in a handmade canoe (because footmade canoes do not exist) and along the way we saw many exotic winged-creatures, called birds, as well as a really nasty-looking crocodile called a Marsh Mugger. Interestingly, the British borrowed the word ‘mugger’ after seeing Marsh Muggers in India drag villagers into the water. I know this because the crocodiles are really proud and tell everyone.

After the canoe ride ended, the jungle walk began. Before entering the jungle, we were given a preparatory speech about how to handle the wild animals if we come face-to-face with them. The advice ranged from the cowardly (“if you see a tiger, scream”) to the more cowardly (“if you see an elephant, run.”) I was interested to learn that rhinos can run 40 km/h, so “if you see a rhino, run 41 km/h.” Unfortunately, the only wildlife we saw were thousands of little red beetles which scurry around everywhere, and only pose a threat during hunting season when they carry shotguns.

Red is his gang color.

Halfway through the jungle walk, which had less wildlife than my hotel room, we were engulfed in a monsoon rain. I threw my camera into a ziplock bag, and spent the next hour walk-swimming (kind of like the exercises you see 80-year-olds doing in public pools.) There was a bottle neck of stranded tourist groups on the bank of the river, waiting to be rescued by canoes.  There were some characters moaning things like, “I can’t believe how wet I am,” and “I’ve never been so wet before in my life.” These fools have obviously never bathed properly. To be honest, as long as my camera was safe, I did not mind the rain. I prefer rain to be falling out of the sky, then say, forks or tasers.

A cricket the size of a mouse...as seen from the outside of a hotel mug

All I will say about “elephant bathing” is that it should be renamed, “pay to be tossed off of an elephant’s back, as onlookers laugh with glee.” I was one of the ones laughing with glee.

When I was in Kenya, I did a safari in a jeep. Today, I can say I have also done a safari on the back of an elephant. Hell, I may even put it on my resume. Essentially, a bunch of tourists come together, and divide up into groups of four. Big elephants come out, with their driver sitting on their neck (commanding the elephants by speaking some sort of cryptic elephant language, pushing the elephants ears with their feet, and conking the elephants on the head with a big stick. Seriously. Our driver was able to navigate the elephant, tell the elephant to knock down trees, command the elephant to run…), and the four tourists cram into a little box on the elephants back. While sitting in a small box, strapped to a bouncing elephants back, with three other people was not very comfortable, I cannot imagine that having a box strapped to my back, with four people in it, and a guy sitting on my neck kicking my ears and hitting me on the head with a stick, would be a prance through Happyland, either. Yet, it was a fun trip. We saw some rhinos, who we succeeded in scaring the hell out of by surrounding them with four to seven elephants, and sixteen to twenty-eight camera-strapped tourists. Supposedly there was a tiger, too. All I saw was a pair of legs, which looked like a deer, slipping into the forest. It could have been Dolly Parton for all I know.

Nope....not a tourist in sight.

As for the cultural dance show… We watched traditional Tharu dances, which were entertaining. We clapped. Some tourists were invited onto the stage to flop around like nearly-asphyxiated fish.

Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha:

After Chitwan, I ventured west to Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha. I would have expected Lumbini to be more of a tourist attraction, but on the two buses from Chitwan, there was only one other tourist and the rest were local people just riding the bus, as local people will do. On the first bus, a man brought on three crates of baby chickens. Just riding the bus, as baby chickens will do. On the second bus, there was no room inside, so I rode on top of the bus and worked on my gripping abilities. This experience reminded me that in life, we seldom ride “on” the bus (or “on” the airplane for that matter. As George Carlin said, “let Evil Knievel ride on the plane, I am riding in the plane. There seems to be a little less wind in here.)

On the bus to Lumbini

I was also surprised to find that aside from the massive park containing the Maya Devi Temple (the birthplace of the Buddha), as well as many beautifully ornate monasteries, there is not much to see, or do, in Lumbini. However, I gather from the stares I receive, that the circus is in town.

It is said that Maya Devi, a princess from Devdaha and the soon-to-be Buddha’s mother, had a dream about an elephant and upon waking, took a bath in a pond. She came out of the pond and began to feel labor pains. As she gripped a sal tree, she gave birth to Gautama Siddhartha, who would later become the Buddha. After entering the world, the Buddha took seven steps (each producing a lotus flower) and uttered something profound. Ironically, the birth of the Buddha was very similar to my own, except my mother spent the night before the birth sleeping in a bed covered in sandbox sand, and after I was born, I just screamed. Maybe I was preparing for the tigers I would meet some day on a jungle walk.

Anyways, I woke up early one morning, rented a “bicycle” (calling that death trap a bicycle is like calling Laffy-Taffy a suspension bridge), and spent four hours riding around the massive complex (a park with many temples/monasteries, a central canal, a crane sanctuary.) Most of the monasteries are really quite amazing, and my descriptions cannot do the architectural beauty justice, so please look at the pictures.

It is hot in Lumbini, and when I say that I sweated during my tour of the area, I mean I SWEATED. I was riding over fairly flat ground the whole time, but the heat had me producing enough salt water to soak all of the karpas at all of the Passover seders in Brooklyn. This was a sweat which would make even Lance Armstrong call it quits. I would say that I have never sweated so much before in my life, but one flashback to running the mile in elementary school P.E. would disprove that statment. There is a chance that the immense loss of water would have killed me, seeing as the opportunity to buy clean water was far and nill, yet thanks to two wells, one generous janitor, and my SteriPen, I am alive.

The Peace Bell

Me and my pet elephant skull

Marsh Mugger

Red is his gang color.

Bathing elephants/tossing tourists

Nope….not a tourist in sight.

A cricket the size of a mouse…as seen from the outside of a hotel mug

On the bus to Lumbini

A final thought for all of you unemployed folks who have too much internet-browsing time on your hands (or is it the employed who spend too much time browsing the internet? Another case for the Boxcar Kids to solve….) I have enjoyed my time outside of Kathmandu, as I am meeting many fellow tourists. While in Kathmandu, I primarily spent time with Nepalis, so have had very little opportunity to swap stories with my fellow traveler (or culture-destroyer, depending on who you ask.) In Chitwan, I braved the jungle with a Spanish teacher from Chicago, an Indian whom everyone confuses for a South American, and a Serbian girl whose name sounded like “dragon.” Coming to Lumbini, I traveled with an Indian-born woman who has a very philosophical tongue, and an eye for architecture. Never before have a heard so much disdain for concrete. I also met a pair of travelers who spend half the year working and half the year traveling on pennies.

I am in an internet cafe in a town called Tansen. They are blasting Creed over the speakers… a sure sign it is time to sign out.

Tomorrow to Pokhara…

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