This is an elephants foot. It tells the story of many miles travelled. I used to do a lot of complaining about the condition of elephants feet as when they walk to far and to hard they get smooth like an overused car tire. Many a time we have not been able to afford new tires for our charities cars and motobikes and have slid and skidded about in the mud and caught more nails than normal. In the end though we have found the money and have brought new wheels. However you cannot really do that with an elephant and in the end their feet become smooth and tell the story of the roads, trails and every stone, nail and piece of glass trodden on. The pressure from the tourism industry to supply elephants each and every day is incredible. Owners of elephants can earn 5 to 6 times a normal daily income to carry a pair of tourists a number kilometres down the road and back again and many elephants in Cambodia do this every single day. Our calls to have a break, slow down, rest your elephant and NOT lets it feet become smooth like this often fall on deaf ears as the calls to earn more money and keep on walking are 5 to 6 times more persuasive. An overworked elephant shows other signs too; dehydration, loss of muscle tone, loss of muscle mass and a general listlessness that soon makes them ignore even the most severe beating. In the end they just give up, they sit down and refuse to move, if they can get back up they slowly walk away and look for some food and water, if not they roll over and wait to dies. 10 days ago I went with Chan, our research guy and Hier, our vet, to help lift up an elephant called Gee Chan, in a village called Pulong. 5 days before she had arrived she had been carrying tourists on her back to the village waterfall, she was tired, thin and her foot hurt from a bad infection. After a while she sat down and gave up, refusing to move another foot. The mahout got scared and the tourists got off of her and took off her basket. After a while she got up and moved off, but her owner found her the next day and tied her to some bamboo near a river, but not close enough to drink water. We tried to winch her up and over and get her on her feet but she was just not interested. She lasted two more days and died a week ago. Her owners, to their credit, did a full Bunong Ceremony and buried her in the forest rather than cash in her skin, meat and bones as many an owner has done in the past. It was then, when I looked at her skinny, small dying body, slowly giving up on life that I saw her feet and took a photo. A photo of these large smooth feet that showed the signs of many miles travelled. Elephants do not belong in captivity they belong in the wild.
Posted on: Tue, 04 Mar 2014 08:58:07 +0000
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