Friday, April 2, 2010

Neighbour V/S Neighbourhood

This is yet another of my neighbours.



She stays a little away on the other side of the main road and advertises her address thus.


She is employed in a spice farm near my house which happens to be a tourist destination. Her job is to remain lying half submerged in a stream in front of a board which says “Give bath to elephant – take bath from elephant – Rs 200." ‘Foreign’ tourists, for whom a trip to India is not complete without an elephant, part with Rs 200, apart from an entry fee of Rs 500, with pleasure and pour buckets of water from the stream over her. She in turn sprays water on them from her trunk.
Her keepers scout around Ponda for her food and when they spot an edible tree, cut it up to feed her. Today was the turn of the jackfruit tree in front of our house. One of them was cutting the tree while she stood in the shade of my garage and had a bath from my hose for a change.


Then she had her lunch and carried the packed dinner on her back.


In the process, my neighbourhood which looked like this


before her lunch, looked like this afterwards.


This neighbour is eating up my neighbourhood.

No comments: