Toe in the Water

Elephants

Elephants

People seem to like elephants. I can’t speak much about the Indian ones, but the African elephants scare the bejabers out of me. Having spent a quarter of a century in Africa, I have seen and been close to (literally, not emotionally) many elephants. And those fellers are scary, believe me.

It’s all very well to think them cute and cosy when you’re in Europe or the new world, but the reality of them is something else. For a start, they are huge. They are the only animal that can kill you even if you’re in a car. All they have to do is sit on it.

You might think that elephants have delightful placid temperaments and they won’t hurt you if you don’t harm them. Don’t be fooled. These guys are nasty, extremely bad tempered, and are happy to go out of their way to squash you. I have seen a mother elephant with a calf object to my presence from half a mile away. She covered that distance in far too short a time for my comfort and it is only the fact that a car is slightly faster than an elephant that I lived to tap out the tale on this keyboard.

Perhaps the worst of it is that they understand perfectly just how easily they can give us heart attacks. Many times I have been idling along, minding my own business, only to have an elephant step out from his hiding place in the bush to trumpet his presence in my ear from a few yards. When you have to look up to see his face and his ears are flapping like giant windmills, there is only one thing to do - get out of the vicinity pretty damn quickly.

It’s true that most of the time elephants will ignore humans, especially when they’re in a herd. But watch out for the lone ones, the ones who seem to have a grudge against anything that moves. There are plenty of them and they’re completely unpredictable.

So don’t tell me your favourite animal is the elephant. What you mean is that you like the nice grey jumbo in the cartoons that are incapable of harming a mouse (frightened of mice, that’ll be the day). The real ones are the most terrifying creatures in Africa.

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