February 23, 1999, Tuesday, sunny,
13-28C
[12:02 @ Rm., 111, Kanha Jungle Lodge]
Today,
the lodge will be a beehive of activities.
First
of course is the panchayat meeting.
Faiyaz has been off with Tirath as of 08:00 to pick up the panchayat
leaders, due to arrive around 13:30.
But before he left, he told Anne he may have chosen the wrong day, since
today is market day, and some panchayat members may not come and those who do
may not be able to stay very long.
We’ll have to see how it goes.
Right now, Anne has volunteered to take charge of the solar oven
demonstration by cooking one pot of rice in the solar oven, set to start around
13:00. We have also set up the solar
reflector in the parking lot near the clinic, just to give them an idea of what
can be done. The slideshow is scheduled
for about 5 pm. By then, hopefully, the
voltage converter and the slides will have arrived.
Second
lodge activity is the arrival of about 20 American tourists, mostly older
people, led by one Mr. Harris, tour operator.
The rooms will largely be all occupied.
We’ll show them the Champions video tomorrow evening and the slideshow
the evening after that.
Third,
but not least, is the return of Kim.
[22:49] A momentous day, about as satisfying a campaigning day as any
I’ve experienced. Anne said afterwards,
“This is the most successful day so far in India.” The superlative is well deserved, even factoring in the heady
days in Delhi and Jaipur, and the tiger-sighting days in the park.
There
were several kinks due to our inexperience, such as keeping the panchayats
waiting 10 minutes after they arrived, the slide projector being locked in the
clinic waiting room and the key could not be found, poor food served to the
panchayats, no calendar for planning, Anne leaving her notebook in her room,
etc., but nothing that could touch the day’s essential excellence.
Faiyaz
did arrive around 13:30, with 7 panchayat members. Between 13:45 and 14:50, I chatted with them via Faiyaz’s very
capable verbal translations. I myself
could read their body language without translation, and all showed
understanding and agreement, with frequent positive feedback. Anne took copious notes and Christopher
video documented the proceedings until towards the end when the Hi8 cam began
to act up a little due to overheating.
We
started with a round of self-introductions for the panchayats. They were:
Jaitpuri
panchayat (4 villages)
–
Mrs. Dhanmat Dhurve, sarpanch (head of
panchayat)
Mr.
Budh Singh Dhurve, ward member
Paundi
panchayat (4 villages)
- Mr. Bagas Ram Mohne, ward member
Mr.
Saheblal Bhardwaj, village elder
And
three others. So that’s 8 villages out
of 178.
On
our side Faiyaz had laid solid ground for me, since their attitude towards me
was one of deference and respect.
Faiyaz said it was all due to my media folder, which spoke for itself
and for me, and which he now upholds like “the Bible”, as Chris L. put it.
Then,
I asked for their grievances, which were: no irrigation, too few schools
requiring kids to walk up to 10 km one way on country roads or paths, no roads
between villages of the same panchayat, no compensation for livestock lost to
predators and for crops lost to wild grazers, lower compensation for villagers
than for urbanites who lost their lives to various unnatural causes, inadequate
government actions, unfulfilled government promises (is this Canada here?),
etc.. To these I said that I would do
what I can to help them, by presenting their case to the right people, and by
persuading the park to raise the gate charge by 10 fold and have 50% of the
increased revenue go to the villagers as per Chitwan. I may have impressed upon them the long established tenet that
the tiger is worth more to them alive than dead, and the park would benefit
them more intact than destroyed. One
villager returned to the chital-eating-crop problem, to which I replied that we
could help him introduce alternative crops, like orange, that chitals don’t
eat, and that the tigers eat chitals and are therefore their allies. Much much more - see video tape.
At
14:55, we led them out to the parking lot to view the solar oven and the solar
mirror. Anne opened the oven before
their eyes, and revealed a pot of rice cooked better than even the kitchen rice
we’ve been served – by far the best cooked rice the solar oven had ever
cooked. The woman’s touch? We shared it with the panchayat people in
an afternoon snack. There can be no
doubting the usefulness of the tool in the eyes of the villagers. We then returned to the school room for
further discussions. One villager asked
whether the oven can be used in the rainy season, which showed that he had
accepted the idea for the dry season. I
replied that India has 9-10 dry months, versus Vancouver’s 4-5, and is ideal
for solar technology. The other 2-3
months? They could use biogas or, what
the hell, burn wood.
At
16:00, we went into the park. Since
there were 7 of them, we took two Gypsies, the old one driven by Chris L. and
the new one by me. Faiyaz came with me,
and the new Chris went with Chris L to enjoy his first excursion into Kanha
National Park, with Tirath serving as guide in their vehicle.
After
entering the gate, Faiyaz told me that the gate guard was grumbling that Faiyaz
put me and Chris at the wheels, both being foreigners, for the purpose of
saving money, since drivers do not need to pay the park entrance fee, and the
gate fee for foreigners is ten times higher than that for Indians (which means
that Indian tourists staying at the Jungle Lodge pay a ridiculous C$0.25 to get
into the park, while paying Pradeep US$200 per day to stay at Jungle
Lodge). I responded by insisting that
on our way back out, we should pay the fees.
When it was done, it was received with surprise and appreciation.
None
of the villagers has ever entered the park before and they had an eye-popping
good time, enthralled by the very wildness of it, even by the chital that they
otherwise loath for plundering their crops.
Faiyaz said something beautiful and profound: “I want them to fall in
love with the park, even with the chital.”
We
returned to the lodge at about 18:00.
When I parked the Gypsy back in the roofed parking spot behind the
kitchen, Mr. Jharia, the forest conservator, was there waiting for me, and had
been waiting since about 17:30. I
apologized, explained, then took him to the parking lot to view the solar
devices. Soon after that the power came
back on, and, with the very efficient translation of Faiyaz, rapid-fire
sentence for sentence, I gave the tiger slideshow without much
modification. Anne’s free school
children were there in the front row.
The whole room was pin-drop quiet.
When it was over, Jharia gave the most appreciative smile I have ever
seen, which Faiyaz interpreted as “He was amazed by the receptiveness of the
panchayat members.”
Yesterday,
during a pre-event chat between Tarun, Faiyaz and the rest of us, there was a
lot of concern and apprehension about the reaction of the panchayat, given
their long standing antagonism to the tiger, the park and officialdom. I don’t know what I did for officialdom, but
I certainly undid huge knots in their hostility to the tiger and the park, and
further, implanted positive feelings in them for what they now have begun to
regard as their potential benefactors. Tarun
was too busy to attend the show, but whatever doubt in Faiyaz’s mind has been
dispelled. Tirath was given to drive
the panchayaters back to their villages.
At
one point in the meeting, Faiyaz had to run back to the lodge to get his
calendar to set a date with the panchayaters for the conference. He was told by Tarun, “Don’t decide on
anything without having first asked Pradeep.”
I said that I would to go right ahead to decide, since it would
be extremely troublesome to decide later, then go for a day’s drive to inform
them subsequently. We settled for March
23rd. I’ve already tried
calling Pradeep numerous times, and he hadn’t been around any of those
times. I’ve done my part. If he does not help, at least he should not
hinder.
At
one point, while walking the path towards the free school to meet the
panchayaters, Anne said that she was very demoralized by Pradeep’s
attitude.
I
said, “The important thing is what we’re doing, not what Pradeep is not
doing. What do you think of our
panchayat conference plan?”
Anne
said, “Totally fine.”
“Then
things are totally fine.”
She
brightened up in time for the panchayats.
This
evening, I was introduced to a VIP – the Collector (a curious title, but the
top brass in the district). He had
authority over many things, including the park. His long-standing main concern is the antagonism on the part of
the villagers against the park. We had
an amicable social chat around the fire pit, then agreed that while his parents
go into the park in the morning, we will have breakfast together at 09:00 and
talk in depth.
So,
Kim is back. We hugged when she got off
the jeep. Tarun pulled his practical
joke about putting her into Rm. 111 (mine), given the lodge being full, and two
reactions from the ladies: Anne showed spontaneous disapproval, but after only
a casual “Are you serious?”, Kim said, “No problem.” The rest roared with laughter.
I joked that I had planned the stunt with Tarun to see what her reaction
would be. Kim didn’t know what to
believe. In fact, she was given Rm.
115, but was later pulled from it into Anne’s room for one night. Around, 23:15, while I was standing with
Tarun and Faiyaz planning tomorrow’s activities, she came to join us in her
pajamas.
Tarun
and Faiyaz had some disagreements regarding vehicular use. As expected, Tarun said that the Tiger Trust
team would have no vehicle to use tomorrow.
I said to hire a vehicle from an outside source, that TT’s CIDA budget
would cover it. “I’m here to work, not
to wait.” Tarun lapsed into Hindi and
Faiyaz followed suit. After a stretech,
I said, “Gentlemen, please use English.
What you’re discussing concerns me.
I’m a part of the planning process.”
Tarun at once acquiesced, and said, quite respectfully, that I would
have a vehicle to use tomorrow, at least as of noon.
Later
I had chai with Kim and along the way she filled me in on Bandhavgarh.
In
a lull between intense activities, Chris said to me, “I wonder how high we
human beings can go.”
“How
high? In what?”
“Since
the termite mounds cannot form multi-mound civilizations, nor can the bee hives
form multi-hive civilizations, the social insects cannot integratively
transcend higher than the Tribal Level of Organization. There is a transcendence limit to the
termites and the bees, and that is on the Tribal level. So, I’m wondering if for all species there
is a transcendence limit for our species, and if so, what level it would be.”
“Let’s hope that the transcendence limit of Homo sapiens is not on merely the National Level of Organization, or else, the Transcendental Integration of our planet Earth would never happen,” said Anne.
“What
do you think, Anthony?” ask Faiyaz.
“I
believe that we do have a transcendence limit.
This limit is determined by the remaining life span of our species. And whether the genus Homo can exceed this
limit or not will depend on the potential and kinetics of our descendent
species,” I said.
“So,
the key for our species to integratively transcend as high as possible is to
survive long enough to give rise to descendent species?” said Faiyaz.
“May
your transcendence limit be in the realm of the stars,” said
Raminothna.