AANA (ELEPHANT)PART1 Dear friends,
Recently I read a lot of information about elephantsin whatsApp. In some North Indian states of India it is common nowadays to mateelephants and also help them in delivery. In Assam many homes have elephantsdomesticated like cow and oxen. Size of elephants is comparatively smallerthere. African elephants are larger than Asian elephants. I saw in whatsApppicture how easily share autos cunningly moved and tourist buses waited faraway from elephants waiting for their vacating road on the way to Moonnar.Passengers were keeping quiet without showing their face outside buses. Surelymany making frightened voice. In 2017, on a tour to Moonnar from Pollachi afterattending a wedding there, for caution the driver informed how we should be inthe car if the elephants blocked the road. My wife scared and asked – Is thereno other route to go to Moonnar? Driver said- There is a route from Ernakulam,which is still more frequented by elephants. He said, he would follow some lorry, and it was safersince elephant would try to harm lorry if at all it is of harming nature.Really I was also scared, but did not show it outside. Half the interest ingoing to Moonnar lost by driver’s caution. Fortunately no elephant came to roadin our trip either way. My son, daughter in law and daughter calmed my wife,telling nothing would happen. On return trip driver showed a group of elephantsstanding about 300 metersaway in a location. I do not how I developed interest in wooden elephantsafter I came to Trivandrum on transfer. I had at least 20 wooden elephants ofdifferent sizes kept in the show case. I kept one male, one female and one infant;remaining I gave to guests. Thinking still larger one is required; my son gottwo wooden elephants with all adorns for the new home in Chennai. Whenever a woodenwork is there in my home, I ask the carpenter to polish the wooden elephants. About two years back or so I read in an iyer home in Palghat, an elephant idolis made to the real size is installed in the entrance, made in RCC and paintedblack-grey. Stomach portion made as hollow inside during RCC work. It was also adorned with “Nettipattam”. Isaved the image in my laptop. I searched whether there was any posting on elephantsby me earlier. There was one dated 16-12-2012, with lot of responses. Importantresponses were from Sri Venkatraman Perinthalmanna, Sri Subramoniam Kaipullymatam and Sri TNC Rangarajan. This is a fully edited version of the old posting,with some information deleted, and many information added. Hope an interestingreading. Sincerely, Gopala Krishnan 07-02-2022. 1. REFERANCE TO ELEPHANTSEVEN BEFORE TRETHA YUGA. It is stated during the churning of milky ocean, amongvarious things appeared, one was a WHITE ELEPHANT. It was named EIRAVATHAM andLord INDRA took it for him. Since it has been differentiated as white elephant,there would have been gray or black elephants even earlier. We have reference to the elephant in Dwaparayuga, SreeKrishna, killing an elephant by name KUVALAYAPADA. Also there was an elephants wing in the Mahabharatha war. Even beforeyugas in the legend ofMahaganapathi, a head of a lying elephant was cut and added to the childcreated by Parvathi, to give him life, after killed by Lord Siva. Hence thechild became GAJANANA. 2. SIZE OF ANELEPHANT. We have many animals in the world. If we create a listabout the body size of animals, after a gradual increase, there is a sudden peak inincrease for Elephants. This has made me to think about some other animals,which has faced extinction in the world. 2A. MY CHART OFANIMAL SIZES. From my basiczoological interest- 1. Animals like Rabbit, Jackal, Cat, Dog, and Monkey-gradually increase in size. 2. Animals like Tiger, Lion, Goats, Ass, Deer, Cow,Buffalo, - gradually increase in size from Monkey. 3. Animals like Horse, Rhinos, Camel, and Giraffe -gradually increase in size from Buffalo. If we make a comparison, the height is graduallyincreasing among the animals. The body width is not so much in increasingproportion. Now coming to the elephant, size of body and height are muchmore than camel or Giraffe. 3. ATTRACTIVESPECIAL FEATURES OF THE ELEPHANT. No other animal has a nose as long and flexible as thetrunk of the elephant. Further the trunk also assists in eating food. But thetrunk is heavy. Recently on a Pondichery tour with family, we visited theManakkula vinayagar temple. The small elephant in front of the temple wasblessing devotees. I showed my head after keeping 10-00 rupees in its trunk.Cash was collected by the mahout and elephant blessed me with its trunk keepingon my head. It was as if keeping about 3 kg weight on head. It is said the elephant does not know the real sizeand strength it has very sharp in intelligence. The animal obeys the controlsby mahout unless it is in heat. I was listening to a documentary on it a fewdays back. It automatically likeshearing and obeys some words, which has no meanings like ISATTI AANAE. Similarly if a stick is placed on the feet,it would not move forward. The elephant can stand more time comparing to otheranimals. Elephants wag their large ears to reduce the heat. Ifthe ear is folded, the elephant is told on heat. One of the information Ireceived from member Sri VenkatRaman. There is a difference in the growth of tusks. There ismore growth in the males comparing to she elephants. The she elephants do havegrowth called “THEATTA”. Both male and female African elephants have tusks. While other animals are sensitive to touch the hornseven after domestication, elephants are not so sensitive. Whatever be our liking, a cow does not likeus to touch its horns. Further elephants cannot jump; bend more its body topass through lanes. The eyes of the elephant are LEAST PROPORTIONAL to thebody. I have imagined, if the eyes are more proportionate and bigger, howterrible the animal would have been to look at. Though such a big animal, it is sensitive to a smallcreature, the ants. A group of ants entering in nose can kill such anelephant!!! 4. ELEPHANT SLEEP The elephant sleeps for smaller duration after about 2PM in the night. At that time, it lies down, folds its trunk and keeps insidethe mouth. 5. THE COLOUR OFELEPHANTS Elephants have dark gray body colour and some haveblack colour in appearance. The ears vary in size. While seeing in Animalplanet, the African elephants have found to have very big ears, and lengthierand more bend horns. It is not known, whether it is due to body heat,elephants like bathing in water at its own. We can see forest elephants walkingin to water and pour water on body using the trunk in addition to drinking. I will continuein next posting -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Thatha_Patty" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/thatha_patty/1813750610.284878.1644196036158%40mail.yahoo.com.
