Encountering an elephant

I walked a few kilometers north of a nature preserve I had wanted to visit (Yok Don National Park, pronounced Zok Don) after the park attendant told me I would have to hire a guide for $20 -- which I didn't have on me -- due to the park's proximity to Cambodia, a reason I really didn't understand.

I got hot and sweaty walking along a long road, but at last reached the Daklak Rubber Company plantation -- a wondrously weird dead end.

I couldn't make sense of this plantation whatsoever. It appeared to be a posh retreat type of place where rich city people could rent villas with thatched roofs by a small lake and ride elephants through a few paths that weaved among the rubber trees. The place was pretty much abandoned, except for me, some workmen, two men standing waist deep in the lake fishing and a family of elephant caretakers.

Although I saw no evidence of it on this day, I think rubber might still be harvested here, made from tree sap. (Here's a little info on rubber trees!) The Daklak Rubber Company's head office is in Buon Ma Thuot, I think. (For more on this city in the Central Highlands, read the entry below.)

One of the cottages had a herd of cattle grazing in the yard. (I believe these are traditional Mnong longhouses.)

Along my wanderings, I stopped by to stroke the trunk of a humongous and gentle (tolerant, rather) elephant -- the first time I've ever been so close to one!

The elephant had many folds in its thick, cool skin, tiny bristly hairs growing out of its trunk, and bright orange eyes. Why does an elephant have so many wrinkles? Rudyard Kipling says the wrinkles, at least on rhinos, came about after a Parsee man took revenge on one that stole and ate his cake, by slipping cake crumbs under the rhino's skin as the animal bathed. (The rhino had slipped out of his skin to take a swim.) The crumbs tickled him so much the rhino created great folds in his skin as he rubbed and rubbed, trying to ease his torment.

I think someone should use elephant wrinkles in an anti-Botox advertising campaign.