Tokalo: Day Seventeen

Day Seventeen is about homes and traps

I wake up in yet another house. After kua we move to interact with people in the village.

I recall staring at this for long

I see a volley-ball match in progress, broom-grass being dried, girls going to fetch water, people looking with amusement at me and more. We meet a couple of young men. They are eager to chat with Ja - I refrain from interfering. Next I see papaya orchards. They are as much of a surprise as was the carefully laid orange orchard I saw yesterday. This is followed by a homestead with tidily laid out cauliflower. Some of the houses have bamboo placed to ensure that the doors remain shut. There are some goats too besides the pigs and chicken and they make their presence felt on the dusty roads of a late winter morning. I am told that cows do not survive in the village despite bring present in nearby areas. People here do not milk cows, buffaloes and goats. They are either for help with cultivation or food on table. I recalled a discussion during my first trip to Phura with the Forest Range Officer then. He took a while to agree that the buffaloes give milk!

Broom grass and firewood - companions of all homes 

I am called to a house by one of the colleagues. A tortoise shell, a jungle-fowl kept in captivity, few tails and a mind-boggling trap. The trap is beautifully made, appears as if polished and while in action forms a circle. The (now pet) jungle fowl is tied inside the circle in a forest as bait. The (wild) jungle fowl arrives and lands in the circle on hearing calls of the pet counterpart. It is then caught. These (wild) jungle-fowls are exquisite meat – often being sold for 1,200/- a bird. When those with resources desire this meat they contact these expert trappers. So similar, I wondered, with the situation at Sheopur. There the Moghiyas were asked to trap and hunt wild meat for the rich and powerful. As the trap is demonstrated I leave the camera and pen. This surely is an art that also merits respect. How much is addressing demand crucial to address the hunting conundrum? What are we doing for this?

This is how the trap rests when not in action 

Walking back to our place of stay I have food and tea. My teeth remind me of my having going beyond permissible limits for kua and I wonder for the nth time how some colleagues are able to enjoy around 40 - within a single day. We leave Lopu via Supha and walk fast. Am amazed by the frequency of skink sightings. Are they present in such high numbers or is one fellow following me and crossing me repeatedly. I reach before 2.00 pm.

The Forest Range Officer had now shifted base to be able to drink freely. I am tired, put myself on the wooden sofa taking support of the rolled up sleeping bag on the handle. I miss the faces and cheerful banter of those who have left for Lomasu. Those helping with the luggage. Ra too intends to leave tomorrow and is moving around with a gloom on his face and his grand child on his arm. Suddenly from high action and noise, today we have the need to rest coupled with melancholy. I go to a tea-stall, one of the 2 in this village and catch up on some gossip with Ja and Jo.

Bait is missing in the demonstration!

I also wonder how these days walking in these amazing forests brought us close together; given that I miss those smiles, the eyes, colourful caps and more. Strange how we miss presence of people even when we have not chatted much with them and just by being together; do we feel others? Is it the forest or is language not as big a barrier it is made out to be? I recall the line from the movie Anand that each of us has a transmitter and a receiver – we receive signals from some and transmit to some!

I just lay and have tea, don’t even bother to get to the water point. I have also been told that we are short of money! Last week we were short of dal and we put oil and masala in the boiling water; this may be somewhat more complicated.

I don’t write, am in no mood after food - another chicken meal. Am now tired of it. Perhaps it is the law of diminishing returns at work. I read the pages and field-guides that mark beginning and end of these books. Do not recall having given them enough time and this is indeed a strange place to do so.

Forest Guard from Phura joins us. His colleague from Phura who is a part of our group has an early meal and comes over to where we are staying. Claims he doesn’t drink, is disturbed. He is lying. Ja goes to church in formal clothes; he and Jo then roam around. I saw Ja’s attire at Bymari as well. How he managed to carry it, including shoes, is a mystery. Influence Church yields in these parts is not easy to fathom. Those of us who get ‘educated’ in cities anyways have little idea of religion.

It is 9.30 pm and I just close myself.

Day Eighteen here.

Day Sixteen here.