{"id":1298,"date":"2010-05-20T16:17:41","date_gmt":"2010-05-20T10:47:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/?p=1298"},"modified":"2010-05-21T16:14:33","modified_gmt":"2010-05-21T10:44:33","slug":"kabini-wilder-waters-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2010\/05\/kabini-wilder-waters-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Kabini: Wilder Waters – 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

The tusker charged at our jeep. Initially I thought \u2018mock charge, ha ha\u2019 and started clicking away on my Nikon D90. And then it struck to me that only the \u2018aunties\u2019, female elephants that take care of the babies, mock. This tusker meant what he was trying to do: smash us to pieces. Our driver, an experienced, expert hand, from the Jungle Lodges Kabini team reversed and was all set to turn around and scoot when the tusker abruptly gave up his charge. So our driver chose to hang around. A red wattled lap wing shrieked and flew over us. My heart was banging against my chest. Axel, a German photographer, whispered, \u2018can we go closer? After some time?\u2019  I was stunned. I wanted to scream \u2018Dude do you realize we could all have been killed?\u2019 And I turned to Anil to seek some support only to realize that he too was nodding furiously in agreement with Axel. Wildlife photographers are crazy fuckers. They are never satisfied. Only about ten minutes back, we had the good fortune of meeting a handsome leopard. We took the turn into the jungle off the road that connects Kerala and Karnataka, and within 30 seconds, our naturalist said \u201cLeopard!\u201d And there he was, sitting on a branch with an arm hanging out, pristinely calm\u2026 he didn\u2019t even bother looking at us. <\/p>\n

\"Leopard-1<\/a><\/p>\n

We were the only Jeep. the three of us had the Leopard all for ourselves. So we clicked away. The rat-a-tat of the shutter too didn\u2019t disturb our Leopard. I stopped clicking and started admiring this wonderful animal. After a few minutes, the other safari jeeps came over and the leopard decided to leave. That\u2019s when we got a full view of this graceful predator. This was my first trip to Kabini, and I never imagined that Kabini was all that my friends Anil, Phani, and Raghu had told me about: heavenly, wild, and unpredictable.<\/p>\n

\"Leopard-1<\/a><\/p>\n

Long after the leopard had jumped off the tree and vanished into the jungle, I was still pinching myself. It was hard for me to believe that I was in such close proximity to a leopard. And I told Anil, \u2018Tomorrow, we\u2019ll see the Tiger.\u2019 Did we? Watch this space.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The tusker charged at our jeep. Initially I thought \u2018mock charge, ha ha\u2019 and started clicking away on my Nikon D90. And then it struck to me that only the \u2018aunties\u2019, female elephants that take care of the babies, mock. This tusker meant what he was trying to do: smash us to pieces. Our driver, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[216,152,218,122,153],"class_list":["post-1298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stories","tag-birds","tag-kabini","tag-mammals","tag-nature","tag-wildlife"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"jetpack-portfolio-admin-thumb":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Suman Kumar","author_link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/author\/suman-kumar\/"},"uagb_comment_info":2,"uagb_excerpt":"The tusker charged at our jeep. Initially I thought \u2018mock charge, ha ha\u2019 and started clicking away on my Nikon D90. And then it struck to me that only the \u2018aunties\u2019, female elephants that take care of the babies, mock. This tusker meant what he was trying to do: smash us to pieces. Our driver,…","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2Gbk8-kW","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1415,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/dabur-partha-tusker-part-2-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":0},"title":"Dabur Partha and the Tusker (part 2 of 2)","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"March 14, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Continued from part 1 My feet refused to move. It was as if my legs had a mind of their own, and they hated me. A wave of dust blew right through me. I rubbed my eyes and opened them to the captain of the Srinagar colony team alighting from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "childhood"","block_context":{"text":"childhood","link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/category\/childhood\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1399,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2011\/03\/partha-aka-dabur\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":1},"title":"Dabur Partha and the Tusker (part 1 of 2)","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"March 9, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Someone stole Niall O' Brien's kit and that inspired me to recount this story The match was, how do I put it... ah!, tantalisingly poised. It was a 'bet' match. We were playing for money. Not for a ball or bat. The money at stake was 110 INR. Each player\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "childhood"","block_context":{"text":"childhood","link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/category\/childhood\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":575,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2004\/10\/yellow-pages-blues-the-early-days\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":2},"title":"Yellow Pages Blues: The early days","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"October 1, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"I worked with Tata Press Yellow Pages for about two and a half years, between October 1995 and early 1998. To me, it was a great learning experience; I took up the sales job as I had to make some money, but I made more than money there. I learnt\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "stories"","block_context":{"text":"stories","link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/category\/stories\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":828,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2005\/11\/south-indian-heroes\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":3},"title":"South Indian Heroes","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"November 11, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Amrit Hallan of the Writing Cave wrote a post on south Indian heroes:I was just wondering why south Indian heroes look so crude and why the heroines look so seductive. While surfing the TV channels whenever I come across south Indian channels I see grandpa type uncles pathetically trying to\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":847,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2005\/12\/people-attack-hps-cab\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":4},"title":"People attack HP’s cab ?","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"December 22, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Unconfirmed sources claim that people attacked an HP cab near the Madivala flyover in Bangalore. The driver and a couple of HP BPO employees were injured. Backlash to Pratiba's gruesome murder? While I want the murderer scum to be shot dead or probably stoned to death, I think it is\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1088,"url":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/2009\/04\/aandal-part-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":1298,"position":5},"title":"Aandal Part 2","author":"Suman Kumar","date":"April 17, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Read the first part It was a Sunday afternoon and Aandal was squatting outside our grand ma's. She was telling my granny about this mentally challenged kid in one of the homes on Alwarpet street. She was talking about how that kid was always screaming for food. \"Maami andha payyan\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "chennai"","block_context":{"text":"chennai","link":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/category\/chennai\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1298"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1298\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1300,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1298\/revisions\/1300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sumankumar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}