Travels on My Elephant

Rating:
Summary: An imperialist's nostalgia.
Review: British writers, writing about India are of two types. One are genuine humanists who look at today's India from an objective albeit sometimes sympathetic point of view. Mark Shand falls in the other category- ruminating nostalgically about the Raj, although, the present story is somewhat melodramatic and about an elephant.
One good test to distinguish between the two is to ask the question, what would the person be if the 'Raj' was still alive. I am positive, Mark Shand would fall into the class of people who would live secluded in "McCluskeygunge" (a closed gate communty of Anglophiles) and sneer at the poor natives with an upturned nose!
Unfortunately, fair skin on its own merit(?) still attracts salutes in India. The three hundrend years of oppressive british tyrrany has been hard to shake off. Shand lives by the power of his white skin and rules with his green currency and day dreams about the serenity and glory (for the english) of the Raj.
I have yet to come across a genuine expression of guilt or shame in a britisher about their colonial sins. To take the case of India, the richest coutry on the planet, sucking it dry of all its resources and riches, and leaving it to fend for itself. And now Shand returns to satisfy his whim of travelling on an elephant and revel in touristic sightseeing of the poverty and the overwhelming deterioration! Utterly disgusting!!


Rating:
Summary: Travels on my Elephant
Review: A remarkable story about one of the few Europeans to enter the mystical, beautiful, dangerous, austere and disappearing world of the Indian Mahoot. Shand writes honestly and insightfully about his experiences on an elephant Trek through India which makes the book all the more refreshing. An easy afternoon read by the fire with your map of India on your lap.

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Summary: The magical travels of Tara and Mark (by stardustraven)
Review: A wonderful, tender and very funny account of Mark Shand's journey across India on Tara, a female elephant of great charm. The reader cannot but fall in love with her, she is such an endearing personality. Mark Shand and I certainly did so. A great yarn of friendship and love between man and elephant. An assorted and unusual crew of travel companions is to be found here as well. But the greatest delight every time I re-read this book resides in encountering Tara time and again. She easily steals every scene which features her. Very highly recommended!

Rating:
Summary: Inspiring, captivating...this book doesn't last long
Review: I have read all of Mark's books and this is my favourite. Full of humour, you can't help but fall in love with Tara and the magic of India. The sequel Queen Of The Elephants is also worth reading; this film of QotE is shown regulary on Discovery/Animal Planet.

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Summary: Quick-Reading Fun In India
Review: The British seem to be particularly adept at coming up with whimsical ideas, making them happen, and then writing about them (cf. comedian Tony Hawk's Round Ireland With A Fridge, and Playing the Moldovans At Tennis or journalist Andrew Marshall's The Trouser People to mention just a few recent examples). Shand continues the tradition, concocting a scheme to buy an elephant and march around India on its back. This quick-reading book is an account of his adventure in India, where he purchases an emaciated 30-year old elephant ... from a pair of saddhus (mystic holy men) in the province of Orissa (a few hundred kilometers SW of Calcutta). His goal is to walk her from the coast to the great elephant market on the banks of the Ganges at Sonepur Mela, some 1000 kilometers north, in Bihar, where he would sell her.

However, as he soon discovers, elephants have a lot of personality, and he quickly falls in love with his. The pleasure of the book is not its travelogue description of the sights and sounds along the way (although these do break things up), but the mischievous antics of the elephant and the discovery of its personality as a loving and lovable creature. Tara, the elephant, displays remarkable intelligence and wit over the course of the journey, although at times Shand does veer into anthropomorphizing her. While he doesn't go deep into the role of the elephant in Indian and Hindu culture, it's clear from his travels that they are widely revered as symbols of Ganesh, as bystanders often often small prayers and alms to Tara.

Shand's own lessons in becoming a "mahoot", one who is versed in the ways of elephants and able to ride/guide one, is an equally fascinating and touching story. An older and younger mahoot are along to train him, as is a photographer friend and two rascally drivers with a support Jeep. It's a fun adventure, with a suspiciously fortuitous climax at the market, when Shand discovers he can't bear to sell his elephant for use as a moneymaking curiosity. It's a touching book in many ways, although some readers may be put off by the notion of a Westerner traipsing around a poor country on an elephant, especially given India's colonial past. Still whatever one may think of that, Shand's love for the animal is clearly genuine. He's written a followup book (Queen of the Elephants), that's apparently not as good.

Rating:
Summary: A wonderful book
Review: This book gripped me from the start. Mark Shand's matter-of-fact writing style and unshamedly romantic account of a trip across India on his elephant Tara, will make you curious about India and fall in love with this beautiful creature that became a grown man's best friend. A beautiful story for readers of all ages. I loved it and am about to read it again!