The Ordination & Lifestyle of a Buddhist Nun

Some people might be wondering why at one time they are reading stories about horses, elephants, etc…while at another time they read about life as a Buddhist nun. My past is as interesting as the present. That is why I tend to bounce between past and present. Today we will again turn to the near present, to the life of a Buddhist nun. How did it begin and what is the daily routine of a Buddhist nun or Mae Chi?

I decided to become ordained some 4 and a half years ago for the first time, as a thank you for all the blessings I received and for being alive. Once I had received permission from the head nun to do so, I would be ordained for 7 days, to see if I could tolerate the life style. I was ordained for initially 7 days and went through the following procedure. Once I was settled into my room and dressed in white, it was time to face the monks. A flower, 3 incense sticks and a candle, together with an envelope containing money was prepared. Five sets were required for 5 monks. I received the 8 precepts, followed by 5 monks chanting the blessings. Pronunciation of the 8 precepts in the Pali language was a challenge, but the monks were most helpful. I had the advantage of being able to speak Thai, which made it easier. Before the ceremony was over, I poured water into a bowl while the monks chanted. This ceremony is to transfer merit to my parents and teachers, as well as to the deceased ancestors. After the initial ceremony was complete, this water was poured on any tree to transfer the merit of my actions to my ancestors, etc…

By now it was almost 11 am and time for the last meal of the day, which I enjoyed in the company of several other nuns. The other nuns were very helpful and kept pushing food in front of me, telling me to eat more. I would otherwise be very hungry later on…. After helping to clear the plates and glasses, as well as the remaining food, I returned to my room for a short rest. At 1 pm it was time to meditate. This experience was initially very strange to one who didn’t know the first thing about meditation. Nuns and monks gathered in the meditation hall. Meditation would last from 1 pm to 4 pm. It was fine for the first 3 days. On the 4^th day I was so sore, I could hardly sit down, not to mention that my body, especially my legs, went numb. The other nuns told me that this was normal and that everybody goes through this stage. Oh joy…… It was one of those things that required tolerance. Let the numbness overcome you and watch how it progresses and then disappears. After sitting for an hour, we would do meditation walking. Translated this means walking in such a way that we are consciously aware of every muscle throughout every single movement…. It is hard work and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!! Having walked for an hour within the meditation hall, it was then time to sit in meditation for another hour. After the 3 hour meditation session, I was exhausted!! Now it was time to return to my hut for a brief rest before evening chanting began at 7:30 pm. This again required a lot of concentration. Although I was lucky enough to receive an English version of the evening chant, it takes a while to get used to it. After chanting was over, it was time for a Dhamma talk by one of the monks, followed by an in depth explanation by the abbot. To complete the evening chanting session, monks and nuns would chant the evening transfer of merit and pay homage to the Triple Gem. This pretty much completed the first day of being ordained.

The next morning started early at 5 am. It was time to buy food just outside the temple, to offer as alms food to the monks who made their alms rounds starting from 6 am. That completed, it was now time for our breakfast at 7 am. Breakfast usually consisted of rice porridge. Only occasionally was fried rice on the menu. At 7:30 am it was time for morning chanting. This is where it really started to get interesting!! The monks would chant in the main ordination hall. The nuns would chant at the “sallah”, where the monks took their meals and where we did the evening chanting with the monks. In the morning Pali passages were usually translated into Thai as well. That meant that we were chanting in two different languages for any given chant!! Confused??? Totally flabbergasted is more like it! Nuns, who didn’t shave their heads, had to chant the 8 precepts every day. Other nuns would only receive the precepts from a monk on every “Wan Phra”, which happens once a week on new moon, half moon and quarter waxing and waning moon. Wan Phra has a different timetable from the ordinary day, but more on that in a minute.  This completes the normal daily routine of a nun, without going into details about helping in the temple whenever we had free time.

As for the schedule on Wan Phra….We would still offer alms food to the monks around 6 am and have our breakfast at 7 am, however, on Wan Phra, morning chanting would start at 8 am and the chanting is done together with the monks. As mentioned earlier, this is the day where all the nuns would receive the 8 precepts from a monk. This is mostly followed by a Dhamma talk by one of the monks and chanting the morning transfer of merit, which then completes the morning session.

At 11 am is the final meal of the day, and then it is possible to rest until 7:30 pm, when the evening session starts. Chanting and Dhamma talk as usual, but that is where the normal routine ends. The evening session continues until 9pm. We have an hour’s rest and then it’s off to the meditation hall for 1 hour. To complete Wan Phra, we head back to the “sallah” for another hour of chanting until midnight. This completes our Wan Phra program. I enjoyed this routine and was ordained for another 7 days, before having to leave to take care of personal business. Little did I realize that this would soon become my permanent life style…..

Close Encounter with the SPCA at Phuket Zoo

When I had my first encounter with the SPCA here in Thailand, I was working as a mahout at Phuket Zoo. My charge was a 14 month old bull elephant, called Marway. Marway was just beginning to eat solid food such as long grass, which I had to chop into smaller pieces. His milk diet consisted of boiled rice porridge and milk, with bananas. I had to wake up at 4 am to boil the milk mixture for him, because it had to cool down enough for him to drink it. A baby bottle was made from used water bottles with a nipple on top. This diet is standard pretty much all over Thailand. Baby elephants are usually separated from their mothers at the age of one year, so that they would bond with their human mahouts. This is done to facilitate training at an early age. The longer one waits to train a baby, the more difficult it will be for it to perform the tasks that are required of it. What the baby is trained to do, will depend on its character and ability. For example, babies that are not so strong, will learn how to paint and make music. Ironically babies get a real kick out of using their trunk as a hand…..

Marway was fed three times a day with milk. It was during the second feeding, at approx. 10 am, that the zoo’s general manager approached me and dumped a woman on me, saying to me in Thai, “ You deal with this”……Huh??? I learned that the woman was from the SPCA, and told her that while we talked, I would be preparing the baby elephant’s formula. The formula had cooled enough for me to start squeezing fresh bananas into the milk formula. So here I was, both hands covered with bananas and milk formula, while this woman poured out her numerous complaints.

The first complaint was about the crocodile pools being filthy….. My response was in the form of a question. Was she not aware that whenever crocodiles were sick or injured, this was exactly what they needed to heal….. “Oh!! I didn’t know!!!!”

Second complaint…why are the tigers tied up so short? The answer is obvious enough in such an environment… However, it was made clear to her that they hated the heat and as such had 2 fans each, which blew cool air at them. This generally made them lazy enough to sleep in this tropical heat. In the early morning, before the zoo opens, all working tigers went for a walk with their handlers, virtually all over the zoo. They would work for no more than 4 hours, before they return to their cages that were equipped with a swimming pool. Approximately an hour after returning to their cages, they would receive the meal of the day. The very young tigers would also receive milk before the zoo closed at 4:30…. Here came that famous reply from the lady again…  “Oh!!  I didn’t know!!!”

While all this dialogue was going on, I kept right on preparing the banana-milk formula for Marway. Actually I surprised myself at how cool and calm I was through this entire interview!

The third question then followed. Why is such a large eagle kept in such a small cage? We had a massive sea eagle, dark brown in color, in a cage that was indeed too small for it. The bird had become entangled in the fishermen’s nets and they brought it to us 5 days earlier. Since we did not have a cage suitable for a bird of this size, a new cage was being constructed for this eagle. She also complained about the sea eagles in our care. I explained the situation about the brown eagle and the fact that the sea eagles that we had, were blind in one eye and would therefore find it most difficult to survive in the wild. All the eagles were eating a hefty amount of fish, including the newcomer, which meant that they were not under undue stress. This conversation went back and forth in this mode, while I hand fed my baby elephant. He drank his milk with his eyes half closed, and all this for the woman from the SPCA to see. The circumstances were hilarious!! As if to rub the message in, junior became very playful after he finished his milk. I played with him and let this woman watch our games. Another 15 minutes went by and junior started getting very sleepy.

He was not chained up, because he was in the company of two other baby elephants who were already 3 and 5 years old. He just lay down on the floor and took a nap….

The lady from the SPCA had no more questions. In fact she was in tears of joy,  watching me and Marway. Hahahahaha! She threw one last surprise at me! She gave me a 500 baht bill and said “thank you for the education and the opportunity to watch the interaction with the elephants” There was no trouble at Phuket Zoo and none of us ever heard another sound from the SPCA.

The moral of this story…..before anyone starts mouthing off, please do the appropriate research….. 

The Birth of a Giraffe

Many years ago, I used to work for Phuket Zoo, taking care of macaws. During this time came an exciting moment when one of the three giraffes was ready to give birth. About 10 of us were on hand to assist in a birth that no one had ever witnessed before. The veterinarian was barking orders and our female giraffe was tied up by her legs and with a noose around her neck. This was tricky, since every time she went into a labor spasm, she would swing that long neck in our direction. Not to mention that we were in constant danger of being kicked. We persevered, trying to assist the vet as best we could. When the baby was just about to appear, the rope holding the giraffe’s head in front and close to the rail, came undone. Not even thinking about my own safety, I grabbed the rope, thinking only about the safety of all the people at the giraffe’s rear end. Before I could re-secure that rope, the baby was well on it’s way and mother giraffe swung her head straight in my direction. I got wacked so hard, that I went flying backwards, landing head first in giraffe shit!!!

Even in the middle of all the excitement, everybody burst out laughing….. I was rather embarrassed when I touched my head and found that the entire back of my head was covered with giraffe poop. Needless to say, I was the laughing stock of that group!! I immediately got up, red-faced and with crap all over me, and helped the others with what was left to do. I was so embarrassed that today I can’t remember what came next.

What I do remember, is that the baby was unable to get up. The mother giraffe had outright rejected her own baby. No matter what we did, mama wanted no part of this male infant!!

Now what?? Eventually we were left with no choice but to carry the infant to where I slept, for its own safety. It became very clear that this momma was about to kill her calf.

After the baby was safely tucked away, 16 boys tried to get milk from momma for about 3 days, without success. No matter how narrow a space we had put her into, she simply was having no part of it. There was only one alternative. Try to get goat’s milk as a substitute. This was easier said than done. Many animals can only strive if they are fed on goat’s milk. However, try as we might, there were no goats on Phuket Island or in any area nearby.

Sadly, me and my now ex-husband were the last people to see the baby giraffe alive. Cow’s milk could not sustain it. I cried for several days afterwards, but still remained the laughing stock of Phuket Zoo staff!!!

Some months later we found out that the mother had a serious calcium deficiency, which was why the baby giraffe was unable to get up after its birth. Hopefully the situation has been rectified now and they have successfully had baby giraffes as an addition to the zoo.

2012 Doomsday Predictions are not in sink with Buddhist Prophecies

Reading about all the doom and gloom for 2012, predicted by various religions and cults, not to mention the end of the Mayan calendar, the nagging thought stays with me, that none of these prophecies tally with the prophecies of Lord Buddha, more than 2,500 years ago. Buddha left his rules for wholesome living and development, together with the predictions for the future for the world, in his collection of 45 volumes, called “Tripeedok”. For those of you who can obtain access to these texts in English, it is highly recommended reading. Many of these prophecies have already come to pass and are still in the developing stages, however, nowhere is there mention of the end of the world…

According to Buddha’s prophecies, the age of man will continue to spiral downwards until a five year-old child will already have a spouse and the maximum age would be approx. 10 to 12 years of age.

Buddhism will deteriorate as a religion. People become ordained to gain a comfortable life, without the practice of moral conduct and meditation, which is the main reason for the age decline on a world-wide basis.

Man’s constant abuse of nature will bring plagues and disasters with it and the suffering of people will increase until they see the wisdom of practicing good moral conduct and meditation. The moment that this truth is realized, the age of man will start to increase again. This will continue until approx. 6,000 years after Buddha’s death, [or his attaining nirvana], when the next Buddha will appear to guide mankind on a new path to enlightenment and fulfillment.

In short then, it can be concluded that the world we know now, must end to make way for a new and better one. This is not the crash and boom of our planet, but rather the evolvement of mankind that needs to take place before the coming of the next Buddha…

There are countless more examples in the Tripeedok volumes,  which I unfortunately don’t have access to. The one thing that I am certain of, is that the destructive forces that govern the world today, may seem invincible now, but in the end, they always fall.

It is up to the individual to develop the spiritual essence within each one of us and to practice good moral conduct, hold the five precepts, make merit in whatever way one can, and finally develop the practice of meditation correctly and continuously.

May all blessings be with you and may you succeed in your quest for spiritual and material fulfillment. Ayu wanno suckang pallang, which translated, means the four blessings of,

long life, beauty happiness and strength

Floods & Monkey Business

This year Thailand experiences the worst flood in over 50 years. Our temple, which has never experienced a flood situation, was waist deep in water for nearly a month. The only way to move around was by boat. Even in this national disaster, the Thai people never lost their smiles and compassion for their fellow humans. To watch how Thais went out of their way to rescue both people and animals from flood waters, with an extremely dangerous current, was an experience that deeply touched my heart. The monks at our temple, made their rounds by boat every morning, handing us nuns dried foods and water and whatever else they had to share with us. Their care and concern was obvious throughout the ordeal.

In these last few days, however, the floodwaters at the temple subsided and until now, there is still a massive cleanup in progress. An immigration issue forced me to travel from Ayutthaya to Lopburi today. This was my first time out since the floods arrived on October 7^th, exactly a month ago. Throughout the floods, I was confined to my hut at the temple with a German shepard female for company. There was basically no dry place available for the temple dogs, and both nuns and monks did their best to provide them with a dry place to sleep and food.

My trip to Lopburi was uneventful, though I was surprised as to how quickly I reached my destination, even after having to transfer to 2 different minibuses. My encounter with the Lopburi immigration dept. was equally uneventful and I was quickly whisked through. What struck me on the way to Lopburi, was that although the roads were dry, there were tents set up along the side of the roads, which housed not only people, but cows, buffalos and goats as well. Some people had lost everything and many houses were still flooded, often right up to the roof. Water levels were only about 5 inches lower than the road, which means that it may still be another 2 to 3 months before people can return to what was once their homes, and try to salvage what they can. Those who still have a house to salvage can consider themselves lucky. The flash floods came with such force that in some cases, the entire house was washed away!!

After my errands were completed, I decided to take the minibus that goes to Bangkok, because it would certainly pass Ayutthaya. Little did I realize that there was a surprise in store for me! This entire area of Lopburi was filled with long-tailed macaques. These monkeys virtually owned the town! They would walk along the road in groups of 5 or more, with absolutely no regard for traffic. The people of this town were obviously used to this. At one shop, a monkey was busy picking up stuff, sitting on a stool, while the owner of the shop made coffee. At another sundry shop, the monkeys were picking things out of the shop waste-basket. The people themselves went on with their daily routine as if the monkeys weren’t there! The monkeys on the other hand, more or less ignored the people unless something, like a shiny pair of earrings or a shiny hairclip caught their attention. I noticed a couple of the monkeys that were eating bananas and other fruits which someone probably gave them.  In yet another shop, the monkeys were playing with things from the shop, “checking it out” so to speak.  The owners of the shop ignored the monkeys. It may well be the case that to acknowledge this “monkey business”, may incur the wrath of the macaques, I don’t know. Whatever the case, the monkeys were busy with their monkey business and the humans tended to their own business and everyone seemed to do just fine. To see people living in such harmony with nature was indeed an experience not quickly forgotten. It showed me that it is definitely possible to live in harmony with other creatures. There simply was no conflict to be seen anywhere!! I’m sure that the occasional “misunderstanding” occurred from time to time, but it certainly wasn’t visible today. Although I am no lover of monkeys, today’s experience was certainly a lesson in humility!!

Welcoming Buddhist Lent

Buddhist Lent is one of the major highlights of the Buddhist calender every year. It is a time for isolation, contemplation and meditation. Buddhist Lent lasts for 90 days and we are not allowed to be out after dark or sleep outside the temple we are asigned to. It is also the time where the heavens open and the devas come down to watch how well devotees keep to their precepts. Almost every year I find myself tested by these devas in one form or another, but more on that later.

The above photo, taken by Phra Mahaoath, shows the crowd sitting outside the sallah while the evening chant is going on Buddhist Lent eve. People will circle the chedi and ordination hall 3 times with flowers, candle and incense sticks on the eve of Buddhist Lent to celebrate this auspicious occasion. For the Buddhist Lent ceremony itself, there are generally no outsiders present.

On Buddhist Lent morning I was up and working at the 'sallah' at 4am. My job was to arrange the alms bowls and trays with bowls for almsfood for the monks. I do this every Buddhist Lent, on every 'Wan Phra' during the 3 month period. Having completed this task, I bought almsfood, usually a set of rice and accompanying food, sweets or fruits and water. With this in hand I make my offerings and put money in the common bowl for the monks. Then I pour water onto a tree near my hut and transfer my merit to the deceased, so that they too may benefit from this act of giving.

After doing my own chores at my hut and a light breakfast, I'm ready for a gruelling day up in the chedi. The chedi is absolutely packed with Buddhists and non-Buddhists from all over the world, who make merit on this very auspicious day by offering gold-leaf to the eight Buddhas in the chedi. The eight Buddha images in the chedi represent the eight victories of Lord Buddha.  The chedi itself is a celebration of King Naresuan's great victory over the Burmese, which enabled Thailand to gain its independence nearly 500 years ago.

My day in the Chedi ends at approx. 4:30pm, which gives me time to prepare for the ceremonies of the evening which commenced at 7pm.

A tray or decorative bowl is adorned with special candles for this occassion with a little bowl made out of banana leaf, filled with flowers and a cone-shaped lid, also made out of banana leaves. The cone-shaped lid is then adorned with a jasmine wreath. This we bring with us for evening chanting

After completing mandatory chanting, we hold up the adorned bowl with flowers and candles, reciting the vows for Buddhist Lent. This is followed by a speech by the abott and all the monks paying their respects to the abott.

Once the monks have left the sallah to go to the ordination hall, all nuns offer the decorated bowl to the abott in respect, followed by the civilians who wish to pay respects as well.

Now is the time where all nuns pay their respects to the head nun. Completing this, we now proceed to the main ordination hall to honor the main Buddha of this temple, Phrabuddha Chai Mongkhol.

 After chanting by the nuns, a speech is given by the head nun. This usually involves behavior during the Buddhist Lent and a stern speech about things that are not up to standard. One must never forget that this temple receives many visitors every day, since it is a major historical site. If nuns don't dress or behave according to a certain standard, the reputation of this temple would very quickly be ruined. Every monk and every nun is a spokesperson for the temple. As such, team work and following certain standards are mandatory.

Having completed the ceremonies in the main ordination hall, all nuns then proceed to the chedi Chai Monkhol for further chanting. We offer our decorated bowl or tray here the same way we did in the sallah and the ordination hall, to honor the devas and also to honor the spirit of King Naresuan the Great.

We pray for protection and guidance during this important time, both by the King's spirit and all sacred spirits around the chedi.

This completes the ceremony for welcoming Buddhist Lent.

We all return to our individual huts.

As for me....I then honor the Buddha images in my hut by offering the decorated bowl, followed by King Naresuan and his grandmother

Phra Si Suriothai.

This concludes my ceremony. It is 10pm by the time I finish.

Mae Chi Margo & Dum, the Black Kauwow - Wat Yai, Ayutthaya, Thailand

You've been reading about Dum, my kauwow friend, and now you can see him in 'person'.
This video shows one of my final encounters with this bird, before he returned to the wild permanently.
Dum is one of several success stories that brings me great joy and satisfaction. There are no words to express the satisfaction of watching a bird that would have surely died falling from such a tall tree, to seeing his recovery and finally to experience him as a free soul.
This particular kauwow was one of the worst pains I'd yet encountered in that he demanded and was generally extremely aggressive in his behaviour. I made it a point not to try and change that, since I felt that this aggression might well save his life one day. Instead, the goal was to help him heal and grow in his own natural way and then return him to nature in the best possible condition.

His release was determined by his tail which was very quickly getting long. Keeping him in the cage would have resulted in his damaging the tail and therefore making flying difficult at best. Even though it was still obvious that he didn't know how to eat on his own, the decision was made to release him anyway.
It was the choice of the lesser of two evils in a sense. Several nuns watched as I carried this screaming youngster to a grassy area with a broken chedi or stupa, flung him towards the stupa and watched him land and immediately take off, landing in the tamarind tree nearby. Everybody was stunned!! Not only could Dum fly, he flew with a speed and grace that surprised everybody, most of all me! There were the nods of appreciation for what had transpired and we all returned to our individual huts.

As for me....I thought that was the end of it.....how wrong I was!!
Two days after his release, I heard that familiar cry coming from very close to my hut. It took a while before I figured out where he was, but there was Dum, waiting to be fed! Quickly checking to see if any of the cats were nearby, I had to make him come down if he hoped to be fed. Hunger won the day and he had his first greedy meal of the day. On another occassion, I was sitting on the steps of my hut, and before I knew it, Dum was sitting on the bench next to my hut demanding to be fed. I panicked! This I could not allow! It would almost certainly signal a free meal for the neighborhood cats! I threw a slipper at Dum if ever I saw him on anything lower than the cage in the video. Who says that kauwows can't be trained?? Whatever the case is, Dum learned very quickly that not only was he not going to be fed, he was going to get something thrown at him if he landed in the wrong place!!

Unlike other birds, kauwows do not know how to care for their young, leaving the chicks to be raised by other birds, mostly mynah birds. Dum still had the call of an out of tune mynah bird and it will take a long time before he learns that he is indeed a kauwow. My two females took some eight months before they started the appropriate call for their species! That also means that this bird matures fairly slowly. I am told that they have a long life too...some ten years or more.

After having several kauwows in my care who had fallen out of the nest, I couldn't help but ask myself, why this was happening with such frequency. Only recently did the answer occur to me. The mynah bird makes a nest for its own chicks, yet the kauwow chick is almost as big as an adult minor bird, so much so that any small movement within the nest will cause one chick to fall out.

In conclusion, Dum was in my care, caged for 3 weeks and fed as a free bird for another 3 weeks before he was integrated back into nature fully. Less than a month after Dum had regained his freedom, I was in for another surprise! I had cleaned out my hut for the coming Buddhist Lent and was sitting on the staircase sipping a cup of coffee. It was then that I noticed something moving on the bushes in front of my house. The husky/local mixed dog was really excited...the cat was excited.....yet neither of them could get to the chick that had fallen out of the same tree as Dum had. Low and behold, here was another male kauwow chick, this time the brown species. He was barely alive, having lain on the bushes for several hours already. When I picked this one up,I discovered that he was basically naked. His feathers had emerged and were still covered with a shieth of sorts. He was kept inside my hut for a few days and steadily grew stronger. This male is very different from Dum in that he is sooooo soft in his manner. I call him Nim, which means soft in thai.
Meanwhile he is in an outside cage now and has become just as loud as Dum, but minus the aggression.
Hopefully before the middle of August, another one will have gained his freedom as well.

Nim finally won his freedom in late August. Unlike Dum, he only returned 3 times before flying away for good. He did give 3 of us nuns a surprise though, when he showed up again, approximately 2 weeks after his release.
Sitting in the tree right near my hut, he was a sight for sore eyes.  We observed him for some time, satisfaction on all our faces.......

Dum disappeared for some 3 months. One morning I had the most unusual  encounter with him again. As a young male, he was silently perched on the tree right in front of my hut and sat very silently, so as not to arouse the attention of the other males. He had grown a little bit, but the important thing was that now he had come back as a free bird. All the birds that I released, had come back between 1 and 3 months, as if to say thank you for saving their lives. Each time such a bird came back, there is no way to describe the inner satisfaction that fills me. This is reward at its finest.....

[FOOT-NOTE]  After many unsuccessfull searches for the appropriate name for this bird, I finally found it!!
                           It's actually an Asian Koel, very common in Thailand.

Dum [The Conclusion]

Tweet had been successfully released some time back and for the past week I haven't seen him or heard his call. Occassionally I still get a glimpse of the 2 adults who take care of him. They are still running around for food to feed Tweet, I can only guess. Whatever happens to him now is up to his karma.

That leaves me with newcomer 2, Dum, the baby black kauwow who thinks that he is a minor bird!
In the 3 weeks that he's been here, he's grown a little bigger and now sports an elegant tail.
I have never seen anything as demanding or with a worse temper tantrum than this bird. Believe it or not, he actually has a temper tantrum when he gets hungry! His call changes in sound when he knows that I'm in my hut, and he gets angry when I don't respond. I've played with this temper for a while to see just how far this chick would go. He's all over the cage when he sees me approaching, screaming his little head off.
With his eyes now a medium grey, and his black feathers and blood red mouth, he gives the impression of something that came from hell more than anything else.

There's something else that's wierd about this bird. Ever since he arrived, I've had nothing but bad luck.
This is something that I never experienced with the other birds. A few days ago I had the opportunity to speak with a visiting monk and asked whether this bird had anything to do with my past lives, as was the case with Cha and Peh. The monk replied that there most certainly was a connection.
The more I looked into the birds eyes as I fed him, the more I got the feeling that this thing had just been reborn from hell. He still wasn't happy and wanted revenge for something. That was what came accross from Dum.

By now he had successfully been weaned off wet food and was taking dry pellets from my hand. I occassionally peeked out my window to check whether he was drinking water on his own, and discovered that indeed, he was taking in water on his own now.

However, try hard as I may, Dum refused to eat on his own. Until now I can't figure out why. Did he not recognise the food tray for what it was or did he simply not see it? I'll never know the answer to that question. Analysing this situation, I realised that he now had a decent tail and should have no trouble flying.
If I continue to keep him, chances are that he would destroy his tail in the cage that was too small for a bird of his size. He has a beautiful wingspan which he shows off during feeding,

With this delema I approached Lung Poo Chai Mongkhol to seek an answer about what to do.
I was granted the permission to release Dum, and immediately fed him and set out to perform the task of his release to freedom. After feeding him, I checked for any cats in my vicinity and grabbed hold of him.
Of course this didn't sit well with him. He started screaming and trying to peck me!
When I saw that the coast was clear, I threw him in the air towards the broken stupa in front of my kuti.
Dum landed on the stupa and instantly took off again, only to land in the tamerind tree near the big chedi.
His beautiful flight amazed me! There was grace in his movement towards his freedom, It's comforting to know that now, the 2 birds that needed some help, received it and could successfullu attain their freedom.
Today I heard Dum's call...it's still a kauwow with a minor birds call, only louder. He may well have tried to be accepted by the minor birds. If that's the case, then he still has a good chance of making it.

The longer such birds are kept, the more they get stressed, even to damaging themselves, and the more difficult it will be to adjust to being free. Dum had left me stuck between a rock and a hard place, so to speak. But like Tweet, his survival is now in the hands of his karma. What could be done, has been done!

Two days after publishing this blog.......................
It would seem that the conclusion is not yet concluded?!

Today, 10th May brought a surprise with it! Dum has found his way back to my hut! He gave me the merry runaround this afternoon. The fact was that he was very hungry and had no alternative but to come back.
This evening though, things came to a head when his hunger got the better of him. During the afternoon I had placed a dish of water on the big cage for him to drink if he wanted to. He landed on the big cage and greedily took what I gave him, before he started gulping down water. He must have been extremely thirsty.
The pellets will do that. If this is to become our new arrangement, so be it.
I can live with feeding a free bird until he's ready to find his own food. This arrangement might be the best all the way around!

Beginnings of a New Life

Having lived in Ayutthaya off and on for some 6 years, enabled me to become friends with some of the mae chi [Buddhist nuns] at Wat Yai Chai Mongkhon.

I had now fully recovered from my ordeal and knew for certain that the blessings I had received, were a result of merit made in my previous life. Thamasat Hospital was very proud of my case. They told me that 90% of all patients with 'pseudominis' infection, don't live to tell the tale. If nothing else was clear to me, this merit from the past had come to my rescue.

I still didn't have any strong desire towards life, still confused as to why I was alive. From early childhood I never believed that a person could commit crimes and then be forgiven by an outside entity. Even in this life, if one kills another human being, one goes to jail and bears the consequences. After death, why should this be any different? The Buddhist concepts were always in line with my deeper thoughts, though I didn't know it at the time. I refused to be brainwashed by anybody in this respect, call it stubborn if you will.

I approached the nuns and asked if it would be possible for me to be ordained for a short period of time, as a form of merit-making. I was ushered to meet the head nun and was accepted, but only for 7 days. If I could withstand this, I would always be welcome to extend another 7 days, which I happily did before the end of the first week. For nuns who want to shave their heads, they too must go through the initial 7 days to see if they are able to cope with the regime of ordination. Then they approach the head nun, who will then approve or disapprove the request to shave the head. Nuns over the age of 60 years of age are no longer permitted to shave their heads and requesting monk hood will also not be approved in Thailand, if the individual is over 60 years of age. The reason for this is that biologically the body spirals into a downward motion, especially after the age of 60. The Abbott or the head nuns worry that such an ordained person will become a liability to the temple, due to illness or inability to withstand rigorous schedules of being ordained.

A date was set and when the big day arrived, I was shown to my 'kuti' [hut] to settle in and get ready for the monks. When taking the vows, this is done in front of 5 monks. Five lotus flowers, together with 5 candles, packets of incense sticks and 5 envelopes for money are prepared for the ordination, one set for each monk. How much money is put in the envelope is up to the individual, but anything less than 20 baht notes is a little pathetic to say the least. Nobody is that poor...especially if they intend to be ordained! Next, repeating after the head monk, or leader, I had to recite the 8 precepts. Having done that and whatever was required for me to chant, the tray with the 5 sets of offerings is presented to the head monk, who then passes this down the line so to speak. The head monk then chants the mantra for transfer of merit to ancestors and others, who have died, while I slowly pour water into a brass bowl. Having completed this, all five monks chant mantras of blessing for the ordination. This marks the end of the short initiation ceremony. The water that I poured into the brass bowl, is then poured near any large tree, to enable ancestors to receive the merit that was made and shared.

What is the daily ritual, for the 1st ordination that I took on? First of all I must consider myself very lucky to be able to speak the thai language, as this temple doesn't have much to offer in the way of english speaking monks or nuns. I doubt I would have pulled this off if it weren't for this ability to speak thai. Though not fluent, I found my thai gradually improving as dhamma teachings were a daily affair here. Now I'm getting ahead of myself.

I would usually wake up at 5 am and after a cup of coffee, buy alms food for the monks. This offering would be made at around 7 am, after which it was time for me to have breakfast before the morning chant, which
was always conducted at 7:30 am. The nuns would chant at the 'sallah' or recreational meeting hall, and the monks would chant inside the ordination hall. The nuns would usually translate all their chanting into thai as well, whereas the monks only chant in the pali language. This ritual generally lasted an hour and also included etiquette rules for nuns. From the way we sleep, what we wear in our 'kuti' [hut], what we use for sleeping, to how to dress properly, to manners when in public or among ourselves. This included language that was appropriate for an ordained nun, [example: one doesn't turn around and say "fuck you" and one doesn't speak in a loud rowdy voice at any given time]. Our whole demeanor would have to change. The goal is also to try and remain detached at any given situation, and not get emotionally carried away. In short there was much to be learnt. On Tuesdays and Thursdays chanting was conducted mainly in the pali language, and various mantras were practised so that nuns and monks could also chant together when the occasion arose.

After the morning chanting was over, we have some free time until 10 am. When I first became ordained the morning meditation hour hadn't started yet, for lack of a good teacher monk. Now there is 1 hour meditation from 10 am to 11 am, after which lunch, or the last meal of the day is served for monks and nuns. Mae chi are under 8 precepts and therefore cannot eat any solid food after 12 noon until sunrise the next morning. This is to train the body in preparation for meditation. Food has got to be the single most dangerous aspect of being ordained. Why?? Eating too much makes one liable to sleep during meditation. It leaves the body feeling uneasy, bloated and just basically uncomfortable. Eating too little will leave one feeling hungry in the afternoon and evening. Both ways are a form of suffering. The trick is to know how much food to partake of, for the body to remain healthy and free from pain and discomfort. This in itself is already one form of meditation. We reflect on chewing and swallowing, basically the whole biological process of eating. We reflect on why and how much we eat. Food is supposed to sustain life....no more and no less.
Whether the meal is delicious or not, is of no importance. When the food is delicious, the tendency to overeat is always a threat. That doesn't mean that we don't enjoy our food. It just means that we place less importance on it. Desires of eating something tasty is 'gile' or defilement which we try to do away with. The final goal of an ordained person is to slowly and gradually leave everything of this world behind. We leave the world the same way that we entered it....alone and with nothing. The luxuries that we acquire are the fruits of merit made in a previous life. There is nothing wrong with enjoying this, however, we constantly have to remind ourselves of the impermanence of all things. Reflecting on impermanence and therefore 'not self' is a major subject. How can anything that is so impermanent be called 'self'? Can we stop our bodies from changing and getting old? The answer is no. Knowing this in the head is very different from knowing this in your heart.

Enough of the subject of food and impermanence. Lunch has been served and there's a short break before meditation starts again. When I was first ordained, the early afternoon meditation had not yet come into being. In those days, meditation began at 3 pm and only lasted an hour. Nowadays, thanks to an excellent teacher, we start meditating at 1 pm to 4 pm. The 3 hour meditation is broken up into 1 hour sitting, 1 hour meditation walking, and finally another hour sitting in meditation. The session ends with some chanting and the transfer of merit to ancestors and other spirits who have departed from this world.

After meditation we have a break until 7:30 pm when the evening chanting begins. For evening chanting, nuns and monks chant together in the pali language. I was again blessed in that I was given a book of mantras which contained the morning and evening chants in pali [karaoke english]. This made chanting a little easier. Basically it was a matter of adjusting which I didn't find difficult at all.

This was basically my routine for 15 full days until I was forced to leave due to an expiring visa.
Little did I know that this experience was to become the blue-print of my future!

The Recovery

What had happened to me was a bacteria called "pseudomonis aeriginosa". That name is certainly a mouthful?! One of the student doctors, or intern, wrote it down for me. When I came out of the hospital, I looked it up on the internet, because I had never heard of this bacteria before. Nasty piece of business, this bacteria is! I realized later that this was the primary cause of death in humans and also elephants who had died of bacterial infection. If the pseudominis bacteria finds it's way into the bloodstream, life expectancy is expected to fall to 50/50. Not very promising is it.
I'm getting ahead of my self now.....every day I was given something like 6 to 8 hard-boiled eggs to eat. The eggwhite is protein that will help the flesh on my foot to increase sufficiently to do a skin graft.
Looking at my feet, the missing skin and flesh, with tendons and bone showing....left me thinking and feeling...so this is the human body. Just meat really!! For lack of a better description.

The big day finally came and I was wheeled back into the operating theatre for part two of my ordeal...the long awaited skin graft. The skin layers were taken from my thigh and stitched up on my foot. Hygiene was critical for the healing process here. That meant constant cleaning, because less than 48 hours after surgery, the wound is treated as an open wound, to enable cleaning and promote healing.

I had entered the hospital without any money and the cost would have been far too great for the manager to bear himself. After some discussion with the hospital, myself and the manager, it was decided to start sending emails. In Thailand this is a most effective way to get help when help is really needed. I send email to friend and friend sends email to friend, and so on. At some point the TV stations got hold of this mail, but that's another story. In any case, the hospital was very helpful and helped keep the cost down, so that in the end, the bill came to only 55,000.- baht. This is very cheap if one considers 1 month hospitalization, 2 operations, not to mention all the medication that was required! People from around Thailand had sent money, some even came to visit me at the hospital to hand me the money personally! It was quite an experience, unlike anything that I had ever lived through....and believe me, there were many close shaves in my short life of 50 years!

Possibly a week after the skin graft, I was released from hospital. All was well and the wound was healing without further complication. I still couldn't walk, the day I left!! No weight had been placed on my foot since the infection put me in hospital. The manager didn't allow me to go back to the elephant camp. The risk of re-infection was too great for that. Instead I was to find shelter at his home, together with his wife and children. I stayed with the family for about 6 weeks before it was time to get back to the reality of everyday life. I say that because everything that had happened seemed to have happened through a maze of some kind. To me it seemed like all this was a movie....like it was happening to someone else and I was only the observer. People would come for a visit and then the newspapers and TV people followed up!
Suddenly I was front-page news....why? One for being a white female mahout and two, for having received such genorousity from the thai people. Another 3 weeks went by, and before I knew it, I was in a TV studio as a guest of VIP on Channel 9, elephant and all.....
I didn't have much strength at the time and still wasn't walking properly, but here I was propped up on the neck of Om, an adolescent female elephant of 20 years. Om had been performing in Japan and Taiwan and was difficult to unsettle.....but the studio did it!! She unnerved the truck-driver by attempting to check out the surrounding traffic with her trunk on the way to Bangkok from Ayutthaya!! Om took one look at the moving crane with mounted camera and decided this was not for her. Oh oh!! I knew she was gonna run and I was not prepared for this by a long shot!! I called to her mahout to help keep Om under control for the short shoot. She did settle down eventually...bananas go a long way! On the program VIP I told my life story and how it was that I became a mahout. Of course people also wanted to know the circumstances under which I ended up like this.

Some time after this Channel 5 also looked me up at the elephant camp and did a 10 minute spot which showed my work as a mahout and the fact that although salaries were minimum, I was happy doing what I was. I also received a basket full of health goodies and a 20,000.- cheque to help pay for post hospital care.

By now I was able to resume work, nothing fancy I might add. Picking up elephant shit all day and keeping the premises clean. Not too stressfull on the brain for sure. Basically I became bored. I was getting nowhere and no longer trusted that I had the strength to take on a 4 ton elephant full time. I would still regularly
take the elephants out for grass after work, or chain them up in the jungle for the night.
Within a year I had fully recovered from my ordeal. It was now time to give back to society what society had given to me.

The Beginning

Watching videos on youtube about conversations with Buddhist nuns still leaves me questioning, why are phiksuni referred to as Buddhist nuns in the west??? With 311 precepts, they cannot possibly fall under the catagory of "nun".
Be that as it may, today I will write about the beginnings for me. It was early July 2008. I had used up all the money I had, trying to find work without success. Lucky for me, I had friends at an elephant camp who gave me shelter until the tides changed. As was the custom, boozing always started once the elephants were put away, or while they were out grazing with their mahouts sitting on their backs. This usually started around 4:30 pm. After having spent a few days at the camp, the owner of the camp decided that a 2nd cage was needed around the tiger enclosure. So after work, beer in hand, all the mahouts gathered to help in this endeavour. Just before dark the mosquitos got so vicious that I was forced to retire. They only attacked my legs and feet and I was itching until well into the night.
In the morning I awoke with high fever and a swollen leg that was the same circumference as my thigh.
It didn't hurt that much, but I couldn't help but wonder what misfortune struck this time. Friends gave me antibiotics and anti-inflammatory medication, but no matter what I took, that swelling would not go down.
Even the old malay treatment of wrapping the leg in tamerind paste to draw out swelling, did nothing to improve my condition. Worse still, within a matter of days I was unable to walk and had clear fluid seeping out of my foot. With no money in hand, how was I to seek medical attention?
Eventually I asked the manager of the camp for permission to stay on. Permission was granted on the condition that I seek medical help. At that point there was no longer any denying the fact that I had approx. 400 baht to my name. The manager in his kindness than took it upon himself to bring me to a clinic. The leg looked terrible! Walking was becoming increasingly difficult and painful. The clinics refused to accept my case, saying that this was serious and that I needed hospital care.
Me and the manager ended up at Tamasat University Hospital in the Rangsit area. After about an hour's wait, we were quite bluntly informed that I would have to be admitted. And so it was that I was admitted on Sunday morning. No food or water and a few blood samples and other checks were the norm of that day. At 7:30 pm I was wheeled into the operating theatre and put under. This being a Sunday, meant that my condition was much more serious than anyone realized. The doctors generally have Sundays off.

When I awoke, groggy from the anestethic, I only saw bandages all the way up to my knees, but I was soon to find out that most of the flesh and skin on my foot had been removed, as well as a good portion of the inside of my thigh. I was still too groggy to fully understand what had happened, but that would change the next morning, when the interns came to clean the wound!! Talk about pain!!! Even the morphine injection did nothing to help the pain of having the wounds cleaned! I was fortunate in that the interns treated me very well and tried as best they could to keep me out of pain. In fact, eventually I became friends with many of them and started joking whenever they came into my ward. I was trying to keep my sense of humour, however difficult this was. I didn't want anyone to know the suffering in my heart and mind.
When I finally found out the truth about what happened, I kept asking myself, how is it that I'm still alive??
Deep down I no longer had the desire to live. Everything in life that I had ever done, had been ridiculed and put down. Promises aplenty, betrayal and backstabbing seemed to be the norm of my life, until I thought to myself, "why fight anymore when things turn against me anyway"?!  I was perplexed and couldn't understand why all of a sudden, there were people who were helping! Guess I never did understand that, other than that there was still unfinished business in this lifetime, that I had yet to complete.

Margo and the Wild Birds - Wat Yai, Ayutthaya, Thailand

Adding videos to blogs is still kinda touch and go... This was a video put together by a close friend some 2 years ago. One of my roles at the temple....saving birds. Sadly the "nok kapoot" baby only survived for 2 months. Really sad because that baby had the best of personalities I'd seen to date. Put it down to my total inexperience raising meat-eating birds.
The 2nd bird, the kauwow chick is non other than Cha, who is still with me 2 years down the road.
She was found by Achan Long, somewhere in the fields of the temple grounds. She was way too small and had a white mouth, and frankly I didn't think that she would survive at the time. Still I gave it my best shot and today she's a strong healthy lady. Unfortunately she has a balance problem that makes it impossible to release her. It's taken 2 years for her to become a reasonably tame bird. Probably, because of the kauwow's long life span, [some 10 years, I hear] they are very slow to mature. Now as I raise "Dum" the newest of the kauwows, Cha wants to know what all the noise is about! She comes right up to the top of her cage and eyeballs me and the noisy baby kauwow, watching all the while as junior gets fed.
She even called when the baby got hungry!!! Unbelievable for a bird who normally dumps their offspring on minor birds to raise!

There is another bird in my care that has never had it's photo published. She also arrived as a chick some 2 years ago. Her name is Peh, and she too is a kauwow female. She was not as lucky as the others, because when she fell from the tree, she was automatically a handicapped bird. Her one leg is not broken, but it feels like it's been dislocated by her fall. Handicapped birds, like handicapped humans are incapable of looking after themselves. Handicapped birds also vertually live in their shit. This means that every few days, Peh gets a bath with luke warm water to remove the crusted shit from her feet and body. She is then wrapped up in a T-shirt to dry, while I change the cloth in her cage and put in fresh water and food. Also, like humans, she develops sores, similar to bedsores in humans. These wounds need to be constantly cleaned and gentian violet applied. Peh has turned into quite the personality. She would peek through the wood pane, see me and usher her greeting. She can also be extremely loud if her food is finished!!!

Call it fate if you will...I've been taught that nothing comes to you unless it is somehow connected to you.
About 3 months after Peh and Cha arrived, I had a really strange dream. In the dream I was on a modern street with parks and tall modern buildings, the kind you would find in any city. I was looking for my house. Next thing I knew, I found myself in a basement appartment living room with one wall completely covered with Buddha and monk images. A massive alter this was.
Suddenly 2 men came into the room. One had an epileptic attack and the other had a mouth full of white maggots! I gasped and said loudly, "Where am I to find the merit to cover this!!!"
Again I was on the street outside when I woke up. I looked at the clock. It was exactly midnight!

At first I couldn't think of what this strange dream meant, until a friend told me that the 2 men referred to the 2 kauwows in my care. Time revealed that Peh, the handicapped kauwow had saved my life in a previous incarnation. I was forbidden to put her down as a mercy killing. It was also made clear to me that if Peh were to die at a young age, her next incarnation would be even worse than this.

So here we are, 2 years down the line and still going strong. Guess you could almost say "Friends for Eternity"! 

Dum [Newcomers 3]

Today is April 25th, 2 days since I released Tweet to freedom. For the past 2 days, I could still hear him calling for food. His adopted parents are being kept busy. From his calls I could tell that he is learning to fly more, even though it's only one or two trees away. Practise makes perfect,  eh. It's rewarding for me though, because I know that Tweet is alive!! That means a lot to me.
Meanwhile I still have "newcomer no. 2" to deal with. I mean the baby black kauwow that dropped in on the 14th, the second day of Songkran. He's a much bigger bird than the spotted females I have. He has quite a nice wingspam which he shows whenever I approach to feed him. He just spreads himself out, as if trying to make himself as big as possible so that I don't miss him. That not enough, his call is still that of a minor bird!!
He still doesn't know that he's a kauwow!!!
Time will fix that. From experience with 3 kauwows, I find that these birds mature very slowly. It took Cha, my female almost 2 years to remember who I am. Now she won't shut up. She sees me from far and calls. If the black baby is hungry or she gets impatient for any reason, she will give out the shrill kauwow call which can be very painful on the ears. Cha was not able to attain her freedom because she has a problem with her balance. Her feet would slip off the branch in her cage when she was resting. It didn't make any difference whether the branch was big or small. I've tried both and got the same reaction twice. Though I feel sorry for her, there's really nothing that I can do about it, save take care of her for the rest of her life. Someone once told me that kauwows can live up to 10 years. If that's true, than it will be a very long friendship indeed!

Meanwhile Dum, the black male has a very good chance of winning his freedom. His fall from the tall tree in front of my house left him none the worse off. Next week I will start weaning him off handfeeds and start teaching him to take dry food. This can be tricky because if his fluid intake is insufficient, he could end up in trouble. I need to monitor this process very carefully, by observing his droppings. That will give me the information I need. Strange how animal and bird droppings can tell stories about health conditions.
When I was working with racehorses, there were three things that I had to take in very quickly every morning when I went to check the stables....the droppings, how much water was left and whether the eyes on the horses were clear or not. I was stable supervisor and had to look after 60 horses. More on that in a different blog.....

I named the male kauwow Dum, which is the thai word for black....not very imaginative.
The other thing I need to do is bring him into my room and see how ready he is to fly.
Once he's ready to fly and eat on his own, he will be ready to embrace freedom. Part 4 of this story will be forthcoming soon.

The last male kauwow that I released some 2 years ago did some very strange things. Firstly, when he was first released he didn't know that he was a kauwow and therefore ended up spending 4 days with the pigeons!! I didn't know whether to say smart or stupid??
Smart in that he would have friends that show him how to find food? Well, anyway he finally decided that the food of pigeons was not for him. He then spent some time with the minor birds!! He faired better because I noticed that he was putting on weight. You might wonder how I recognised him. He had vertually no tail when he was released, which means that he had to use his wings more rigorously. Untill a new tail grows out, he was easy to recognise. The last time I saw him was some 3 months after I had released him. His tail was halfway grown out and he'd become the confident flyer. Probably by then he'd figured out that he was indeed a kauwow??!

Female Crankiness in an Elephant

Bulls are not the only ones who snap!!! Females can be even more dangerous because they generally don't give up until they get their target.

I've seen several cranky females during my 10 year stunt as a mahout. Here's another example.
Koh Samui is known for exporting coconuts, which means that we have coconut leaves as food for elephants and of course plenty of coconuts for mahout and elephant. The mahouts would often climb the tree and throw us a few coconuts to refresh our thirst in the heat of the day. The flesh of these coconuts was hard and unpalatable to us, but they were great for the elephants. We would drink the water and then pass on the coconut to an elephant. We passed a few coconuts to Sau, a now 5 year-old female, and she would promptly step on them, crack them open and eat the flesh first. Now we had about 7 peacocks which roamed freely on the premises. They caught on to this and it turned out they loved coconut flesh too.
Cleverly they would wait for the elephant to open the coconut and then try to steal some of this good stuff!
Sau did not take kindly to this game at all. Once I saw her slap a peacock so hard that the poor thing went flying through the air for approx. 5 meters and crash-landed on the banks. The peacock was groggy for about 15 minutes and I couldn't believe what that peacock did next! It came back for more!!!
By now Sau got really angry. She tried to trample the peacock. Fortunately, that peacock caught on to this and avoided too close a range to Sau. Since that day, I nicknamed the peacock "a fancy chicken", because if you look closely at it's head....it's about the same size as a chicken!

Extremely Dangerous Must

The above is an extreme case of must which occurred in Tamilnadhu, India 2003. This is news footage from a local newsroom. The elephant in question would be approx. 30 years old and be working as a logging elephant, based on the gear he's wearing. He was impossible to catch even after sedation, and was loose for nearly 2 weeks. Needless to say how many people were killed and how much damage he caused.

He's way too fat which makes him all the more dangerous. In Thailand, how fat we allow a bull to get will depend much on his temperament and tendancies. For example, at one camp where I worked, the bull worked throughout his must without any problems whatsoever.

A friend did a research project on elephants in must some 6 or 7 years ago. She would take blood samples from elephants, seperate the blood from the fluids [where all the harmones are stored], by means of a centrifuge and send those samples back to the US for analysis. The reason for this was because way too little is known about the must period. If you look at deer, for example, all males come into runt at the same time. And this is the case for most herd animals. But not with elephants!!
There seems to be no seasonal connection to elephant must. Each individual has his must at his own time.
Hence this research. Later on, females and younger elephants were also included in the research.

What they found out was that first of all, elephants produce a harmone that is normally only produced by primates, meaning monkeys, apes and humans. This new knowledge puts a whole new perspective on the elephant world. When the bull enters must, this harmone increases together with adrenaline production. This means that the elephant is the only creature that can hide a foot of his chain under his feet and pretend like he's at the end of his chain. One move, and whatever is nearby is dead.
The bull above is extremely agitated by his must. Again as is often the case, the mahout either missed or ignored the oncoming must, otherwise this elephant would have been isolated and chained up between 2 strong trees to prevent him from hurting himself and others.

With other chosen videos, the subject of must will be more elaborated on.