Reflections: Water for Elephants

Jacob Jankowski is a ninety three year old man rebelling against the rigid confines of a residential home for the elderly. He struggles to cope with his decrepit body and his slippery mind that fazes in and out of his unforgettable past. Jacob recalls his time as a veterinarian in a Circus in the early 1930s. His memories are a bitter-sweet mixture of fondness, sorrow and guilt, but the past unwaveringly haunts him to somehow help him make peace with it. In this story, the reader gets an inside look at the unglamorous backstage of a Circus - starting from the hierarchical segregation of its people, the cut-throat survival tactics, the conniving politics, the pitiable lives of captive animals, to the bits of humanity and camaraderie that surface amidst much cruelty. The story is an explosion of romance and drama that is sure to reorient our perspective on Circus performers.

I actually have been to the Circus only once, and even that is a very hazy memory. In general, my parents and I have primarily felt only pity and sympathy for the human and animal performers, rather than any awe. Especially in developing countries like India, the concept of human or animal rights hardly exists in such trades. So going into this book, I had the same mental-model of a Circus as the author presents. Although it wasn’t much of a surprise in that regard, it still shocked me. You get punched by the brutality of the story. When I started the book, I was so drawn into the setting and the characters that I wanted to watch the upcoming movie based on this book. But after reading about the violence and callousness, I’ve decided not to. I get easily affected by disturbing visuals of gore. When I have enough of such images floating translucently in my mind, why make them more real and graphic by watching the movie. Or so I tell myself now :). Let’s see how tempted I am when the movie comes out!

The aspect that I was most impressed with was the characterization of the old and crabby Jacob Jankowski. Sara Gruen garners the human elements of the story by her exceptionally good characterization of the old man. She pays attention to every single detail of the experiences and angst of an old man abandoned in a place that no longer acknowledges him as a person with an identity, a personality and even a spectacular past. Jacob is transformed to a real, living person. More than the Circus, it is this parallel thread that is precisely and sensitively portrayed. I would be tempted to watch the movie just to see if the actor pulls off this role!

The book is obviously well-researched, for Gruen incorporates real incidents and accidents from history into this story. Gruen also does justice in bringing out the pitiable lives of vagabonds during the  Great Depression, who scurried through life and braved through indignities, just to scrape pennies. Although the story definitely takes the glamorous sheen off the notion of a Circus, it is an absorbing story of survival, humanity and the heart-warming bonds animals and humans can share.

Digested Thoughts: The story makes for an emotional and engrossing read. Gruen’s writing is commendable, and her characterizations are excellent. This is an interesting read on the life of Circus performers. It makes one respect the value of survival and of course, our cushion of financial security!

Reflections: Animal Farm

Human beings grow up with an inevitable ego that they are better than other animals - creatures with just sparse senses, incapable of thought, language or intelligence. Religious, social and philosophical theories try to mold us as superior beings, who are above and beyond animal-like impulses, who are far more cognitively developed than lower-order Pavlonian-creatures who obey their behavioral responses, who have the innate clarity to discern between good and bad, uphold equality and harmony, and who are blessed with an alacrity to work against Nature, to innovate, progress and stay invincible.

But looking at the world around us, the societies and civilizations that have risen and fallen, it's an irony that we humans start bearing the very same animal attributes that we were taught to overcome; worse yet, we indulge in these "primordial" animal traits with a devious use of our "sixth sense" - the power of thought. When this sordid metamorphosis afflicts people, the hope for Utopia, for love, peace and harmony evaporate, leaving the world dry and parched of freedom and equality.

George Orwell yet again explores the strong theme of dystopia through this book. In this tale, farm animals decide to revolt against humans, after years of suppression and cruelty. Through a brave rebellion they oust their human master and start a civil society, founded on seven noble commandments that profess peace, harmony and equality to all animals. What started as a socialist society with a vision towards Utopia, soon started turning rancid. The most cunning and power hungry pig, Napoleon, employed his conniving political tactics to gradually amend each of the seven commandments to suit his dictatorial authority. The gullible, naive and "illiterate" animals are swayed into trusting Napoleon and his entourage of cunning pigs and vicious thug-dogs. Those unfortunates who dared to rebel, ended up as snacks to Napoleon's dogs.

Orwell's prose is laced with intense satire at our political schemes, the manipulative conspiracies and the utter disregard with which the "lower-classes" are oppressed, and beguiled, causing the rich to grow richer and the poor to grow poorer. Just as how ironically, humans start degrading in their values and turn into animals, the pigs, who started a revolution to liberate animals from humans and to keep away from human-traits, soon started acting like men - greedy, selfish, hypocritical and treacherous. The metamorphosis is so seamless that men and pigs become indistinguishable - each having changed with the others' vileness.

Orwell's tale is a tragedy that most countries and societies have faced, and still face. He masterfully hints at how every society despite being started with hopes and promises of equality to all, succumb to core human vices, such that the term "equality" eventually transforms to gradations of social-classes. Although Napoleon, the pig, is a caricature of Joseph Stalin and his totalitarian rule, each person can associate Napoleon with plenty of "leaders" and political swindlers of their society. The book fuels righteous anger and has its heart wrenching moments. I enjoyed Orwell's crafty analogies to depict our societal cultures in the light of simple farm animals. I particularly liked the raven, Moses, who preaches to the animals of a mystical hill that grew sugar-candy and line-seed cake, wherein all animals could be blissful and happy forever. The animals, despite being skeptical of such a hill, wanted to hold onto the belief to distract themselves of their miserable lives and hope for a more sanguine future.

This is a book that makes us introspect on our values and triggers us to prevent the human-animal metamorphosis that threatens to put our civilization on a path to dystopia.

And I need to make a note that I received this book as a loving and thoughtful birthday gift :)

Mice Hunt

A lazy saturday night. A prolonged dinner with lots of chit-chat. In the midst of a dreamy conversation, I noticed something moving fast, thanks to my peripheral vision. And thanks to my coordinated judgment I deduced it was heading right towards my feet. And it had a tail. Reflexive shriek (make it shrieks), plates in the air, mindless leaping and I landed next to N and climbed on top of a chair. My worst fear was - what if it was a lizard... or some other American reptile, just bigger and nastier. I was prepared to even leave the country.
"What is it?" I demanded. "It's a mouse!" was the reply.

Hearts pounded and both of us looked violated. How dare it?!! Well, first question. How did it come in?!! And where is it now?! The space beneath the oven? The living room? My room?!!! You may call it paranoia to assume that a house mouse might instantly scurry into my room, of all places. Well, mice (and their ilk) have an affinity towards me, my room, my shelf (in that order). I have my facts verified, for there was one chubby mouse that dedicatedly clambered up three floors worth of water pipe, to get into the living room and then run for it's life through the dining room, through the corridor, to unfailingly scamper into my room and then hop into my shelf, of all the shelves there were. This was back home in India. After my living on the dining table for two nights, and after futile attempts to catch the little creature via a trap (rather a box) with masal-vada, there was a ravaged search conducted by our maid and watchman, with the use of broomsticks and other handy devices and the mean fellow was captured and let loose a street away. That very evening, our faithful friend found his way back to me, my room, my shelf. Suffice to say I never let people open the living room windows again. Or for that matter any window, for weeks together.

Given this history, my natural reaction was to turn a little hysteric, when standing atop the chair and wondering where mouse1 went, there we saw another flurry of brown fur and tail, disappearing into the crack next to the dishwasher. This was mouse2. Our worlds were turned upside down. N seemed positive that mouse1 looked smaller than mouse2, which could mean that there was one mama and plenty of tots. Mice tots unfortunately have plenty of siblings. I don't know why a chair which was a measly foot off the ground, gave me so much security against these furry creatures, much smaller than me, and probably far more pissed off and terrified at my shrieks, than I was of them. Still I decided to stay there and called for help. A knight in shining armor of sorts, rudely awakened from sleep was made to roam the streets to find an open store that sold mouse traps. Till his return, N and I faithfully stood (and then sat) rooted to the spot, peeling our eyes to update the mouse-counter, and their appearance and disappearance sites. None came by. My mind was playing the movie, "Mouse Hunt" several times, wherein the mouse plays a Tarzan-like trick and jumps from the chandelier, while N made sure to point out that they might have already nibbled on many things, and they might bite us in our sleep, thus passing on Rabies. Sleep? Me? In this house? Ha... I could see myself being wide awake with my feet tucked up, and keeping watch all night till the mice were out of the house. I was focusing on cleaning measures, disappointed that our kitchen could attract such pests. Time to change the disinfectant? Wait... when was the last time I used disinfectant on the floor? Wet Swiffer does not equal disinfectant! I was horrified at myself, deeply regretful of our ignorance. As I was cursing my hygiene routine, N gasped suddenly and concluded thusly, "If there are mice here, then there will be snakes to eat them, and if the mice presumably came in through some broken vent, the snakes can come too!" I HATE worst-case analysis. "There are no poisonous snakes in this area....", I muttered. "Maybe we should get a cat", N continued, "but problem is how do we potty-train it..." Hmmmm....

Thankfully the mouse traps arrived shortly afterward. I wasn't relieved yet... mice don't just fall into traps. It takes time. As N was loading the trap with peanuts, I asked "Wait, this looks like the ones used in Tom and jerry. How can we release the mouse?"... and then I read the back of the cover, "It kills them!!!" I was stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea. I didn't want to kill the mice! For one, it's inhumane, tragic and there could be mouse-babies, and the other reason is, well, it's just gory and messy and stinky! Knight-in-armor was not inclined to hear me whine and plead for a humane trap. This was it, else I could spend the night with mice partying around, and look for a humane trap in the morning. N continued to load the trap with extra peanuts and started leaving trails of peanuts from the cracks near the oven and the dishwasher. "We're saving ourselves from Rabies", was the answer. The decision was made. The kitchen door closed, lights shut, I made my way to my room, wary of furry things with a tail as I walked. I couldn't get myself to sleep - I wanted to tune my ears to the sound of the menacing traps snapping, and yet I tried not to. I looked under each crevice and nook in my room and after being relatively satisfied that there was none around, I contemplated stuffing the crack near the door with a cloth, to block unwelcome visitors.

I kept myself occupied with reading and browsing, not letting myself fall asleep lest my toes be nibbled on. My mind drifted to the scene that awaited in the morning. If they were dead, how would I face them? Worse yet, if their tail gets stuck like Jerry's and they are tied down to the trap, albeit alive, what would we do then? Did the mice really have a little family? Like Ratatouille? Like Despereaux? What will the babies do? I was reminded of Phoebe from Friends, living with rat babies - for all my talk on vegetarianism and equality to animals, I have sunk low. "Another selfish hypocrite. In the end, I was atop the food chain and I flexed rules to suit me. My pretentious analysis on morality has changed nothing - I am territorial to the extent of not letting any creature into my house, my space. Not even house flies. I live in a bubble and make empty noise. Evolution has changed nothing. What if I do let a mouse live with me, what would I name it? Brownie... wow, it's been a while since I had a brownie, as a matter of fact even chocolate. I ate MnMs today though.. I like the blue ones. I guess it's because I like the color blue, even my blanket is blue. Its a little chilly... it's Fall, what to do. Hope it doesn't get too cold this year.... " and I drifted off to sleep.

The harsh sun jolted me out of sleep and I was instantly up on my feet, scanning my vicinity for shredded blankets and furry things with tail. I contemplated whether I was bold enough to go downstairs. No, I decided. N came in a couple of minutes later, announcing, "They are dead...both of them". "Oh! Is there blood?", was my concern. "No, they were suffocated that's all. Will you come help me dispose them?" Oh GOD! "ME?! I am too scared!", "They are dead!", N stressed. So I finally went, although all I did was stand petrified staring at the sprawled brown bodies with tail. N cleared them muttering, "C3H trace of mice. They are wild mice". N's expertise on dealing with white lab mice for genetics research. For my part, I disinfected the area and went up to complain and whine to people. I killed mice! Boohoo.

Then I googled. After an extensive research on humane traps, I found that Amazon sells a couple of products, this and this, among others. There is this person who has invented and patented his humane trap. And of course there are other smart people having devised simple traps like this one and this successful video demo. To be frank, so many solutions to humane traps saddened me. It would have been better to console myself if google had returned no results. With potential mice babies around, and after having massacred the mama and papa? (mouse 1 and mouse 2 seemed to be of the same size in the morning), we fear more. Rather than ramble and make such a big fuss, it seems like a wise idea to order one from Amazon.

The Pig that wants to be Eaten

Ah... finally the book's title is uncovered. The chapter is no euphemism, it means exactly what it reads :). What if you meet a pig that wants you to eat him?

Charles has been a vegetarian all his life, for not wanting to kill or hurt animals. But he had always wondered how meat tasted, and of late he'd been craving to try and have at least one meal of meat. Of course his principles forbade him, so he stopped himself. Imagine you're in a world where animals can talk. Or perhaps Charles just happened to meet one special pig that could talk. The pig tells Charles that his/her life time's ambition is to be eaten by someone else. The pig was reared comfortably and was not ill treated in any way. As a matter of fact, the pig has been looking forward to his day at the butcher's place. Oh so crushed would be the pig's soul if no one ate him.... and Charles wondered if it's unfair to disappoint such an animal's lifetime wish....

If that's not enough, Charles comes to know of a genetically modified chicken that was born in a persistent vegetative state (PVS). The chicken was no much aware of itself than a carrot would be of itself. Eating the chicken was no different than eating a carrot. Charles argues if it's against his principles to eat such a chicken. (Source: The Restaurant at the the end of the Universe, Douglas Adams)

If Charles's principle is towards saving the animal from trauma, and nothing more, then I guess both the animals will face no trauma (the pig will go through painless execution, and both animals were not cruelly reared). If I did meet such a pig or a chicken what would I do? Well, to make matters a little more interesting (and weird) why not consider this - what if Charles meets a man who wants to be eaten? I think I've heard of such a man/case somewhere sometime in an article. Cannibalism is frowned upon, because we humans associate value and dignity to our lives even if we lose all state of awareness and get into a state of PVS. Therefore meat is not just seen as meat. So herein comes the main question -- how different do we consider animals from humans? Animals can't think as much, lack a lot of human emotion and behavior and many many more characteristics due to the current state of evolution. What then are the principles behind our principles on ethical treatment of animals?

I'm a vegetarian myself, so this puzzle is a good one for me. The reason why I don't eat meat is because I consider animals to have a certain dignity. They are living beings who can feel pain, have the right to live, and who obviously don't want to be killed. With all the vegetables and fruits around, why try to kill an animal? I also like pets, and I think all animals are alike. Why be prejudiced against salmons and chickens when I would treasure a gold fish in the tank and an adorable doggy play mate. But as I write these sentences I'm aware of all the "prejudices" within me, and I know I don't act completely true to all those statements.

If I really considered animals to have a certain dignity, then I shouldn't be using any animal product -- milk, cheese, eggs, leather, fur, silk, certain oils, gelatin etc. Although I do abstain myself from leather, fur, gelatin, animal oils, I can't say the same about the rest. For half the time I don't realize what goes inside packaged foods (which is another issue by itself) and I have NO IDEA about how the cows and chickens were treated to get all the milk and eggs.... they are probably kept in miserable conditions.

I also am aware that I wouldn't mind getting certain animals killed --- rats for one (especially if they try to pay a dear visit to my kitchen), lizards for another, cockroaches (the numerous ones I have swatted through my life...), spiders, bees and others that fit into the subset of pests. If I were cornered by a cobra, and I had a spear in my hand, I wouldn't worry about saving it. And if mice were used for cancer research, I don't complain.

So why these "prejudices"? I would take on a Utilitarian stance on this problem. The law of "greater good". If I were to form an equation of the consequences of each scenario, from two different perspectives (if the animal is spared, and the animal is used) and I weigh the outcomes in terms of the "good" generated by the two, I will be convinced if I picked the one that led to the greater good to the majority. I can therefore argue killing snakes, tigers, bees, spiders and bugs for self-defense, rats and cockroaches to ward off diseases, and using mice in experiments to help save millions from cancer. I can argue that milk and cheese provide necessary nourishment for me, which is otherwise very hard to be substituted with. If one day, chickens became endangered, then eating them will be clearly forbidden to save the ecosystem. But today, killing a cow/chicken that never did any harm to me, and will likely do no harm to me, when I can eat other things, is an unbalanced equation. But I do see loopholes... what is "good"? Can we really quantify suffering and good to balance out such equations? It's not something that can be clearly defined all the time.

Everything said and done, will I substitute humans to be used in such an equation of "greater good"? This borders on issues like euthanasia, capital punishments, wars, abortions etc. So the truth is, we do consider animals to be lesser than us and hence assume rights over them, which we probably shoudn't... but oh well it's the survival of the fittest.

The pig that wants to be eaten, will invariably be consumed by so many other people, if not by Charles; and the same holds for the chicken. So Charles is not obliged to eat the pig to save it's life-long wish. If his principle is centered only on ethical treatment of animals before execution and a painless execution, then he does not violate his principle in any way by eating the animals. But If he associated some amount of dignity to the animals, then eating them for the only "good" of satisfying his temptation and hunger violates his principle.