Assam Gibbon Sanctuary and Tribal Life

We had a long adventure to get to the Gibbon Sanctuary after a short stop back at the Orchid Co-op to buy souvenirs. This was not the first time I would have been happy to spend more money to get a higher quality of craftsmanship, but it just wasn’t available. I bought one of the many roughly carved wooden rhinos, some Assam tea, and some locally grown Stevia leaves.

The Gibbon Rest House was our destination, but Google Maps (and the entire internet) does not know that this business exists. We did have the street address and finally made our way to the goal, which had a giant yellow sign marked Spot On Gibbon Homestay. But the owner, Diganta, insisted that the sign had nothing to do with his business and he would (FIVE YEARS after opening HIS business, FIVE YEARS of confusing his customers later…) ask Spot On to remove the sign. OK. Ok. Ok.

There is very limited information on visiting the Gibbon Sanctuary available on-line, and when planning my trip, I had found a traveler’s blog, and they said they stayed in the “Forest Guest House.” The “Gibbon Rest House” was not IN the sanctuary. It was 15 km away in Jorhat. I complained to the travel agent AGAIN. He said there was no accommodation in the sanctuary. Finally, the guides provided by the government explained that there is a Forest Guest House, but it is only for use by the park employees. So I do not know how those westerners got invited, but I didn’t get the nice forest birdsong I had anticipated as my lullaby. I got normal Indian city noises, loudspeaker blasted Islamic calls to prayer five times a day, and reasonably quiet nights, interrupted by the occasional dog barking, and terminated by some loud roosters.

Compared to the views of the elephants and rhinos, the gibbons were less photogenic. They are entirely arboreal, and they stay high up in the trees, like probably a minimum of 60 feet or 20 meters, and they are not that big. So without special photo equipment the sharability result is limited. But they were a lot of fun to watch swinging through the trees. Thinking about it, I guess that means that if there were gibbons at the Brookfield Zoo (near Chicago) they were probably living too close to the ground for their ultimate happiness. In any case, here is a flavor of what we saw. Overall, in three half days, we saw an apparently unprecedented 6 groups of 1-6 gibbons. The guide provided by the national park, the armed guard (in case we surprised some elephants), our hotel owner host and guide all started telling me at the 10 am breakfast break the first day that I had brought them luck. I told them NO. It was a gift from Maa (Durga, great goddess of India). By the end, we all agreed that 1) I brought them luck 2) Maa blessed my visit and 3) the guides were skilled. I was told that there are people who make the trip and NEVER see a single gibbon. In fact, as we were getting ready to leave Kaziranga, a British woman said they had made a brief stop at the Gibbon Sanctuary and had seen no gibbons. So, there you have it. Diganta bought a wonderful cell phone with a fancy stabilizer, so his video was the best. Here is part of what he shot. The male is black, and female brown. She’s a bit harder to see. They are obviously enjoying life.

Since I am still at the IIT Madras Taramani Guest House with reasonably fast internet, I will now upload a few videos from the dancing at the Orchid Co-op. After the professional dancers finished their 20 minute presentation, the host invited the audience. The Home Science students I had met earlier in the day pushed one of their classmates to sing. She has an angelic voice. Then they all started dancing. They looked really happy. I will have to see what I can do later to add the video. The file is too big, and was captured sideways.

While we are back in the orchid park, and on the subject dancing ladies, I will post the picture of the beautiful Dancing Lady orchid.

The last afternoon in eastern Assam, sated with my blessed and lucky gibbon viewings, we made a small jaunt to a village where the tribal people of Assam still try to maintain a hint of their old life-ways. First thing I see?????? A Baptist church!

There was even a (dry) Baptismal Fount off to the side. Well, I have always been conflicted about Christianity in India. But it provides a counterbalance to the devastation created for the lower caste and out-cast people. All sisters and brothers in Christ is more appealing to the Western democrat than the hierarchical system of the bronze age, as much as modern India has struggled to reduce its damage.

We were invited into the home of one of the families. Everywhere in India, people have wanted to take selfies with me. Here are three family members, including two cute young girls.

I also spent an hour or so talking with my taxi driver, Sarwal, and some members of a tribal “Self Help Group” that had built a small amusement park, complete with boating in a small lake. Like many places in India, it’s not for the weak kneed. I got to practice my Hindi a bit, even though the native language, Assamese, is preferred. These people did not refuse to speak Hindi with the same force as my friends in Tamil Nadu, who mostly claim they do not know any Hindi.

My taxi driver, Sarwal, explained to me that he only looks at Facebook when he is “boring” because he has to wait for his customers to see what they came to see. I tried to have Dharmendra explain the difference between BORING and BORED, but am not sure I had much success.

Well, I am going to post this already very long post, but will briefly jump ahead to my second to last day in India, when I went to the Arignar Anna Zoological Park. It’s the largest zoo in India. They do a lot of work to rehabilitate populations of endangered species. Dressed like an Indian, I was less popular as a selfie subject, but these young ladies asked for one.