So it happened again last night. I was sitting in a bar, minding my own business talking to this old friend of mine when a few of her friends came in. I had never met any of them before, so introductions were made all around. After it was well established that everyone was fine, doing good, glad to be off work and what-have-you, My friend tells the entire bar (well not really, but it was a bar and she was loud!) that I am the guy she is always telling them about who shot the elephant. Great! I can see the contempt knotting up in a few faces and of course, one of the other females began explaining to me how it is illegal to shoot elephants, and she knows it is because it was on the Discovery channel or something.

Everyone in her little group applauded her for setting me straight. Then I began with enlightening them to the actual facts and it wasn’t long before I wasn’t exactly the horrible guy who had illegally shot an elephant so much as I was the conservationist who helped feed a village, spur the economy (even if just a little) and generally did a good thing (Still seems too bad that the poor, poor elephant had to die though…yeah!) One of the members of this entourage was about my age (early thirties) and he walks over to me and starts telling me how he is a bird hunter and he gets it and wants to know what it was like to go on safari and hunt elephant. He has like the requisite 10,000 questions and all and while I was listening to him ask his questions, I felt my eyes cloud over and I was no longer in that bar, I was back in the dry, sandy river bed in Zimbabwe.

This fellow hunter could not get a grip on what it was like to have been there and done that. I found that when I started telling the story to him, I got a little lost myself. I wasn’t telling the tale to him. I was really speaking; to myself, he and the others around were just part of the background. I was remembering all the little things, I could smell the grass, feel the sweat running down my back, the slick feel of the rifle in my hands, I could hear the light crunching noise of the grass underfoot as we trekked down to the elephant. I recalled the shot (shots as it were) and the absolute perfection with which the bolt opened and slammed home readying yet another cartridge.

I was floating when I explained to him the feeling of awe when the elephant lifted his head toward my group and I saw in his eyes that he had decided to come and remove us from his land. I feel the pain in my knees when I jumped off the opposite bank in the dry riverbed and trotted over to get into position for yet another shot on the downed elephant (who was never getting back up). I tried to relate to him how that minute and a half changed my life – forever. I felt the heat coming off the barrel as the fray ended. I was relieved when I sat down next to the 5 tons of meat and rested my back against him.

I realized during my retelling that I was standing in this bar, holding an imaginary rifle, working the imaginary bolt and every body must have thought I was crazy or drunk. So be it! Maybe I am/was. But I have been there, I have seen it with my own eyes, I have smelled it and I have tasted it. I have had the weary muscles and felt the emotion well up inside me as I collided with destiny. It is not a matter of living, it is a guarantee that I am alive and I have lived.

So how do you remember your safari? What sticks out the most? I hope your memories are as real and vivid as mine.
To Perry and Gan – Thank you both. I would trade all the rest of my days for one more day with the two of you in that hot, dry, sandy riverbed. That was my best day.

Brian

Brian:

I've tried in my feeble way to express how I feel by writing here some. I don't know if I've ever do so so concisely and accurately as you.

As to your p.m., I'm checking on the field guides and am awaiting a call, btw. I was told that letters of thanks were sent months ago?

Allout,
You handled, very diplomatically, a situation that many of us are faced with. A group who may never experience life other than through tv (note the small letters), or vicariously through others. It amazes me not at what people know, but what they think they know, but don't.
Teaching as I do, I'm often accosted by students when they find out I am a hunter. (Hmm, accosted. Guess that shows how little they know. I still have to grade their papers.) Personally, I'll probably never kill an elephant, but have no problem with others doing it in whatever situation. There are other species that I will bag.
Thanks for your post.
Max

Brian, I enjoyed your story, thanks for reminding me what we that visit the dark continent dream about...the adventure! Although I've been within 20 yards of wild Ele, I have yet to take one. I'll never forget the mesmirizing effect the two twin bulls had on me, nor just how truly huge they are. It also amazes me how little the public understands about wild animals, especially the one's that flap their pie hole the loudest. Good hunting, LDK

quote:

Originally posted by JudgeG:
Brian:
I've tried in my feeble way to express how I feel by writing here some. I don't know if I've ever do so so concisely and accurately as you.

Judge,
I think we all are very familiar with your particular writing style and ability. That you would even begin to try and humor me…is a compliment. The first round is on me when our paths next cross. I am very much looking forward to it. Till then -

Prof & David,
Thank you both. Those memories are with me every day, some days they just feel stronger than others. Usually the momentary break from reality is follwed by a suffering in which a long time is spent trying to figure out how to get back and do it again.
Oh well, there is another nickel in the jar. Now I am just that much closer.
Brian

Brian,

... Well said, I too tell those that ele hunting is legal and tell it like it is...
Next year in Dallas, you, Perry, and all of us ARers...

Mike

"I was the CONSEVATIONIST who..." That is how I see myslef.A conservationist and animal lover who is conserving wildlife by hunting.

Brian, very well written,and the discription lets one follow your camp fire smoke right up to Heaven! Many men go to Africa and hunt every thing money can buy them, and never find what you found on that one hunt for the largest land animal of today, and to understand what it means in the real scheme of nature! Good show young man!

very well said!!

Extremely well written Brian. I can recall my elephant hunt this past July in detail. Its burned into my memory. It also changed my life in a lot of ways. I have a hard time putting into words for someone the feelings that I have experienced hunting elephant. Your story was great. I have also caught myself "zoning out" recalling the hunt and watched people looking at me strange as I drifted back to that day. I was in a training seminar today and started to daydream about hunting elephant. I miss it.

WLA

Mike,
Don't know if I will make Dallas next year. But if so, you are on.

WLA,
Ain't it the truth? I couldn't talk about it for about two months after I got home. I could write about it, but I just couldn't speak the words. It was sort of like talking about it to people who hadn't done it sort of cheapened it. Now, I talk about it to anyone and everyone. But I don't do it for them, I do it for me.

Thanks for the comments on the writing guys. Much appreciated.

Brian

quote:

Originally posted by Allout:

quote:

Originally posted by JudgeG:
Brian:
I've tried in my feeble way to express how I feel by writing here some. I don't know if I've ever do so so concisely and accurately as you.

Judge,
I think we all are very familiar with your particular writing style and ability. That you would even begin to try and humor me…is a compliment.

Oh, jeez...stop it already. No need to try and out humble each other! JudgeG's writing is top-shelf and some of, if not 'the' most enjoyable reading that has been posted on this website. However, Allout, that post of yours was right up there IMHO. Truly excellent. I enjoyed the read...thanks.

I hope neither of you squandor your talents by sticking to the ephemeral medium of the internet.

To the point of the thread, however, my memories just don't seem to be that vivid anymore. The hectic (insane) pace of my professional life seems to have killed it. I think its part of the reason I enjoy video so much...its like archiving my memories in another medium! Maybe what I really need is to make more time to reflect and reminisce about past hunts before they get lost.

ps: The scenario you described is something I contend with very often. My boss is not a hunter and he gets a kick out of seeing people's reactions when he brings up my hunting trips to Africa...so he does it ALL the time. A few weeks ago I even had to give a two hour after-dinner presentation on my trips to Africa to a half dozen senior executive VPs of the company I work for....most of whom don't hunt, and many of whom will determine the future of my career. No pressure though.

Cheers,
Canuck

Brian,

Great post. The only problem I had with it was trying to picture Perry's brother in a bar of all places. You sure it wasn't a church meeting?

Jim

Allout,

That also reminds me of why I drink
Just kidding..it was a nice piece of prose.
It's been 18 years since my last elephant and I don't plan on doing it again...ever. But I can still remember all of the little particulars about each one. Well said.

Rich Elliott

Canuck -
Jim,
obviously you don't know me very well if you cannot picture me in a bar. Most people who know me think I was born in a bar. Or did you mean behind bars? Cause that is always a possiblity as well. I will let my brother (Saint that he is) speak for himself.
Rich,
I don't know how many more I would ever shoot given an unlimted supply of $, time, etc. I know I would want to go experience it at least once or twice more for sure, but after that...But then, who knows, maybe one more would drive me completely mad and I would not be able to sleep at night if I weren't on an elephants trail. So for now, I will split the difference and say 30 or so would be a good round number to end an elephant hunting career with.

Hey only 29 more to go!
Here is another nickel in the can. Now I am that much closer to number 2.
Thanks guys,
Brian