An Elephant in My Kitchen: What the Herd Taught Me About Love, Courage, and Survival

by Françoise Malby-Anthony

  The team grabbed their emergency kits and raced along 220 kilometres of bad roads to fetch her. On the way back, they stopped at a garage to check on her. She was struggling to breathe and her heart rate had dropped dangerously.

  ‘I don’t like this one bit,’ muttered the vet. ‘How much longer to the orphanage?’

  ‘A good hour.’

  ‘She won’t make it. I’m going to put her on a new drip right now.’

  There was no time to waste. The back of the Land Cruiser became a makeshift ICU and the calf was given life-saving nutrients and liquids. Unbeknown to the team, members of the Zulu royal family witnessed their desperate attempts to save her life, and as they were packing up to leave, a black-suited bodyguard approached them. He listened to their explanation and passed on the information to the royal party. Five minutes later, he was back.

  ‘Queen Zwelithini would like to bless the calf,’ he announced gravely.

  And that is how a sick little rhino received a royal blessing and was named Makhosi by the queen of the Zulus. Our rhino princess arrived at the orphanage just after sunset and was placed in the same neonatal room as Charlie, with just a barrier separating them. They were both under a week old, our youngest orphans by far, and so miserable that we hoped that having another warm body nearby would help cheer them up. Charlie had never seen a rhino in his life before and stared through the bars at the strange creature running helter-skelter in the room next to his.

  By 3 a.m., Makhosi was near collapse but too frightened to sleep, and poor Charlie hadn’t slept a wink either, so the team decided to drop the barrier between them.

  Amazingly, Makhosi scampered straight up to Charlie. He swayed his head from side to side in greeting and reached his snout towards her. They exchanged interested noisy snuffles. Makhosi lowered her head and Charlie opened his jaws and gently chomped her ears. She stood still, as if being caressed. Charlie calmed her and made her feel safe.

  Their carers moved Makhosi’s mattress next to his but she didn’t want separate beds! She climbed onto his mattress, nuzzled up against him and fell fast asleep. Such a bond, such tenderness, developed between our scared little rhino and lonely hippo. They comforted each other, went everywhere together, cuddled up when it was cold, and if one woke and cried to be fed, the other demanded a bottle too.

  We can learn so much from the sweet acceptance that animals of different species have for one another. Here were two animal orphans who had never seen anything like the other before, but it didn’t matter. They were delighted to be roommates and helped each other adjust to a scary and unfamiliar environment.

  Makhosi was the weaker of the two. She hadn’t benefited from her mother’s colostrum, the all-important first milk, and had a bad start with painful colic, but being with Charlie soothed her and made it much easier for the carers to feed her and treat her stomach cramps. She was a tiny tot with the gumption of a fully grown rhino and she became very good at dishing out bruises if she didn’t get fed quickly enough.

  At this stage, Thando, Gugu and Impi were between ten and twelve months old, and big and sturdy enough for the much older Ithuba to safely join them at last. No more watching enviously through the fence any more! What a bunch of happy hooligans they were together. Ithuba loved being the biggest and the others happily let him be the big brother in their newly formed rhino crash.

  Their enclosure was next to Charlie and Makhosi, and little Makhosi was at the fence separating the two bomas every day, squeezing her nose between the poles to ‘chat’ with the rhino gang on the other side. Charlie adored Makhosi but he never joined her when she was bonding with her friends next door. It was as if his rhino neighbours didn’t exist.

  Maybe he thought Makhosi was a hippo like him. Who knows?

  Charlie’s teeth started to cut through; his gums became swollen and sore and he lost his appetite and chewed on everything in sight, covering his mattress, humans and Makhosi in dribble. Nurse Makhosi ignored his grumpiness and comforted him with gentle nudges, sleeping up against him with her snout touching his as they snored the night away.

  Once his incisors were fully grown, he went from being a toothless baby to a young calf with a full set of perfect milk teeth. It was as if he knew he should be proud of them, because he ran around showing them off with his mouth wide open. How I wished we could teach him to keep his jaws closed. Hippos aren’t as endangered as elephants but that day is coming, because ivory hunters are increasingly targeting them for their teeth, which are smaller and easier to hide than elephant tusks. In this crazy world, no ivory-bearing animal is safe any more and one day, our boy hippo will also be at risk.

  I never stop worrying about the poaching danger our animals are in, and I am always grateful for the animals we’ve managed to save so far. There’s nothing more rewarding than seeing new orphans play and knowing they’re happy.

  Our nine orphans had very distinct personalities and quirks, but one thing they all shared was a love of water.

  Ellie had adored frolicking in his paddling pool and the rhino calves relished a good mud bath. Charlie was in his element under the garden sprinkler and was always the first to run outside if it rained, so I was looking forward to seeing him be a proper little hippo in water. If he was still living in the wild, he would have spent more time underwater than on land, so it was important to get him swimming. Once his navel was healed, we gave him a big green paddling pool that was deep enough for him to be partly submerged.

  Charlie watched Axel fill it with water, curious but wary. We assumed the noise of blowing it up had spooked him. Makhosi was very intrigued and ran up to it, dipping her mouth in for a drink. Charlie saw what she was doing but didn’t follow her.

  ‘He’ll go in tomorrow,’ said Mireille, a German wildlife photographer who was volunteering at the orphanage.

  The next day, Makhosi and Charlie spent the entire afternoon chasing each other and playing with a thick rope hanging from a tree in their boma. Makhosi would charge it with great gusto for such a tiny creature and Charlie would chomp at the knot and try to yank it down. They could do that for hours, Makhosi banging it with her head to get it swinging and Charlie trying to catch it with his huge mouth.

  They ignored the new paddling pool completely.

  ‘He’s a flipping hippo! Why won’t he swim?’ muttered Axel.

  ‘Maybe he doesn’t know what to do,’ joked Sandy, a young American volunteer.

  Axel didn’t need prompting and leapt into the pool, thrashing about in his best hippo-having-fun impersonation. It half worked. Charlie scampered over for a closer look but he only had eyes for his favourite human and didn’t even sniff the water.

  ‘Perhaps he thinks it’s too deep?’ suggested Mireille.

  Water was siphoned out until only the bottom of the pool was covered.

  Charlie wouldn’t go in. A sprinkler was set up so water cascaded into the pool, in the hope that he could be tricked into following the water flow. He bolted around under the swirling spray, trying to catch the drops in his mouth, tripping over his own feet in excitement – but he avoided the pool.

  ‘How on earth will he survive as an adult without water?’ I fretted.

  ‘He’s only six weeks old so it’s early days,’ the vet said.

  ‘What if he never likes water?’

  ‘Of course he will. He probably hates the colour green,’ shrugged Sandy.

  It was worth a try. Ellie’s old pool was hauled out of storage, patched up and inflated.

  ‘Here you go, Charlie. A blue pool with Disney characters all over it!’

  No luck. Charlie chose his rope toy and play-biting Makhosi’s bottom over the paddling pool. We phoned several wildlife centres for advice but no one had ever come across a hippo that didn’t like water. We wondered if he was frightened of it because he had been abandoned near a lake. Whatever the reason, we had to help him get over his fear, as he wouldn’t survive as an adult without water.

  ‘At least he likes rain and
the sprinkler,’ the vet said. ‘Give it time.’

  Out of the blue, our little clown lost his appetite and his carers immediately raised the alarm.

  ‘He’s missed two bottles,’ reported Sandy.

  I never get used to the speed at which these babies fall ill and we’ve learned not to hesitate to get medical help for them, no matter what the cost. The vet rushed over during a bank holiday weekend.

  ‘His temperature is high, his chest is congested and his breath is wheezy,’ he reported.

  Bacterial pneumonia was diagnosed and Charlie was put on an intensive course of antibiotics. Makhosi was bewildered that he wouldn’t play with her and ran circles around him to persuade him to chase her. He watched listlessly, not even lifting his head. You can tell so much about an animal from the way he interacts with those he loves and the fact that not even Makhosi was getting a reaction from him was extremely worrying.

  Ellie’s death a few months earlier was still very raw and we were all on tenterhooks.

  On the third day of antibiotics, Charlie seemed to be feeling better. He still had a fever but at least he drank something – not much, but half a bottle was better than nothing. Axel opened the door to the boma and persuaded him to go for a walk.

  ‘Come along, mister. Makhosi is waiting for you.’

  Charlie lumbered after Axel, head low, looking decidedly down in the dumps. Makhosi and Duma hopped about like excited goats to see their friend. Charlie stretched open his mouth in a half-hearted hello, then trundled over to Ellie’s paddling pool and walked right in!

  ‘I couldn’t believe my eyes,’ said Axel. ‘The sun had evaporated most of the water but there was enough left to cover his feet.’

  Charlie stood in the pool for a good ten minutes. He didn’t lie down and didn’t move much but at least he was in the pool. It was such a surprise. Was it because he still had a fever and went into the water to cool down? Did primeval instincts to lower his body temperature overrule his fear? It didn’t matter. Charlie the hippo was standing in water. Axel switched on the hosepipe and gently sprayed him. He shook his head in delight, snorting happily.

  Within a week, he was his old self again, eating up a storm and putting on the weight he had lost. We tried to tempt him with a bigger paddling pool but he only wanted Ellie’s old blue one. He eventually plucked up the courage to lie down in it but only if the water was very shallow. Even when he outgrew his pool and had to hang his head over the side to fit in, he refused to upgrade to a more luxurious option. Charlie was perfectly content to wallow in his tiny bit of water.

  It was thanks to Makhosi that he took the next step. She was lolling about in her mud wallow and he must have realized that she was having fun and that mud couldn’t be dangerous, because one morning, without any hesitation, he just walked in and joined her!

  It was more rhino than hippo behaviour but who cared? It was another mini milestone.

  Now we just had to coax him into enjoying being more submerged. The bigger green pool was brought out again and filled with a couple of centimetres of water – just a fraction deeper than his blue pool but quite a bit wider. Charlie wasn’t interested.

  A blistering hot day was the turning point. He finally figured out that sloshing about in the green pool was going to cool him down more than Makhosi’s mud wallow or his little blue pool. Nature is amazing. Somewhere in his make-up, his instincts kicked in and he knew that having more of his body submerged was better for him on a hot day. His carers surreptitiously slid in the hosepipe and added more water to the green pool.

  Charlie loved it. The hippo who hated water had become a proper little hippo at last.

  24

  Love in the bush

  I never judge people or animals by their appearance and prefer to look into their eyes to see who they are. It was how Lawrence understood that Nana had accepted Thula Thula as her new home.

  ‘I saw it in her eyes,’ he said.

  ‘But yesterday she was still so angry,’ I frowned.

  ‘She’s different today.’ He stared out into the bush, gathering his thoughts. ‘She looked at me, Françoise. Really looked at me and something happened between us. I can tell you now, that girl won’t try to escape again.’

  Of course Nana couldn’t understand what Lawrence was saying when he explained over and over that she and her herd were safe with us, but I believe she picked up the gentleness in his voice and saw in his eyes that he wasn’t dangerous.

  Who needs words when eyes can do the talking?

  Take Frankie and me. One look from her and I know I’m irritating her. Ever since our run-in on the quad bike all those years ago, she’s been huffy with me – as if she still holds it against me for giving her such a fright. She has a headmistressy way of scowling at me that makes me wish I was invisible.

  One morning, my dogs got me into such trouble with her. The herd was at the fence and I was in the garden watching them with Jeff, Gin and Gypsy at my feet. They know how to behave when our elephants visit so I never worry they’ll do something silly.

  The ‘fence’ is simply a few rows of electrified strands that Lawrence strung up around the main house compound. It’s a couple of metres high and has a powerful enough voltage to send a hefty no-entry message to the elephants, but dogs and humans can slip underneath without any risk of being zapped.

  Frankie and Gobisa were standing slightly apart from the rest of the herd, trunks intertwined and foreheads touching as if sharing secrets. I love seeing them together. It’s a lonely job being matriarch and I’m so happy for her that she has Gobisa as a mate.

  He is devoted to her, to the point of disregarding bush etiquette that dictates he step aside when other bulls come into musth so mating can take place. Not Gobisa. And it’s caused quite a few skirmishes with the testosterone-fuelled youngsters if they swagger too close to her, but he stands his ground and bulldozes them away.

  Two calves scampered past the lovebirds and chased after each other in amongst the towering pillars of the herd. I recognized one of them as Tonic, Nana’s grandson. He was born on the same day a python killed Tonic, my monkey-chasing Jack Russell, and to keep his memory alive, I named the new calf after him.

  When the babies reached Nana, Tonic skidded to a halt and slipped under her belly for a morning suckle. She let him drink his fill, trunk tip caressing his face. He was her daughter Induna’s firstborn, but as Induna had been too young to produce her own milk, Nana happily helped feed him. Luckily for Tonic his grandmother was still feeding her own son and so had milk enough to share.

  The way our elephants help each other inspires me and I’ve learnt so much from them over the years. They coexist in a harmonious, natural way with endless respect and love for one another, living by simple rules where egos are secondary for the good of all. Yes, the bulls have occasional power struggles, but there’s none of the jockeying for personal gain that is the rot of so many governments. How I wish our planet was run by elephants! Politics wouldn’t exist and it would be a much safer and happier place.

  Baby Tonic was still in the middle of his feed when I saw Siya and Khaya drive up on the other side of the herd on a dirt track that runs parallel to my garden. They waved and switched off their engine to enjoy the elephants with me. The dogs recognized the 4×4 and jumped up and down in excitement, yapping boisterously.

  ‘It’s just Siya and Khaya,’ I shushed.

  But Gin has a mind of his own and shot across the lawn, ducked under the electric fence and bolted through the herd like a mini missile.

  ‘Gin, heel!’

  He ignored me, fixated on Siya and Khaya and oblivious to any danger. Frankie saw the bolt of flying fur and trumpeted indignantly. I held my hands on my head and yelled at Gin to come back. Frankie charged after him, picking up speed as she went. Siya jumped out of the 4×4 but couldn’t do anything without risking his own life.

  Jeff paced up and down, sensing Gin was in trouble. They have a love–hate relationship and I latched onto his
collar in case he decided that, today of all days, he liked Gin enough to try and save him.

  ‘Gin, stop!’ shouted Siya, gesticulating him away with his hands.

  Frankie was a metre from Gin. One stomp and he would be crushed. Only then did he notice the grey mountain closing in on him. He yelped in fright, spun on his back paws, and flew back under the wires, barely touching the ground. Frankie stormed after him, pulling up just short of the fence, and lasered me with an angry glare.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said helplessly.

  She shot me a you-should-know-better look over her shoulder and sashayed back to Gobisa. I hugged Gin to me and he licked my face, as happy as me that he had escaped.

  ‘How am I ever going to get back into her good books now?’ I muttered.

  * * *

  Not long after that, I was in Durban for a fundraiser with some friends. It ended at six in the evening and we were starving but hadn’t booked a restaurant, so someone suggested going to a nearby pub for dinner.

  ‘Count me out,’ I laughed. ‘That place is way too noisy for a bush girl. We can’t talk in there! I haven’t seen any of you in ages, let’s go home instead and I’ll rustle up something for us.’

  ‘Who goes to a pub to talk?’ grinned Michelle.

  ‘Come on, Frankie,’ urged another friend. ‘It’ll do you good to see how the rest of the world lives when they’re not working.’

  I reluctantly gave in, grimacing theatrically at the music blaring from the speakers above the pub’s door. Michelle hooked her arm through mine and propelled me inside. A silver-haired man was sitting with his back to us at the bar and turned as we walked up.

  ‘Hello,’ he smiled.

  I looked into the kindest eyes, felt a little flustered and wondered if we had met before. Perhaps he had been a guest at Thula Thula. My friends assumed I knew him and clustered around. Someone ordered a bottle of Alto Rouge with five glasses. South Africa is a village like that. People make friends easily and have a natural way of chatting to anyone they meet. A far cry from the stand-offish reserve of Parisians.