I know this is a lot to read, but it is really good. It applies to the way life really is. Please take a moment and read it. Barry Elephants Memory - Touching Story In 1986, Mkele Mbembe was on holiday in Kenya after graduating from college. On a hike through the bush, he came across a young bull elephant standing with one leg raised in the air. The elephant seemed distressed so Mbembe approached it very carefully. He got down on one knee and inspected the elephant's foot, and found a large thorn deeply embedded in it. As carefully and as gently as he could, Mbembe worked the thorn out with his hunting knife, after which the elephant gingerly put down its foot. The elephant turned to face the man and with a rather stern look on its face, stared at him. For several tense moments Mbembe stood frozen, thinking of nothing else but being trampled. Eventually the elephant trumpeted loudly, turned and walked away. Mbembe never forgot that elephant or the events of that day. Twenty years later he was walking through a zoo with his teenaged son. As they approached the elephant enclosure, one of the creatures turned and walked over to near where Mbembe and his son Tapu were standing. The large bull elephant stared at Mbembe and lifted its front foot off the ground, then put it down. The elephant did that several times then trumpeted loudly, all the while staring at the man. Remembering the encounter in 1986, Mbembe couldn't help wondering if this was the same elephant. Mbembe summoned up his courage, climbed over the railing and made his way into the enclosure. He walked right up to the elephant and stared back in wonder. Suddenly the elephant trumpeted again, wrapped its trunk around one of the man's legs and thrashed him repeated on the railing, killing him instantly. Probably wasn't the same elephant.
What an amazing story that would have been Mbebe had been lifted onto the elephants shoulders and summoning in his inner-animal spirit, commanded the elephant to trample the doors enclosing it and finally rode off into the wilderness where Mbebe ate jungle-fruit and collected many fine animal pelts for sale.
As he was holidaying in Africa, the original elephant was certainly an African elephant. Most elephants in captivity are Asian, or Indian, elephants. They have smaller ears and tusks, and are not as large as their African cousins. Clearly Mkele was an unobservant dweeb who deserved to die.
