5 Questions to Ask When Setting up Communities

While the terms community management and community manager are more popular, I have never found them very comfortable to use. It is perhaps to do with the word management--which reeks of Taylorism, hierarchy, command and control--all the connotations that to me are anathema to creating a sense of belonging, infusing passion, and leading. I am happier with community leadership or community facilitation. A facilitator is an enabler, a helping hand and a guide. Good facilitation should almost be invisible, empowering members to take decisions and actions. Anyhow, I digress. I will leave the deconstruction of the word for another post...

I want to document a few of my initial learning from setting up communities within our organization. But I am leaping ahead. Let me set the stage a bit.

I have mentioned in my earlier post here that we have launched an enterprise-wide collaboration platform powered by Jive. As typically happens--there are early adopters who embraced the change and became active contributors on the platform. Then there are the cautious and the wary, dipping their toes in so to speak--but not quite willing to see all the benefits yet. And of course there are the sceptics--the quiet and the vociferous. To bring these individual users—endowed with diverse abilities, motivated differently, and at various levels of platform adoption—together to form communities is an entirely different kettle of fish. 

Yet, on the surface, it seems fairly straightforward. Create communities (i.e., groups on the platform) pertaining to the key capability areas/practices and people will join their “respective” groups to participate, share knowledge, collaborate to find solutions, have engaging conversations spanning different continents, countries, and time zones. That's the vision! But moving towards it requires carefully thought-out steps, clearing the path, and laying the bed—a process of continuous nurturing, tending, and guiding. No wonder the metaphor of gardening is so popular with community building! It comes closest to describing what needs to be done.

A note of clarification: When I talk about communities here, I am referring to groups of people who come together to achieve a shared purpose, learn from and share with each other, and enhance the group's as well as their own individual capabilities. 

Having tried my hand at helping to set up a few communities at the initial stage of the platform rollout, I learned a few valuable lessons. Because dumping everything I have learned into a single post will make this horribly long and confusing, in this post I have focused on the initial steps to take before setting up a community.

Aside: And my instructional design background is standing me in very good stead indeed. Setting up a community requires the same level of diligent analysis of needs, objectives, and desired output as does the creation of a training design.

Communities/groups in an enterprise setting form to serve different purposes. They operate under vastly different dynamics as compared to voluntary communities that form on the web, and I don't merely mean in terms of membership numbers. Communities within an enterprise have specific objectives to achieve, goals and tasks to collaborate towards—all of which should ideally help the organization to move closer to its overarching goals and vision. What’s more—each community can and will be very different from another—forming to serve entirely different purposes.

Some of these communities may revolve around core skills and capabilities important for the growth of the organization. These will be imbued with the spirit of long-term vision of capability development, sharing of knowledge and solving of complex issues. Others may form for a very specific purpose--around a project, event, or even a task. These are typically time-boxed communities seeing a spate of activities for a short while—used as an online gathering place to share ideas, insights, and conversations. In either case, I have learned that when someone requests for help in setting up a community, it is a good idea to ask:

1. What are the objectives of the community?
2. Who are the target members? What are they expected to do when they join the community?
3. Who is going to tend the community, i.e., facilitate, moderate, and guide members?
4. What business needs will be solved by the forming of this community?
5. Who are the stakeholders? Are they all on the same page regarding the community’s goals and objectives? Do they have a shared vision?

Once these basic questions have been sorted out, it is time to design a few simple and concise guidelines for the community leaders as well as the members. Without some concrete points of reference, it is difficult to remain aligned with the community's vision over a period of time. 

I will share my thoughts and learnings around this in the next post...

From Instructional Design to Enterprise Community Facilitation

This is a long overdue post, the draft of which had been languishing in my dropbox for some time--half forgotten. But finally I felt this needs to see the light of day. I have reached something of a cross-roads in my career, and I wanted to document the process of this arrival. It has been a long and exciting journey so far, dotted with exciting projects, some wonderful clients, and a tremendous amount of learning. But now I am traversing down a new path--albeit one I have wanted to travel for a long time.

An instructional designer by profession who started her career anlayzing learner needs, creating micro-design documents, writing story-boards and discussing the nitty-gritty of course navigation with visual designers, I have long been interested in the power of social, collaborative and informal learning. This interest was initially triggered by Jay Cross' seminal work, Informal Learning, Morten Hansen's Collaboration, Wenger, et al's Cultivating Communities of  Practice, Wenger, White, et al's Digital Habitats, various blogs--primarily those by the ITA members and others like Michele Martin, Nancy White, Dave Pollard, Dave Snowden, Nick Milton, George Siemens--and later, books like Marcia Conner and Tony Bingham's The New Social Learning, and John Hagel and JSB's The Power of Pull. And my own foray into the world of social media with Twitter. And over all of this hovered the Cynefin Framework that Shawn Callaghan's video had introduced me to. So, even while I scripted storyboards and designed programs for corporate elearning courses, consulted with clients on the best possible means of rolling out elearning in their organization, and suggested elearning solutions befitting their problems--from training engineers and mechanincs on fixing motorbikes to navigating a new software--I was on the constant lookout for an opportunity to put into practice the social and informal learning blend into workplace learning.

Learning--especially in today's workplace beset with complexity, rapid change, and new challenges--as we knew it was changing. It had to change for an organization to survive. There was scant time to design courses to address needs that evolved from moment to moment, that was undefined, needed creative solutions, and innovative daring. The age of Connectivism was truly upon us. One's ability to solve a problem or find an answer to a burning issue via one's network was fast becoming the measure of one's success. The age of social learning is here. The age of Collaboration and Participation is here. Powered by enterprise2.0 tools and technology, laden with social media tools and apps, fueled by the Pods and the Pads, social business burst upon the scene. It soon became a buzzword but also showed organizations the path to survival, a way to remain on top of things, to face complexity with agility, to meet cusotmer demands with inovation.

Folks like Andrew McAfee, Dion Hinchcliffe, Sameer Patel, Bill Ives, Riitta Raesmaa, J.P. Rangaswami, Venkatesh Rao, et al. showed the direction to the future of work  All of this led to my growing interest in communities, communities of practices and the art of community managment,  further fueled by Jono Bacon's The Art of Community.

Therefore, when an opportunity to dabble in communities and play a part in designing and enabling a social and collaborative learning environment as an enterprise community facilitator presented itself at ThoughtWorks, I jumped at it with alacrity. My interest in social business expanded beyond the by now well-defined benefits of reduced time to market, increased scope for innovation, customer engagement, and such. I wanted to understand how communities within an enterprise can help build capabilities, enable expertise, and truly transform an organization into a learning organization.

I have seen how thoughtful use of social media can transform individual learning, help build one's PLN, and fuel one's passion. I wanted to now explore the impact of social media, communities and collaboration on orgnizational learning, on the building of a learning organization. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to experience what I had so far been reading and dreaming about.  

Communities would be the building blocks of a successful move towards being a "social business". Cultivating communities would help to build capabilities, develop skill sets and enable the move from being a novice to an expert easier and quicker. However, theoretizing is always easier than practice. And only as I began to actively help set up communities did I realize the challenges, the needs, and the perseverance, patience and hard work required to put into play what I envision.

My ongoing learnings from helping to set up communities will be topics of other posts. However, I couldn't have started on those without setting the stage so to speak... For the foreseeable future, this blog is going to focus on my experiences and stories around setting up communities, enabling collaboration, and learnings. I am grateful for my Instructional Design background which is standing me in good stead on this new road...like a trustworthy friend.     

Lurking is Not a Static State

Lurking and its role in communities has been on the forefront of my mind for the past few days. It has received a lot of attention in the past from the thought leaders in the realm of learning and the role of communities in personal as well as organizational learning. I have recently taken on enterprise community facilitation and was curious to see how people are interacting on our enterprise collaboration platform. The analytics told me that over 40% of the users are Active Users (a term Jive uses to describe all users who log in to consume content without necessarily interacting with the content in any manner). This is also proved by the fact that many of the groups on this platform have membership of ~300 but obviously not everyone is a Contributing User. They are lurking on the edge, consuming content.


Somehow, the word lurker has become associated with pejorative connotations of people taking from communities without giving back, of not contributing, of being selfish and feeding off the hard work of others. They are the free riders. However, is that truly the case? Would we consider silent participants in a meeting or at presentations lurkers? Not really. They showed up. I think what makes lurking seem dubious in an online environment is that we can't technically "reveal" our engagement. No one can see the engrossed look on my face when I read discussion threads in the Learning and Skills group. A lurker might very well be giving back by performing better at their jobs, by sharing insights with others in the context of their daily work by using the learning gleaned from lurking. This is especially true of communities in enterprises. Since the give back is asymmetric and happens in a different context, this goes unnoticed. Does that mean they should always continue to lurk? I don't quite think that happens. Some of the research material points to a cycle of participation that I have mentioned later.


I recalled some of the posts and articles I had read in the past about lurking as a behavior in online communities and what it indicated, and decided to dig through those again. At this point, I also "serendipitous-ly" stumbled upon a couple of conversations recently that touched upon lurking (this is why I love social media). 
The questions going through my mind were:

1. Do people learn when lurking?
2. Is it an indicator of the value of the content being generated on the platform?
3. When does lurking change to participation?
4. What can community facilitators do to turn lurkers into participants? 
5. How is lurking different from non-participation? 
6. Finally, are lurkers considered as community members?

After digging through the references and some old articles I had saved, these are some of the key points that emerged. 
Etienne Wenger, Nancy White and John D. Smith in Digital Habitats calls lurking "legitimate peripheral participation."

From a community of practice perspective, lurking is interpreted as “legitimate peripheral participation,” a crucial process by which communities offer learning opportunities to those on the periphery. Rather than a simple distinction between active and passive members, this perspective draws attention to the richness of the periphery and the learning enabled (or not) by it. (p. 9)

Quoted in Lurking or Legitimate Peripheral Participation by Christy Tucker

Etienne Wenger in the Communities of Practice: Learning, meaing and identity explains the five trajectories of participation behavior:

• Legitimate peripheral participation, not fully participating (lurkers)
• Inbound, headed toward full participation
• Insider, fully accepted into the community
• Boundary, sustaining membership in related communities of practice and “brokering” interactions between them
• Outbound, in the process of leaving a community

from Lurking and Other Behaviors

There are subsets of lurkers who are Active Lurkers. In Active lurkers – the hidden asset in online communities, writes: 

Active lurkers are those that may take something from the community and pass it along to others using different channels – so they participate in your word of mouth. Active lurkers also include those people who may visit a customer support community and find a solution to their problem without contributing to the community. Those people derive a lot of value from that community interaction and so does your company since they do not clog up your customer call center. Active lurkers also include those who will contact the original poster through a different channel, like telephone, email, or perhaps a face to face meeting – in effect continuing the conversation outside of the visible public side of the community, but not outside of the community itself.

From Lurking builds commonality

...Sometimes. Lurkers are part of a group's latent energy; good things happen when that energy is activated. Lurkers are part of the all-important weak-tie network, and it's important to keep them engaged, even if engagement does not translate to participation. ... the lurkers are a critical part of the weak-tie network -- they need to understand the concepts being discussed so they can discuss them cogently with people who may be outside the network in question.

Just a couple of days back I read Luis Suarez's post on Social Learning at TELUS by Dan Pontefract, where Dan Pontefract says (and I am quoting Luis Suarez's post here):

You don’t have to have everyone on board to get value: Indeed, something that we have seen ourselves, over at IBM as well with some of our social software tools, like IBM Connections Bookmarks where about 35k fellow IBMers make use of it, yet the entire IBM population of 400k benefit from it, because the search results from our corporate Intranet search engine are injected with those social bookmarks that folks keep adding along. And it looks like the folks at TELUS share a similar experience; while they may not have achieved just yet 100% penetration with their social tools, the ones who are making active use of them are helping everyone else get enough value, perhaps not just producing valuable content, but digesting it as well.
This is, in my opinion, a critical point regarding the adoption of social tools within the enterprise, mainly from the perspective of setting up the right expectations and encouraging those who would want to make use of the tools to use them, while allowing the remaining ones adjust accordingly and figure out by themselves whether they would need to jump in as well or not. Let them figure out the value they would want to get from it is probably as good as it gets in order to allow for knowledge workers to understand how, when, why and what to contribute, whenever they may be ready.

There are communities where we continue to remain as lurkers. This happens due to various reasons. Participation, I think, is a factor/output of multiple variables. Some of these are:

1. Comfort level with the topic under discussion and having something substantive to say.
2. The perceived expertise level of the others in the community (if I am out of my depth, I may just lurk).
3. The place of the community in my daily life (if it is on a topic of peripheral interest, I may just lurk).
4. The attention/time ratio I can devote.
5. The feel of the community--does it feel welcoming and generate a sense of belonging, accepting of different opinions, composed of people at different levels of expertise, and so on.

When one or more of the above mentioned participation criteria are not met, users tend to lurk. But, as described above, lurking is not necessarily a bad thing. Lurkers often have weak ties to a community but form bridges between communities. They often try to use their listening engagement to distill many opinions and seek the larger pattern. By virtue of being distant from the core of the activities, they may spread themselves thinly across multiple communities and are in the key position to know what is happening where. And talk about these communities cogently to those external to the communities thus driving users towards the communities. 

Big Cat Trail--The Charm of Corbett

Corbett was our final halt, and definitely a fitting end to this year's Big Cat Trail.

Five o' clock in the morning saw us at the small, quaint station of Ramnagar.  We had boarded our train the previous night from Delhi. The short, comfortable ride was a nice experience.

Our jeep awaited us at the station and soon we were off-- headed towards Dhikala, where we had managed to get a night's stay. Getting bookings at Dhikala had proved to be an overwhelming and frustrating task accomplished only through Sumeet's perseverance, patience, and I guess, sheer will. Having stayed there, I can only say that I am immensely thankful we got to stay at Dhikala. Without Dhikala, the Corbett experience would have been very different. Disappointing perhaps... Dhikala turned it into a dream. Situated about 60 km inside from the gate, any visit to Corbett would be incomplete without a stay at the Dhikala Lodge.

The drive to Dhikala from the gate took about 2 hours...and that was our first taste of the forest. Corbett is completely unlike any forest we had visited so far. Nestled below the mountain ranges, it is cross-crossed with mountain rivers flowing over rocky beds. These are breathtakingly beautiful, even in the height of summer when the rivers had mostly run dry. This exposed the underlying beds of multi-colored stones weathered and smoothened by the years of rain, sun and shine. The sun's rays falling on these made them glisten like semi-precious jewels, of intriguing shapes and sizes...I was completely enamored. They varied in shades from purple to pink, grey to ochre. I particularly loved the violet ones with a hint of white on them...

On our way we stopped at the Crocodile Point-- a spot above a river from where one can spot crocodiles... We were lucky to catch our first glimpse of one resting on the bank...looking like a log of wood to a large extent. As we went in, I was torn between marveling at the beauty of the forest and looking out for any wildlife that may cross our path. Corbett is also well-known for it's bird life, and this added to my sense of anticipation. We saw a group of four Oriental Hornbills fly overhead--they caught us by surprise and unfortunately, we weren't prepared with our cameras.

In spite of it being Mid-May, this forest still retained its foliage and greenness. I could only try to imagine how dense it would be post monsoon. No wonder everyone had said that spotting the big cat in Corbett is extremely difficult. 

We reached Dhikala around  10 am and headed straight for a sumptuous breakfast. We had the rest of the morning to laze about till our afternoon safari at 4.00 pm. I meandered around the lodge area which is pretty large. It overlooks an enchanting river-bed which was completely dry and formed a sand bank at this time of the year. I was to find out later how beautiful it looked in the moonlight, the whole sandscape turning into a shimmering bed on which the trees cast their huge, dark shadows. It requires a much more proficient writer than I am to capture that beauty in words. All I can say is I could have happily sat there gazing into the night watching the play of moonlight on the sand.

The first safari into Corbett was much awaited by all of us. As our jeep rolled out of the Dhikala gate into the forest, I found myself trying to absorb the feel of the forest with all my senses. Corbett, I realized, had a very distinctive scent made up of dry woods, crushed leaves and the foliage around us. Maybe, other forests do too, but it was in Corbett that I became acutely conscious of this. It was heavenly, almost intoxicating. As we wound our way through, looking to spot bird or mammal, I was constantly pulled into this world of heady fragrance.

Corbett, we found, is also known for its herd of wild elephants which apparently are prone to charge safari jeeps. Our driver and guide were both on high alert for these animals and regaled us with tales of how they had been caught between a charging elephant in the front and a herd of them at the back. Anyhow, the stories failed to alarm us and we were eager to see a herd. And we did! A huge herd was crossing the meadows when we reached the spot affording us a good view. Later we saw a huge Tusker heading into the forest, pausing now and then to shower himself with sand. It was an impressive sight.

That night was an experience I will not forget soon. Around 3 in the night, I woke up to flashes of blinding lightning and an incessant sound of thunder. Rain was falling in sheets...it was an awe-inspiring sight. I stood at the window which very fortunately overlooked the sand bank. The zig-zagging, near blinding flashes would light up the entire scene for long seconds to be followed by ominously loud crashes of thunder. In those seconds of lightning, everything was eerily illuminated-- the sand bank gleamed, the trees looking ghostly in that white light, while the rain lashed down. This high-drama of nature continued for the next two hours and then stopped as abruptly as it had begun. I stepped out around 5.15 am and was greeted by a sparkling clean world, strewn with fallen branches, torn and crushed leaves, and a strange silence. After the night's rampage, the birds were still to start their morning chirping...

We went for our morning safari a little tentatively, our guide warning us that there may not be much to see after such a night. Soon after, belying his words and living up to its reputation for being unpredictable and fickle, nature decided we should have our first glimpse of the big cat in Corbett. She had been sitting on the side of the road down which our jeep traversed. We had missed her because of the dense foliage and had gone ahead. Just then, our guide caught a glimpse and urgently asked our driver to reverse. This caused us to inadvertently block her path and she went inside the undergrowth. We waited not really knowing whether she would make an appearance again. However, her mission of crossing the road was evidently uppermost in her mind. A few seconds later she sprang out--that is all I can say--on to the road, mock-growled at us perhaps for causing her that slight delay, and vanished into the other side with a leap. It was all over within seconds. I think I had stopped breathing and taking a picture had not remotely occurred to me. She was gorgeous...a true Royal Bengal Tigress.

We continued with our safari, pausing to see the avifauna life. We did not see anymore of the big cats in Dhikala but we were not disappointed. Later in the day, we went over to Bijrani, which is much closer to Ramnagar station and hence, gets crowded. It doesn't match up to the Dhikala experience. Nevertheless, the safaris into the forest are always beautiful. This zone is not as replete with birds and other mammals as the Dhikala one but we did see the big cat.

What bothered me were the kind of tourist who came in. They seem to be coming with something like a circus show in mind. Noisy, insensitive to wildlife, and raucous, they detracted from the environment. The forest guides did not seem well-equipped to control tourist behavior. I do think there needs to be an educational program put in place that tell tourists prior to entering the forest, how to behave, what are unacceptable behaviors and the penalties for the same, what to expect, and what wildlife means. And this should be a mandatory part of the safaris. This would also be a good way to raise awareness about wildlife and their status in general.

This is becoming an endless post, and I have not even touched upon the different birds we saw from the red-collared doves to the dollar birds and emerald doves. I think I should wind-up now. Corbett should be on all wildlife lovers list of must-visit forests. It offers one of those rich, unique experiences that is difficult to forget. I am waiting to go back again...

Big Cat Trail--Beautiful Bandhavgarh

For some reason, this has been a post very long in coming...but finally, I have put down my thoughts.

Situated close to In Madhya Pradesh, this was our next destination--our penultimate halt in the Trail. We boarded our train from Jaipur for Umaria, a tiny station probably known for it's proximity to Bandhavgarh. Our pick-up awaited us, and we drove down to the White Tiger Forest Lodge about 30 km from the station. The short ride was a pleasant one. The road was exceptionally well-maintained, and soon we were at our destination. We had the rest of the day to freshen up and rest till the time of our afternoon safari.

I had heard that tiger spotting in Bandhavgarh is almost a given because of the sheer density. However, our first ride into the park belied this hearsay. The forest is beautiful, like all forests are; however, it lacked a bit of Ranthambore's elegance and mystique.  Anyhow, that did not deter me from enjoying the ride. What perplexed me however was the route system that decreed not only following a specific route (which is completely understandable and should be done to avoid overcrowding of certain sections), but also completing it. This meant, more often than not, that we were driving to complete the route within the stipulated safari hours, hardly stopping to enjoy the wildlife. We also came across forest officials blatantly disregarding any such rule and using forest vehicles to take friends and relatives on tours. This did put us off.

Anyhow, back to the experience. Our first tiger sighting at Bandhavgarh was of the Bokha male and his cubs. This shy tiger was just coming out after having had his drink of water and was climbing up the slope of a small embankment when our jeep arrived at the spot. He is beautiful and as he paused to glance around, I marveled at the grace and strength. He walked up the slope and vanished into the undergrowth. At this point, our safari guide said that we could take an elephant ride inside to see if we could spot him resting.

Agreeing with alacrity, we mounted our elephant and went in. Sure enough, he was resting under the shade of a tree, and this afforded us ample opportunities to take some close-ups. Just as I was gazing my fill, we heard some commotion and our mahout said, "tiger!" This is a magic word, and we looked up from Bokha. Sure enough, there was a tiger emerging from the forest. He passed very close to our elephant. We were informed that this was one of Bokha's cubs. Happy fortune was with us, and soon the two other cubs soon followed. Full grown in size, they nevertheless stayed together not having yet acquired the hunting skills needed to survive alone.

I was overjoyed when we saw the legendary Kankatti the next day. She was sitting half submerged in a pool of water hidden by thick undergrowth, shrubs and foliage. Her face had a certain sinister beauty-- perhaps because of her sightless eye. The green leaves partially blocking her face from view added to the mystery. Her good eye glanced at us, sharp and bright. She is a beauty with an attitude.

When we left Bandhavgarh, I knew I wanted to come back. To see more of the forest, see Kankatti and Bokha and the new male. I just hope and pray that they and the rest of our existing wildlife stay safe. I hope that with rising awareness, we will be able to control poaching, restrict encroachment on wildlife space and grant them the security and peace they need to exist, to survive. We want our tigers to roam our forests with pride and in safety. We don't want to see them on our long list of extinct aimals.

Big Cat Trail--Ranthambore Rocks!

Our next destination was Ranthambore. Just the thought of visiting any forest is enough to add bliss to my existence. But Ranthambore is extra-special. It is home to the legendary tigress, Machhli. This is the forest that Valmik Thapar and Fateh Singh Rathore wrote about exhaustively. I almost felt I knew some of the tigers there. I couldn't wait to see it.

We arrived at Jaipur in the middle of a hot summer's afternoon. The sultry, hot air physically hit us as we left the precincts of the station. From the station, it was an odd 180 km drive to Ranthambore. I won't touch upon the onward drive, which was eventful in its own way. That will just deviate from the focus of the post. Suffice it to say, we arrived at Ranthambore in time for our evening tea. We were booked into a hotel called Hammir. Made entirely of red- bricks, it was a quaint old place. Somewhat ramshackle and run-down, it had a charm just because it was not too posh and perfect. I loved it. It had a certain old world ambience that blended into the surroundings. The long, broad verandah outside our room was reminiscent of the terrace at my ancestral home where I grew up. I experienced a moment of instant affinity.

I waited for the morning with impatience, trying to imagine the forest in my head not quite successfully. Finally, it was time for the safari and we set off. On our way, we passed a couple of antelopes grazing by the roadside. I felt we had finally arrived.

Ranthambore took my breath away. A forest of contrasts, beauty and elegance, it was picture perfect. It is a forest that can inspire poets and dreamers. Sheer rock faces rise on one side, while the other side is flanked by the Ranthambore fortress. At least a 1000 years old, this majestic old fort adds to the unique charm of the place. The forest proper is a valley nestled between the cliffs and the fortress. As we wound our way in, our safari jeep tilted at impossible angles most of the time because of the rocky terrain, I mentally saluted the driver for his superb control. Clinging to my side of the jeep, I could only marvel at the spread of breathtaking beauty. It felt a bit like falling in love at first sight where the breath is knocked out of you, and you surrender to your senses. For some inexplicable reason, I was reminded of Foreter's A Passage to India...

Our first drive led us towards the Rajabaug lake. This is akin to the jewel in the crown. Glimmering and glittering in the sunlight, the lake had water even in the height of summer. In patches yes, but this was enough to drive the fauna of the forest towards it. It is home to a host of birds who clustered around the edges of the lake in search of food, shade or just to slake their thirst. They were in constant motion--flying, fluttering and hopping from spot to spot. We would suddenly see a flock of Alexandrine parakeets fly off in a flutter of green... A group of Treepies would swoop down clamouring for attention. It was a magical place.

Far away, in the centre of the lake was a tiny fort kind of a structure, a quaint remnant of the past. In this lay a tiger, fast asleep. Far from the madding crowd with nary a thing to disturb him there. To be very honest, I could barely spot it with my naked eye. But my camera caught its stripes.

I could have spent days just hanging around the lake. But we had to move on. The drive around the forest gradually revealed its beauty. The flora at this time was dry and skeletal divested entirely of its foliage. This barren starkness threw the fort and the cliffs in the background into sharp focus. What would have, at other times, been covered in dense greenery, was now revealed in all its majestic glory. The sunlight cast mysterious shadows on the cliff walls that I can see in my mind's eye even now. I am too amateur a photographer to have been able to capture that beauty.

Ranthambore has a rich variety of avifauna life that thrilled us. Birds like the Rufous Treepie are so abundant and so fearless that we could photograph them in evey conceivable pose to our heart's content.

While the first day's drive did not reveal more than a tantalizing glimpse of the tiger, I felt replete. I was unaware of the drama that would ensue the next day. It was on our final drive into the forest that we had our real tiger sighting, but oh what a sighting it was.

As we drove in for our final safari, we wound up at a spot that seemed to be buzzing with human activity. Jeeps were lined up bumper to bumper with hardly a spot to maneuver in. There must be a tiger in the vicinity, declared Saad, our guide. We had also arrived at a similar conclusion and held our breath in anticipation. Earlier Sumeet had declared that we would see a tiger in this safari, and his prediction seemed to be coming true. As we inched our way upward, we arrived at a point where we had our first glimpse. A male tiger was sitting with his back to us, resting from the heat. There is a tigress on the other side, can you see her? Asked our guide. With the uncanny understanding developed through years of driving in the forest, he knew exactly where to park our jeep so that we would get the best possible view (second best given that Priyanka Vadhra's jeep was there). Anyhow, we got a good view. And the sighting that unfolded before our eyes made me forget the presence of everyone else.

The tiger and the tigress were sitting at opposite ends of an open, grassy space. Each had appropriated a tree and was sitting under its shade. The tiger made a point to raise his head every now and then and taking a quick glance to ensure his tigress was still there. Then, he would just flop back, overcome by the effort in this sultry heat. Finally, she got tired of waiting for him to make a move and sauntered over to where he lay. What followed was an amazing display of love and affection between these two inherently solitary animals. The memory of it can give me goosebumps even now. They rubbed and nuzzled against each other, indulging in playful love bites. I watched spellbound. I think during those few moments, there was a collective withholding of breath...It was too beautiful and had a poignancy that made my throat ache...The thought that we might be driving these animals towards extinction was unbearable. 

Just that afternoon before coming from the safari,  I had bought a painting from a nearby store of two tigers nuzzling each other... I had wished we could see something like that in real life. The painting seemed to have come alive for me.

The final safari at Ranthambore left nothing more to be desired except a deep wish to come back to this place again someday. And a fervent prayer that we will be able to check the deadly march towards extinction--of the tiger and other wildlife that are our legacy and pride.

Some of the photos are here...

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Big Cat Trail: Amazing Gir

Sumeet and I headed toward Gir in Junagadh after our Kanha trip. The contrast between the two forests couldn't have been more shocking, and I am not referring to the fauna here. Let me explain a bit.

I have experienced Kanha in November, when it is still lush from the monsoon showers. The subsequent dry months hadn't yet been able to banish the green. In comparison, Kanha in May seemed incredibly dry to me. Most of the lush, green foliage was replaced by reddish-brown leaves; nevertheless, since the deciduous sal forest is liberally interspersed with evergreens, the forest still retained a semblance of greenness. After this, Gir came as a shock.

For miles--as far as the eyes could see--we saw nothing but stretches of leafless, brown trees--rather their skeletons to be more accurate. It didn't seem possible that this barren, stark landscape could also be a thick, foliage covered forest during other seasons. Interspersed with these skeletal trees were brambles and thorny bushes. The earth was varying shades of brown--occasionally turning to a brighter yellow here and there. The dominant color of the landscape was brown. Miles of it. This kind of bone-dryness must be seen to be believed. It has a beauty all its own; the very starkness lending it an air of mystery.


Just as I was trying to accustom myself to this first sight of Gir, a peacock flew by and perched on a nearby tree trunk. The contrast couldn't have been greater. The colorless and barren background enhanced the hues and shades of the living beings manifold--bringing everything into sharp focus. The peacock shone a brilliant blue--a perfect photograph moment. I settled down for the forest to reveal its surprises.

The biggest surprise that Gir had in store for me were the trackers. While I had read a bit about them, I was completely unprepared for what I eventually saw. The trackers play a unique role in the Gir ecosystem. They keep track of the lions by walking or cycling around the forest armed with nothing more than a simple stick. Their courage will put any self-proclaimed hunter to shame. Their job is to keep a lookout for any lion who might be ill or injured; their constant patrolling also keeps miscreants at bay. I saw them stand barely five feet away from a full-grown lion, totally unperturbed. I don't think they thought of it as a display of bravery; for them it was just a part of their daily routine.

The trackers also communicate the location of lions to the guides making it easier for wildlife enthusiasts to watch these beautiful animals in their natural surroundings. Bali, our guide, had promised us that he would show us lions till we wanted to see no more. However, not wanting to see anymore being an impossibility for an animal lover, I must say that we saw lions to our hearts' content. 28 of them...

Lions are social animals unlike tigers who are solitary and secretive. This characteristic makes lions not only easier to spot but also easier to photograph. One can be within 6 feet of a lion without him or her making any move to go away. We saw prides of lions sitting, basking in the sun, drinking water or just sleeping. I was very surprised when we saw a lioness with cubs peacefully sleeping--occasionally raising her head to see if everything was fine. Not worried at all. The most memorable sighting was that of a lioness in the act of stalking and hunting a sambar deer. She was immensely graceful in the fluidity of her movements. I was spellbound. It was National Geographic in the real world. The only spoiler was a horde of tourists who seemed incapable of distinguishing between wildlife and a circus show. I fervently hope that the forest department will enforce stricter measures to bring such tourists under control by educating them and vesting the guides with the authority to drive such tourists out of the precincts of the forest should they fail to adhere to the rules.
 

It must also be remembered that Gir lions are perhaps unique in their acceptance of human beings. Having lived with and among the Maldharis and Sidhi tribes, these animals are much more attuned to human beings than one would normally expect.

Apart from lions, Gir's prime attraction, it is also a bird-lovers haven. We were soon to find this out. In complete contrast to the stark summer landscape that makes up the major part Gir, there is a lush and verdant patch in the heart of the forest. This corner of the forest is seldom frequented by folks who have primarily come to see lions. However, for bird-lovers like us, this proved to be a treasure trove. I had never seen so many paradise fly- catchers fly around, flitting from branch to branch, tantalizing and luring us with glimpses till we gave in and decided to wait at that spot.

And not only this spot. Our drives around the forest revealed various species of avifauna that absolutely delighted me.




Gir is an entirely different exeprience. While lion spotting may lack the mystery and unpredictability of seeing tigers, it is unbelievably amazing to see lions in their natural habitat. Gir brought back memories of Elsa  and Christian and seemed to proclaim the essential ties that exist between animals and humans.


The photos from the trip are here and here.