{"id":1689,"date":"2015-11-28T02:35:20","date_gmt":"2015-11-28T02:35:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/?p=1689"},"modified":"2015-11-28T02:35:20","modified_gmt":"2015-11-28T02:35:20","slug":"harold-jaffes-dispatches-from-india-november-26-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/harold-jaffes-dispatches-from-india-november-26-2015\/","title":{"rendered":"Harold Jaffe&#8217;s  <em>Dispatches from India<\/em>  &#8211;  November 26, 2015"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><strong>Elephants<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>After spending decades in the circus, elephants Mia and Sita were<br \/>\nrescued by an animal welfare group on Sunday, and are now en<br \/>\nroute to a conservation center on board India\u2019s first customized<br \/>\nelephant ambulance.<\/p>\n<p>The two elephants were rescued by Wildlife SOS on Sunday from<br \/>\nthe <strong>Great Circus<\/strong> at Thiruvanamalai, Tamil Nadu.<\/p>\n<p>Mia and Sita are the sixth and seventh elephants to be rescued this<br \/>\nyear for being illegally used in circus performances and for<br \/>\ndocumented maltreatment.<\/p>\n<p>Mia had an emotional breakdown three years back and stampeded<br \/>\nthrough the circus grounds destroying property. As punishment,<br \/>\ncircus managers had her chained, flogged and put in solitary<br \/>\nconfinement for up to six months.<\/p>\n<p>Wildlife SOS is in the process of accumulating evidence of the<br \/>\ntorture meted out to Mia; if successful they will attempt to close the<br \/>\ncircus.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith the addition of Mia and Sita to the herd, we have now rescued<br \/>\nmore than 10 percent of all the elephants remaining in Indian<br \/>\ncircuses,\u201d said Geeta Seshamani, co-founder of Wildlife SOS. \u201cWe<br \/>\nare proud of this progress, but are committed to see this campaign<br \/>\nthrough to the end.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mia and Sita, both in their 50\u2019s, are due to reach the conservation<br \/>\ncenter at Mathura, 50 kilometers north of Agra, on Wednesday.<br \/>\nEach needs medical attention.<\/p>\n<p>Mia is developing a cataract in her eyes, has painful inflammation in<br \/>\nboth hind legs and abscesses in her toenails. Sita\u2019s right foreleg<br \/>\nnever healed properly from an old fracture and is fused, so that she<br \/>\ncannot bend it.<\/p>\n<p>Two years ago Wildlife SOS was instrumental in the rescue of Raju,<br \/>\nthe elephant who wept after being released from a life in chains for<br \/>\n55 years in another Indian circus, which has since moved to<br \/>\nBangladesh.<\/p>\n<p>What they say about elephant memory is true.<br \/>\nElephants\u2019 brains are much denser than humans\u2019.<br \/>\nThe temporal lobes associated with memory are more complexly<br \/>\ndeveloped than in humans.<br \/>\nVastly more space for remembering.<\/p>\n<p>Mia and Sita\u2019s rescue marks the inaugural trip of Wildlife SOS\u2019s<br \/>\nstate-of-the-art elephant ambulance, which is equipped with an<br \/>\nautomatic electric hydraulic ramp, showers, dual power supply, and<br \/>\na dedicated chamber for the veterinary team with washing and<br \/>\ntreatment preparation area.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/jaffeantijaffe.sdsu.edu\/\">http:\/\/jaffeantijaffe.sdsu.edu\/<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jaffeantijaffe\">https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jaffeantijaffe<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/haroldjaffe.wordpress.com\/\">http:\/\/haroldjaffe.wordpress.com\/<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/\">http:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Elephants After spending decades in the circus, elephants Mia and Sita were rescued by an animal welfare group on Sunday, and are now en route to a conservation center on board India\u2019s first customized elephant ambulance. The two elephants were rescued by Wildlife SOS on Sunday from the Great Circus at Thiruvanamalai, Tamil Nadu. Mia [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1689"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1689\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1690,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1689\/revisions\/1690"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fictioninternational.sdsu.edu\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}