Elephants and elephants

There are 450 working elephants in Sri Lanka, 6000 wild elephants, and thousands upon thousands of images of elephants, be it decorations, sculptures, paintings…

Made of wood, metal, stone… painted, carved, chiseled…

or wax-batic-dyed onto cotton, like below…

Most of them are beautiful, but none can compare to the real thing. Once you´ve met them , you can understand the fascination and inspiration they give for artistic expression.

Visiting the elephant orphanage in Pinnawala, we met dozens of elephants. The youngest ones only about a year, we even got to give them milk from a bottle! (Unfortunately, no photos, only on film)

And after the meal, the all went for a good bath to cool down.

It was quite a sight, the elephants walking freely, splashing around, enjoying themselves.

Yes, we are now also the elephant-ladies, not just the Come-and-Go-girls 😉