They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks or,
if you happen to have a Bali dog and a dachshund, any tricks
at all. Willful and headstrong, neither will even acknowledge
me when they are in hunting mode. Prey may range in size from
a housefly to a metre-long monitor lizard and everything in
between. Even my intervention with loud cries and a
stout bamboo pole hardly distracts them when they are dismembering
a hapless chicken.
I’ve tried to explain that it would be nice if we could
all live here together in harmony. After all, the creatures
of the garden and the undercliff have been on this land for
hundreds of generations. I imposed a house on their
territory and will be inhabiting it for a mere two or three
decades, so the least I can do is put them under my protection
for the duration of my stewardship. This sounds fine
in theory but Kalypso and Daisy are not strong on strategic
planning. They live in the moment, and their hunting
instincts transcend any pretence that they listen to a word
I utter. When they see something move, they go roaring after
and, if at all possible, tear it to pieces.
Often this is a chicken, almost invariably belonging to the
mangku next door. I once asked my staff whether white
chickens were more stupid than those of other colours, since
they seemed to be the only ones the dogs were catching.
It was explained to me discreetly that white chickens were
gifts to the priest, and that the carnage in my garden represented
a substantial percentage of his all-white flock. We
all maintain the polite fiction that his chickens do not fly
into my garden and that my dogs don’t murder them.
“If they come in here, it’s their own fault,”
Wayan points out with ruthless logic.
But I still keep thinking that the lion could lie down with
the lamb if the concept of interspecies harmony could be
explained clearly enough. Recently a young white chicken
was seen browsing through the mulch in the vegetable garden;
beside me, Daisy’s muzzle started to quiver uncontrollably.
I picked her up and carried her close to the interloper
and began to explain in a stern voice that this chicken was
under my protection and was not to be harmed under any circumstances.
After a few minutes of this I put her down and held onto her
collar, but she made no move toward the oblivious bird.
Instead she turned her head away as if to say, “Chicken?
What chicken?” and when I released her she trotted off
to the house without a backward glance.
I felt pretty pleased about the rapid results of this technique,
and every hour or so I would go find her in the garden and
reinforce the lesson. Then I went to water the vegetables
later that afternoon and there was an untidy pile of blood-stained
white feathers beside the beans. “Daisy!”
I bellowed. She emerged casually from under a nearby
fern with a white feather stuck to her chin. Daisy believes
she in perfect balance with Nature; Nature provides chickens,
and it is her job to kill them.
When it comes to finding balance with Nature in my compound,
snakes are a frequent challenge. Wayan and Nyoman started
working with me four years ago, at which time all snakes were
immediately chopped to pieces, no discussion. Over the
years they’ve become not only more tolerant but more
interested, looking up different species in the reference
book and examining captured specimens from a safe distance.
Nyoman has become adept at persuading green pit vipers into
empty Aqua bottles for later redistribution.
Both of them are somehow convinced that snakes only manifest
in the compound when I’m away. ”They’re
afraid of Ibu,” I heard Wayan explain to someone. Perhaps
coincidently, most snake dramas do seem to happen when I’m
out of Bali. The latest took place when I was in Canada and
my house sitter was spending a few days at the beach.
Wayan was tidying the daybed on the patio where I frequently
nap, and found a snake curled up asleep under one of the cushions.
Wayan, who really dislikes snakes despite all my rationalizations,
launched herself off the patio and through a hedge of heliconia
with a loud scream. Nyoman and Pak Mangku, who happened
to be chatting over the wall, come running as Wayan shut up
the dogs in the office. The brown snake declined to wake up
or move on, remaining in a sleepy knot until Nyoman coaxed
it into jar. They told me later that they had never
seen such a snake before and decided it must be magical. Don
the snake expert identified it as a Javanese spitting cobra.
Later that day Nyoman discovered a nest of green pit viper
eggs, and tenderly transferred them to the undercliff.
(Even I thought this was going a bit far.) Then the
morning after my return the dogs cornered a snake in the pantry.
It was before dawn and I couldn’t see the markings very
clearly, but it seemed to me to be the harmless little cow
snake from the pond.
But Wayan decided that this was altogether too many snakes
and went off to consult her favourite balian. On his
advice she made an unusual offering from white rice shaped
like a sinuous snake. I gave it two eyes from
chips of red chili so it could find its way back to the river,
and we placed it on the ground with the appropriate ritual.
As soon as we were finished, the dogs ate
it.
I have to admit that I do check under the pillows on the day
bed now before I retire for my nap. But as we’re
all seeking balance with Nature in our own ways I like to
think that she shrugs, and smiles, and keeps our encounters
to a minimum. And so it goes.
