Among Otters

 It’s an overcast Sunday afternoon and I wonder if the kids – after a heavy lunch on the third day of their summer camp at KK and Arthi’s lovely village home – will be sluggish and sleepy; not a good time to make a presentation on otters, even a light one.
But how wrong one can be!

We begin by playing a fun game and before I get down to the title slide, there is a barrage of questions: Have you rescued otters? (Answer: No, thank goodness.)  Do they bite? (Yes! Remember they chomp fish for a living. And that’s why I said, thank goodness.). Why are they not amphibians? (Great question!  Can someone answer that please?)  Do they like people? (No, most definitely not, and  with good reason.  But do you like them?)

  
There is a roar of ‘Yes!’, two dozen voices in symphony.   They had seen Wild Karnataka the previous day and cannot quite get over the clip of a romp of otters chasing a tiger out of the water.  

This bunch of twenty-five is not sleepy by half. 
I am mesmerized by them, by their questions and curiosity.  We talk of paw prints and wildlife trade, of mustelids and dens, of crocs and dolphins and Darwin, of crabs and crabby people, of pesticides and bio-magnification.  The older ones – in high school – are remarkably well informed, the younger ones are diligently curious and happily exuberant.  

An hour flies by unnoticed – time and land forgotten - and Arthi signals with a smile that I must wind up now.  The kids aren’t half as disappointed as I am, but there are more questions outside the room too: Can we come with you to see otters? is the common one (When you grow up a bit more, definitely Yes!).
But then, do you wonder, as I often do, what happens when we all grow up? 

A few copies of Walk Through – my first book of stories – that I had found at Random Rubble are passed around.  Cheerful byes and high-fives, and it’s time to head home.   

A day later, I get a message with a photo from Madhuri, a volunteer whose daughter is at the camp: Tanmaye asked me to send this to you as a gift for your talk yesterday.  

Isn’t this just brilliant?  I think of the time and effort this twelve-year old who loves zoology has put in to draw this gorgeous sketch.  Can there ever be a better gift?