Gulabi the Elephant

            by Kristina Chan

 

     Once, there was a young elephant named Gulabi who was very ugly.  She had long yellow tusks and hair sprouting out of her ears, and when she walked, her feet made a loud, clomp-clomping noise.  But despite this, Gulabi was a kind and generous elephant, and always thought the best of others.

 

 

 

     In her spare time, Gulabi loved to collect the cast-off clothes and accessories that human hikers, campers, and adventurers would leave behind in her jungle. For example, Gulabi had found an abandoned red scarf with tassels that she now wore around her magnificent neck.

     Now, because of her ugliness, many of the other animals made fun of her and called her names.  Rama the tiger tried to trip her as she clomped past.  Kali the rhino pulled her trunk and made faces.

     “Stop that,” Gulabi told them weakly, but they just laughed, and taunted her all the more.  But secretly, Gulabi wanted the courage to stand up for herself.

     Ravindra the monkey, observing what happened, approached Gulabi and said,

     “Don’t pay attention to what the other animals do.  They are ignorant and don’t know any better.  Come play hide and seek with me!”

 

 

     Gulabi was very grateful for what Ravindra said, and was happy to have found a friend who didn’t mind her ugliness.  Gulabi and Ravindra soon became good friends and one was seldom seen without the other nearby.

  They played tag and hide-and-seek.  Gulabi had so much fun, that she didn’t want the day to end. After about an hour, Gulabi couldn’t find the path and realized she was completely lost. Out of nowhere, a glint of gold caught her eye. She went over to it, but she had to clomp her way through lots of bushes and tall dense bamboo plants.

     Finally, she found an object shone like a million suns. It was a golden genie lamp! She picked it up and rubbed it with her massive trunk until a purple genie sprung out. “Hello there, you’re quite the ugly little thing, if I do say so myself. I grant you one wish, so choose carefully,” stated the genie.

     “Wow. My luck seems to be changing!” thought Gulabi to herself. Well, of all the things she hoped for, the first and most important was to appear beautiful like the other elephants and jungle animals.

     “I want to be beautiful!” exclaimed Gulabi.

     “Granted,” said the purple genie with a yawn, as if he was used to that reply.

 

 

      All of a sudden, Gulabi sensed a huge transformation taking place. She rushed over to the clear lake and looked at her reflection.

     “Holy Vishnu, I’m pretty!”

     And indeed she was.  There was no longer hair growing out of her ears, and her tusks were extremely white and shiny.  As she ran back home to show Ravindra, there was no clomp-clomping, but instead, a delicate tread of well-manicured hooves.

 

 

 

     She stumbled across Kali and Rama on her way, and felt their astonished gazes upon her newfound beauty.

     “Wow, you are really pretty now!”  Exclaimed Rama.

     “Yeah, what happened?” shouted Kali. “Do you want to join us for chai at my house? Everyone else will be there.”

     “Okay!” Gulabi was very happy that the other animals were inviting her to play.  So she scampered off with them.

     Everyone at Kali’s house was astounded by Gulabi’s amazing transformation. All the animals acted nicer toward her, and didn’t taunt her like before.

 

 

 

     Suddenly, they started looking at her strangely, like she had grown a second head. She felt her face shift oddly and felt hair growing out of her ears.  Unbeknownst to Gulabi, the wish that the genie had given her stopped working after a time.  The other animals started laughing at what was happening to her, and she ran out of the room.

     “I guess that looks are really just on the surface, and don’t help you to make real friends,” admitted Gulabi to herself.

     Gulabi realized that the others were not true friends, and that Ravindra would like her, no matter what she looked like.