snake!

Yesterday Balaji, a colleague of mine and I met at the Krishna Temple on CMH road and 80 feet road intersection in Bangalore. We usually meet there around 8pm. Something interesting happened. There was a cobra snake that was coiled up in the shoe rack of the temple and it had its hood open. It was pretty intimidating to see the snake up close and personal at 4 feet away. A few well-meaning volunteers had gathered with tongs and wanted to put the snake inside a jute bag. I had learnt from watching Discovery Channel that this exercise is fraught with danger. Since the snake has the infra-red sensory pits it can thermal-image the handler outside the jute bag with a high degree of accuracy and one must be extremely careful of this. The volunteers had a plastic pipe into which they were planning to cajole the snake into. That might work only if it mellows down.

There is something about witnessing the hissing strike posture of a cobra that curdles the blood. One's primeval fears are materialized. One wants to run but the legs dont oblige. One is transfixed by the spectacle marks as the serpent sways. A mesmerizing toxic beauty. One is enchanted and transfixed. And when the head strikes one has scarcely a split-second to move. and should the strike land, one has 5 minutes of euphoric dizziness and agonizing helplessness. The neurotoxin shuts down the diaphragm so respiratory system grinds to a halt. Lack of oxygen to the brain and limbs makes one feel life ebbing away. The heart desperately compensates by beating at 200 beats per minute - more than 3 times its usual rate. And finally it gives up. The last 10 seconds one can only surmise the last thoughts as the brain accepts the inevitable fact - slowly sliding into a spiral of inky black oblivion.