The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

He was not crowned or otherwise adorned. He did not look so different, though
his horns curved a little more than the rest. His back was solid and strong. Even
though many flies came to rest on him, he did not flick his tail to shoo them
away like the others did. He was willing to share his body. A product and
companion of nature, he would say. His stance was noble. He was the king.
As they gathered around him in silent acknowledgement, he looked at each one
of the. He thought of his dreams for them and he imagined the future. They all
nodded in agreement.

The water buffalo grazes in herds of about fifty animals. Both wild and
domesticated buffaloes have a keen sense of smell.

The sky was fading and the slight breeze in the air was momentarily trapped in
the tall bamboo. The herd had dissipated and he was on his own. An occasional
tinker could be heard from a bell that hung around his neck. His bones told him
of something impending.
The darkness cam and he waited. It was an unusually black night. The stars did
not emerge and the slight moon was hiding. Still, the wind innocently played
hide-and-seek with the bamboo.
Then, as deafening as the thunderous roar of an immense storm, screams
echoed so hideous that they carved themselves onto the field. The noises came
quickly, one after another, producing a monstrous earthquake of terror. The king
knew it. He smelled it coming. He cocked his head to the left and listened for the
next anguish. He paused. Then with graceful swiftness he sped towards the echo.
Just behind the bamboo cluster he slowed to a halt. He lowered his head and
listened to the silence. After the horrific cries, the silence emerged like a lost,
curious child. Then with all his might, the king groaned to the starless sky, a
sound so mournful the moon came out from its hiding and sobbed. As he walked
slowly among the dead herd, he knew his time had come.

The Indian water buffalo is used in Asian rice fields, but has been taken to many
other parts of the world, including the East Indies, the Philippines, Egypt,
Hungary, Spain and other countries. Its bone structure and the distribution of
weight across its legs make it well suited to agricultural labour.

When the king arrived in the South, he was astonished. There was so much
abundance! So much fertility in the soil! Its green was so bright and wholesome
he began to weep for his herd. It was busy and exciting. There was movement
everywhere. No one noticed his arrival. He took up work at a local farm and, as
the days and nights passed, contentment began to seep through his skin. He
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The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

worked and rested and worked and rested. The cries of that horrific night began
to fade from his ears.
After one long day, as the sky began to fade and he began to rest, he noticed
that the stars did not emerge and the moon was hiding behind a cloud. It was an
unusually black night and the spirit of his herd came to visit, each one gently
rolling over his eyelids. The cries came back and haunted his ears and he
groaned a mournful sigh to the starless night, wishing for the heat that he had
left behind.
Then suddenly, the ground began to move and the trees began to shake and
divide. The moon split into twenty pieces and the ground tore beneath him. He
was frightened and tried to hold on to anything, but even the air was being ton
and ravaged. Suddenly he felt a sense of lightness, something he had never
experienced before, a lightness so beautiful he felt he was going to drift away.
Then with horror and amazement, he saw the horns on his head begin to fall out
as if some giant hand was plucking them from his skull. His dark blackish-blue
skin began to fade and his feet were dividing into five short stalks.
Then his snout began to flatten like a mound of clay melting in the sun. His ears
began retreating into his head. Afraid he would no longer be able to hear, he
twitched them vigorously in a futile effort to stop them receding. He felt as if
someone was stretching out his body on a canvas and he could not bear it any
longer. But his eyes did not change. He squeezed them shut while rubbing them,
hoping it would all disappear. Then with all his might, he yelled out a raging roar.
As the rivers rippled with the sound and then became calm again, a freakish
stillness overcame him. The land stopped tearing.

Despite the buffalos ability to adapt to its environment, physiologically it is less

able to adapt to extremes of heat and cold than various breeds of cattle.

Slowly, he peeled away his hands and un-squinted his eyes. What had become of
him? Who was he?
He looked around and saw concrete paths, shops, a coke machine gleaming from
a shop window and a bus pulling up to the kerb. He was confused and dazed. But
these surroundings felt strangely familiar.
He slowly learned to walk. It took many weeks. After he had mastered walking on
two feet, he ventured to learn to talk. This was much harder than he could ever
have imagined. What was this language that these people were using and why
could they not understand him? Every now and then, he would let out a groan to
the sky above, but this was always met with, Why dont you speak English?

Buffalo hide is thick and tough and makes good leather. The water buffalo is
hard working and powerfully ploughs deep into the mud, making rice farming
possible in many places.

The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

As a strange in a new land, he began to fade into the background. He became a
working man and thought, At least I am safe here, but he knew where he had
left his heart. He tried hard to forget.
He had children and they graduated from medicine, pharmacy and computer
science. They were all driven by his desire for them to walk faster and talk
smarter than he could. And they succumbed to the pressure, never knowing why
they always did better that their colleagues who spoke English at home. Maybe it
was the extra tutoring.

Though the water buffalo is strong and versatile, its greatest loss is among its
calves. Newborn buffalo calves can fall victim in large numbers to diseases and
poor nutrition. The most dangerous and susceptible period for the calf is the first
two months of life.

His only daughter, sick of treating girls with chlamydia at the hospital, gave up
her career and returned to college to become a painter. This destroyed her
father. They had an angry fight. She said shameful things like, Youre worthless,
He said, Youre a selfish, ungrateful daughter. I wish you were never born. The
schism lasted for years.
The one day, the daughter found herself lying on an expensive couch, drinking
expensive red wine, reading Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. She glanced
out the window of her apartment at the hundreds of people scurrying along, and
she noticed and old man. He was trying to catch the bus, but was still learning
how to walk and talk. She returned to her novel, but the feeling of loneliness
would not leave her. Maybe that man was from the same land as her father. Then
she realised she did not even know where that land was.
She had exhibited painting widely and had won numerous awards. But from that
day on, her work changed and the critics were harsh. Too sentimental, they
said. The artist is in a professionally dark phase, she has lost her edge and
traded it for the human condition. It is rather unfortunate.
She existed on a plane far away, staying still while the wold moved faster and
faster around her. She never did belong, here, there or anywhere. She was a
strange in a familiar land. She was fatherless.
One day she returned home. It had been years. Her father was sitting on his
favourite chair a milk crate in the garage. She grabbed another milk crate and
sat beside him. They looked at each other and sat in silence until the sky faded.
I know you have suffered, but I want to know where it came from. I want to know
where your heart is. I want to find it because it has never been here, and I have
never been complete, she said.
He replied, It is in another lifetime, my daughter. It is impossible to reach. It is
gone.

The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

The water buffalo when wild is very fierce, and it is said that it is a match for a
large lion. But generally, the water buffalo is a docile creature, as seen in many
postcards from South-East Asia, carrying children on their backs.

She took out a large blank canvas and her paints and told him, Father, I want
you to paint your life.
He took the brushes and began with efficiency. He painted a landscape with hues
the daughter had never seen before. Then he painted himself, the second-hand
Levis jeans, the T-shirt. Hours passed and the sun rose. The daughter woke up
and found her father asleep near the canvas, the paints strewn across the
linoleum floor. She inspected the picture. It was beautifully peculiar with these
vibrant colours and foreign feelings. Amongst it all, there was an image of a man
without a face.
Time passed, but the daughter was still trapped in a world she could neither
explore nor explain. She was caught in a dimension between reality and a dream
world; a world that belonged to her father. She had become consumed by the
search for his lost heart, to understand it and to bring it home.

More than five per cent of the worlds milk comes from water buffaloes. It is high
in fat and solids, which give it a rich flavour. In many countries, it is much more
highly valued than cows milk, resulting in high levels of calf mortality, as milk is
taken from the parent to be sold.

Years later, she received a note, brief and empty. Callously typed in Times New
Roman, 12-point font: Father is dying. St Albert Hospital. Intensive Care. Room
12. Bed 6.
She arrived. His body had shrunk and he looked like a creature from a fantasy
novel. He glanced up at her and asked her to bring him the canvas, the one he
had painted for her all those years ago. She did not understand but left
immediately. She searched the garage violently. There it stood, in bubble wrap,
under a wise layer of black dust. She took it to him, along with some paints. He
asked her to leave and come back in two days. For two days she sat outside the
door; the old man locked himself in tightly, refusing food and aid.
His frail hands shakily picked up the paints and began to mix them with precision
and grace. As the clock ticked slowly, doctors and nurses scurried along holding
bedpans and needles.

The water buffalo, though strong, works quite slowly, and walks along at about
three kilometres per hour. It feeds on pastures and farm wast such as crop
stubble and sugarcane. The average life of a buffalo is about eleven years, but
some can work to age twenty.
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The Water Buffalo Thao Nguyen

It was time. She opened the door to see her father a transformed being, yellowed
and shrivelled. She was filled with bewilderment: not sadness just confusion. As
he drew her near, he whispered, This is my last gift to you; carry it with pride
and keep it warm beside your heart. And with this his body collapsed, with a
gentle sense of deflation.
She sat for a few moments watching this now empty body, a carcass. The air felt
crisp. The old air-conditioner hummed nonchalantly. Remembering the painting,
she held it up to the light. The world stopped and her head began to buzz. The
ground began to fade. Looking at the painting, she finally saw the endless pain in
his eyes, the hundreds of stories buried in the abyss. She saw a lifetime of
heroism and pockets of private hopes. She saw time and humanity, war and life.
The face of the painted buffalo stared at her with so much sorrow and nobility,
she felt her heart dissolving.
She looked back at the body on the hospital bed and didnt know what to do. She
ran outside as fast as she could, but there was no one on the streets. It was 4
a.m. and the air was chilly. There was a homeless man sleeping among some
green rubbish bags. She ran towards him and babbled incomprehensible
sentences about a buffalo and a great man passing. The homeless man shrugged
her off and went back to sleep.
Finally, she was on the border of the dream world, but it was too late. She would
never know and she would be caught forever in this place between dream and
reality. As she collapsed on the ground, she gave a mournful groan to the stilldark sky.
She slowly returned to the empty halls of the hospital and made her way back to
the room where the body lay. Sitting on a grey plastic chair across from the bed
she watched. As the sun came up and forced its way through the sterile venetian
blinds, it cast itself on the painting, highlighting the hues she had never seen
before, those foreign brilliant colours. Somewhere between this reality and her
fathers dream world was where she now existed, a place of truth.
She picked up the bedpan, walked out the door and closed it gently behind her.