Essence of the Wild

 I was 7 years old when i moved from a small village to the capital city, Bhubaneswar and visiting India's 2nd largest zoo, Nandankanan zoo is an obvious. Back then, in 2005, there were no battery operated vehicles or any transport facilities, so we had to walk for an hour or two to visit all enclosure which was not possible for us. It was quite exciting at first, not being familiar with anything, we walked along a group of visitors from West Bengal, leaded by a guide. The guide was telling about each animals, how much food is served to them and of what kind, as we moved from enclosure to enclosure. We were looking somewhere else when the guide, at top of his voice called out "kishan" and there came a roar that could be heard from miles away. He called the name again, and again came another roar in reply.  Everyone around or near, were drawn towards the sound. With excitement and an unknown fear, i too ran towards the fence of the enclosure and never aware of their exist...

We, Homo sapien sapien are the most advanced form of living entities present on earth so far. What makes us so unique and stand out from the rest? The power of memory and imagination that no other living organism possess. We are always after and in search of truth. The truth of the universe, the truth of our existence and truth about everything we observe around us. But what happened to us, when we were bound to stay in the houses, for our protection from a tiny thing that we can’t even see with our naked eyes? For months?   We started to suffocate inside the concrete walls, it didn’t seem warm or comforting anymore. We started to go insane, depressed, to such extend we needed helpline numbers to cope with it. According to the recent review on psychological impact of quarantine, conducted by Brooks et al. (2020), being forced to stay at home leads to negative psychological effects such as fear, frustration and anger. The increasing cases of suicides and mental illness is evide...