The lizards also scavenge—they’re opportunists,
always on the lookout for food, alive or dead.
Scavenging takes less energy than hunting, and
the dragons can detect the scent of a rotting carcass
from miles away. Little is wasted: The big lizards
aren’t picky about which body parts they eat.
Despite the dragon’s somewhat off-putting
habits, islanders do not necessarily respond with
fear and disgust. An Indonesian folk story tells of
a prince about to slay a dragon. His mother, the
Dragon Princess, appears and cries, “Do not kill
this animal. She is your sister Orah. I bore you
together. Consider her your equal, because you
are sebai—twins.”
Modern times have not entirely quashed this
belief. In Komodo village I climb a crooked
wooden ladder to the house on stilts of an elder
named Caco, who guesses his age to be 85 years.
My guide says this slight, bespectacled man is a
dragon guru; the elder doesn’t refute the title. I
ask him how villagers feel about dragons and the
danger they pose. “People here consider this animal
our ancestor,” he says. “It is sacred.”
In years past when islanders would kill a deer,
he said, they’d leave half the meat as an offering
to their scaly relative.
Hiç yorum yok:
Yorum Gönder