Essayish Elephant

Why working (together) is like riding an elephant.

Essayish thing number 2

In my life I have had the pleasure to ride an elephant several times. The one I remember the most was in Gonarezhou National Park (gonarezhou referring to the shona: gona re nzou, which means field of the elephants). The elephant was huge, but as a small girl the driver (or whatever I should call him) let me sit on top of the head, in front of the driver (who was sitting just behind the elephant’s ears). Sitting in a split, with long and very sturdy ‘hairs’ (that felt like iron wire) and a seat of sandpaper was absolutely no fun at all. However the view was beautiful, and the elephant kept giving me gifts, things like stones and grass, with his trunk, because he knew that the driver behind me had food which was really cute.

Working in a group is similar, especially to the painful part. You have to think about what everybody you work with is thinking, and you have to take all of this into account. You can’t just blatantly be yourself and work at your own pace. No, you are forced into the minds of other people, thinking like them, having to adjust your own pace and will to their pace and will and all of that just to finish a project. A project that you are not doing because you love the idea and are really interested in doing, but something that you need to do to get your points so you can finish your study. Well, this again depends on the people you are working with, as a good group will find a way to make the project a personal goal, not something that needs doing for the good of the study. A bad group fails in this which leaves no enthusiasm and no drive to keep on working.

 Working on your own however, is not very much better. Forcing yourself to do anything (let alone something useful) is difficult. Next to that thinking of something (like a solution for a problem) is very hard on your own, at least for me. I tend to be unable to choose between several possibilities and end up doing all of them simultaneously, which is a lot of work.

On the positive side, riding an elephant is a ride of a lifetime. I am probably one of the few in the Netherlands who has done this several times before the age of 10 (rides at zoos don’t count). On the other hand, it is not very good for the creature itself. Elephants are used to attract tourists and attention, however, they do have to pay, they are not able to live the life they are supposed to live, captivity is never good for an animal, let alone a huge beast that needs its space.

As elephants suffer, so do the projects. In teamwork, the project doesn’t start off very well, nobody agrees, nobody does anything, and in the end, all that is left is taking what you have (which is not a lot) and making the best of it (which is not what it could have been).  For one person, a project is a huge task, one that needs a lot of time, but when motivated, the person can just work, not having to rely on others for information, teamwork or help. But for one person, this project is also a very big mountain, almost impossible to climb up alone.

Is there a solution for this? Well, one solution could be to remove the humans from the equation. Humans are beings that cannot be relied on; they have their own will and are prone to disagreeing. Replacing people by machines would ensure that every piece of the project works as fast and as hard as possible and in the end, will lead to work done. But machines cannot replace the creativity and beauty of the human mind. So we are stuck with each other.

I wish working together would me more like a bite from a snake, painful, but fast working. This would mean that after the difficult start, everything would just work, like taking a Band-Aid off. In a way, it is like a snakebite, however, the painful part is the whole project, it just takes way longer than it would a good snakebite. The dying part would be receiving the mark. I am an overachiever, and putting a lot of work into something and getting no acknowledgment for this is horrible.

More people should ride elephants, as more people should be aware of the hardships and problems that lead to making something beautiful. Most people just need to suck it up and cooperate. Working together is something that is very hard for every person, but something that is essential to Creative Technology. For a lot of people, this means a trip to Africa.


In a way this essayish thing was riding an elephant too, having to sit behind a screen for hours trying to write something that needs to be written, but just doesn't want to be written. A story that fights back, that stings and prods you isn't all that fun to write. But afterwards, when you get of the elephant with sore legs, it was still a memorable journey.