Status Updates From The Jungle Book

Bagheera knows when he’s done and says to get Mowgli and go. The monkeys will not move unless Kaa tells them too.

Kaa is delayed because he’s so big. When he arrives, the monkeys freak out because they are terrified of Kaa. A python’s head strikes like a hammer. From the time they are lttle, monkeys are taught to be terrified of Kaa. A small python can knock over a man and Kaa is enormous. The monkeys flee in terror. Baloo and Bagheera are banged up and they are glad to see them go. Is Bagheera in the water a figurative death?

Suddenly, Baloo shows up with his arms swinging like a paddlewheel. Bagheera is in the tank, head barely out of water. Monkeys are lined up along the edge to go after him if he tries to get out. They jump up and down on the red sandstone steps screaming with rage. Bagheera speaks the snake’s call which basically means he’s begging for help. Other animals are attracted to the fightbecause it is so fierce.

This is worse than Indiana Jones!!! Mowgli begins to speak the words that Baloo had taught him. The cobras respond and say to put their hoods down. YIKES! Cobras end up in every ruin. They tell him not to move so he doesn’t step on them. Bagheera is fighting and twisting as only a cat can and Mowgli tells him to roll into the water tanks. Hearing his voice renews hope in Bagheera.

I take that back. Only Kaa and Bagheera are there. Baloo is somewhere else. They have to be careful because the monkeys can kill them because they are greatly outnumbered. Kaa comes over the most stable wall (western). Bagheera goes to the terrace where the monkeys are talking nonsense to Mowgli. Bagheera drops in the middle of 50 or 60. They throw Mowgli in a pit of cobras. The monkeys go after the panther first.

They want Mowgli to go back and tell the jungle people how great they are as they praise themselves more and shout “this is all true.” He wags his head as if he agrees but thinks that they have been bitten by the jackal for they are all mad. A large cloud covers the moon and he thinks about running away. He’s too tired and what he doesn’t know is that Bagheera, Baloo, and Kaa (tripartite?) are waiting.

The monkeys pinch him and try to cajole him into thinking how great they are. He knows better. It is night and there is a moon. They pull him to the terrace near the queen’s palace with a fallen dome covering the underground passage. The moonlight shines through marble fretwork laced with precious gems. The monkeys have a rally where they praise themselves. This reminds me of JA and other things: wilful deception.

He is hangry and he now realizes that everything Baloo told him about the monkeys is true. They lie and steal. They are lawless and he realizes that getting cuffed by Baloo and following the Law is superior to leading the monkeys. He wanders around the Lost City trying out the stranger’s call and, since the land is lawless, there is no reply. He believes he will die of his own foolishness.

They are proud of having done a new thing but they have no idea of what to do. Mowgli thinks they should have napped upon arrival. Instead, they sing and dance and beg him to teach them howto weave creepers together. They get confused and bored and act worse than middle schoolers (ha, ha). Mowgli is hungry so the monkeys run off to gather nuts and pawpaws but they get distracted and never bring him anything.

They sit in the king’s chambers and pretend they are like men but they do not know what humans do so they scratch for fleas and eat nuts. They fight and scamper around, shaking fruit down from rose trees and orange trees. They drink water from the tank, fight, and muddy it up. They behave like your classic mob mentality--they ruin everything they touch. They think they are clever and wise but they are fools.

Roofless houses look like honeycombs. Tree roots have thrust up cobblestones. The domes of temples are shattered. The only thing left of gates are rusty hinges and splintered wood. I wonder of the lack of roofs and domes points to the head being uncovered. There are also underground tunnels that they explore. Sometimes they move stuff around but they forget what they are doing and gallavant somewhere else.

Worm is another word for dragon but they also called Kaa a speckled fron and a fish. Is this a wild man because we can’t tell his nature? Or are the monkeys are stupid? A lair is a den of a wild animal but I immediately think of dragon. It’s also called the Lost City. The Indian city was once a marble palace but now it is ruins, stained with red and green. Four roads meet where an idol once stood.

Baloo asks if he knows where they took Mowgli, and he acts like he doesn't know, but I think he is lying. He can't eat Mowgli if Baloo gets him back. The kite interrupts them and passes on Mowgil's message. They are taking him to the Cold Lair (Hell?). Bagheera offers him the head of his next kill, and the kite acts like it was no big deal. Mowgli gives him the proper words and the kite had to act.

Bagheera says the palm leaf pickers stole their mancub, and Kaa acts like he never believed the stories Ikki told him about a man thing. Baloo calls Mowgli the wisest and the best. He will make Baloo's name famous in the jungle. Are jungle people like sheep and monkeys like goats? He actually calls on Kaa as a jungle person to intervene in finding Mowgli. He wants to get the back now that he is stirred up.

He does not want to admit that his girth is the problem with branches breaking, which woke up the monkeys, and they called him insulting names. When Bagheera repeated the names, Kaa bristles up in anger, which is what they wanted to do. He tells them where the monkey people are. Then Baloo is embarrassed because he acknowledged the monkeys for the first time. Baloo acts humble to puff up Kaa but Bagheera refuses.

I love this imagery. Kaa twists himself into knots. He is a little blind from the molting and strikes with his blunt head for defense. He is also hard of hearing, and they must speak slowly to him. He is very hungry, and branches do not hold his weight well. He has sat in a path with nothing to show for it. He asks if he can join in their hunt. Kaa is proud of his le mm gth, but not his girth.

Baloo curls up in a ball, and Bagheera scolds him for acting like a porcupine. The latter is less worried because Mowgli is well taught. Baloo thinks they should consult Kaa the rock python because the monkeys fear him. He eats their young. Since he is not of their tribe, he wants to bribe him with goats. Kaa is thirty feet long. He is brown and yellow. He is licking his lips as he thinks of his meal to come. Mowgli?

Rann decides to wait for them to catch. The two decide to stop and think, and they worry that the monkeys might drop him. Baloo finally accepts that he was wrong not to tell Mowgli about the monkey people. He worries that he had forgotten recent lessons, and he may not remember the words he needs. He is rolling his head back and forth. He regrets beating Mowgli on the head.

The monkeys are giddy about getting attention. Mowgli knows that getting angry will not help, and he lacks the strength to break away. So he uses his mind, and because he can speak bird, he tells Rann the kite to mark his trail and to tell Baloo and Bagheera where he is. Rain agrees and feels sorry for the monkeys because nobody can stand against a bear and a panther who kill more than goats.

Two monkeys grab Mowgli under the arms, and they travel through the treetops by swinging, going 20 feet at a bound. They have a network of roads in different directions. Mowgli enjoys the wild ride, but he gets slapped by branches and vines. The valleys drop them so low he is terrified of hitting the ground. They can go faster, but his weight slows them down. They sway like a ship at sea.

They have no habit of remembering either. Mowgli is the son of a wood-cutter (ahem, CARPENTER) and making huts out of sticks comes naturally to him. They want to make him leader so he can teach them (thankless job). Mowgli is reformed and takes a nap between the panther and bear so the monkeys decide to kidnap him. The beasts wake up when they hear Mowgli how as he is snatched and pulled up into the tree tops.

Baloo doesn’t want to take the blame. The monkey people live in the tree-tops (are they overreaching by living at a higher level?). In fact, they seem to be offering Mowgli a false paradise. They taunt wounded animals. They howls and sing nonsensical songs. They ask jungle people up into the trees to fight. They leave their dead on the ground to freak out people. They want attention but have no habit of attention.