Recently I was reading Kabini on My Mind: Musings of a Naturalist by Vikram Nanjappa—a collection of short pieces written during his years close to nature, first as a tea-estate manager in Kerala and Assam and later as Evolve Back’s lead naturalist in Kabini.
Evolve Back was the connection. I had picked up the book on my recent stay at Evolve Back Hampi. An expensive luxury I indulge in whenever I can (which is not often), Evolve Back spoils me in ways my ordinary life in India does not. The properties sit in quiet corners of southern India—Coorg, Kabini, and now Hampi—cordoned off from the everyday Indian.
Yes, the Indians. It is a sad admission, but one I make without much apology: the absence of the everyday Indian is part of what I pay for. Whether that reflects more on the country or on me, I do not dwell upon nowadays. Inside these velveted enclaves of nature I am assured safety and a measure of peace. The forests are treated with dignity, and there is a façade—because I do not doubt it is a façade—of taste and order that runs surprisingly deep.
What struck me most in the book was not Vikram’s many simple, evocative encounters with the wild, but the final chapter in which he explains why he left what looked like a perfect job as a naturalist at one of India’s premier hospitality brands after more than ten years. He laments how, over the years, the visitors to Kabini shifted from those who truly wanted to meet the forest to those who wanted a packaged experience. Nature as product. Nature as content.
I have watched the same shift.
The first time I visited, around 2010–11, the place was still called Orange County. I had chosen the Coorg estate. A handful of quiet guests. Most of them content to sit with the morning mist, slightly lost in reverie, a cup of steaming coffee in the cold, wet air of the reading lounge.
On later visits, I began to notice noisy families, early-morning dolled-up faces all ready and made up to “catch the vibe” for their content, people who, once the shoot is done, spend breakfast editing teaser videos rather than watching birds or the monsoon rolling across the coffee estates.
Evolve Back is equally culpable in feeding this mindless frenzy. Their promotions today half-heartedly include the obligatory tigers and elephants, but they have fully embraced the amplification of influencer content—people whose primary skill appears to be being vacuous and talkative.
It was a poignant close to Vikram’s writings. The gradual degradation of his experience with visitors and their demand for instant gratification runs directly against the ethos of the natural world.
As a returning visitor to Evolve Back over a decade and a half, I lament the change. I go to these places seeking secluded, cordoned-off pockets of quiet where people switch off—where they recalibrate to a slower, more atavistic rhythm, and where the moments they experience can be held in private rather than shared the instant they occur.
Today we create and consume without measure. Rich and poor, old and young, men and women—no one is exempt. We want more, we want new, we want it now, and we want it before anyone else. The place you visited must be claimed and announced. The dress you bought must be shown before it becomes passé.
We consume not to know, not to relish or rest. We consume out of anxiety. We no longer respect the art, the object, or the experience, and in return they have been reduced to the cheapest versions of themselves—designed to dazzle once and then be discarded.
In an increasingly fast world, it is becoming harder to justify slow.
Even when watching birds, I catch myself chasing the exotic. The ordinary bulbuls nearer home lose their power to thrill. They are so familiar that I scan the horizon for something new and only reluctantly bring the binoculars back to the beautifully coloured bird still hopping and dipping in the water pool on the wall. Their colours have not changed. Their movements still follow the old evolutionary clocks. It is I who has forced them into a frantic tap-dance on the hot pan of mindless urbanization.
I still try to write about those birds only when I feel sufficiently familiar with them through repeated, unhurried sightings. I actively write off and never repeat questionable experiences.
Reading Vikram’s encounters with the wild—and his quiet yearning for the era of his childhood heroes, Colonel John “Papa” Wakefield, M. Krishnan, Jim Corbett—makes me realise that naturalists, their profession, and the very grounds they walk are being driven toward extinction faster than many of the endangered species they protect.
There is comfort in slowing down, in remaining with the familiar long after the first thrill has faded. A relationship forms. The longer you stay with something—respecting it, returning to it despite the endless distractions that gladly beckon the wandering mind—the closer you come to a gentle peace. It is like the embrace of a dying hero.
We are constantly told that only outcomes matter. I urge you to remember that, in the long run, the means outweigh the results.
Go gentle into that good night. Tread softly. Breathe slowly.
The Reluctant Book Worm 
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