Elephant Polo
Among adventure sports in Nepal Elephant Polo carries a unique feature of being distinct from others. The World Elephant Polo Association (WEPA) organizes an annual Elephant polo tournament in the airfield of Meghauli Chitwan, south west of Kathmandu and north of the Indian border.
The World Elephant Polo Association (WEPA) was established in 1982 with it's headquarter at the Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge in Chitwan, Nepal. WEPA has also established the governing rules for the Elephant Polo Tournament. The first games were played on a grass airfield in Meghauly which is located just on the edge of the National Park. The co-founders, James Manclark, a Scottish landowner and former Olympic tobogganer and Jim Edwards, owner of Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge and Chairman of the Tiger Mountain Group, came up with the idea in a bar in St. Moritz, Switzerland, where they are both members of the Cresta Club.
Somehow, Elephant polo is similar to the Horse polo but you can easily a bit difference. The primary difference between horse and elephant polo, besides the substitution of an elephant for a horse, is that the elephants are "driven" by their trainers, called "mahouts." The mahouts have generally worked with the elephant for many years and the elephants respond quickly to the mahout’s signals and commands. The mahout communicates with the elephant with verbal commands and by applying pressure to the back of the elephant's ears with their feet. The player's responsibility is to let the mahout know where to go, how fast, when to stop, etc. Most of the mahouts and all of the elephants only understand Nepali, so the communication is difficult at times. The professional players tend to learn some basics Nepali to help with the communication on the pitch.
The game is played by four players of each team on a marked pitch 140 x 70 meters, using a standard size polo ball and consists of two 10-minute chukkers of playing time, with an interval of 15 minutes. The whistle blown by the referee stops and starts play. The pitch is marked with a centre line, a circle with a radius of 15 meters in the centre of the field, and a semi-circle with a radius of 30 meters measured from the centre of the goal line at either end of the pitch. Elephants and ends are changed at half time.
Teams participate from all over the world including Scotland, Thailand, England and Hong Kong. The local favorites, the Tiger Tops Tuskers, also take a part. After the day's play all the players and guests have dinner in the Golghar, a traditional round house with a great bar. Elephant Polo in Nepal runs between last week of November and 1st week of December.
