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In Sickness and in Health
by Steve Winter

A lot of people ask me questions about my encounters with wildlife, about the adventures and dangers. On this trip I’ve blogged about this a lot. But traveling abroad and working in the jungle, the creatures that cause us the most problems aren’t the big, beautiful animals—it’s the microscopic ones you don’t see that really get you.

A few days back, I woke up with “Delhi belly”, throwing up at 2 AM, stomach pains, legs and arms aching, fever. Luckily, this scourge coincided with three days of intense, thundering downpours, so we were only able to work part of each day—and I could rest up and hope to get better.

The next day, Gabe woke up in the middle of the night shivering uncontrollably, so cold that he put on a hat, gloves, layered himself in blankets. Even so, he couldn’t stop shaking for an hour. 102 fever.

We have no idea what we have.

Gabe in bed with fleece, hat and 2 pairs of gloves. It is hot tropical climate but he has the chills—bad. He has been up with fever and chills for 2 nights.

Photograph by Steve Winter

Yesterday Gabe went to the hospital to see a doctor (who came up with a rather questionable diagnosis) and I went into the park midday since the sky had finally cleared. I had a fever and all my muscles hurt, but we had amazing encounters: a herd of wild boar with 19 tiny, striped piglets wandered by (usually you just glimpse a single boar moving with a herd of deer who act as personal alarm bells for tigers or other predators)—and later, we came upon a group of rhinos, sambar deer, and swamp deer grazing in close proximity around a beel (lake). As I was shooting, a herd of 20 elephants walked into my picture!

Before we leave on foreign assignments, we always visit NG Medical. They are meticulous in ensuring that we have what we need to stay healthy wherever we’re headed. For this trip, they vaccinated us against Japanese encephalitis, hepatitis, and typhoid, and gave us a well-stocked medical kit and prescriptions including malaria pills and Cipro, an antibiotic to treat things like “fever of unknown origin.” (We’re both taking it.) Last winter when I was shooting my snow leopard story in the Himalayas, I brought a medical kit that included a scalpel—and a do-it-yourself tracheotomy kit! That became a standing joke.

Obviously no one likes to be sick. But when I really get hammered, I can’t work. Normally I work every day and I hate the idea of losing possible images.

Watching what you eat and drink is crucial. When someone generously offers me food, I often politely decline if it’s at all questionable because it could mean some extremely unpleasant days. In the Himalayas, that even meant a cup of tea: at that altitude, water needs to boil for 20 minutes to kill all the microbes, and the villagers and yak herders I spent time with definitely wouldn’t waste that much precious fuel on a cup of chai.

We’re still sick but working anyway. Today we went out into the park, repaired a camera trap that had been trashed by some elephants and set one up in a new location. We had to take two guards along because it’s an area heavily frequented by both elephants and rhinos—let’s hope they wander by our trap. At the end of the day, we went to my favorite part of the park, a big, open low-grass plain where on a good day, the hoofed animals cluster around the water. In sickness and in health we’re on the job.

Steve looks at a camera trap lens that has been scratched by elephants while park guard Siba Sakia stands on the lookout. This is a very dangerous area so the guards always need to watch for animals.

Photograph courtesy Steve Winter  

Steve and Park Guards Siba Sakia (middle) and Ajat Hazarika (right) looking at a male elephant who wants to cross where work is being done on the camera trap.

Photograph courtesy of Steve Winter

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