I saw Philippe. He waved at me and came rushing over.

“I was just looking for you,” he said. “Your elephant is waiting.”

I laughed. That wasn’t something I heard very often.

“I just have to find my parents.”

“That is easy. They are already sitting on top of your elephant! Come!”

I ran after Philippe. He was tiny—I towered over him—but he moved very quickly. We cut through the lobby and out the front door. There, right by the entrance, standing among the waiting taxis, was the elephant. My parents were already sitting in the big wicker basket—the howdah—on its back.

“We thought you were going to miss it!” my father yelled out.

I ran up to the elephant. It had gleaming white tusks, and it was enormous—a lot bigger than the one down at the beach that was used for little two-minute rides for kids. A set of stairs was there to help me, and I climbed up. The driver—he was called a mahout—reached out and offered me a hand to help me over the gap, onto the elephant and then into the basket. I settled in right beside my mother.

“All right?” the mahout asked.

“Let’s go,” my father replied.

The mahout sat down in front of the basket so he was more on the head of the animal than the back. He said something to the elephant and it started to move, and we were all rocked forward.

“My name is Nija, I am the mahout, and my elephant is Ning.”

“Good to meet you. We are Sam and James and Ingrid, the Brooks family,” my father answered.

The elephant moved between one of the waiting taxis and a souvenir stall on the sidewalk. It was a tight squeeze but he didn’t even nudge either of them.

“You have a beautiful elephant,” my mother said.

“He is a fine elephant. Very smart. Very big. We have been together for many years.”

“So you’ve been giving tours for a long time,” my father said.

“Not long. Before, we worked in the forest. Ning is very strong, also.”

“But you decided you wanted to do this instead?” my mother suggested.

“Government decided. No more cutting trees. Now give tours.”

We moved along the side of the road. On one side there was a fairly constant parade of vehicles—some small cars, an occasional bus or a truck, and lots and lots of bicycles. On the other side was the sidewalk, and it was packed with people and stands selling everything from fresh fruit to fake fashions and Rolex rip-offs.

Some of the tourists on the sidewalk took pictures as we passed, but for the most part we were pretty much ignored. An elephant walking down the street almost anywhere else in the world—even in New York, where people pretended that nothing fazed them—would have drawn a little more attention. Here, it didn’t mean much. There were lots of elephants. Some were just for the tourists, but others were used to haul things, pull wagons delivering merchandise to stores, or for roadside construction.