The Elephants in My Backyard: A Memoir

About this book

Rajiv Surendra was filming Mean Girls playing the beloved rapping mathlete Kevin Gnapoor when a cameraman insisted he read Yann Martels Life of Pi. So begins his "lovely and human" (Jenny Lawson author of Furiously Happy) tale of obsessively pursuing a dream overcoming failure and finding meaning in life. This was a once-in-a-lifetime chance. I found myself standing dangerously close to the edge of a cliff. Far below me was an incredible abyss with no end in sight. I could turn back and safely return to where I had come from or I could throw caution to the wind lift my arms up into the air . . . and jump. From The Elephants in My Backyard What happens when you spend ten years obsessively pursuing a dream and then in the blink of an eye you learn that you have failed that the dream will not come true? In 2003 Rajiv Surendra was filming Mean Girls playing the beloved rapping mathlete Kevin Gnapoor when a cameraman insisted he read Yann Martels Life of Pi. Mesmerized by all the similarities between Pi and himselfboth are five-foot-five with coffee-colored complexions both share a South Indian culture both lived by a zoowhen Rajiv learns that Life of Pi will be made into a major motion picture he is convinced that playing the title role is his destiny. In a great leap of faith Rajiv embarks on a quest to embody the sixteen-year-old Tamil schoolboy. He quits university and buys a one-way ticket from Toronto to South India. He visits the sacred stone temples of Pondicherry he travels to the frigid waters off the coast of rural Maine and explores the cobbled streets of Munich. He befriends Yann Martel a priest a castaway an eccentric old woman and a pack of Tamil schoolboys. He learns how to swim to spin wool to keep bees and to look a tiger in the eye. All the while he is really learning how to dream big to fail to survive to love and to become who he truly is. Rajiv Surendra captures the uncertainty heartache and joy of finding ones place in the world with sly humor and refreshing honesty. The Elephants in My Backyard is not a journey of goals and victories but a story of process and determination. It is a spellbinding and profound book for anyone who has ever failed at something and had to find a new path through life.