In a tiny village in India where there are more elephants than people, the residents gather every year to celebrate their icons who they revere more than any other gods. The elephants are adorned with wreaths and wreaths of sacred flowers like marigolds, orchids, carnations and gardenias so they will all smell heavenly. The people pose with the elephants who they consider sacred and healing and equal to all the other gods and deities they pray to. The people pose for photographs and paintings that they then hang in their honor in their homes. They believe that elephants bring good fortune and luck. Some believe they bring love. Nearby villages are not envious or mean spirited instead they are curious and often attend the yearly ritual. All the elephants who live there roam freely on the grass near all the homes and all the motorists abide by the signs in the road that have a symbol for elephants crossing. It’s been said that this village has lived in peace and in excellent health and all villagers are blessed with bountiful crops and live self sufficiently off the land as they are vegetarians. Most of the elephants have names. The babies are cared for by all the mothers in the herds and the males spend the day gathering weeds and treats of bananas and mango that the farmers  all save for them. The elephants and the people of the village all live past 100 years old with no health problems and there’s only one doctor in the village who is an eccentric woman who adorns her own elephant who she named Shanti as it means Peace with wreaths of flowers all year round. They walk side by side to the surgery every morning and Shanti grazes on the grass until she gets bored then she goes to visit her aunts and uncle’s and sisters and brothers and other friends since her parents passed on. Every day village is peaceful and content as are all the cats and dogs because it’s rumored to be that the elephants protect them from harm just as they do with all the villagers. Visitors love seeing the fields and fields of flowers growing in the spring and early summer alongside of beautiful summer squash and rows and rows of green kale and cantaloupe. The trees grow heavy with mangoes in the summer, there’s so many that the villagers collectively decided to give them to the elephants and rest they use for an exotic tincture that sells for millions of dollars making each and every villager very wealthy. Every day in the village after lunch time and a following nap time before the villagers return to work, they pray and are allowed to ask the elephants for one wish a day. The wishes can be for rain when it’s too hot before the monsoon season, or they can be for a personal matter such as finding love and marriage or getting blessed with a child, or for having any one wish granted. These photographs are of the sacred festival where the villagers celebrate and give prayers of gratitude for this wonderful place they live and for the bountiful harvest they receive every year. The elephants show their love by never leaving and protecting the village and all its people which they do with grace and joy in their hearts every day in every year. Each villager has a family portrait or a single portrait if the villager’s live alone. People come from all over the world to visit and to try the highly sought after mango tinctures and of course to see the elephants on display in the parade for the annual festival. It’s been said that the few people who’ve actually made it there to the village and spent time with the elephants have all been blessed with good fortune, good health and good luck and even love.