Crickets Yum Yum!

May 28

I didn't actually get ripped off on the taxi from the airport! April was coming from some other hotel that was closer. And I was reading the itinerary from g adventures and it said depending on traffic and the way you go a taxi will be between 350 and 500 baht. So yey! I didn't suck after all haha.

Today we left at 6:30am to make sure we would make it to the border and not have to stand in 2 hour lines. We had to drive about 4 hours from bangkok to the border. We stopped after about 2 hours at a 7-11. A lot of the girls were a little uneasy about the Asian style toilets. I was like okay move over. I had to do #2 and honestly going poo in the squat toilet is so much easier. Maybe I'm crazy.
While stopped we had to fill out our visa forms for the Cambodian Visa. Then after driving another 2 hours we took a 5 minute stop at the Cambodian consulate at the border on the Thai side and were assigned our Cambodian visas. They are nice and green. Also, if I would have bought it in the US I would have paid around 200USD. Here it was 1100 baht which is about 35USD. Yey saving money!!!
We got out at the border and they put our bags into a wooden wagon wheel barrel thing and a person took it across the border for us. Again, a lot of people thought they would never see their bags again. I didn't even think twice about it since that's what happened at the Indian Nepalese border as well.
We waited for a bit and then started walking. I didn't even get to take a picture f the you are now leaving Thailand sign because I thought we would see it after we went through a building but we never saw it again. I did get a picture of the archway for the Republic of Cambodia... I think that is what it had said. We also crossed the friendship bridge between Thailand and Cambodia and it was really small. Like maybe a few feet long. I'm not sure if it was the real one or not.
We got out stamp saying we were leaving Thailand and filled out our departure card and then we walked across the border and went into another little building. There we got our entry stamp for Cambodia and had to fill out our arrival card. They staple your departure card directly to your passport. Makes it easy to not misplace it.
Once we crossed, I had to use the bathroom again. I thought I was going to get diarrhea again and I was like really self. You need to get your shit together. But I haven't gotten it yet, knock on wood!
We hopped into a bus and it took us maybe 5 minutes to the bus station where we got into a different bus. Our bags had been loaded into the back of the first bus and to put them into the second bus the buses pulled up close to each other and the drivers just passed the luggage through the window! It was very clever.
We still had to drive about 2 and a half hours to the hotel in Siem Reap.
I was really tired and kept dozing off. In the vans on the way to the border I thought I would sleep but we all talked. I was in a van with April, Marianna, Kristen, and Ed. We talked about music and the difference between education and health care in Britain and the US. We also talked about a lot of other things.
From the parts I was awake and saw of the Cambodian countryside, it was very flat. There was also not very many people walking around whereas in Thailand there were a bunch of people all over. The streets were less busy as well. It may have been because it was the middle of the day and not a big city but I don't know. It seemed very dry. There were nice patches of green trees or random palm trees hanging out In a small group or alone. There were a lot of brown fields and green grass. I saw maybe 2 hills the whole time and they were right next to each other. We drove past some rivers as well. It was disgusting. The water was a very light brown, mucky color. It didn't even resemble water one bit. There were cows roaming around ANDD drumroll please, an air conditioned bus to take us around!
The field had these strange looking plastic and wood contraptions in them. Matt told us they were to protect the crops from insects. It was 2 wooden sticks that had another wooden stick joining them at the top with a piece of long clear plastic that went to the ground from the top of the horizontal stick. Then there was a bucket of water at the bottom. When the bugs jumped at the crops they would hit the plastic and fall into the water. Farmers got it going on!
It was still pretty hot in the bus though. It was pink and they called it the lady boy color. This was the first time people on this trip realized you start sweating in places you didn't even knew sweat and it leaves marks for the entire world to see. Everyone had wet asses and thighs and arm pits and groins and backs.
When we got to the hotel we had 2 hours to do as we pleased. All of us decided to go swimming. Originally I just sat on the side and was working on my blog but it looked so refreshing and it was so hot so I said screw you to the blog and jumped in. I really miss being in a pool! We used to go all the time when I was little. Maybe I'll start swimming when I get home... In all my spare time...
I rinsed off after the pool in freezing cold water and put my sweaty nasty clothes from the day back on. I don't want to have to go through 2 shirts and pants a day. I don't have enough clothing for that.
We met again at 5pm for a very original experience in Cambodia. We were going to see the New Hope Center. This is a very different side of Cambodia we were told most people do not see. It was just a few miles from the hotel and it is one of the poorest communities in Siem Reap.
With g adventures (the company I am traveling on most of my tours with), they partner with planeterra which is a non-profit organization dedicated to making a positive difference in the lives of people and communities around the world through support of international charities, local organizations and community projects in the places we visit. It's a pretty cool idea.
At New Hope we went to their original start up building at first. It was very basic and run down. There were 8 rooms which included a medical center and a classroom. The rooms were pretty small. The tour guide was telling us that they have now built a new facility so the old facilities now houses 8 families. The kids that were there were all so cute and they LOVED that we were there. They wanted to hold our hands and be picked up and play with our stuff (sunglasses, water bottles, etc.). They walked with us all around the village. We don't normally get to visit the village but it was a national holiday so the kids were off school and we had the opportunity to do so.
The living conditions were extremely basic. Small huts with not very much in them.
We were told that they are very poor and don't have very much but they don't know anything else so they don't really complain or anything. They were all smiling and seemed happy. We got to see the olde and younger kids playing volleyball as well.
One family we saw who was sponsored by New Hope had 4 children plus the mom and dad. The families make about 75 cents a day. Maybe $20 a month. Most of the children are the ones that have to work for the families by going out and selling trinkets or begging for money. This means they can't really go to school since they work during the day. Many of the women in the community work in brothels as well. The men pay about $1 or $2 for sex and if they do not want to use a condom they can pay an extra dollar.
Men do not want to have sex with their pregnant wives because they think it will harm the baby. Many of the men then seek out the brothels for sex. Ron, an Australian man who has been a large Help for New Hope, said that most of the women are HIV positive now so a number of children are contracting the disease as well from birth. If children are born with mental retardation or something else, its looked down upon and usually the people think that it is because they had sex with their wife while she was pregnant. There are not HIV meds in Cambodia as of today.
New Hope was started by a poor Cambodian (Khmer) man. He was waiting by a few tourists to collect their bottles when they were done drinking to get money from them. The tourists wondered why he wasn't in school and he said that he really wanted to go to school but he didn't know of any. The tour guide knew of a school and came back the next day to bring him to the school.
In Cambodia you are required to have a signature from your parents to go to school and his parents needed him to work so they wouldn't sign. He went back to the school and told them this. He wanted to study before he had to go to work. The school told him if he could find 10 kids that they would run a class from 4am to 7am so he found kids who wanted to do this and they studied and went to work after class. He ended up making how own business I think and he is still studying for his PhD degree.
He came to visit this community and saw how poor they were and how the kids were working and not going to school. He started running classes for the kids from his own home. I don't remember exactly all the details and how things happened but New Hope was created. They provide free education for the students. They end up paying the families for what the kids would make that day from donations and g adventure trip funds. At the school there is a computer room, a library, and many classrooms, as well as a room with a lot of sewing machines. They are trying to get women out of the brothels by teaching them sewing skills so they can make money from that. New Hope is opening their own shop to sell the items the girls make. They are also teaching basic computer skills so the people can go into the town and get a job.
They do the same with the restaurant. They accept 5 or 6 trainees and train them in customer service for the year an then they can go out and find a job. They also have a tourism office where they train people as well. All the people they train are from this very poor community. Essentially they are helping them to help themselves make a living.
There is also a hospital at the New Hope center. Everything they do at New Hope is free. The hospitals in Cambodia are not free. Any treatment you receive you have to pay for. (There is a children's hospital in the city that is free but only for children). A bed costs $8. If you bring your own bed it costs $2. Ron said there are bodies all over the place because there aren't care providers either so each patient has their own family member with them to help make sure they are staying cool or getting treatment. He said you literally crawl over people. He also said that a lot of people will come in for treatment but if they cannot pay, they are not able to receive treatment. Some people will also have an operation but they can't afford pain killers so they just don't get them.
New Hope provides medical help to all the families in the village for free. There is a volunteer nurse from Australia I think and she teaches the doctors in the community.
There is med school in Cambodia but I guess the standards and what they are taught is not very good. Right now there are also 2 doctors from Canada (I think) who teach the local doctors. They are always looking for more volunteers so if anyone wants to come out...
Ron said that westerners shouldn't and can't be in Cambodia forever so they really try to do as much as possible to help the locals live on their own. In the New Hooe hospital, there are also 7 social workers with about 60 families each on their books. I'm not sure if the social workers are locals or volunteers.
We then had the pleasure of eating in the New Hope restaurant. We were served spring rolls with a sweet and spicy sauce. There were also crickets, beans with a sugar coating, and sweet potato chips waiting for us on the table when we arrived. The fried cricket was actually nice tasting. I prefer the cricket to the scorpion. When we arrive in Phnom Penh Matt said we will have the opportunity to try a spider. I think a tarantula? I still have a few days to get used to that idea though. The strange food hasn't really been too bad. It's one of those things you can't really think about. And you figure it has to be fine since people here eat them all the time. But I think once you start thinking about what you are eating is when you get into trouble and start getting the heebie jeebies. At the restaurant we were also served rice with a pumpkin curry and morning glory which was green beans with pork. For dessert it was green beans with a little bit of sugar and coconut juice sprinkled over the top. All of it was very good. I think I'm still traumatized from Anna's week of cooking pumpkin everything senior year of college but even the pumpkin curry was incredibly enjoyable.
After New Hope, we went back to the hotel and walked across the street to an ATM. Literally, the Cambodian money is worth so little they actually use USD. That is what you get from the ATM. When you pay, they don't have coins so you get Cambodian money for change, especially if the change is under $1. The exchange rate is approximately 4,000 Cambodian Riel to $1. The largest bill I have seen is 20,000 Riel which is about $5 and I think the smallest is a 500 Riel bill which is maybe 12 cents.
Even though everything is still pretty cheap here, because it is in USD I feel like I am spending more money. I can't explain why. Spending 40 baht ($1) seems way less than paying $1 because of the exchange rate. It's all the same though.
Matt took us around real quick to introduce us to the Night Market (which is apparently the second best on our trip) and Pub Street. While walking I pointed at a necklace that I thought was cute and the lady jumped on it immediately. She wanted $5 but I wasn't even going to buy it. I said $2 and she wanted me to pay $4 and then $3 and I walked away and said I would come back tomorrow (which I was fully intending to do) and she said ok $2! So I bought another necklace. I probably shouldn't have bought anything because now I am buying more than I should. Grrrrr. The stuff here I also like a lot more than in India or Nepal.
We were all pretty tired so we went back to the hotel after being shown around pretty quickly. We have an early morning tomorrow! Wake up call at 4:30am, leaving for Angkor Wat at 4:45am to make it to see sunrise.
I don't really know too much about anything I am doing over here. I didn't research any of the sites and I don't have any expectations. I'm in the dark for the most part aside from the big things. Before I left people kept asking me what I was most excited for or most looking forward to and I wasn't sure. The more I think about it, I think I would say Malaysia. I know absolutely nothing about Malaysia but it was my first country assignment for International Relations at my first.. And only conference. I don't even remember too much about it because I was in the WHO and our bill had nothing to do with me because we didn't even have a health care system or good hospitals.

P.S. I forgot to write down the Thai words I learned. Thank you is "ka poo kha" (men would say ka poo khop). The "kha" is kind of longer and drawn out a bit. Hello is "saw wah dee kha" same with the way it is drawn out and khop for the men.

Scorpion

May 27

9:47am Thai time
Woke up around 5 and then 8:30. I conceded and got up and went to breakfast. It's included with the hotel which is really nice. Toast, a fried egg, pancake, and cereal with cold milk! It was amazing!!!

I totally got ripped off last night. I kinda knew it was happening too. And I feel dumb I didn't say something about it. The taxi drivers have meters and the meter was going and it was really low. Like maybe 35 or so baht. When I got to t airport I went to the airport stand and they were going to charge me 1,300 baht to get to my destination which seemed like a lot. Then she told me I would have to wait 20 minutes so I went to find a cab on my own. In all the other countries we went to we had to agree on a price before we got in the cab, so I asked before I got in how much. He said 500 baht. And compared to the airport charge it seemed good. So then the meter was going and he didn't say anything about it. When I got out I should have asked about the meter but it was 11:45pm and I was tired and confused and things were new. So I paid him the 500 baht. I should have followed my gut which was saying this isn't right. So I ended up paying him $16 when I probably only had to pay him a little over $1 or 40 baht. But, I don't feel terrible because they work for such little money. It was probably a 40 minute drive from the airport. But I'm sure he is laughing at me. And I wasted a lot of baht. Oh well.

I met a girl named Halle (like in the parent trap) in the lobby. She is doing another g adventure trip but we are going to go check out the zoo and probably walk around. My group doesn't meet until 6pm. I was just going to chill all day but if I can go out with someone I mine as well, right!

Midnight Thai time
Today was good! Halle and I went outside the hotel. There were tuk tuk drivers trying to get us to go with them to all these attractions. One guy, mr. Moley?, let us sit in his tuk tuk as the driver and take pictures. It was cute and very fun haha. No one has ever done that so far! We ended up paying him 20 baht each to take us to a boat so we could go along the river.

That was a terrible idea. It pretty much was a tourist trap and I didn't want to pay the money. You didn't even see cool things. It was 1600 baht for both of us originally. Then we walked away and she said 1000 but I still felt like it wasn't worth it so we just started walking.

Bangkok is like a big city! Like any big city. The shops are more open though, like the rest of Asia. We walked past people welding metal right in the open in their shop on the street. There aren't as many tuk tuk drivers or taxi drivers in your face about going places like in India, but they still come around. One man actually parked his tuk tuk in the middle of the road and walked over to us!

Halle is from San Diego. She is 19 and she works at a shop where she rents surf boards and other things to tourists so she meets people from all over the world. She said she can go to many countries in Europe and have a place to stay. So jealous! She hasn't traveled much but she is in Thailand for a week doing a g adventures tour in the hill tribes area in Chiang Mai. She got a 2 year degree in sociology.

We saw some temples along the way and stopped to take pictures. It's kind of like the temples in Lumbini, Nepal. Very bright and colorful and detail oriented. Dragons and elephants. There was a painted statue of a person on dragons and elephants in one of the temples and she had glued on eye lashes. It was strange but looked really nice. There was also a group of people at one of the temples with flowers. The flower was all closed up but they pulled it back to open it up and it was beautiful. Just white though. Lots of candles and incense.

I think temple is "wat" but I am not positive. The maker had from the hotel had wats all over it. We went to wat traimit (i think) and just took pictures from the outside. I don't know what things my tour does that I have already payed for in Bangkok. Plus I have 5 days alone so I can always go back. There was a lot of gold and white marble maybe? The sky was very blue today as well and that just made everything pop and look so much nicer.

There are a lot of monks walking around. More so than in Nepal I think. I'm not sure why but it throws me off a bit still. A lot of them have very bright orange clothing.

While we were walking around we stopped to ask a lot of people where we were on the map and how to get back to the hotel. It was pretty hot out today and Halle had had enough by around 1. Our hotel is in china town and we walked around that area for a while. We actually walked way past our hotel and had to meander back. At one point she said excitedly, "oh, I can feel the first bead of sweat dripping down my face." I responded, "the first of many." For real though. It's gross. Like hot yoga but all day and not just an hour ha.

We stopped at a 7-11 to get water and I wanted a magnum. Chocolate truffle. It was really good but I felt a bit sick afterward. I ate it at the hotel when we got back and I read for a while and slept.

Bangkok is not as confusing to me as India and Nepal were. There are actually street signs that are marked with the names of the roads in Thai and English. There are also signs pointing to different attractions, like there would be in Europe. The streets seem to be rather normal as well. Paved streets. Large side walks. There are even cross walks and stop lights and they count down how long you have to cross the road or how long the red light is. We should have that. I think people maybe wouldn't be as annoyed with red lights then.

The streets are very clean. People are very helpful as well, even if they don't speak English. I bought some jewelry. It was about 150 baht for 2 necklaces and 2 bracelets and she threw in a free ring. The exchange rate is about 30 baht per USD. So that was about $5. I figured I had some space because I got rid of the 50SPF bottle which was pretty large. Ashley took it from me at the elephant park. I was so happy to get rid of it! I'm also throwing away the tevas Aunt Cindy lent me because the sole just came off one of the last days I was walking around the elephant nature park. The other sole is about ready to come off as well. I felt bad throwing them out but she said it is okay. I think it will be nice as well to not have to carry them.

I feel like my English is really strange now. I hear so many accents and different ways of talking. I always want to say "I quite like it" or some other strange way of speaking British English. It's kind of awkward!

I met my roommate, April, around 4 or 4:30pm. She is from Ireland but she works in England. She is a nurse and she works with people who are not directly from the ER but just a step down from that. She told me not to work with old people for OT. I told her I wasn't planning on it haha. She is nice and I like her a lot so far.

We headed down to the hotel lobby around 6pm to meet Matt, our tour leader. I was surprised he was British. Although not too much since his name is Matt Ford I was expecting someone English and not Thai. I think he is our leader for the entire month but we do end up having local guides for different tours and things in the countries. He has been traveling for 25 years and he seems like he knows what he is doing. He knows Thai as well. I think he said he is doing his 50th loop or something through Indochina. He seems very well organized and seems to have a lot of informational sheets for us which I think will be nice.

I think there are 14 of us maybe for the first 10 days? 4 people didn't make it tonight for the meeting. There was only 1 male so far. The people are from the US, Canada, Britain, and Australia so far. Everyone seems really nice. I will write about people as I find out more about everyone.

Matt took us to dinner at this little place. It was very good. I had a singha beer which is a Thai beer and also chicken pad thai. I don't think I have ever had pad thai before. I was expecting it to be a lot more spicy but it wasn't too bad. I actually added pepper flakes to it. The chicken was good and normal looking. The dish tasted very buttery to me. The meal only cost 110 baht or $4. That would be the cost of just a cheap beer at home, let alone a whole meal!

After that, Matt pointed us in the direction of the Banglamphu district (I believe). It is a huge shopping street and night life area. It was a lot like Europe to me because there were a lot of cafes with tables and chairs outside. But it had its own twist as well. There was a lot of entertainment... Western music but they didn't really know the words lol. And a lot of bumping and lights and very loud music. There were lights and food carts all over. Spring rolls, fruit, smoothies, beer, chicken or pork, noodles, etc. We even saw scorpion on a stick! Ed bought one and bit into it, claws and all! He asked if anyone wanted to try the rest and I figured why not... So I tried scorpion! I think it's really hard to explain how it tasted. It was crunchy on the outside and the inside was not like crunchy like a shell but kind of harder, more of a substance. It doesn't taste like chicken. I have no idea how to describe it though. It was kind of stringy inside and dry. Jenn, I'm sure you're dying right now haha.

There were a lot of massage places along the side of the walking street as well. They had reclining chairs with cushions set up. There were a lot of them. Maybe 20 or so chairs. Maybe more. You could get a hand massage or a foot massage. I think also a back massage but I didn't pay too much attention to the signs.

They also walk up to you with little signs that have a list of sexual things on them. Like pussy ping pong and snake cigarettes and all these other things with pussy. It was a bit of a shock at first! They also walk around making the noise with it. Like a pop sound. When you purse your lips together and suck them in and open your mouth. It's funny! They are all shows as well. I don't really know exactly what they are but I can guess haha ...

There are double decker buses here too. And the tuk tuks at night, well some of them, have party lights or rope lights. Matt said to not take a tuk tuk here because they rip you off. Metered taxis! And make sure the meter is always running! We had to fight with cab drivers to get back tonight. They wanted to charge us 250 or 300 baht for 5 of us. But it should only be 70 baht so we insisted the meter be used. Some drivers wouldn't take us. We squeezed 4 of us in the back (Marianna, Kristen, April, and I) and Ed took the front. I think a lot of people don't like Bangkok because as a tourist you really get ripped off a lot. Or they at least try to rip you off. I think I'll just need to be very wary of it.

We have to get up at 5:30am tomorrow to pack and be eating by 6am. We need to be leaving by 6:30am to go to the Cambodian border. He said if we leave earlier it makes it less likely we need to wait for 2 hours in the heat to go across the border.

I have to get my Cambodian visa still so that will be interesting. Matt said we actually get it before we get to the border because it goes faster. It's 1100 baht or about $35. He said the ATMs in Cambodia actually spit out USDs at you. I hope we still get to use whatever money they have there though! The exchange rate is crazy! It was 3,942 to $1 when I looked the other day. I don't think my brain will do very well with those conversions. People on my last trip said you can get a million dollar bill so I want one haha. Then I can feel semi rich even though its not USD.

I need to try to sleep though. We have a wake up call in 4.5 hours. And this is probably why I keep getting sick! I'm going to try to start taking Vitamin C on travel days.

P.S. I did find out that April didn't get screwed getting from the airport to the hotel. She met a British woman who works in Bangkok and she helped her get a metered taxi. She paid about 100 baht. So I guess I only overpaid by 400 baht instead of 450 baht.

Meaty Goodness!

May 26

6:00pm Thai time
I'm sitting in the Chiang Mai airport right now and people are very well dressed. They're not necessarily wearing very nice clothing but they are very well put together. It's like at home in a city. The girls are wearing dresses and nice sandal wedges or toms or flats that look nice with their outfits. There are skirts and tops that match. Lots of jeans. A lot of people have sandals on but if they have shoes on they take their feet out of them to put cross their feet on a chair or put their feet up on the chair. Even the men are in collared shirts or button down shirts and shorts. People are well groomed. Their clothes are clean. Very different from India and even Nepal. Everyone has a smart phone or tablet as well. There aren't as many thrown together outfits or strange clothing choices (what I would consider strange I guess).
A lot of people here are buying food in bulk to take from the airport. Strange. Also not sure why that's happening.
Their airport is pretty normal. The shops in the airport are not like the typical news stand shops though like in America. It is a lot of candy shops and dress shops. I haven't seen magazines or newspapers.
This may not be strange, but everyone, in all the countries doesn't recognize "The United States". I have to say I am from America for people to know what I am talking about. That seems strange to me. I don't know why.
All the cars (except tuk tuks) had air con and the airports as well. We ate McDonald's when we got here. It was actually pretty good. The fries tasted normal and having meat was really great. At the elephant park it is all vegetarian food. There was no cheese. A lot of rice and a lot of noodles. We did always have French fries at lunch. But today at lunch I took a bunch of the food I normally ate through out the week off the buffet line. A couple different types of noodles, fried rice (but its like yellow instead of brown), a few fresh salad type things... One tastes like tibouli and one had peanuts in it and was ridiculously spicy, some fresh fruit (watermelon) and or vegetables (carrots and cucumber) and steamed greens and spring rolls. Today, I left so much food on the plate. I definitely didn't waste any rice, but the noodles and even the spring rolls just didn't taste good. I couldn't even eat it. I also tried and did eat a lot of tofu during the week for nutrients and a protein substitute. Not that I have been getting too much protein between Nepal and India though either. There was always soup as well which I never had because it was too hot. At lunch and dinner you basically ended up with a massive pile of food but it was the smallest portions of just so many different things. We ate well. But I guess you need to when you're working all day... It was hardly all day but it felt like it.
At breakfast we usually had toast with a choice of butter, peanut butter or jam. There was usually hard boiled eggs or really greasy omelets. And rice or beans which I never ate. We also always had fresh cut up fruit that was covered in a plain yogurt. The fruit was usually apples. Sometimes mangos. There were grapes in it.
Dinner was a lot more rice and tofu dishes and mixed (this auto corrected to Moses...?) vegetable dishes. Lunch was by far the best.
We've been at the airport since 2pm. I had planned on walking around Chiang Mai but everyone was going to their hotels until around 6pm when they were meeting up with the group for a party and dinner. I asked Apple what I should do in Chiang Mai in the afternoon and she said go to a hotel and sit in the air conditioning. So I figured I mine as well go to the airport. I'm kinda bummed I'm missing the party with everyone. I think it would have been really fun. But, I also think it will be good to get to the hotel tonight and be able to sleep in tomorrow. I'm still sick. Two girls from the program are also taking the same flight as I am to Bangkok tonight. Their names are Kristina and Laura. They are from London. They are my age. We've past the time together really quickly which has been nice. Talking about the experience and comparing British and American English. There is a lot to compare! Also talking about traveling. They are spending 3 months in America after doing a week in Bangkok, 2 weeks in Vietnam, spending time on the Thai Islands and Indonesia. If they get to Chicago it will be close to when I am starting school but I may try to see them there or in Niagara Falls. They are going to California and doing a lot of the parks in the West, New York and Florida. Probably the Bahamas.
One thing I have been really impressed with is how well people can speak English when it is their second language. They can speak it just as well as I can! And joke around in it. It impresses me. I am not fluent in any foreign language, especially now that I haven't used them in so long. Amelie said that it is different though because they grow up learning and speaking English from such a young age and they have to use it fairly often. We don't really have the need to speak other languages.
It's also been really interesting while traveling to hear about other people's countries and cultures. It's really fun.
I think I must be really tired. We just saw a lady walk by and she has the checked by security yellow sticker they place on your bag across her back. I couldn't stop laughing. That's not even funny. I can wait to sleep tonight.
I know there will be a meal on the airplane tonight and I don't think I am looking forward to it. I'm not sure how much more rice and noodles I can eat. I really want pizza!
I'm also pretty sure I smell pretty bad. I didn't shower before I left because I figured it would be nicer at the hotel tonight. I also didn't have too much time. I had to shower everyday at the elephant park. I thought I was so tan the first day and then I realized it was dirt so yea...
Last night I was up pretty late coughing. And I woke up early this morning coughing. And having to pee. I tried to hold it but I couldn't do it anymore. I finally got out of bed at 6:20am to pee. I think I had been awake on and off for an hour already since then coughing. I packed my bag and headed to breakfast at 7.
By 8am we were ready to work. We could do ele poo or ele food. I really wanted to do poo... I know that's strange, but poo gets done so quickly with a bunch of people and food usually takes at least 2 hours. Plus you usually have to unload a fruit truck. Unfortunately, I think everyone thought the same and no one wanted to do food so a few of us ended up switching including me. And you get to be close to the elephants when you scoop poop. Luckily, food only took us an hour this morning. I was so nervous a fruit truck was going to come in because there was almost no food in the elephant kitchen. It didn't!
We then had 2 hours to pack and get ready before we did our group photo. I couldn't fin Debbie anywhere and she had the key. We only had 1 key for the room. It hasn't been a problem until yesterday. Then today she just took the key with her. But it was fine. I got in the room around 10 (an hour after we finished food because Debbie went to the dog shelter and thought we were still doing food) and finished packing my stuff.
At 11 we had a group photo with the elephants and then we ate lunch and said goodbye. By 1pm we were leaving and by 2pm I was dropped off at the Chiang Mai airport! It's a pretty normal airport. Not too much to say about it. We only had to go through security when we entered (our bags on a belt) and when we went through the security to get to our gate.

Later Thai time
Thai airways is very nice. The seats are all different colors which was fun. The plane was very large. I wasn't expecting that. It was also only a 56 minute flight but all the seats had their own TVs. I didn't use it though.
We were served a snack. Mixed fruit juice (always coffee and tea but I turned it down) and a mini croissant with something in it. I have no idea what it was. It was sweet and white with maybe little pieces of fruit in it. Absolutely no idea but it tasted fine so I ate it.
When we arrived in Bangkok I met the girls when we got off the plane and we collected our luggage. They had paid to get a transfer service to their hotel so there was someone waiting for them with their names on a sign. We said a quick goodbye. Laura was still feeling really sick and we were all so tired. It was around 10:40pm and that was really late for us to be staying up! We went to bed so early in Chiang Mai.
I went to a taxi stand and they wanted to charge me 1300 baht to get to my hotel. I think they could tell by my face I thought that was a lot. Then she told me I would need to wait 20 minutes. On the way I had read the guide book and it had said you could find your own taxi for pretty cheap. So I walked around trying to find a taxi.
There were 3 or 4 different levels to go out of to enter the street so that was confusing. I went out the level I was on and walked around for a bit. It was all shuttle buses so I finally found someone to ask and they told me I needed to go upstairs. They have moving walkways to get upstairs but its like on an incline and then flat and then on another incline. It was hard to stand and keep my balance which seemed dumb.
I walked out from the next floor and immediately a guy was motioning to me. In the guide book it said to use a metered taxi. He had one. But I also wasn't sure if you needed to agree on prices before you got in the cab like in India and Nepal and even in Chiang Mai. So I asked him how much and he said 500 baht. That was half of what the airport service wanted to charge me so I said okay. I talk about this more in my next post.
When I got to the hotel I wanted to sleep but I really needed to do laundry and I wanted to make sure my clothes would be dry and ready for when we left on the 28th. So, I think I was up until 2am washing my clothes. They were filthy! The laundry service at the hotel was expensive. It charged per item not per kilo. I think my clothes are probably still pretty dirty since brown water kept squeezing out of them but at least they smell clean. And I got most of the brown to become clear.
I also realized tonight that I lost my retainers at some point and I'm really upset! I know that sounds silly but I wore my retainers a fair amount still and I've had them for 8 years. My teeth are really sad. I hope they turn up but I searched my bag 4 times so I think they're gone :( I emailed the dentist asking about whether or not my teeth would be okay and what the options are for when I get back. They were obviously really old and the plastic part for the top retainer was even broken. But man! So bummed!!! And I have no idea where I would have left them. They could have fallen out anywhere or been left anywhere. It was hard to wear them though because I couldn't rinse them in the tap water. So I don't know. But grr. I don't really want a permanent retainer and I think it will be expensive to replace them. But I am also worried about my teeth shifting over the next 2.5 months. So boo!!!

Manual Labor

May 23-26

Ok. So there are a lot of jobs we did at the elephant nature park that I have not yet talked about. Ill mention them in a list with some descriptions here if I haven't already written about them in previous posts.

Ele food
Ele food may have been one of the easiest tasks we had, but it was still hard work. In the elephant kitchen there are just mass amounts of pumpkins, watermelons, and bananas on shelves or in closets. They're all stacked up and jammed in. As I mentioned before, it takes about 3 tons of food to feed the elephants for a day at the park.
All the elephants have a different diet base on their health. Some of the elephants don't have great digestion anymore or their jaws are not able to chew hard things very well. Some of the elephants need the watermelon or bananas peeled or don't eat pumpkins. Some of them even need the bananas mushed up. Part of the kitchen is preparing the banana balls for these eles. We go through some of the bananas and peel the more mushy or ripe ones. Then we mush the bananas around with our hands and add corn flakes and some other grain things. Then, once it is a good consistency (doesn't stick to your hands as much and can be balled up) we roll them into balls, a little larger than the size of a baseball, and put them in a basket.
We always started by getting 5 baskets of pumpkins and 7 baskets of watermelons. The pumpkins are green and orange and all different sizes and shapes but not like the pumpkins we have at home that are orange and round. The watermelons were WAY smaller than the watermelons we have at home. Some are the size of baseballs or smaller but some are maybe half the size of the larger watermelons we have at home.
We filled the buckets up and had to drag them over (we used a T-shirt strung through the handle and pulled the ends of it to drag the bucket) to a pool full of purple solution. I think Apple said it had ammonia and some other things in it. We had to take scrub brushes to the pumpkins to clean them just in case the farmers had used pesticides or other chemicals. We loaded all the pumpkins into the pool and then washed them and put them back into the buckets to be cut. The watermelons we did the same process but instead of scrub brushes we used a smooth sponge pad.
The buckets with the clean fruit were then moved aside to be cut. What was the cutting tool? A machete! More machete use! I think I am rather skilled with a machete at this point haha. I cut fruit almost every time I was in the ele kitchen. A lot of people seemed a little nervous about cutting the fruit. I figured I have used a paper cutter so much that it was pretty similar to that. It actually was similar with making sure my fingers were out of the way.
Once we did all the washing and cutting the Thai women who worked in the kitchen would organize the baskets for each of the elephants. We would then make a food train. A bunch of baskets were lines up and we would each stand in between a basket and grab handles from both baskets. We'd all pick it up and walk the baskets to the different feeding areas for when it was feeding time. We had to make sure to place the baskets pretty far away from the edges where the elephants come up to the sides because they sneak their trunks into the baskets, knock them over, and steal the food! There were a few times I saw eles sneaking food! Once the mahouts saw they came rushing over to stop them. Sometimes the elephants had eaten all the food! It was pretty funny. Their trunks can reach really far. They also have a really good sense of smell. They also sense vibrations through their feet. Their vision is pretty poor though.
Ele food usually took at least 2 hours. After you washed the watermelons and pumpkins your hands got stained a yellow color. Luckily, after peeling and mushing the bananas your hands became totally unstained. It was perfect!
Usually if we did the ele food a fruit truck would come in as well and we would need to unload it. During the week we unloaded a watermelon truck when we first arrived with all 21 of us... We made a train and passed the melons along to put them in a wooden bin area on the floor.
We also unloaded 2 banana trucks I think. The banana trucks kind of sucked. Well, all of the trucks sucked. They jam so much fruit into such a little truck! It took between 30 minutes and an hour to unload them depending on how many people were helping.
The banana trucks came with a bunch of bunches of bananas but with all the rings and levels. Some of them were so massive and awkward to pass along in the train. We had to put the bananas on a shelf. We pretty much crammed them in. They counted the bunches as well (our volunteer coordinators) and for roughly ever 50 bunches they took a banana off and put it in a bucket. Then at the end they could have a very rough estimate of how many bananas had been delivered. They weigh the truck by the kilo to price it out so I don't really know why they count the bananas. We never counted the watermelons.
When we unloaded the watermelon truck the second time during the week there were only 6 of us because it was just our group doing the ele food. It took so long! We were unloading melons for maybe an hour. We didn't have enough people to make a train so we had to fill buckets and drag the buckets over and dump the buckets into the wooden holding pen. To unload the fruit you have to get right down in the truck bed. I was literally standing on watermelons, sitting on watermelons. Haha. I even busted a watermelon open with my foot. Whoops, sorry elephants.
When we were unloading trucks we had to be conscious of bad fruit as well. For the bananas most of them could go toward making banana balls, even if they were brown. For the pumpkins and watermelons, we had to make sure to throw out any parts of them that were mushy or moldy because those are bad for the elephants. There was always a "bad basket" for the rotten fruit. With the watermelons it was quite fun... Like playing basketball with trying to throw it over the truck from inside the truck into the basket. I put a nice spin on all mine. Made them all in. Woot!
There was ALWAYS music in the ele kitchen. One thing I have noticed is that even though everyone has their own taste in music and the local bands they like, a lot of the music around the world is the same. The pop and rap music... Top 40... That we listen to in the US is really what everyone else has been listening to as well. You hear it in bars, on iPods, on the street. It's really cool. Music really does being everyone together.

Planting banana trees
This day we actually combined groups. There ended up being 14 of us. Before we left the park we had to get out of the truck and load the banana trees that had been collected the day before into the truck. They really like trains there so obviously, we got into 2 lines and started passing the banana trees along up to the truck. There were times we did this same thing with unloading them as well throughout the week. This was when I saw my first massive centipede. Like literally 6 or 7 inches. It was disgusting. I hear they bite and it is pretty painful although not poisonous.
Once the truck was loaded with the trees (there weren't as many sometimes because the elephants would get into them and steal them), we rode a long way out to the place where we were planting banana trees. Once we got there, we luckily didn't have to dig too many holes. We had to use hos to dig the holes which is really hard because the ground was hard. You kinda just had to chop away at the ground til the hole grew. We put 2 banana trees in each hole. Then we had to kick or fill in the dirt around the trees. The dirt came out of the ground in chunks so we also had to break all those pieces up by smashing the ho over them.
After we did maybe 10 trees at that spot, we got back in the truck and drove to another area. Here all the holes were dug for us. There were ladies taking a break and sitting there watching us plant the banana trees. Again, it was 2 trees per hole. I stayed on the truck and handed trees to people with Vicki, an older woman from the other group. We handed everyone 2 trees and they walked around and put them in the holes. We planted on a hill and at the top of the hill. With all 14 of us it went pretty quickly.
They told us originally we were going to have to dig holes but we ended up just watering the trees we had already planted. Again, we employed the people train method! Apple stood at the well and got water and we passed the buckets up the hill. There were 3 buckets so the last 3 people went around and watered the trees. It was really fun! We threw the buckets to each other on the way back and while they were full we had to walk to each other a bit.
We rode back standing up in the back of the open truck. Apple always said, "Britain, no. Germany, no. America, no. Thailand, we do."

Collect banana trees
Collecting banana trees was an easy afternoon. We again had to cover up. Long sleeves and long pants. Gloves. They recommended a hat but I skipped on that. We drove a while with the 6 of us from group A in a truck. It looked like one you collect animals from the street in.
Once we got there, we went with the women who work there to collect the trees. Once again, the favorite train method was used! We went from pile to pile of already up rooted (correct terminology?) banana trees and grabbed a pile and passed it along up to the truck.
The trees were wet and you got pretty dirty. It didn't take very long at all! We were pleasantly surprised with our afternoon job. We were 100% convinced we were going to have to do something else or that there would be a surprise job. That seemed to happen a lot.

Move rice straw
Speaking of surprise jobs! This one was a surprise and it BLEW! I think this was my least favorite job. Saturday morning, our second to last day at the park, we did poo or food and then we had extra time so they gave us another task. We started loading rice straw onto a truck.
It really doesn't sound like it would be too bad but it was. Ha. The rice straw was all piled up on the side of the river. It was hard to pull it out of the pile and keep them in their tied bundles. It was dry and the feeling on your arms was uncomfortable. Hay got everywhere. In my hair, in my mouth, down my shirt, in my bra, while we were passing the stacks along a few pieces even stuck up my nose. It was so dry and dusty. I still had a cold so I was sniffling all the time and therefore breathing it in. It was horrible!
There was so much of it as well! We loaded 2 trucks before lunch. All 3 groups, aka 21 of us, were doing this job. Half of the group rode with the straw/ on top of the straw to help unload it. They were gone for what seemed like forever. When they came back we were dismissed for lunch and our afternoon break.
Unfortunately, we were not done. We spent the rest of the afternoon (until around 4:10pm) moving rice straw.
When we came back from lunch we loaded 2 more trucks and this time our group, the half of us that hadn't gone to unload the first time, got in the trucks to unload.
We had to drive a long way. We crossed the river and ended up at a farm looking area. There was a fenced in area with a house and a million cows on the other side of the fence. The trucks drove up really close to the fence and 2 people threw the rice straw down to us/on the ground so we could stack it in a huge pile.
The cows loved it! They started mooing every time they saw a truck pull in and they would rush up to it and try to eat the straw off the truck even though there was perfectly good straw all over the ground. Literally the ground was covered.
Once we unloaded the trucks we sat in the shade and waited for the other group to load them and for the trucks to drive back to us so we could unload them. I think we unloaded both trucks 3 times. And they kept telling us only 1 more so that was the worst. Every truck we were like yey! We're done! And then Mix would say oh no, there is one more coming.
It didn't help that it was really hot out... Like every other day so I don't even know why I mention that anymore.
We had entertainment while the trucks were getting more straw for us to unload. The cows. They had a bunch of loose extra skin on their necks. It looked kinda rooster like, but white and on a cow. The calves were also trying to get milk. I think one if the calves was trying to feed from a cow that wasn't its mom because the cow started freaking out and running in circles to get it off and kicking it. Her calf was also feeding from her though during this. They really yank on the utters! It looked violent.

Ele poo
I know I had discussed ele poo before. However, we only did it 1 time with just the 6 of us and it took a long time. When we split into 2 groups and there were 10+ of us it went so much faster AND it was way easier! Mix and Can ended up showing us that if you use 3 people with a combination of shovels and rakes that you can pick up a whole massive pile. And by massive I mean it fills the entire wheel barrel and then some. It was pretty cool. And made it way more fun. If you didn't time it correctly and move together to the wheel barrel it all fell apart.
Team work definitely made the dream work at the elephant nature park haha.

I don't know if I said this earlier or not but the machetes are pretty heavy and I got more blisters from those in the corn field.

Elephant Nature Park: Thai Culture and Other Tid Bits

May 23-26

Okay. So this week has been a lot of work and a lot of culture and I have been exhausted from the work so I've gotten behind on my blog. Therefore, I am going to split the rest of the week up into a working post and an informational post. This is the informational post.
When we watched one of the documentaries we have seen this week, one of them talked about how Lek really wants to protect the jungle for the elephants. She took a bunch of pieces of orange cloth to be blessed by the monks. She was then going to tie these cloths around the trees so people won't cut them down. If a Buddhist cuts them it is considered bad luck because after the monk blessed them they are considered holy and it is a bond that shouldn't be broken. When the head monk heard what Lek was doing, he wanted to help. All the monks went with Lek to tie the cloths around the trees. Hopefully it will protect the jungle for the elephants to one day be able to live in again. The cloths are still on the trees. We drove past many of them a few different times on our way to various tasks during the week.
One night, Sophie, Debbie, and I were talking to Ken. He is from Thailand and he is a leader of the over night groups at the elephant nature park. We were asking him if rice or corn farming was harder and he said rice farming is more difficult. He told us that there is a "machine" to separate the shell from the grain, but it sounded more like a little contraption made from bamboo. He also told us that he feels bad when people who visit waste rice. He said that if the farmers knew we were wasting even a single grain of rice that it would break their hearts because of all the time they spend harvesting it. That was really sad and I didn't waste any rice the rest of the week.
Ken was also telling us about having an elephant. His family owned 2 elephants. It sounded like they were working elephants but we don't really know what they did. His grandpa ended up donating his elephant to the nature park because she was having a difficult time. This elephant is the elephant with an earring. We asked him why she had an earring and he said that it was for decoration. The way Ken talked about his elephants was really nice. He really loved them and cared about them. They're like pets. It's really strange actually.
He was talking about the elephant and said that he saw her slip on some wet leaves because it had been raining. He was very alarmed and went over to help her up because he was worried she was injured. They didn't want to over work her so I think that is when they donated her to the park. I am not positive that was exactly what happened though. He said it is really nice to be able to see his elephant still everyday. And he knows she is happy and has a good home where she will be cared for. It was really moving to hear all of this. I'm pretty sure Aunt Sharyl would have been in tears haha.
I really hope I'm not getting bronchitis. I have a pretty nasty, phlegmy sounding cough. And I still have to blow my nose constantly. I have gone through a role of toilet paper (normal size) in the past week on blowing my nose alone. And I've only been using 1 or 2 squares per time! (Random... In India the toilet paper didn't have squares).
Between basically 11 and 1:30 we have free time everyday... That includes lunch though. I have written my blog, read, talked, gone out with Jody to see some of the elephants, used wifi. Really whatever. Then we usually have free time again from 4:30 to 6:30 when we have dinner. Sometimes there is a program at 4:30 and 7:30 but other times there is just free time. Most days I have gone to bed pretty early. Like after dinner I shower and get ready and maybe read and write for a bit and then pass out.
Along the side of the road, there are a lot of tiny houses with like water or orange pop on it in little glasses. This is a spirit house. When you live on a property you don't always know who was there last. It's a house to pay respect to the spirits and ask them to live there so they won't disturb you in your home. You offer orange juice, water, and alcohol to them. So the spirits have a choice of what to drink and they can be pleased.
One evening we had a Thai culture class. It wasn't very structured. It was mostly a place for us to ask questions to Apple, Can, and Mix. Apple is 29! I would have never guessed that. Mix is 25 and Can must be in his 30s because he is older than the other 2. The all look so young though. It's incredible haha.
We learned a lot in the culture class. I still have a million questions though. Good thing I am coming back to Thailand haha.
There are 5 ways to "wai". I'm not totally sure exactly what "wai" means but it is when they put their hands together and their elbows out and bow their head to someone. It is a sign of respect. There are 5 levels. At the heart/chest is for someone the same age or younger than you... You're equal. The chin is for an elder. The mouth is for your teacher or someone you consider a teacher because they teach you to speak in a proper way. The nose is for your parents because they give you breath. Between the eyes is for Buddah because it is the center of everything. And the King is over the head because he ultimately has all the power. If he doesn't like you and tells you to die, you have to do so.
In Thailand there are only kings. If you are married to the king you will always be a princess. Never a queen.
There are 5 main rules of Buddhism. You don't have to follow them strictly but they are the way to a healthy, good life. They are do not kill animals, do not steal, do not lie, no polygamy, and do not drink alcohol.
We learned the elephant song which is a nursery rhyme type song that all children know. It's about an elephant and how it has small eyes, big ears, a long trunk and a tail. There are hand motions and everything. It's really cute. Elephant in Thai is "Chang".
I asked if they had a cast system and they didn't know what cast meant. So I don't think they do but I am not sure. He said they don't have arranged marriages anymore.
We talked about traditional Thai toilets being the squat toilet. Chrissy had a picture from her hotel in Chiang Mai of a man squatting on a toilet seat with an "X" over it. Can said that some people don't know how to use a western toilet still so they try to squat on it because that is the only way they know. Their right hand traditionally was for eating and their left hand was for the toilet. He said they usually use toilet paper now but if the water stops working then they still use the bucket to wash their bum and their hand to clean. Elderly and some of the hill tribes will still use the traditional way. Same with the shower. They usually use the shower head but they still use bucket showers if the water stops working. There were very large buckets in the bathrooms that were full of water. Like industrial size compared to the pail sized buckets in India and Nepal. The showers were all cold as well at the nature center. It would have been nice if I had chosen to shower in the middle of the day after working when I was hot and sweaty. But, I like knowing I'm clean at night I guess after all the poop and hay and everything else so I showered in the evening. Which meant I was still sweaty but not as hot and the cold shower took a few seconds to adjust to every time. No matter how prepared I was.
They usually eat rice for or with every meal. For breakfast they usually have a full meal as well so they have enough energy to work all day.
We talked about how the western style of dress is rather sexy compared to their style. They said they cover up as a respect thing to their elders. Normally the shoulders and knees are covered. We weren't allowed to wear bikinis or bathing suits in the river. Just shorts and a tshirt. Respecting their elders is a really big deal and very important to their culture.
Can said that about 95% of the country is Buddhist but there are Christians and other religions. I think he said a lot of the hilly tribes will choose to practice Christianity. I'm not sure why though or if that is even correct.
There are 4 different languages in Thailand. The northern language, southern language, central language, and eastern language. There is no western language. He said that everyone learns Thai as well. But the central language is understood by everyone. If northerners and southerners tried to speak they would not understand each other at all.
They also told us that all Thai men become a monk for a little bit. Usually 2 or 3 months. They do this because it is supposed to prepare you for life. A lot of people will do it right before they get married. I think Mix had just done it. His eyebrows and head was shaved and Can said that was why. At first when Can told us we didn't believe him and thought e was pulling our leg but then they told us this little tid bit about the culture.
I am so infatuated with Buddhism. It is such a beautiful religion. Just the outlook they have on life is so amazing. I think Hinduism is way too strict. Too many rules and women do not have any value other than looking after the house and raising the children.
On Thursday, after our morning jobs of ele poo or ele food, we went to the local village school to visit the children. We drove over in vans. It was probably a 10 minute drive from the camp. There are a few kids who live at the elephant nature park. Jody has an 8 year old who speaks Thai and English. Jody is married to a mahout. I'm not sure if he still works as a mahout or not and if he was from the nature park or they met somewhere else. The head cook also has a little boy who goes to the school as well.
The school isn't a normal school building like we would have in the states. There was a gate and then a big dirt courtyard. There was a building surrounding the courtyard. And the classrooms were in that. The classrooms are just cement walls but there are normal things inside the classroom. A teacher desk, a chalk board, each student has a desk, the kindergarten room had a toy corner. There was even a child walking around with a toy gun! That would absolutely never be okay in the states. He was pretend shooting everyone and making noises.
A lot of the girls have short hair as well. Like bobbs. Can said they cut their hair usually by a certain age because then they can pay attention in school better.
We were at the school for a little under an hour. I went to the craft corner to make bracelets with some of the girls. It was basically braiding and adding beads every little bit. Some people got to go play duck duck goose with the kids or get foot massages by kids who were learning the techniques. While we were around there weren't really any teachers to be found anywhere. It was a little strange. Even Apple was like whattt where are the teachers?!

The last evening we were there we had a chance to listen to Lek speak. She was supposed to speak earlier in the week but she was very ill. I definitely cannot do this woman any justice by just telling you about her. We were shown documentaries in between her talking to us as well.
Her story is amazing and she is a beautiful person with so much passion for animals. She also is very passionate about helping women find a voice and become more powerful in their communities and villages.
In 2011 there was a huge flood in Bangkok. The city was pretty much under water. Lek took volunteers from the camp to Bangkok, as well as her staff, and they helped rescue dogs. The dogs had Ben abandoned by their owners but not because they wanted to leave their dogs behind. The government would not allow them to being their pets on the rescue boats because there was not enough room. Millions of dogs were left starving and alone. Many died. Others were not able to be rescued because when they tried to save them they started fighting and biting the person. In that case they just left the dogs with food.
Lek tried to rent as many boats as she could but most people would not rent her boats for animal rescue. She also tried to buy rice for the dogs and the woman she was buying from got very angry and told her "rice is for people. Not for animal."
The volunteers helped dig graves and bury the dead dogs. They also helped drag dead human bodies out of the mess. This is the main reason why there are so many dogs at the shelter. It is very sad because a lot of them will never be adopted. They have a really great home at the park though and they seem very happy. Since there are 450 of them territory is hard to come by and that leads to a lot of those fights. We watched a documentary from the floods in Bangkok and what Lek and her volunteers were doing. It was really sad. (There were also 200 monkeys trapped at a temple that they brought food to).
After this documentary Lek spoke for a minute and then we saw a documentary about the elephants. This showed a lot more violent footage of the ways they train the young elephants. It was really difficult to watch. They even made the elephants pick up the sticks with the pointy part on the end with their trunks and hand it to the owner who was sitting on their back.
Unfortunately, I waited too long to write about this and I don't remember all the details. Lek grew up in a village where elephants were used but it sounds like her father, a shaman, taught her everything she knows about medicine and healing the elephants, dogs, and cats. Lek has so much passion for these animals.
She met resistance at every step of her process and she still puts up with resistance everyday. When Lek bought the land at the elephant nature park (through help from donations because she comes from a poor family), the villagers were protesting outside the camp because they did not want her there. She spoke with them and wanted to know what she could do to make it better, to fix anything that she was doing wrong. They told her they just didn't want her there. She said there were 3 reasons even though they didn't give her reasons. First, they were doing illegal logging and the logs were buried on the land. Second, she was a woman who was leading something and they didn't like that. I can't remember what the third one was. Sorry. The second one may have actually been split into 2 different reasons.
Her family disowned her on public television because of what she is doing. I can't even imagine having that happen. She said that her friends want to talk to her and be her friend when there is good press but not when there is bad press. Then they tell her they are not her friend.
The government has told her no a million times. The villagers have told her no. Her family has told her no. She even has trouble still with the mahouts in the park. Lek doesn't want there to be any hooks or sticks and the mahouts feel they need them to be in control of the elephants. She does not want these in the park because all of the elephants have already experienced so much trauma and abuse that she doesn't want them to have to go through this again. She wants to build an environment where the elephants feel comfortable and have trust in her. You can see this with the way she trained Hope.
The documentary we saw the first day talked about this. Hope is the elephant she rescued from the village and then bought. She focuses on positive reinforcement methods instead of using hooks to hurt the elephants. With Hope, she raised him from being a baby. She fed him from bottles and kept him alive. She was up all day and all night taking care of him. She ended up breaking 3 ribs and maybe an arm (I know the ribs for sure). They really wanted to prove with Hope that the hooks don't need to be used to train an elephant and technically Lek did prove that. However, the community doesn't accept that really because Lek didn't train Hope to be a working elephant, so it isn't the same thing even though she did train him to be more civil.
With the building of Lek's elephant sanctuary, she also brought many jobs to the villagers. The men are employed as mahouts or working in the fields and the women can then work in the kitchen or as maids. This gives the women a way to be empowered because they don't make any money without a job. Lek said one woman she knew who she gave a job to had asked her husband for a pot because it was broken and non useable and he told her no because there wasn't enough money and proceeded to go out and buy himself a bottle of whiskey. The women are so thankful to be able to make their own money. Lek also sends the parks' employees children to school. The people working there make a lot of money and have a lot of extra things taken care of for them compared to a lot of other Thai people in the villages. She even gives them a place to live.
When her mahouts try to say they will quit unless they can use hooks or if Lek finds them going against rules, she is happy to tell them to leave. No one wants to though because of the nice conditions.
When Lek was gone in Bangkok for those 16 weeks helping after the flood, she came back to finding out that the men in the village had been arrested. She hoped she wasn't going to get blamed. When she entered the kitchen she asked them who had been arrested and the women all responded saying men in their families, brothers, husbands, uncles, had been arrested. When she asked why she found out the women had called the police on them because they felt they were too strict and controlling. This made Lek sad but also very happy to know the women were beginning to have a voice.
The volunteer program started in 2004 because a western woman (I think a volunteer or a vet I can't remember) suggested Lek start the program. Lek didn't have enough money to pay her workers so they walked out on her. She thought she was going to have to shut the park down but they started the volunteer program instead. Lek said she thought it was crazy because she didn't think anyone would pay her to come work for her on their holiday. Obviously, she was very wrong.
Lek's dream is to be able to have more land she can put the elephants on so they can be wild and then allow the humans to view them from the skywalk. Jungle Boy is still on the chain (for the safety of the other elephants and the people in the park) but she would love to have enough land to put fences around large areas so the elephants can roam free. She saves up money all the time so that when land becomes available she can buy it. She just purchases another 14 acres of land last month.
The last thing Lek talked to us about was being an advocate for her and the elephants. She said that if we can change the face of tourism that then the elephants will have a better chance to survive and become wild again. She encouraged us to spread knowledge about the way domesticated elephants are trained and treated. Most westerners come to Asia and just know they want to ride on an elephant but none of the bad things are talked about. Lek said that if we go home and write to our guide books or go to travel agencies and try to encourage them to not sell the types of trips or tours that exploit elephants that we can help make the shift. Since riding elephants is what westerners want, Thai people will capitalize on this as long as they want it. If people start to do less of these types of tours and more things similar to what Lek does, the elephants have a fighting chance.
Honestly, Lek is so inspirational. I was tearing up. Her story is also incredible and she has overcome so much. Listening to her made me really want to write the tour books and go advocate for the elephants. I hope that when I get home I still have enough passion to do this.
I feel like awareness goes a long way. Although, I (and many other people on my tour) was stunned when Debbie said she had booked an elephant trek before she came for her and her family and wasn't going to cancel it. I just can't imagine how you could go do that after being at the camp and hearing Lek's story and seeing how elephants for those types of things are being treated.

The last evening we were there, Saturday night, we had a special dinner on the second floor of the mess hall area. We had a traditional northern Thai meal. There was traditional dancing by some of the children as well for entertainment. There was a mushroom soup, a jack fruit salad (this was really spicy), a pumpkin curry I think, fake chicken curry, carrot and celery sticks with a really hot salsa, a fried mango maybe, a crunchy long thing, sticky rice, and a few other things that I don't remember. The thing that I thought was maybe fried mango was AMAZING tasting! Everything was very good. A few things were too spicy for me though :)

P.S. I don't know if I mentioned this but when you have a Buddhist monk tie a bracelet around your wrist and bless you, you have to keep it on for a minimum of 3 days for good luck. You are supposed to leave it on until it falls off though.

Day 2

May 22

Today our task as group A was to cut corn. Group C had done it the day before and said it was hell. We were all expecting the worst... And even dreading it a little. We loaded into the back of a truck and sat. For a long time. Maybe 40 minutes. There are no seats. We just sat in the bed of the truck. And the dirt on the floor of the truck would fly up and go in your face and eyes too. We had a bunch of Thai people with us too. We dropped maybe 5 women off at one place so they could plant banana trees. We then continued on with the men. There were maybe 5 of them. Later we found out one of them didn't show up for work.
We finally stopped and got out of the truck. Our group leader today was Can. Mix went with another group.
Can told us all to grab machetes from the bucket an follow him. Yes... Machetes. We were going to use machetes to cut corn for elephant food. It's quite heavy actually.
A lot of the field was already cut in the front so we followed Can down a path to get to the uncut corn.
The way the field is lined up is that there are multiple rows of corn on each patch of land and there are many square patches with what is like a moat surrounding them. Then, down the middle of the patches there is a single, long pathway you can walk to get to all the patches. This path is very thin and you can pretty much stand on the whole width of it with both feet next to each other. It is pretty much necessary to have this piece of tiny walking land though because on all the other pieces of land there are either corn stalks or stubs of cut corn stalks. Both of them make it very difficult to walk.
Our how to use a machete lesson was literally, "use the sharp end to cut." And "cut corn as close to bottom as possible." And then, "like this" and he showed us how to cut one. Then, "okay go!"
It was actually really fun cutting the corn! Machetes are handy little tools. They're really sharp. We hacked away at corn for a while then. When we were cutting it, we had to put them into piles. The bottom stems had to all line up. You didn't want to make the stack too big because we were going to have to carry them to the truck later. The field ends up getting cut down but there are just piles of corn stalks every which way. Finally, we got to the last area of cutting the stalks and we went to take a break.
While we are doing this task, realize that we not only were wearing tennis shoes, a hat, gloves, and sunglasses, but we also needed to wear long sleeves and pants to protect from the stalks scratching us. It is like 90-100 degrees here. You pretty much just sweat a bucket load a day. Maybe 7. Even though it was hot, having that protection from the leaves and the sun was great. I didn't have a hat or gloves so I took it from the ones provided. The hat had a rim all the way around but it also had fabric coming down the sides of the neck and snapped in the front. Super handy for when we had to carry the corn on our shoulders to the truck. My nice dry wick and breathable clothing was also amazing. You sweat no matter what but I felt like my body was staying cool.
We took a break to drink water and have biscuits to give us energy. I didn't like the biscuits too much. It was a cracker with creme or something in the middle. Like those cookies Jenn used to love but round. They didn't taste bad but I felt like it made my mouth more dry. After a pretty long break, we went back out and started carrying the stacks to the truck.
We couldn't put them directly into the truck though so we had to put them on the side of the road. The truck blocks the whole road so it couldn't be parked there for the whole time it took us to bring all the corn over.
After a little bit we were pulled in to eat lunch. They had packed watermelon, green mango, some type of mixed rice, and bananas for us to eat at the sight. I ate a little spoonful of rice and a lot of fruit. I hated knowing I had to go back out and work. When I would eat noodle soup with Sonam and we would continue trekking right away it made me feel like I was going to hurl. So I wanted to avoid that feeling.
At this point, Claire was already feeling dehydrated and Can gave her some rehydration packets. We sat for a while after we ate as well. Like maybe an hour. We were also given really good biscuits this time. They were bite sized coconut cookies with jam in the middle of them and sprinkled with sugar. They were seriously amazing.
Carrying corn seems easy and it kind of is, but at the same time it's difficult. I realize that is not an intelligent statement. The task of carrying the corn is simple. The problem is actually doing it. The men we were working with who do this everyday would carry 3 or 4 stacks at a time. It was crazy. They're like my size but way thinner. Like what! The stalks are so tall. And, when you put a bunch of them together they are actually really heavy! The men had gone and tied the stalk bunches together while we were still eating lunch.
We all carried the stalks different ways. The men all carried them on their shoulders I think... Or back. I don't know. The piles were so large it was hard to tell exactly how they were carrying them. A lot of the girls were carrying it in front of them. I found that made it difficult to move and made it seem heavier. I rotated between carrying them on either shoulder and draping it across both shoulders, kind of on my back, and grabbing parts of the corn on either side by my ears. I couldn't fit my hands around all of it though so its good it was tied together. I pretty much was boss at carrying the corn since I was the only one from my group who hoisted it on my shoulders. Annnd I'm pretty sure we all felt like bad asses cutting the corn with our machetes. Ha. What!?!
I don't even know how many trips we made. It felt like you had to walk 2 or 3 minutes to even get from where we were putting the corn on the road to where we had laid it out and cut it and were taking it from. It was a rather tedious task but I actually really enjoyed it.
I definitely wouldn't want to do it all day everyday like these workers though. I'm not sure how much they get paid, but I don't think it's very much at all. I want to say we heard the mahouts get $150 a month maybe?
After we helped them carry the corn to the road, we were told to take another break so the workers could load the corn into the truck. The corn all got stacked up into the back of the truck. Can told us that we were riding back on top of the corn. We legit had to climb all the way up the front of the truck to sit on top of the corn. The corn was at the top of the truck and we were on top of that! It was crazy.
At one point Sophie asked Can if we needed to lay down or if we just sat up there (so we wouldn't hit our heads on tree branches and other things). He just looked at her and so matter of factly said, "no, you just take a seat. There's no need to lay down." It was kind of funny. Sophie was like, "yeah, well where are the seats!" It's just a different world. They didn't want help loading the truck. We would be more in the way than a help.
We ended up sitting on top of the corn but we had to duck a lot so as not to get hit by tree branches and power lines! I'm surprised no one has ever gotten clothes lined by a power line before. They come up pretty fast! We didn't get back to camp until about 3:30pm. We were supposed to pick up banana trees but we didn't have time to do that. I have bruises on my shoulders from carrying the stalks around on my shoulders though. None of us complained and we actually didn't think it was too bad. Next time, I will bring my iPod probably. We don't really talk while we are doing our work because I think it takes too much concentration of us. Chrissy and Sophie fell a few times. Chrissy actually fell across the walk way and ended up getting mud from both moats. I slipped at one point but I caught myself on my knee. I'm surprised I did because I thought it would be a disaster since I was also carrying the stalks on my shoulder.
It was really hard work but I really liked it. It's funny because coming in to the program I thought that I would be working around or with elephants all day long. This isn't really the case. When we are eating or hanging out or sometimes even working (like with the poop job) the elephants go by and you sometimes get to interact with them. Other than that though we basically are working for the elephants! We scoop their poop and gather their food and prepare their food and plant their food. Taking care of elephants is a chore!
It was kind of exciting though around 430 or 5 we got to see the corn truck drive by and deliver corn to each elephant. It felt like we had actually done all that work for something important and worthwhile.
The rest of the evening we had free time. There is dessert every evening and its pretty good. It's usually something in coconut milk. I loovve coconut milk. One night there was tapioca in it. Another night there was a bunch of different jellie things and beans and such to put in it as well as tapioca.
There are 450 dogs here. They got most of them after the flood in Thailand in 2011. They start going crazy at certain times and all bark. It's so loud and really ridiculous. One evening at dinner there was a dog fight. It was terrifying. Certain dogs have red collars which means they might have rabies and aren't really dogs you should pet and are a bit crazy. This dog just went up and bit the leg of another dog. It was really chomping away! And then people are trying to break up the fight but its really scary. I just wanted to stay as far away as I could!
They still sometimes get calls saying dogs will be killed but if you want them you are welcome to take them. There are a lot of cats as well. Liz, a vet student from Texas, is doing the vet student program and has been assigned to taking care of kittens. They don't have a mom and they need to be fed every hour during the day and every 4 hours during the night. They also have to be peed and pooped and require a lot of attention. She likes it but is happy to be switching over to the elephants in a few days.
Most of the evenings we have had free nights.
There are a lot of really strange bugs here. Jenn, maybe you wouldn't want to come here... Last night we saw a spider the size of my hand on the wall. There are also these huge flying seccada like things that make a super loud noise. It sounds like 100 of those grass cutter things with the blade. They are freaky looking too.
The elephants make a lot of noises as well. They squeak and grunt and make dinosaur noises. They actually recorded elephant noises for Jurassic Park. They also trumpet. And honestly, it took me a while to register the fact that when I heard trumpeting it wasn't a band but it was actually elephants.
I know this says Day 2 and it is the work we did day 2, but so much has happened that it is hard to separate all of it. I've crashed every night so keeping up with the blog has been difficult. I honestly think when I get home I am going to be exhausted. Traveling all the time is tiring and hard! And I didn't build in too many rest days! Got too greedy trying to pack as much in as possible. Really, really hope I'm not sick the whole trip!!! I'm also not complaining because this is one of the best ways I can think of to spend my money. It's just amazing. I'm so glad mom and dad taught me how to save and made me do so.
Anyway, we watched a national geographic documentary one night called "Vanishing Giants". I think it was actually last night after Jody spoke.
There used to be 100,000 elephants in Thailand and now there are only 5,000. Elephants are highly respected and feared and a symbol of power in the Thai culture but they are not treated in this way. In 1989 there was a ban on logging. This ban left most working elephants out of a job, abandoned, killed, sold to Burma, or other things. In Thailand, domestic elephants are considered live stock and there is only a small fine for killing them. The elephants are endangered and they aren't even being protected. For domesticated elephants, tourism is the only work left and they essentially depend on it to live. Without work the elephants are left to die.
A lot of elephants still work the streets and do street begging. They can make a lot of money for their owners, way more than the person could make working a real job. The street begging cashes in on people's fascination with elephants. It's actually really sad and terrible. Elephants are not allowed to be in the city (they cause bad accidents and many other issues) but the police only give a small fine and they don't care too much so the people do not try to hide the fact they are in the city with an elephant.
Being a Mahout used to be a job most people looked down on that didn't pay very much money. A mahout is basically someone who looks after an elephant (at least that is my understanding of it). There are some schools that are trying to make being a mahout important again. One man feels that having a connection with the elephant is very important and a strong bond allows the mahout to communicate better with the elephant allowing him to lead the elephant.
Pijan (sp?) is a way of training an elephant that is domesticated. It is something thy is rarely talked about but that happens with all elephants between the ages of 2 and 4. A rope is placed over their neck and they are led into a cage in which they barely fit. If they struggle they are beaten with sticks that have nails on the ends of them or stabbed in the inner ear which is really a sensitive area for them. They can spend 3 days and nights to maybe even 7 days and nights or longer in this. It is supposed to break the elephants independence. They use many tactics such as sleep deprivation, hunger and thirst to coax them into submission. Males tend to fight harder and it is difficult to train them.
Elephants in Thailand are being used a tools, not cultural icons. Lek is looking to help Thailand an its tourism business move away from exploitation and move toward a more natural way for the elephants. Lek's name in Thai (its a nickname) means small and she has a really big heart. We haven't gotten to talk to her yet because the day she was supposed to talk she came down with a bad fever. I hope we get to hear her speak before we leave! She is a reminder that one person can really make a difference.

Day 1

May 21

There are 21 volunteers this week. All females. 3 different groups. Its supposed to be good because were so small it means that we have an opportunity to all do something during our work times. Buttt that can also suck too haha. I am in group A. There are 6 of us. Chrissy who I mentioned yesterday, Debbie who is also my roommate (she is older. She has 2 boys somewhere between the ages of 8 and 16. I have met so many people now I'm starting to get details confused. She is also Jewish. She is nice. It was a little strange at first and I was bummed I wasn't with any of the girls my age but it has been very good. She's from California and works with blind students. She is in Thailand for another 6 weeks. Her sons and husband are coming to meet her in a month.), Annie and Claire (they traveled here together and they are from Scotland. I am getting pretty good at understanding different accents. Scottish was so hard for me to understand while I was in Scotland but I think I'm getting it now. They both went to film school and hated it but they aren't sure what they are going to do now. They are traveling for a while as well.), and Sophie (she is from the UK and is a vet nurse. She has 3 dogs. She is just here on a 1 week vacation).
This morning we went with Mix, one of our group leaders to scoop elephant poop. It sounds gross, but it really wasn't too bad. We each got a shovel and a wheel barrel and went to work.
The elephants are vegetarians so their poop isn't too bad. It is a lot lighter when it's been dried out by the sun though. They put grass over the poop too. So there are piles of grass and poop in it so we look for those to scoop up. There is then a dump pile in part of the park where we dump out the wheel barrels. I'm not sure what happens to that pile or how often. It's pretty massive though.
Even though it doesn't sound like a great job it is actually pretty cool because the elephants are right there with you. They walk around us and we actually even got to feed them some bananas at one point. We're not supposed to put our hands in their mouth to feed them because their teeth are really strong and will (and have) grind your fingers to mush. Instead, we just put the food into the end of their trunk and let them put the food into their own mouths. It's still so cool. I don't really even have words to describe it. They look so happy when they are eating. Which is a lot. They eat at least 10% of their body weight everyday and spend 18 hours a day chewing. I think I heard that all the elephants in the park together eat 3 tons of food a day.
After we got back from scooping ele poo (as they say here) a banana truck came in. We made another 2 lines and unloaded bananas into the elephant kitchen. We put them directly onto shelves from the truck. They also count as accurately as possible every 50 bunches and then put a banana in a basket to make sure they can keep count of how many bananas came in later. It doesn't seem too accurate. Some of the banana things... No idea what the name is... Are super heavy, and or oblong. Trying to get the dirt and stickiness off our hands after was the worst. I think I scrubbed my hands for maybe 7 minutes and there was still a bunch of gunk left over that had kind of stained my hands.
While scooping poop, I developed 2 new blisters. Both on the left hand. One at the base of my pinkie, the other at the base between my middle and ring fingers.
After lunch we went lychee picking. We had to load up into a truck. the sides are metal bars and the back is open. We had to help the other group load banana trees onto the truck and then we went on our way to go pick lychees. I hated this. It probably would have been really fun if we would have been able to eliminate the millions of fire ants and spiders that would run up your body every time you tried to pick the lychees off the tree. We just needed to break the branches off the tree and put them into a basket. Super easy task. The only problem is the lychees are really high up... Even for tall people. We were trying to climb in the trees and pull branches down for others to pick the lychees off. Once we all got bit a few times we didn't want to do it anymore. Mix ended up getting up in the tree and climbing around and breaking the lychees off. We pretty much failed that task.
Lychees are really good! They are little, rough, red balls on the outside. You peel that part and inside is a white fruit that looks kind of like the inside of a grape. There is a pretty large seed inside of it though. It's very sweet if you get a ripe one.
When we got back we had a talk from Jody. She has worked here for 10 years doing elephant journals (about their behaviors) and typing up publications. English is her first language so it was great to listen to her tell stories. She told a lot of stories about the injured elephants. She also talked about how males are more difficult to have in the park. They go into musk which is when testosterone levels are higher so they are less obedient. It is especially difficult when the elephants haven't been broken in, but they don't want to do this to them because it is really abusive and terrible. I am going to try to go with Debbie tomorrow to film Jody talking about some of the elephants individual stories.
From the first video we saw, there is a blind elephant. I can't remember any of their names. They all sound similar to me because I don't know Thai. The elephant was a working elephant and was doing logging. She was pregnant but they wouldn't let her stop working. She ended up having her baby while she was on the top of the hill. When baby elephants are born they are incased in the placenta still. The baby rolled down the hill and died. The elephant was heart broken and refused to work and just laid down. Her owner shot her in the eye to get her to work. She then tried to fight him and he stabbed her other eye.
There is also Hope who is one of the males. He is an orphan. His mom died when he was really little and his owners didn't have enough money to buy the food. They called Lek and she agreed to take him in for free. They originally only wanted her to take him for a bit but Lek raised enough money to buy him. He didn't go through any of the breaking in training.
The way they talk about the elephants and their behavior is the same way we talk about people. Also even though they are not family, they have formed their own family groups.
The nature center also doesn't encourage breeding but they don't stop it if it happens. There are already so many elephants that don't have a great place to be in the wild and who are being put to work still that it doesn't seem right to breed them into that environment. They also don't want to make it an option that is not available to the elephants because it would happen in the wild.
With elephants, they learn how to behave based on older elephant being present to teach them. Since there are not that many male elephants at the nature center, the 4 and a half year old elephant thinks he is the boss and its not very good. They are considering bringing in an older male just for a little bit of time to teach the male elephants.
In the future, the center really wants to move toward a way of tourism that is centered more on watching the elephants in the wild... subjecting them to less human contact... instead of riding them or touching them or feeding them. They really hope other tourist places will start to follow what Lek has done but it is very controversial in Thailand because elephants bring in so much tourism. She would like to be able to buy more land that would be good for them to live on in the wild.
The thing I really like about what Lek has done is that she admits that there is a lot of space to improve the conditions for the elephants, but at the same time, she is doing what she can to keep them alive and wild. Most other places focus on breeding and working and tourism.
Bed time!

Elephant Nature Park

10:04pm thai time

My plan of getting up at 5am definitely did not work out haha. I think I finally got out of bed around 5:45. I was moving so slowly. I showered and packed and went down for breakfast around 6:45am.
Breakfast was included with the price of the hotel again. It was a buffet and wow haha. It wasn't a massive buffet. There were a lot of things out though. I got more fresh fruit! Watermelon, cantaloupe, pineapple. Yummy.
I also tried some glass noddles and vegetable noodles. And the pancakes here are green so that was strange. They still taste wonderful though. I'm so sick of bread I couldn't finish them though. I also ha an omelet which was weird too. I just got plain eggs and he made it like it was going to be scrambled eggs but then at the end it rolled into a log. It was a roll of eggs haha. The cool thing was that when you went to put the fork in it it unrolled into an omelet style thing which made it easy to put on toast. I don't know why I can eat toast but not bread. I also have to put something on the toast though. I found it strange there were noodles for breakfast. There were also pastries and a bunch of dishes like fish and soup which also seemed weird to me for breakfast. Pineapple juice here... And India and Nepal... Has been really good.
After I ate, I went again to ask reception where the elephant nature park office was. The lady there said it is a 15 minute walk and 5 minute drive. She gave me a map and had no problem figuring out where it was.
I went upstairs and grabbed my stuff and went back downstairs to check out. I got 2 free complimentary bottles of water from them and there was a mini bar. Before I left they had to make sure I hadn't taken anything. They used walkie talkies. And I was tempted to take the free water but it was in a glass bottle. The "take away" ones were plastic and cost 20 bhat.
I went to the taxi stand downstairs and stood there. Maybe for at least 5 minutes. No one came over and there were even 2 guys at the desk right inside. They were just watching me. They never came over but when I went over there they were quick to jump in and help. I'm not sure why they didn't come to the stand outside the door when I was there, especially since the stands sign said taxi cab and information.
I showed the men the same address as last night but all folded up so they couldn't see the elephant part. They were like oh yeah yeah yeah. But then he opened it again and got confused about an elephant tour. 10 to 8 I finally got a tuk tuk.
It was going to be 80 baht. The tuk tuks are so much more spacious here than in India. I don't remember riding on a tuk tuk in Nepal... But the Thai tuk tuks are basically like a 5 star hotel in tuk tuk land. Maybe 4.5 stars because the roof is pretty low and you can easily hit your head. They even look polished and nicer.
I arrived just at 8pm at the elephant nature park office. I walked in and filled out a release form because when you work with animals as large and somewhat wild as elephants things can be pretty unpredictable.
I was told to enter the next room. I walked in and was told to go to the next desk. There was a lady sitting there with her back turned to me. When she turned around I quickly realized she was not a she haha. It was my first day and I had already seen a she man. I don't think I reacted. At least I hope I didn't. I was prepared for that happening.
She had an Adam's apple and her skin was powdered white with a lot of make up. She was even wearing a wedge and tight skirt. No hips though. She gave me a tag with a number on it and told me to go get a free shirt and water bottle.
I might end up buying another shirt. Unfortunately, the sizes here are smaller so the L is pretty tight. It works. But I definitely wouldn't wear it here. Baggy clothing is definitely the way to go here. I just feel so much more comfortable in baggy clothes because a) it's not as hot; b) everyone stares at you so you already feel self conscious; and c) it's a respect or their culture thing, just like covering your knees and shoulder which I also always try to do. I also got a free water bottle and a water bottle carrier which is super nice to have, especially for the rest of my travels. I almost bought one but I didn't and now I got one for free and its cute with elephants on it. Winnnn!
There were a few volunteers already in the office so I introduced myself and we started talking.
Amelie is from Montreal and she is going on her second week at the elephant nature park. She loved the first week. We were all picking her brain about how things were. She just graduated law school but still has to take the BAR exam.
Ashley is from Toronto and she is also 23. I can't remember what she said she was going back to school for. She has a boyfriend. She was also in Cambodia and Vietnam for the past 2 months and said she loved them.
Popee and Georgina traveled together and they have been gone for 2 months and are going for 3 more months still. They are from London. Popee is studying chemistry and Georgina is studying English with a specialization in American and Canadian studies. She doesn't know if she wants to be a teacher.
We waited at the office for some more people for maybe an hour. Then we loaded our bags into a van and got into another van. We played a name gam to get to know everyone and you had to say the strangest food you have eaten. I couldn't really think of anything. I still can't off the top of my head.
On the ride we were shown a documentary about elephants and the camp and Lek, the founder. It's a pretty amazing thing and Lek is a pretty amazing person.
Lek means small in Thai (its her nickname) and she is very tiny, although we haven't met her yet. She has devoted her entire life to elephants and saving them.
In Thailand, elephants are a very respected animal for many reasons but they also are not treated with very much respect. They are used to street beg, tourism purposes, and they used to be used for logging work. The government banned logging in Thailand in 1989 and the only thing left for the domesticated elephants who were working is tourism.
Unfortunately, there is a lot of exploitation and mistreatment of elephants in this business. Leks goal is to make a sanctuary for elephants in which they can be free to roam about and have freedom. The goal is for none of the elephants to be chained but one of the males is right now.
He is chained because the park is full of old, crippled, handicapped women and this elephant hasn't been "broken in" yet, which is actually really good. But it also means he is more difficult to control and he doesn't listen to a mahout anymore so in order to keep the other elephants safe they have to chain him. He has a really long chain though and can still walk a good stretch of the park and even get down to a water source. The elephants are also all chained at night because it prevent them from walking across the river and bringing food back from the village. They put pesticides and other chemicals on their crops and it can really hurt the elephants, so it is for their safety.
We also stopped at a 7-11 so people could buy bug spray and other things they may need. I was set haha. Once we got to the park we ha a tour of the grounds. We got to see one of the babies with her mom. They are in a cage right now though because they are worried about the other 2 elephant babies of the mom getting jealous they aren't getting milk and the baby is. So again, they are taking a safety measure for the baby so she doesn't get hurt by one of her siblings.
There are 35 elephants in the park right now. I thought I heard 4 boys and 31 girls but I think it's 2 boys. Ill have to find out for sure.
Lek has enforced a program using positive reinforcement to train the elephants instead of the brutal methods used elsewhere in Thailand due to tradition.
After the tour of the grounds, which is very nice. There are real toilets and shower heads (only cold water comes out of them). The rooms are nice. I have a mosquito net! There are 2 fans and 2 beds. There is a huge hut area where we eat all our meals and we have wifi access.
The meals are amazing. It's actually ridiculous. The food is so good. And I get fresh fruit and vegetables that are safe to eat! It's amazing. Lychees are really good. Everything else... I don't even know what it is called. It's tasty though. We eat e breakfast at 7am, lunch at 11:30am, and dinner at 6:30pm. Tonight dinner was at 7pm though because we had a welcome ceremony.
For the ceremony we went to the second level of the dining hall and sat on square cushions. There was what I am assuming is traditional Thai music being played and a shaman from a nearby town to bless us. It was pretty cool I guess. There was a lot of chanting and throwing holy water on us with what looked like a bunch of pine needles. Then there was a colorful thing with flowers and 2 tall sticks he lit on fire. Then there was a large bouquet-ish thing of flowers that had 4 areas where it looked like there were wings or something. 4 people put their hand on them and the shaman tied sting around their wrists. Everyone got a bracelet. Then all of a sudden it was over and it was dinner time.
At 4 or 4:30 we had gotten to bathe the elephants. We took buckets and threw water on them. The second we washed them off they were just going to start showering themselves with mud again. It keeps them cool and is also a natural sun screen. You constantly see them throwing dirt or mud on their backs.
Being up close with the elephants is actually really cool. Like getting to stand with them and look them in the eye is crazy. I honestly know nothing about elephants but they are really fascinating. The way they act as a family and have interactions like humans is very interesting. Also I am so enameled by their trunks haha.
We have a schedule everyday with different tasks we need to do with which group is doing what when. There is a morning job and an afternoon job everyday. We start at 8am in the morning and 1:30pm in the afternoon. There are feeding times for elephants as well as bathing times that are optional. There are also fruit trucks that can come in at any time. We unloaded watermelons today.
It took probably half an hour and I think it was all 21 of us helping plus our 3 leaders. The truck pulls up to the elephant kitchen and a few people get in the truck bed with the fruit and pass it out of the truck an we form an assembly line down to where the fruit needs to be placed on the shelves.
During this time I met Chrissy. She works with marine animals like sea lions and dolphins and whales. So cool! She lives in Florida right now. Her degree was actually in theater which was good for her job because they don't require a degree but you so need to be able to entertain a crowd.
There are water bucket and ice boxes with clean water and ice. At first I was really skeptical about it but realized it had to be fine if everyone at the camp drinks it.
Just on cue. I entered a new country. Time for another cold! I don't think I talked about the second one I got in Nepal but it was pretty mild. I hope this one is too. Sucky!!!!
During the afternoon we all had to say our names, where were from, and a special skill. It's all girls in our group so I decide to go with my tongue vibrating. People got a kick out of that ha. I still love that reaction.
Everyone crashed and went to sleep pretty early. I wasn't super tired. This day had actually been pretty tame for me. We didn't do too much. I showered before I went to sleep and spent a good 10 minutes tucking my mosquito net under my mattress.
Tomorrow should be interesting! The real work starts.