One of the major things I needed to do while in South East Asia was see elephants. I didn't want my only experience with an elephant to be a 30 minute ride where I don't know how the elephant is treated. I wanted to make sure that I was going to a place that was contributing to the greater good of the diminishing population of Asian Elephants in Thailand. Joey and I googled several places and we found the Elephant Nature Park (http://elephantnaturepark.org/) which is a park started by a Thai woman named Lek. She has been rescuing abused elephants since 1995.
I wasn't quite sure what to expect when going to the park. Driving down the road to the park I saw lots of other tourist parks where the elephants were tied up to posts with small ropes and no access to water or trees/grass to forage from. I was starting to think about what kind of heart break I was getting myself into. I was so relieved to hear about the park we were going to on the way to the park. We were not going to ride the elephants. Our itinerary included feeding, bathing and hanging out with elephants. Exactly like it should be. There are 32 elephants at the park who have come from dire conditions. They are able to roam around where they please; there is no fence or gate to stop them from escaping. They stay because they know it's heaven on earth.
Along with 32 elephants there were about 20-30 dogs, 20 cats, a herd of cows and water buffalos. The love Lek has for elephants extends to all animals. I was excited about the elephants, and Joey was excited about all the dogs around. No puppies for Joey though, Lek gets all the cats and dogs spayed. The way it should be!
First off we started with a safety and courtesy talk. We learned how to move around elephants, and what parts to touch. Apparently they don't like their snout touched over and over again because they are like us in the way that it's their nose and if it was us, we'd be annoyed if someone kept touching our nose. They also told us how to act around the baby elephants. We were only allowed to touch them if they came to you, or if they were wandering on their own away from the pack. If they were with their mom, watch out. Don't even try! Another note that was made, was that when feeding we MUST feed them out of their own basket (each elephant has their own) or else they will think some other elephant is eating their food. We don't want to start a fight now do we?!
So we went to the feeding area where we fed the elephants from their respective baskets. The elephants eat about 10% of their body weight each day. Their diet mainly consists of pumpkin, watermelon, bananas, leaves, and grass. It was funny to see that different elephants baskets were filled with different things. I guess elephants have a preference for food too! It was really neat to feed them. They first take the food with their trunk and then throw it into their mouth. Some are so greedy for food that they don't even chew until they have so much food they can't cram in anymore. When the basket was empty, they were heart broken. Atleast for a few hours until the next feeding. Can you believe that elephants eat 18 hours out of the day? They sleep for 4 hours at night, then the rest of the time they spend it either bathing or scratching various body parts on any surface they can!
Many of the elephants have had horrific experiences in their life time. Many were born into the logging industry where even from the get go they weren't allowed to nurse from their mothers as much as they needed and were robbed of childhood experiences because they had to follow their mothers while they worked. A common practice when the baby elephant is about 3-5 years old, people take them away from their mothers and place them in a contraption called a crush. Here they are tied down and unable to move. They are unable to access food and water. For the next 3-7 days they are repeatedly beat with sticks covered in nails by villagers until their spirit is literally crushed. This is when they will finally submit to the people. What else can they do? This is when the mahout (elephant trainer) can start to train them for a life of exploitation.
That's only the beginning. After the logging industry became illegal, they moved to the streets. It's illegal in Bangkok now, but 5 years ago the streets were full of elephants who were trained to beg for money from tourists. They would spend hours in the streets without access to clean drinking water or food. Many elephants showed signs of traumitization due to malnourishment, repeated beatings from mahouts, the vibrations and loud noises of the streets. One of the elephants at the camp was blind in both eyes because she refused to work after her baby died. She had to work so they left the baby by a cliff and it fell down and died. Her mahout took a sling shot and put it in her eye. He stabbed the other eye with a knife. I was so happy to see that she is living out her life in a perfect setting away from horrible people like that.
On to happier things... After the feeding we took some of the elephants to the river where we splashed them with water and scrubbed them down with brushes. It was awesome to see the elephants all playful in the water. The babies and their pack had a really fun time rolling around and trying to climb on eachother. It made feel so happy to see them happy. This is the life that an elephant should have. Ideally it would be in the wild, but this is not possible for elephants who have been in the work force. They would not survive. Hopefully Lek continues doing what she's doing and all of these elephants can live the rest of their lives in peace and quiet. The oldest elephant there was 80 years old and she likely has 20-30 years left of her life!
All in all, this experience was truly amazing for me. I got to see my favourite animal in such an ideal setting. I got to interact with them and I also got to see them be happy while interacting with eachother. I hope that this park continues until there isn't an issue of elephant abuse in Thailand.
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