Tuesday was a forced day off from the Park; we had to go to Nathon to renew our visas for a further month. (This saved us having to go across the border into either Burma, Cambodia, Vietnam or Malaysia to do the same thing.) Nathon is only about 25 minutes on the scooter but we had to wait in the Immigration Office for about 2 hours to fill out forms and get the stamp in our passport. Suppose it beats 12 hours in a minibus there and back to the border to do the same thing. We’d just got ourselves a new bike, one that was a bit cheaper but to be quite honest it was so hard on the back for me (and it ain’t like I haven’t got enough padding to sustain a few bumps) and more’s to point, it wouldn’t pull a hen off its flippin’ nest so lame was its poke! The old bike returned that evening!!!
We awoke eagerly on Wednesday ready for another day at the park and were delighted to find out that we were to spend the whole day not just feeding and cleaning up all things Elephant but were going to learn how to ride them properly and take the tourists around the park (with Mahout in the vicinity of course!) Now, getting on to an elephant when you are a tourist is a piece of p… perhaps I’ll explain… walk up the steps of the elephant station, hold on to a piece of rope and step on to the seat! Get comfy. Getting on to an elephant from ground level is a whole new ball game! Fortunately, there are some very generous Ellies who will lift up their front right foot and allow you climb on, saving yourself a couple of feet, and then clamber on up to its neck. Sounds easy? Try it! I must’ve tried a dozen times and just could not pull myself up. The mahouts are far too demure and reserved to give a female a helping hand as it might mean placing their hands on said lady’s butt so I had to persevere! Eventually after much huffing, puffing and downright hysterical laughter from the mahouts, I was on – only to come down the other side, albeit a tad quicker – and almost on my bonce!!! Dan however would seem to be a natural! One foot on animal, one heave ho and there he is on top! Unbeknown to me, he had already perfected the art of asking the elephant not only to lift his foot up but to raise it up with him on it to shorten the gap even further from floor to neck! Damn I should have been paying attention instead of sharing out English cigarettes with the Mahouts!!!! My dismount however was apparently perfect, swing leg over neck and head and slide down leg! Straight ‘A’s for me for that manoeuvre!
My new acquantance is a 45-year old bull elephant called Ceelang. He is so gentle (well as gentle as you would imagine a 3-tonne elephant to be). He loves being scratched underneath his eyes and his trunk being stroked. That may have something to do with me bringing him big bananas and corn cobs most mornings!!! Because he has not been looked after properly in the past, before he came to our Park, his tusks are splitting and he has the equivalent of braces on – hard plastic sheeting wrapped around each tusk with metal cable ties holding them on. He seems nonplussed at their intrusion but in any case, do you know any 45 year olds that would want to wear braces!! Ceelang and Omm are in enclosures next to each other and are friends, demonstrated by trumpeted and banging their trunks on the floor to talk to each other. There was a very sweet moment when they entwined trunks across enclosures; I really only thought you saw that in films romanticising the relationships that elephants have.
Dan and I are allowed to take the elephants down to be showered on our own now as the Mahouts are confident in our ability to lead them there and back on our own. This is with the exception of Omm and baby Kwan Samui – trying to control two of them is rather challenging to say the least. Kwan got very excited by the water, she is still not quite sure what to make of it, and was running around and ran into me – I was nearly flattened – a bit like a mini cooper running into you I would imagine. Omm usually takes the water hose into her mouth; an elephant trunk can hold up to 4 litres of water; and then sprays it all around her, thwacking her trunk against her sides and up over her head – good job I’ve got used to not wearing make-up or drying my hair for six weeks – really would be a waste of the toiletries and cosmetics as you get soaked! Kwan as we have recently found out is actually tickly under her armpits! You have do tickle a bit more vigorously than you would on a human but it’s so funny, she lifts her feet up to try and stop you, wrapping her trunk around your arm, if she can reach, to try and get you to stop. It’s the cutest thing in the world although you have to make sure she doesn’t squish your arms between her legs and her enclosure fence, that would necessitate a trip to the local hospital such would the PSI be. We’ve learnt how to ask the elephants to lift their trunks so you can put their food directly into their mouths and as long as you keep your hand directly out of the way of their big back molars, there’s no danger of getting your hand clapped between the equivalent of two house bricks – that would certainly get your attention!! Dan has also been playing football with some of the younger elephants, a 2-year old, and a 4 year-old. You really don’t want to be standing in front of them when that ball is kicked. The 4-year old has perfected a sneaky trick - just when you think she is going to kick the ball, she turns sideways and trunckeons it with her back foot instead! Now how’s this for a Thai massage; not by the hands of an experienced masseuse but by the foot of a tonne-weight elephant. You lie down on the floor, face down and they put their foot on your backside and gently use a pummel action up and down to effect the massage – quite surreal to by lying under the foot of a beast that big!!!
Wednesday night after work we were invited to stay behind for a drink with the tiger keepers and some of the mahouts. They are all really great characters and they wanted us to teach them some more English! Over the course of a few beers, a few more choice words were exchanged but the funniest thing for them, and for us, is that there are certain words and pronunciations that neither party can get our tongues round – literally! The funniest has to bee Tee, one of the young tiger keepers who cannot for the life of him say Fish. It’s a constant Fssssssssss, Fsssssssss, Fsssssssss and has us in hysterics! We on the other hand, cannot say dark blue which is Cee Nam Nnnung – you have to put your tongue in the roof of your mouth against your front teeth for the Nnnung bit and we both look we’ve been hired by Care in the Community trying to do it!!! Whilst we were sitting alongside the guys, our boss, Nuch came and joined us and was helping out with the translations which made things somewhat easier and beside us was a gibbon called Eeeeouuuugh and a little poodle that lives on site; they were happily playing with each other with Eeeeouuuuugh grooming away at the poodle’s fur! Another dog that lives on site is a lovely creature that just wanders about, sleeps in the shade and wags its tail at everyone. His name is Keptop. As he came walking over to us on this particular evening we were looking at her quite strangely and then realised why, some comedian had drawn blue glasses on his face! The next day, a pair of pink whiskers had been added to the ensemble!
The guys were so generous and provided us with Chang beer and somebody else arrived up with the most delicious BBQ-ed catfish (it tasted like the most delicately cooked salmon you could imagine). We ate it off the table with our fingers. They in turn smoked all my cigarettes – again! Chang beer is very strong and is akin to drinking several pints of Stella (Hag you’d’ve of been proud of us!). We headed off for home, thankfully only about 10 minutes away, much to the disappointment of the boys; they had expected us to stay the night with them and the Tigers! Nah! Don’t think so!
We had to be at work early Thursday morning, 8am, for a meeting with the all the staff and the big boss. Everyday all the staff wear colour-coded polo shirts, Mon-Tue is green, Wed-Thur blue, Fri-Sat – red and Sunday is pink. We had been given our quota of tops each and when Dan put his blue one on for the big meeting, it was like he was wearing blue cling-film; we were able to procure another for him just before the meeting started. The Thais are so small, both of us have to have extra-large tops and then, they only just fit us comfortably.
All the staff of the Park were dutifully lined up with us in the first line and the big boss out front. The meeting was, as we were about to find out, primarily to welcome us to the Park! Oh Gawd!! The national flag was raised as the National Anthem for Thailand was sung by everyone (we just hummed vaguely!) and after standing in blazing sunshine for about 15 minutes while he spoke to everyone, we were called out to face the staff and asked if we wanted to say anything. Bloody hell! We weren’t prepared at all for this. We just asked Nuch, our boss, to say that we really appreciated that we were allowed to come to work at the Park and to thank everyone for their kindness. They all then proceeded to bow their heads, make prayer hands and say thank-you. The boss’s boss, then proceeded to talk for about another 15 minutes while we baked in the heat, nearly passing out before the ceremony was over. Part of the meeting was also to thank the staff for their work and their continuing loyalty to the park and to remind them to wear the correct colour tops everyday and polite shoes (ie not flipflops!) Thought that was hilarious – polite shoes!!! Hee Hee. Some of their phrasing when translated to English is so endearing.
Thursday and Friday, we were invited to take tourists up to the waterfalls on the 4x4 jeeps which is an experience not to be missed. We were excited to find out that we got to ride on the top of the jeep, in seats directly above the cab, with everyone else in the back of the jeep. The ride up to the waterfall is challenging, the mountain road is steep beyond steep, as well as very, very bumpy and overhanging trees and branches threaten to take your head off if you are not alert and looking all around you. Aaaaaaah, that’s why we got the “good seats”. Doesn’t matter if the staff get beheaded, as long as the tourists are safe!!! HSE would have a flippin’ field day here. But that’s what makes it such fun – nature is left to nature and its us humans that need to watch out rather than ripping up trees and making concrete roads through the jungle to get to where we want to be.
Friday afternoon was spent down at the Tiger station, again helping the Thai staff to perfect their English – we tried to explain that they must be polite (which is of so much important to the Thais anyway, it’s part of who they are.) Tourists do not like to be pounced upon and asked for money for photographs of the animals and be confronted with them trying to snatch their cameras amid shouts of “money for photo, money for photo – give camera, give camera” They have now learnt to give the information about what’s available to the tourist and politely ask them if they want them to take the pictures for them. Each time they ask correctly, they look to us for confirmation that they have said it correctly with a ‘thumbs up’ signal and are delighted that they are getting a positive response from the tourists now – and selling many more photographs! All in all a win-win situation. And our boss loves us for it!
We have been invited to a Thai birthday party on Sunday morning by our friends and apparently as several Buddhist are monks coming to ‘officiate’ the proceedings we are very privileged to have been invited. We’ll try not to get converted – however, there are no-more gentle religions than Buddhism, so who knows, the next photos you see of us may well show us with skinheads and bedecked in orange robes!
Take care M&D x
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