Today we are on our way to the Happy Elephant Home, which is about an hour drive from Chiang Mai. One of MJ’s friends runs the place, and MJ loves the elephants, so I said let’s go all out and take the executive overnight experience. What the hell. I know very little about elephants and I love the word ‘executive’ when traveling.
I cannot describe the trip from Chiang Mai other than primitive mountain roads meandering in a chaotic, random way to a planned destination. That means it was winding and bumpy.
The scenery is chaotic and random. City to country. Rows of buildings to nothingness. And there is another temple. Bamboo next to banana trees, next to a dragon statue, next to a shack. And a random gold buddha next to a random tree by the side of the road. The houses are an odd mix of glued together tin and pounded together boards roofed with giant teak leaves stand proudly next to a modern stucco masterpiece with a gate. There is no order to the type or assembly of buildings other than there they are. I cannot in good conscious call the large teak leaves roof shingles, but they are used as such.
When we arrived we were greeted by Apple, (a person, not a fruit) MJ’s friend. There were others with us who were doing the half day experience or day experience, so as a group it was explained how to change into the traditional karen clothing.
Elephants have a great memory, and incredible senses. Many of these elephants are here because they were overworked and abused by humans, so they naturally shy away from contact.
It took a long time for the helpers here to gain the elephants trust, so one of the ways for them to provide the experience of getting close to the elephants is to have guests change into clothing that smells like the camp. From appearance to odor, the clothes convey ‘friend’ to the elephant instead of enemy. So, we all changed.
The pants were fine, but I struggled with my massive, powerful biceps in the shirts. Strength can be such a burden. Sigh.
Meeting the elephants
The first elephant at this sanctuary was Molo. She came in 2014 and is blind in one eye, which caused her to be too to be a good slow worker in the logging or riding camps.
Before covid, there were 10 elephants here, but when covid started, they could no longer afford to buy food for all the elephants, and one by one the owners came and took their elephants back, leaving only Molo behind.
The next elephant to arrive came in 2023 and is named Bua Baan. They thought Molo and Bua Bann could become friends because Molo was so sad without anyone around.
At their first meeting, Bua Bann tried to take some of Molo’s food, and they have not gotten along since.
If Molo walked up to the gate, Bua Bann would walk away. If Bua Bann moved to the field, Molo would move to the shelter. Elephants have long memories, and love, as with hate, are hard to forget.
Mojico was brought to the home by the owner, who said she could no longer work because she was pregnant. When Mojico arrived, shot her trunk up in the air and made a loud noise, to which Molo responded as if they had known each other for years. They were instant friends. Molo now has someone she trusts to lead her around and is happy. Bua Baan is also happy Molo does not bother her anymore.
It was discovered that Mojico was not pregnant, only fat. When they told the owner, he wanted her back because she could work, or so he thought. Of course, her back was broken from all the riding passengers she had to endure, and Molo was so happy with her new friend, they asked if they could keep her. The owner said he could make 20,000 THB a month if Mojico worked, so if the home could pay that, he would agree they could continue to take care of her.
Which brings up an interesting thing about elephants in Thailand. They are property. Like a truck or a bulldozer. I suppose that is not a new concept, but It baffled me. If I came to a point where I could not feed my dog, or horse, or whatever, first, I would probably stop eating or readjust my lifestyle because that being is my responsitibily. But if I did come to the point where I had to give up an animal, I suppose I would try to sell it, or I would give it to a caring individual who could care for it.
I do not think I would drop it off and say ‘here, take care of this for me because it is lame.’ Then turn around and say, ‘I want her back now because I need the income and she is not lame so she can work.’ That is like taking your truck to the service shop and leaving it there for the ‘off season,’ then coming back and picking it up, expecting it to be fully inspected, repaired and ready for use, and then expecting to pay nothing for the service or the storage.
Especially since the owner was not making 20,000 THB a day while she was at Happy Elephant, and he was also not paying for food or medical for her. But, apparently that is the way this system works.
So Apple and the Happy Elephant home decided to pay him 20,000 THB a month to keep Mojico around. Not easy since they are sustaining the elephants mostly by giving these tours, but they want Molo to be happy, and they want Mojico to be safe. I was unclear if the 20,000 per month is a contract to eventually buy Mojico, or if they are simply paying for the privilege of taking care of her, but they are paying the owner each month for the right of caring for his elephant.
The last 2 elephants came together. One, Molipo had her leg caught in a trap so she could not work. She was brought to Happy for rehabilitation, but she left Mojii, her friend behind. Mojii cried every night and made awful sounds during the day which made people wonder if she was being abused, so the owner agreed to let them stay together at happy until Molipo was healed and able to work again.
So 5 elephants are in residence right now. They all look alike to me and I am not sure I will ever sort them out, but we are now off to meet them.
We gave them chunks of watermelon for our first event of the day. They must have cut up 50 watermelon for us to feed the 5 elephants, and I was being super conservative with my bag so to share among all.
Their trunks are very strong when they grip the food, but not crushing. The skin is papery and not as thick and hard as I remember thinking it would be.
Of course, just saying watermelon indicates there would be a sticky factor involved, but there was also a spit factor from the elephant which made it more interesting.
We had to move on to the next event, which was to take them to the river to bathe them. There is a certain time Happy Elephant Home can be at the river because all the elephant sanctuaries share the water and they don’t want to have any fights between the elephants who are surprisingly territorial. They set up the schedule to keep the animals safe, but they can only use the river for 30 minutes twice a day.
As we walked the elephants along the path, they stayed in line and kept close to the people. I could not tell if they were following us or if they were simply going to the river and allowing the humans to mingle among them. I don’t suppose it matters, yet it entirely does. They ate from the vegetation along the path and were prompted to keep moving more than once so they would not miss bath time.
Their skin is papery yet thick. Their trunks are strong yet gentle. They are massive beasts yet tread lightly. It is interesting to watch the contradiction elephants are.
Bathing the elephants consisted of throwing water on them. A couple of the staff used brushes and scrubbed their skin, but mostly people delighted in throwing water on them. I took a lot of pictures because that is my bliss and my comfort zone. I also knew I had 2 days with the elephants where others only had one, and I was perfectly happy standing back and watching.
I thought they would suck up the water and throw it on themselves, but that was rare, not constant. They did appear to enjoy the attention from others doing the work for them.
We walked the elephants back and had some time to relax before lunch where Apple gave us a cooking lesson. All the ingredients were laid out, and each step explained, but we cooked our own. It was very interesting to watch the lesson, but I again and again am not a foodie. I had noodle soup. It was very good.
The afternoon we made medicine balls out of bananas and a bunch of other stuff for one of the elephants who needs medicine.
It is hard to tell the elephants apart. I can tell all the dogs apart, and there are several dogs here, but other than Molo has a weeping eye, and that I only see if I am on the correct side of her, the others are a mystery to me. They tell me what to look for, but they are all big, so unless they are all standing together, I cannot tell which is the biggest, or the smallest, or whatever. I suppose I am not here long enough to form intimate relationships with them, so I will let it go.
Our next task is to give one of the elephants medicine, and since the elephant is so aware of smells and tastes and such, we need to hide the pills in these medicine balls, but not all of them, just some of them.
The making of the balls involves using a stone bowl buried in the ground. The ingredients are placed in the bowl, then someone operates a large wooden hammer like object with a primitive foot pedal to raise it up and down to pound the ingredients together.
Like a mortar and pestle set used in pharmacies, but bigger and operated with your foot.
After the grand pounding. Oh that sounded rude, sorry…
After the ingredients are properly mixed, we made balls out of the paste and put pills in some of them, and leaving the others drug free.
Then we went over to the elephant and did not allow her to take it in her trunk as we did with the watermelon. Because she would crush the ball, smell the pills, and walk away. Not unlike my dogs.
Instead we had to place it in her mouth directly.
Yes, that was a slimy experience, but as MJ repeatedly said, ‘don’t worry. They won’t eat you. They are vegetarians.’
After that we took the elephants to the mud hole for their afternoon mud bath. Entirely different than the river bath in the morning. We stand there and the elephants spray mud on themselves and a good deal of their surroundings. It helps cool them down and acts as a sun block.
They did a lot of spraying here, unlike when they were at the river. It was almost like the river was a cooling experience, but this experience was fun and had purpose. They had to spray everything to get their sunblock in all the right places. Or, one could liken the experience to a child having a bath, then running outside and diving into a mud hole for fun, or perhaps for spite of being cleaned.
We walked the elephants back and it was time for the day group to go home. MJ and I were taken to a place up the hill from Happy Elephant home, where we were to stay for the evening, and Apple invited us to dinner at her home a couple hours later.
I am not sure this is the place other people stay in the ‘overnight experience,’ or if this is the place we stayed because MJ and Apple are friends, but it was right next door (in a rural, farm kind of way) to Apple’s home, and the view was outstanding. Our bedrooms had full, double wide glass doors that opened onto a balcony overlooking the mountains.
I learned that dinners in homes in Thailand can go on for hours and are not rushed as many are in America. A plate full of food can last 2 hours and more is added to the buffet as the evening progresses.
The weather was cool, the stars were bright, and I learned about the different elephant sanctuaries and a lot about Apple and her love of cooking; elephants; and dogs.
Not cooking elephants and dogs. Punctuation is important.
I also learned there is a local population who were celebrating their new year or a local tribe celebration, forgive me, I did not retain the details about why this was happening, but this particular tribe does eat dog. For this particular celebration, they believe black colored dogs are the luckiest to have and to consume, so a few days ago, someone approached Apple and asked if they could have one of her dogs. She declined. As would I.
This topic of conversation came up because there would probably be a lot of noise this evening with fireworks and carrying on. Not nearby, but sound travels here.
There were in fact fireworks and gayety. I was glad my dogs, black or otherwise, were in Iowa.
As I mentioned earlier, the rooms we were given had glass doors at the end of the bed that exposed a view of the mountains. So when I woke up, it felt like I was in a tree house. The area is so remote, one can leave the drapes open and allow the sun to come in. Did not want to leave the doors open because of the bugs, although there was mosquito netting over the bed and the breeze would have been wonderful, but the view. That was nice.
Day 2
Today we got an exclusive up close and personal time with the elephants. We walked them up the hill for their morning munching on vegetation outside Apple’s house.
Then we went to town for coffee and saw the place had reopened after the devastating floods last October.
Mud up to the counter top and water to the ceiling, but he saved his coffee maker and was able to reopen last week. Apple likes to support the businesses in the tiny town, but this one in particular is run by a young person who decided to stay in the area instead of running off to the big city. That is a rare in this area, and after the flood, he still decided to come back and reopen.
We drove around the village to see the sights and got a lot of information about the floods from last October.
Apple and others in the area took on not only Elephants, but organized clothing and food drives for their communities, helped with housing and getting people to safety, and generally being a good community member. Apple also took on a lot of the dogs that were abandoned in the area. She says she doesn’t own any of them, but they all know where they are safe and can find a good meal. And not get eaten by the local tribe that eats dogs.
For lunch we had another cooking lesson from Apple. This was a private lesson just for the two of us, and she taught us how to make Pad Thai. There is a the Thai way, and there is everything else. Of course, this was an authentic Thai lesson.
After lunch, Apple took us to the banana dealer in town where we had to select the perfect bananas for the elephant enrichment exercise. I had no idea what that was at the time, but we worked very hard to get the right bananas.
Elephant enrichment in this case is hiding food around so they can retain, at least in part, some of their foraging skills. We took the bananas to their shelter and put them around with the intent of when they were put away for the night, they would hunt around and find their snack.
But the elephants knew what we were up to. First one, then in a few minutes all 5 were following us around. We couldn’t hide them fast enough. I don’t know if the elephants were enriched or not, but they certainly snarfed down 80 pounds of bananas without a second thought.
And then it was time to go home.
We changed out of our Karen clothing and headed back to town with the afternoon group.
I bought stuffed elephants made by Apple’s girlfriend. I bought some bracelets and I bought a wood carving of Bua Bahn because I fed her. A lot.
Maybe I bonded with Bua Bahn, or maybe I didn’t. I kind of hung out with whatever elephant was following me at the time, to be honest. But I do relate to her story if only for the fact she is a loner in a group of friends. Not a bad thing, I want to be clear, but I am an introvert. I do enjoy people, but I don’t mind being alone. In fact, frequently I do enjoy my own company. It is sad Bua Baan does not have a partner to relate to in this group. Perhaps some day she will, but right now, she she is safe, well fed and cared for, and content. I feel that. In a ‘I am searching for something but not sure what, but I am safe and don’t have complaints nor want to leave where I am,’ kind of way.
Anyhoo… I am glad I had this experience. I learned a lot about elephants but am still a novice of understanding them. We really do not have a huge elephant population in Iowa so it is not part of my thinking. My knowledge of elephants before this experience comes from school and books, which romanticized tales of great leaders riding on elephant backs; elephants charging into battle and carrying the weight of 10 men. Those thoughts expose that my education, or what I remember of it comes from myth, legend, and history books instead of scientific facts. My information, for the most part is all true. None, or very little of it humane.
I am not going to beat the drum of animal rights, or elephant rights, or even comment on how despite the extensive knowledge and extensive respect and regard Thailand holds for elephants… they are still being used extensively for logging and giving rides to tourists.
Thus creating the need for so many of these sanctuaries to exist.
But I will say, give a thought before you decide to take a ride. Yes, it is exotic and interesting on vacation, but especially if there is a saddle involved, that is a lot of weight for the elephant to carry around, and if you study their spine, it is particularly vulnerable to injury when excessive weight is placed on it.
Perhaps think of it this way, if you weigh 200 pounds, and you put a 20 pound pack on your back, you might be okay for a while. Most elephants carry 3 to 4 passengers per ride. That is 600 – 800 pounds, which would be like you putting 60-80 pounds on your back. Add a 100 pound saddle to that and the elephant is carrying half its body weight. Can it be done? Sure. Is it smart to do every day for 20 to 50 years of your life? Perhaps an argument can be made for some cargo being that important in days before heavy machinery was able to carry things around, but I would argue tourists paying $2 per ride is not worth destroying the health of a majestic, gentle, powerful being. No matter how exotic the experience is.
But I will not form your opinions for you. I freely admit my statements and opinions are based on conversations and observations I was exposed to on this one experience. I did not collect data or ‘facts’, but I did collect and retain impressions. If you want to know more, please go out and do your own research. If it is within your scope of comfort, go out and teach the world. I applaud you. Just make sure your sources are diversified to include many perspectives, because I have learned over many years, no matter how right one source is, or how many facts they have to back up their claims, they are not always right.
