Chiang Mai, Thailand

Dear blogger friends and family.

In the Thai language chang means elephant. This experience was all about chang, chang, chang.

This October, after first quarter ended, the children had one week off and we traveled to northern Thailand. Jane planned this vacation at the Elephant Nature Park. We volunteered at this conservation park which is dedicated to providing a refuge for abused Asian elephants. Asian elies have long been part of Thai culture. For many years they were trained to work in the logging industry. Logging was banned in 1989 in order to save the forest. This left the elephants and their mahouts without work. As a result, many elies began working in tourism and begging on the streets of Bangkok. Their lives became difficult and heartbreaking.

The woman who started this park is dedicated to providing these elies with a more natural and humane life. We joined 18 other volunteers to spend time with the elephants and work around the park. Our children had the experience of meeting a great group of international travelers of different ages, all coming together for the benefit of these endangered elephants. We worked really hard, but had much fun and made several new friends.

We began our chores daily at 8 am, rotating jobs of shoveling elephant poo, buffalo poo (really stinky), or corn cutting with a machete. We then had a morning and afternoon project, such as building fences, shoveling sand, mixing concrete, planting grass stalks, harvesting bamboo, etc. In between was the fun part--feeding and bathing the 35 elephants. The temperature was blazing hot and we were very dirty, sweaty, blistered, scratched and mosquitto bitten by the end of the day. The cold faucet shower was something to look forward to, and dread, at the same time. The nights were cool while we slept in a bamboo hut, in a bed enveloped by mosquitto netting. Not as romantic as it may sound. The elephants snoring lulled us to sleep. The dogs barking kept us awake.

Many elephants are rehabilitating from injuries. In the photos you will see Medo with her broken back, one with a wounded foot from a land mine, and Jokia is blind after her mahout fired a sling shot deliberately to her eyes when she refused to work after losing her baby. We were lucky because the park has two 4 month old babies that were very cute, curious and playful. Hope, a 4 year old male, and a typical tweenager, requires a bell around his neck so you know when trouble is coming.
Mae Perm is 89 years old and the most gentle and loving creature.

It was magical for us to observe these giant animals socializing in their family groups, talking, playing, nursing, bathing, scratching and eating.

Lots of love~
Lauren and Jed

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