Finally, we are able to enjoy the payoff of the long term construction work and the constant presence of heavy machinery. Our newest chain-free shelters are finally reaching completion!! The good news Within the last year, there have been three…
We have finally said goodbye to the hot and dry season. Each night, the mountiansides were ablaze and the usually fresh air was pungent with the acrid smell of smoke. The moon itself, barely visible through the heavy smog. The…
And so it begins ... Before arriving to Elephant Nature Park on the last day of February 2009, Mintra spent her whole life as a street begging elephant. Mintra seemed to develop slowly, possibly because of her dislocated hips. Though…
Editor’s Note: We’ve invited our intern, Sofiya, to contribute to Save Elephant Foundation’s blog and document her experiences with some of our projects.
For most of my life elephants and monkeys have been my favorite animals. You can imagine my excitement when I found out I was selected to intern at Save Elephant Foundation here in Chiang Mai, which meant I would be traveling to Thailand where my two favorite animals happily reside.
After a couple days settling into the office I had the opportunity to volunteer at the park. There are several different ways to visit Elephant Nature Park, from day visits and overnight stays to week-long volunteer opportunities. Since I arrived later in the week I missed the general tour and information which week-long volunteers receive at the beginning of their stay. Before I could join the volunteers in their duties, I was scheduled to walk around with the day visitors and familiarize myself with the park grounds as well as catch up on what I had missed.
At 8 a.m. I got picked up at the office with a group of day visitors and we embarked on an hour long ride to the park. In the van we had the opportunity to hear details about the park and were shown a documentary centered around Asian elephants and the park itself. Our day visit guide, Sai, was incredibly knowledgable, friendly and open to every and any question we had about the park and the elephants.
One year ago a blind ex-circus elephant, who had been chained in her owner’s yard for the past three years, hit the jackpot … a truck pulled up, ready to take her on a 20+ hour journey that would end at ENP, where she would begin her new life. Little did she know it, but it was her lucky day. For once in her life, her name was fitting, for she was known as Lucky.
Education and knowledge are the keys to change. This is something we have learned over and over, not just with visitors who come to Thailand and to our projects, but also with other elephant camps.
When Erawan Elephant Retirement Park opened in July, 2013, Save Elephant Foundation was able to take five elephants from trekking camps, street begging and performance shows and move them to a new home … in retirement. Now, almost six months later, we are happy to report that these elephants are enjoying their freedom. This project came about because Lek worked hard to establish relationships with camps in Kanchanaburi and educate them on how to help their elephants lives become better.
An integral part to all of our projects is education that expands beyond just our world of visitors and volunteers. We continue to educate elephant camp owners and hope we can help improve their lives in captivity.
Over the past few years, we have had several camps open next to us at Elephant Nature Park.
The nearby trekking camp with their elephants. This is no longer their world, thanks to the hard work and education they have received from Lek and SEF about how to better their elephants lives.
One of the nicest, most competent and well known mahouts at the Elephant Nature Park is 36-year-old Dam. He is currently the mahout of Navann and Sri Prae. Dam comes from the Shan state of Burma (or Myanmar). About ten percent of our mahouts are Shan, who fled their homeland to escape persecution. Dam has been in Thailand for 15 years and has always worked as a mahout. His wife, Gayna, is also employed by ENP, and works in the kitchen. They have a beautiful 5-year-old daughter, Faa Sai. Dam is linguistically diverse and is fluent in Shan, Burmese, some Chinese, as well as Thai!
Rumbles, roars and chirps erupted at around 12:15 a.m. on August 25th breaking the midnight silence, announcing the arrival of a new born calf. Stirred to consciousness by the vocalizations, bleary eyed ENP staff sprung from their beds. Grabbing flashlights and cameras, they rushed to the elephant shelters to catch a glimpse of the newest member of our herd.
The majority of us are blessed with the gift of sight. We take it for granted, without thinking how very lucky we are.
Imagine for a moment not being able to see, relying only on hearing and touch. Imagine being born blind, therefore not having any mental images stored for descriptive reference.
Imagine traveling to a foreign land, where your native tongue is not spoken and venturing to a place where elephants roam free and you can experience them up close, learning about them through touch.
Would you be afraid? Would you be excited?
For two years in a row we have had a very special group of teenagers from the Korean Art Association for the Blind who travel all the way from Korea to visit Elephant Nature Park, staying two days. They come from the Chungju Seongmo School for the Blind and their tour is titled “Touching an Elephant.” These students are training to be artists and are learning to ‘see by touch’ so that they can create works of art in various mediums.
Their stay at Elephant Nature Park included the group engaging in feeding the elephants, learning about them and having an up-close experience with Lek and Faa Mai.
In our last post about Navann and his ever changing line up of doting aunties, Dao Tong had joined the group much to the dismay of Mae Jarunee, who moved off to the sidelines in an act of protest. Faa Mai, Faa Sai, Tong Jaan, even Mae Bua Tong and Chang Yim had been spending lots of time with Navann, causing Mae Keow and Dani to lose their confidence to approach the irresistible young bull. Malai Tong was quite busy between keeping Mae Jarunee company, checking in with Navann and flitting around like the social butterfly that she is catching up with old friends.
