Thailand’s Elephant Camps

Cipriana Botez,

Correspondent (Our World)

 

Sakit is crying. The chains around her ankles are dangling with each wallowing step up the jungle path. Her natural grandeur is all lost under the weight of tourists on her back, hollering in excitement and snapping pictures. For them, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity, a dare off their bucket list. For Sakit, a young Asian elephant, this is the third time she’s going through it today.

“Does our elephant look sad?” one girl asks, craning her neck over Sakit’s floppy ear. Her pace has lowered; her defeated cries fill the valley. But she’s still ahead, leading a small herd of four elephants packed with tourists up into the jungle they have come to know so well. “Lazy, lazy! She’s a lazy elephant,” retorts the mahout (elephant supervisors), grabbing at his metal hook. Whenever she stops for a break, he’s there to prompt her forward with swift and determined hits on the back of her legs.

It’s a long way back to the camp under the glaring sun. “Many tourists cry after visiting the camp,” says Max. His real name is Chayakon. Our young guide goes under the English nickname to make himself friendlier to visitors of the Jumbo Elephant Camp, a few miles off Chiang Mai.

As we walk below a blood-red sunset tinting the camp with a flaming hue, he explains the plight of elephants in Thailand, and how increased tourism has reduced elephants from sacred national symbols to subdued tourist haulers and sources of profit. “In Thai history, only kings were allowed to ride elephants” says Max. “Now, the four elephants who are left at our camp make between five and six jungle trips a day, carrying up to four tourists on their backs at one time. It’s sad and inhumane. The elephants are not happy, and they should be in the wilderness, not here.”

Chiang Mai is the country’s most popular elephant hub, the “go-to” place for backpackers in search for a jungle adventure and their first real-life interaction with an elephant. “Tourism is the reason elephants are mistreated,” says Carol Buckley, Founder of ElephantAid International. “They live deprived painful lives, used and abused for human profit and entertainment.”

“Most people are poorly educated about elephants and know them only by the characters they learn about as a child. Elephants are unrealistically romanticised and the media plays this up. Most people mistakenly think the elephants are domesticated.”

The majority of mahouts are not of Thai origin but come from neighbouring Vietnam and Cambodia to work with captive elephants in the thriving tourist industry. Nowadays, In Thailand, a newborn elephant is worth 1 million Baht (almost £20,000) to his owner. Rather than selling it, a bigger profit can be made by attracting tourists with one to three days package deals, offering them “a real Thai jungle experience,” which includes daily elephant rides. “The mahouts don’t care if the elephant is hurt. They are just interested in the profit.” Max explains.

Across Thailand’s territory, there are around 5,000 elephants left, out of which only 2,000 live in the wild. “The issue and problem is money. Elephants generate a great deal of money for their owners. I cannot speak for these people as to why they fail to honour an animal their culture holds as sacred, but my experience has been that many times, in fact most times, money trumps culture and tradition,” Carol explains.

A surprising move from the Thai government has recently brought in new hope in the longstanding fight against elephant trafficking and poaching. In October, the official Elephant Awareness Month, officials have given green light to the Wild Animals Preservation and Protection Bill, sparking protests from mahouts. The bill aims to nationalise the country’s wildlife, moving the ownership of captive elephants from the hands of private owners to a state-run agency.

Carol Buckley is less hopeful: “Elephant related tourism has to be completely banned in order for elephants to escape the abuse. Protection bills and laws do not work. When there is money to be made, someone will always circumvent the law for profit.”

Ewa Narkiewicz, Director at Elephant Stay in Ayutthaya, is equally skeptical of the government’s actions, but otherwise holds a strong faith in the power of tourism. “The government is not interested in taking more than 3,000 elephants and improving their plight. As I want the elephants to survive into the future, I think the best solution is to encourage camp tourism,” she says. “What would happen to the 3,300 elephants that are currently owned by people?”

“In camps, elephants can be protected and live in a community. There is the support and infrastructure to breed and have proper health services. It saves elephants from begging in the street or starving. You almost will never see an adult elephant begging in the street because they can give rides in tourist camps.”

She sees the increasing demand in tourism as positive, as it encourages breeding and increases elephant diversification and population. Elephants have a 5,000-year long history of living and working with people. The effect of this longstanding co-habitation is making people “want to experience something of that history” and they can do that through taking a ride. “It is a glimpse for the tourist of what it means to be with an elephant,” she says.

While pressures from NGOs and animal protection agencies to try to change legislation within Thailand, the local population will clash with such developments. They see the elephants as their daily livelihood and a sustainable source of profit, especially in recent years, when thousands of young foreigners were washed on the country’s beaches every summer. Working in Thailand, in close proximity of the elephant camps, Ewa sees the human side of it: “Elephant camps invest a huge amount of money in their elephants and their upkeep. It is not in their interest to mistreat their animals.” She adds, “Internationally, people need to respect the mahouts who take care of the elephants. They are human beings like everyone else.”

But when touching the giant’s thick, coarse skin, you cannot help but wonder if underneath lies a quiet longing and suffering, carrying someone else’s delight on its back, day after day. The indents and scratches mark someone’s wild summer or gap year.

On depart, Max guides the tourists towards the exit, to board the jeeps carrying them to their next adventure.  He flashes a smile and tells me not to worry: “I’ll be here, taking care of the elephants.”

Image Courtesy: By Deror Avi (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons