Lets talk about animals

Well, I've done food, and transport, it's time to talk about animals.

Thursday was the Elephant Nature Park with Adrianna, one of the people from Partners I met last week. After an early start we had about an hour drive to get to the park. During the drive they first played us a pretty funny safety video which had cartoon graphics of what happens if you (for example) approach an elephant from behind. The way the person was sent flying reminded me of Miss Piggy on the muppets - Hiyah! However after that they played a longer clip (including undercover footage) of how elephants are abused in order to make them work or perform or paint or beg or be ridden. Not nearly so funny, and not really a pleasant way to start the day. Of course it depends who you talk to as to how widespread this is, I don't know enough to have an informed opinion. On this trip I have regularly recalled a saying of which my Grandpa was very fond - believe nothing of what you hear and only half of what you see.

Once at the park our guide Andy took us to different areas, feeding different elephants and having photos taken, then washing one in the river, then a viewing platform to see them rolling in the mud then to see a little baby one, then to see the males which are in a different area, and not even the mahouts go near them, they stay on the outside of the bars. There were lots of opportunities to feed them, apparently they spend 18 hours a day eating, and they eat 10% of their body weight each day. For a two tonne elephant that's 200kgs of food. It did occurr to me that feeding them isn't quite as special as, say, watching a tiger eat, they only do that once every few days!

A lot of the elephants had something wrong, a few had broken legs apparently from accidents caused by chains breaking when they're hauling logs. One also had a wound from a trap or snare that they were still treating more than two years later. A lot were solitary,  but there were a few obvious pairs and one set of three that were always together.  Even some elephants have besties :-)

Next day (Friday) I was able to visit a farm run by Partners which has dual purposes. They experimentwith and demonstrate better farming techniques, and they also teach these techniques to refugees or migrants from Myanmar. They had two different types of biogas systems for cooking and could also compress it into gas bottles, and composting systems. They had lots of different types of crops, rice, corn, mangos and passionfruit amoung others, and animals, including poultry, pigs, cows, frogs and fish. See if you can work out which is which in the photos. Sombat who showed us around also regularly travels to Myanmar tomteach farmers in the country. Often these people have been displaced, and have to establish a new way of life in a marginal area, so good techniques and experts available to troubleshoot are hugely necessary and helpful.

It was a really interesting visit, and I'm looking forward to comparing it to the work that A Rocha Canada are doing in Vancouver regarding community gardens and sustainable agriculture. Then in the evening I made the acquaintance of an American couple, Susan and Rick who live a few doors down from the Jolls', and ended up inviting myself along on their plans for the next day with another couple who are just here for a couple of weeks and volunteering at one of the places Susan does some work.

Saturday, first we picked up the other couple who are Ronda and Gary from Vancouver Island. Hopefully now we've met I'll be able to visit them during my time in Canada. Yet another example of God putting people in my path on this trip. We started the day with a couple of 'yard sales', (that's American for garage sales). Then it was off on our road trip. On the way to our destination we stopped at a unique place called the Graveyard Cafe (it overlooks a crematorium!) We just came across it on the road, but it was a fun place to stop, they had an eclectic mix of kitch, including items relating to Chairman Mao, Buddha and Jesus. Then we arrived at the Sticky Falls. Its real name is the Bua Tong Falls, but the sticky part is because the rock is really, well, sticky, and so it's possible to climb up the falls with no hand holds or anything. It was a lovely spot, quite a few people around but big enough that it didn't feel crowded, and great to get wet on such a hot day. I was a but nervous about climbing the falls to start, I had visions of seriously cutting short my trip with a decent accident. However, Gary was very kind and went up the second time (out of three times total) with me so I could get the hang of it. There were a few places where there was moss which was pretty slippery, so you did have to watch your footing. I am very pleased to have done it though, and the new Facebook profile pic is from there. Yes, that's right, I have decided to revive my FB for this trip, so there'll be the odd photo and teaser post popping up there too.

We were there for around three hours I think, there was also a five minute walk to the spring which feeds the waterfall. This was quite interesting as the sediment was bubbling up from the bottom of the pool but the wated was quite clear as it was to heavy to stay suspended once the water pressure reduced. It looked at first like a geothermal pool, but there were no bubbles reaching the surface at all, the only movement on the top of the water was from the fish and insects. There was a shrine there too.

After a mid afternoon meal we made it to the place I was keen to see, the Siam Insect Zoo. I had found out about this from a brochure Sandra had, and Trip Adviser had some very positive reviews. It was a cool place to spend an hour, first lots of examples of insects from all over the world mounted for display. Then the live insects, spiders - mostly tarantulas (yay!), cicadas, butterflies, stick insects and scorpians to name a few. There were some that could be handled, not the spiders unfortunately, but the scorpians which are also arachnids, so I was reasonably happy with that. It was an awesome way to end the day.

I had dinner for the second evening with Susan and Rick, though they called it supper. It was really nice to have different people to spend the day with. My Saturday plans had been to do a few museums on my own, which would have been fine, but this felt so much better, and during the driving we were able to get to know each other and exchange some ideas, and I always really enjoy that.

No animals on Sunday sorry, but I was able to go back to Chris and Sandra's church again even though they weren't there, and again I enjoyed that. I was given a ride by an American couple who had spent two months in the South Island a few years ago, so it was fun to hear what they got up to, and to encourage them to come back again to see the North Island.

Today is Monday and Sandra, Kayla and Nathan got back last night from their few days away. We've had a quiet day, did some shopping and went to a local pool for water aerobics with a few other ladies.  I've never actually done that before, and it was lots of fun. The pool was nice and the water refreshing. It's been a good day.

A few days ago I got some information through from A Rocha Canada about what I'll be doing for the next three months. I'm pretty excited, the science looks really interesting, and the chance to really get stuck in a produce some research and study that has long term value is pretty cool. I also now know that two of the other interns are Canadian, and one has a car, so that has good potential for seeing some of the countryside while I'm there. I do have some reading to do before I get there; happily I have a day on the bus on Friday and then a flight on Saturday, so I should be able to get through the material.

One other note, while I have a nice bruise, the leg hasn't been bothering me much since the accident, it's just tender to touch when I forget and bump it, so that's a good result

I'll write again soon.
Sarah

PS, do keep the comments and emails coming, it's easy to feel a bit out of touch over here!