Spring Break Thailand aka “My Elephant is Bigger than Yours.”

We finally have internet in Hangchat, so I am able to update the blog and put up some posts that I had written previously.

After all the lectures, and being cooped up inside the good old Louis Tavern hotel in Bangkok for about 5 days, all of the CIEE’ers were anxious for a little Vitamin D and communing with nature. After an approximately 4 hour bus ride (about an hour of that being trapped in Bangkok traffic,) we arrived at the Pavilion Resort in the province of Kanchanaburi, (western province of Thailand). Kanchanaburi is probably most notable for its location on the River Kwai. If you don’t know what that is (as neither I nor my fellow English teachers did,) break out an encyclopedia. A bridge was built over it by the Japanese during WWII to transport supplies back and forth through Asia, into Myanmar. Anywayyyyy, the river is gorgeous, as was our hotel, despite the mosquitoes, ants, geckos, etc . . .(A foreshadowing of what was to come in Hangchat . . .) I finally felt like I was actually in Asia, not just in an American hotel!

As you may have already heard, we got to go bamboo rafting on the River. The people who wore sneakers got the short end of the stick as our feet were pretty much submerged. I was prepared to sink, carefully keeping my mouth closed so as to not digest any illness-inducing Thai water, but we did in fact keep afloat! I really can’t describe how beautiful the river was, and a picture won’t do it justice. It was one of the most peaceful places I’ve ever been . . . NO noise whatsoever in any direction except for wildlife.

After the rafting, we headed to the elephant center to hitch a ride on a pachyderm. There was a sign as we climbed to the top of the tower that gave such warnings as “The trunk is a hand, a nose, and a weapon all in one.” Thank you, elephant center. An elephant trainer is called a “mahout.” I’m thinking of a career change. My elephant really took to me – NOT. Our particular mahout thought it was a funny joke to make the elephant go fast after I had slid down to its neck (that’s right, bareback on the elephant – there’s nothing quite like the feeling of an elephant ear flapping on your bare leg) The command for faster was “Boom Boom.” I repeatedly shouted NOOOO BOOM BOOOOOM! In my defense, an elephant is very large and when it walks, it really rocks back and forth in a big way. The neck is too big to really wrap your legs around. Needless to say I was very unsteady up there. Mr. Mahout happened to think this was very funny and proceeded to completely imitate me and make fun of me. Thanks. I had to request to get back into the seat, as we were descending into the river. The elephant “trek” took us around the small, very primitive village where these Burmese people lived. Absolutely surreal . . .it’s easy to forget that there really are still people who live in one room wooden huts. Children were running around everywhere (on a Monday . . .like a true teacher, my mind immediately jumped to – ‘why aren’t these kids in school?’). At one point, our Mahout even put his little son on our elephant. Baby Mahout did not like this and began bawling his eyes out!

Erin got a bit more conversation out of her guide. He informed her and the girl she was with . . .”You, from America. You, study study study. Become doctor! Me . . .elephants! My son, elephants!” They really are proud of their occupation though, there’s no shame in it at all! They seemed to be very content, especially given the non-stop mockery towards us!

After a delicious (finally) lunch of chicken kabobs, French fries, rice, cinnamon soup, mixed veggies, (and much more) we headed back to the hotel for Spring Break Thailand. The rest of the two days was ours to do with as we wished. And given we are a group of 94 twenty-somethings we all headed straight to the pool, Singhas in hand, for a little R & R - lots of fun.

After dinner on the Kwai River, we went down to our hotel’s “Club” and got our daaaance on. It was a great time, seeing as our group members were the only ones there and somebody in our group replaced the Thai DJ with his Ipod and lots of great music. However, I have never sweat so much in my life . . .enough said. All in all, it was an amazing final night with some great new friends.

Update on life in Hangchat to come from Erin. Let’s just say it will take a lot more adjusting than we originally anticipated – party’s OVERRRRR (for now, at least).

Again, we miss everybody A LOT. Thanks for following/reading. We hope you remain adequately entertained.