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The full moooon and the elephants....
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| The full moooon and the elephants.... |
| 03.30.04 (5:18 am) [edit] |
DAY 5 -6 In Krabi
One of the biggest things on my list of things I must do in this life is :
Hang out with elephants.
Erin and Zac bail out on doing this, Karen and Bret already did it before, so they bail. Good thing Amanda was down because for when I am close to achieving those things on my list - I shouldn't and can't alter my plans for anyone...
Soo, my birthday wish come true a little late!.....
I finally spend some time with the elephants.
Amanda and I set out and ride on elephants backs through the jungle. We actually get to ride on their heads!
Their gray and pink spotted skin is so thick and tough. Their sags of rolly, wrinkly hard skin and thick broom bristle black hairs rub our legs as we ride their heads the way the natives do. The natives walk around all over the elephants barefoot like the elephants are the earth. How much of our weight do they feel?-- little ants picking at them, which explains the constant nervous whipping of their ears and broom tails to shooo insects and maybe even us away. And under all of those folds of gray flesh are those soft sweet brown eyes of the animal very knowing, yet kind of curious and mysterious. I stood too close to them while feeding them cucumbers and bananas and the native guide has to remind me that I think they are too friendly! After, we walk them to cool off and bathe in the stream.
The villagers nearby are hard at work, scrapping bamboo and sugarcane to make torches and green jungle juice drink for a full moon party.
The natives know sugarcane and bamboo and rubber trees and palm oil well. Our guide named Nok walked us around and showed us a stinky white glue-like sap that comes out of the rubber trees to make rubber. Somehow a golden glove session was discussed and we ended up chillin with the natives in the woods and partaking in the local greenery. They told us that they live in paradise.
I will spend more time with the elephants, these beautiful creatures, and hopefully it will be under better conditions..I mean they poke the elephants with these scary long metal hooks that seem harsh, but I never knew how tough the elephants skin is til now. I doubt they treat these elephants well after we leave though. Its pretty sad...
But I need to see reality for what it is at least once...
That night I witness the full affect of the full moon for the first time ever.
The full moon's coming on strong.
Never fully knew how much of a great change occurs ocean side. Its stirs the people. Something quite interesting fills the air. The wind is picking up blowing people and bamboo huts around- Plates, napkins, hats spinning around the large outdoor restaurants' big boats filled with ice and eenormous swordfish, baracuda, tiger shrimp, sharks- all catches of the day, that stare at you as you walk by, with half of their bodies gone on to some dinner plate. These restaurants that line the beaches at night and their staff scramble to accommodate for the hungry high tide reaching out to consume. Where we used to walk, we walk no more. The 40 feet out into the muddy mangrove tree root nests to catch a longtail boatride back to mainland is devoured by night fall.
Now we get splashed at the restaurants and wonder if this is dry season-what's the rainy season like? Then morning comes and the ocean recedes even further back than before- maybe 100 feet of shore is now walkable and visible.
It makes for an altering of the people as well.
If there's one thing I am learning- it is how difficult it can be to be independent. How to decide what you want to fill your day and life with, without being stuck doing something that brings you down and doesn't feel like the proper message to receive...its a challenge... there are many fears to conquer in being a leader and doing your own thing! And out here most of those dangers are VALID because doing it alone in a foreign place heightens the danger and possible mix up...I always thought I was independent but this shit is putting me to the ultimate tests that are more apparent out here, every day!
I make it out to a full moon party that night with Julie and her new English friends she met. We had to take a longboat to a new beach Hat Ton Sai, tucked even further in the limestone to find the party. There were about 80 foreigners and 30 Thai people mostly doped up on E or something chomping and flitting away at the techno music echoing off of caves that I swore begged me to somehow cover its ears. No goodies for me, thanks.
The only really exciting thing was when the local fire throwers showed up and showed off spinning, breathing and spitting fire. I talked to them for a while a cool tribal-looking couple from Japan. I tried not to cry when they told me they were from Hiroshima and I had to answer that I am from AtomBomb, I mean America, knowing that their grandparents if alive are still feeling it. After all this.. excitement... I soon fell fast asleep on the beautiful white sand, music unfortunately bumping, yet the moon glaring, lighting the place as if it knew day, and so bright the light loud enough to win the battle it had with the music... and so I slept, almost like in my Daimond Cave House bed with my sand colored comforter, which every night I swore I was wrapping a blanket of sand around me before I went to sleep.
To get home when I awoke at 5 in the morning was a drama. The girls and boys I was with were sloshed and they cut up their feet on the coral beds we had to climb through to get to the boat that now sat 100 feet away from normal shorline. I was fine, the beach took care of me and I didn't lose my shoes like some and I loved how the full moon time reveals the ocean's naked bottom that you'd never regularly see...
An intimacy I won't ever forget....
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