Northern Thailand’s Elephant Nature Park
|Late last year, I spent a month volunteering at Northern Thailand’s Elephant Nature Park, located 45 minutes from Chiang Mai, in a lush valley by the Mae Taeng River. This was truly one of the most amazing experiences of my life. Every day was spent working on projects like building fences and huts and collecting food for the 35 elephants who call the Park home. Almost all have been rescued from terrible situations.
There was Mae Boon, who’d lost part of her hind leg in a mine explosion on the Burmese border, and Medo, whose back had been broken in a mating session forced upon her by her handlers. My favourite elephant, Max, was a huge fellow with sad, thoughtful eyes who had been made to beg on the streets of Bangkok for over twenty years. Here, at the Park, these amazing animals can finally have a sense of freedom; to live in an environment without leg chains and away from abusive humans.
If you love animals, and are looking for a unique holiday experience, you really can’t go past the Park. It’s hard work, but it’s bloody rewarding
Tagged: Chiang Mai, Mae Taeng River, Northern Thailand's Elephant Nature Park, volunteer work
- 6
- 1
Also by NIKKI SAVVIDES
New Delhi-based digital artist Archan Nair (aka archanN) has worked for notable clients, including CNBC, Hugo Boss, Apple and Tiger Beer. But although his corporate works stand out in their glorious, hyper-real colour, his more intricate and personal works are my favourites. Read more
The Miss Rockaway Armada is a group of about thirty artists, musicians and performers who hail from across the United States. In the summers of 2006 and 2007, the group floated down the Mississippi River from Minneapolis to New Orleans on a flotilla of handmade rafts. Crafted mainly from junk and recycled materials, the rafts ran on wind and solar power, were fuelled by bio-diesel, and their crew subsisted on rainwater and dumpstered meals for the entire journey. Read more
Free Spirit Sphere tree houses
Eve and Eryn, two amazing Free Spirit Sphere tree houses, are located in Vancouver, Canada, high up in the canopy of the West Coast rainforest. They are, as their creators describe, ’suspended like pendants from a web of rope’ from the trees. This is a unique way of creating unobtrusive means of living amongst nature. Insulated and set up for one or two people to stay in, these spheres allow people to experience the ‘energy shift’ that occurs ‘once one breaks contact with the ground’. Read more
YOU'RE SAYING (1)
HAVE YOUR SAY
Swedish-born Linn Olofsdotter has not only moved around the world, she’s also shifted her career from graphic design to motion graphics, before working as a senior art director at a Boston advertising agency. Currently Olofsdotter works independently creating artwork for a number of clients — including Levis and Spin Magazine — in the fashion, advertising and editorial fields.
Along with the greening of brown sites, this has to be one of the answers for a more eco future. To take a large piece of land, to maintain the bulk of it as it is naturally, and then to design a highly dense yet attractive living environment. Read more
Alfred Hitchcock’s icy heroines inspired Yeojin Bae’s Autumn Winter 09 collection. Its 40s noir meets modern day muse with seductive tailoring and asymmetric style. Yeojin Bae’s signature has become ultra-feminine shapes contrasted with coveted tailored separates Unravelled shapes are expertly tailored. Raw edge silk blouses have dipping necklines and are worn boxy and loose. Wool Angora overcoats feature a dramatic bias cut hem and buckled flare sleeve in black or herringbone. Flame red chiffon falls delicately into an asymmetric wrap skirt, as figure hugging stretch leggings bring billowing shapes back into the body. Read more
Joe Coleman’s paintings are a feverish cross between Ivan Albright-inspired grotesqueness and R. Crumb-like pop-social critique. Read more
This one-stop shop for all things eco-friendly is proof that protecting the environment is becoming a popular pastime. Almost every material category that comprises our society, from design to celebrity to transport, is looked at through a green lens. They’re ranked number twenty-two on Technorati’s list of 75,000,000 blogs, and even Daryl Hannah is singing their praises. Why? Its writers, they claim, ‘have the ability to take topics that most of us snoozed our way through in school, and make them the addictive juicy, green bits that they are’.
History is the story of the winners, and western dominated culture recounts few triumphs from the east. Mongol is an effort to correct this balance, and the eastern influence is evident in much more than just the storyline. It is more like a fairy tale or legend handed down through generations, than based on fact, with mythical elements playing a major part, and the character’s motivations remaining simple. Read more
A culmination of nearly four years of writing and recording, Omaha quintet, The Faint are preparing to release their fifth album, Fasciinatiion, on August 5 on the band’s own newly-formed label, blank.wav. Working without any time constraints, the songs went through many recorded incarnations before finding their final forms. The result is the best album in the band’s career, a record that is the purest culmination of The Faint’s brilliant musical instincts, ideas and aesthetic, with each member contributing equally to its creation.
WE'RE RESPECTING
WE'RE POSTING / SOME OF THE BEST
Alex Passapera’s dizzying pen and ink drawings are cascades of images melting into one another, often looking like contorting, mutating creatures spewing blood-like ink splatters. Read more
Check out Mike Stimpson’s Lego reinterpretations of classic photographs. Stimpson’s version of Malcolm Browne’s iconic 1963 photograph of the self-immolation of Thich Quang Duc is particularly twisted. Read more
Wheeeeee! This game is so freaking fun! You move your cursor over each dot to make them split into four smaller dots ad infinitum.
Amazing cake designs by Charm City Cakes
Baltimore company Charm City Cakes produces the most innovative wedding and party cakes on the market. Inspiration for these creative bakers comes from everywhere: art, fabric, furniture, architecture, landscapes, science, and music, and each cake is individually designed to match your personality, and the theme of the occasion you are celebrating. Don’t miss these cakey engineering masterpieces. Read more
Good thing Kris Kuksi channelled the trauma of growing up with an alcoholic stepfather, his disdain for ‘the typical American life and pop culture’, and his fascination with the macabre into obsessive, baroque assemblages, paintings, and drawings. Read more
Thanks to Sony Australia, four Lost At E Minor readers will win personal audio prizes, including the new 8GB Walkman S series video MP3 player and the MDRXB500 Extra Bass headphones. Read more
Fourth is King make limited edition unisex t-shirts, printed on 50 percent polyester and 50 percent cotton construction, with custom embroidered tag on the left sleeve. Read more
FOLLOW US
DISCOVER MORE
SO...
SEARCH: Can't find what you're looking for? Do a search..
IS IT GOOD FOR YOU TOO?
We hope you're enjoying your time on Lost At E Minor, but it’s not over yet. Got something to share? Tell us about it and we'll look to publish it. If you want to have your work featured on the site, we'd love to hear from you. Pssst, we also have an online store stocking some of the goodies we feature on the site.
If you're a media agency and want to use this platform to connect with our readership, then drop us a line and tell us about it. Oh yeah, and we do digital consulting for cool brands that want to reach the sort of demographic that visits this site.
Vanessa said | 8 September, 2009
Hi Nikki,
Thanks for your great posting on the Park. I’ll be volunteering in November and was hoping I could ask you some questions. Please let me know if you have time to answer them. Thanks so much!
Vanessa