After a long absence mahouts are once more patrolling the beaches and streets of Pattaya with their pachyderms. 20 baht buys a plastic bag of sugar cane to feed the gentle giants and who’s to tell a hungry elephant ‘no’. The police vow to exile any errant elephants back to their parks, however it’s low season and the mahouts seek extra income to provide their beasts with food and maybe a little lao khao for themselves.
Is that such a bad thing?
For me no, but my daughter intensely is scared of elephants along with monks and clowns. I never realized clowns were so frightening, then again they are really weird.
Elephants are just big.