Leaving Asia

Wow. Eleven months exactly, and suddenly -- well not so suddenly, as it took 30-some hours to get to the US -- I was flip-flopped to the other side of the world. I spent my last day in Thailand with elephants, but I spent my last night at a drag show, an equally suitable farewell to Thailand.

Between wats and massages and elephants and ladyboys I visited Tip twice a
day almost every day for the best smoothies I've had all year.

After all of that I went back to Kuala Lumpur to regroup and repack. For the most part this meant lounging around Marta's house, doing some last-minute souvenir shopping, and going out to eat. However, on Friday I got to do something special. Marta has been volunteering as an English teacher for Afghan refugees, and on Friday she took me and her son to meet two of the families she has been helping. They were inspiring people to meet, and I also learned a lot about refugees and resettlement and what different countries offer the refugees they receive (easy since I knew pretty much nothing about this before). Both families have suffered almost unimaginable difficulties, but it was interesting to see how one family seemed to wear their struggles, while the other exuded energy and hope. I wish for the best for both of them, but it is much easier to foresee the latter family thriving when they are finally resettled in Australia. That evening Marta and her family took me out to a farewell dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. Believe it or not this was a welcome and missed cuisine, and I got to play expert and recommend dishes for everyone.

The next day I began my long journey back to the United States. Seven hours took me from Malaysia to Japan, and then I had a nine-hour layover in Narita. With so much time on my hands, I decided to leave the airport and have a day trip in Japan. It was still early in the day, and few things were open when I got off the subway, but I figured I would wander around anyway. I was starving, and I stopped in one of the few open places for what claimed to be a salmon and cream cheese sandwich that ended up having slivers of salmon slathered in mayonnaise.

Getting comfortable on the plane

Welcome to Narita

sights around town

Fortunately, the rest of my visit went better. I walked to Narita's main attraction: Narita-san Shinsho-ji, a Shingon Buddhist temple founded in 940 that was expanded to a massive complex starting in the 1600s. The temple grounds were certainly large and impressive, but I was having a hard time appreciating them, possibly because I had no information about them and also probably in part because of my heavy backpack. However, as I wandered the grounds, leaving the temple areas and entering the scenic garden areas, I made an exciting discovery. Dismembered Japanese rhinoceros beetles were strewn along the path and were being voraciously consumed by ants. They were an exciting and unusual sighting for me, but internet research shows that they are popular pets in Asia, even being sold in vending machines. After that I also found some beautiful yellow and green spiders spinning webs between mossy rocks surrounding a waterfall.

Rhinoceros beetle carapace

feasting

For lunch I stopped at a place that had caught my attention earlier because a man was sitting at the entrance deftly slicing and cleaning live eels. Some of my favorite Japanese dishes feature eel, and so I was excited to see that almost every restaurant on the walk to the temple had an eel special. I went back to the place with the public butchering, which seemed to be one of the most popular restaurants within my price range. The restaurant was bustling, and I was entertained to hear people saying 'domo arigato', not followed by 'Mr. Roboto.'

Expert eel slicer

nom nom nom nom

Along the way to the temple I had spotted some shops where I thought I might be able to unload any unspent Yen I'd have left. Luckily, I did not do that before lunch, because after paying for my food I had little more than return subway fare left. Before leaving Japan I made two more notable sightings: a Mexican restaurant and a fancy-pants(less) Japanese toilet.
 

Enlarge to see the many options the toilet buttons offer

With that, it was a 10-hour flight into the US and another layover and flight until I reached my final destination. Now I am adjusting to eating American food (though I went out for Japanese noodle soup already), gorging on cheese, marveling at high-speed internet, and having days filled with little moments of contrast that remind me just how different a life I led for the last year. The blog may be over, but the adventure continues. Thank you for being a part of it.

"To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted." – Bill Bryson

Among the elephants

I had four more days in Chiang Mai after my day trip. I spent most of that time hanging out with traveler friends and being pampered (drinking smoothies and getting massages). The Brits left on Tuesday morning and I wouldn't be leaving until Thursday morning. I debated what to do with the time I had left. At first I thought about just relaxing in air-conditioned places; I felt like I had made a pretty thorough tour of the city's offerings. However, I got a sign -- literally. I was headed to breakfast one day when I saw a sign for elephant training courses. I had already heard about this activity, but for some reason I actually stopped to read more about it this time, and it piqued my interest. Here was something I could do that was very local (elephants are a big part of Thai culture) and was not something I could easily do somewhere else. I investigated and I committed. So, I spent my last day in Thailand canoodling with elephants.

Wednesday morning I got picked up, and on the way to the elephants we stopped at an orchid farm. It was pretty small, but still pretty.

Then came the main event. Only two other people, a honeymooning couple, had booked an elephant day, so we had a nice small group. First we fed the elephants pineapple and bananas and learned that each elephant consumes 250kg  of food per day. After we got on their good side with food, it was time to get up close and personal. They taught us the commands that mahouts use when riding the elephants and then it was our turn to test our skills.

Commands, spelling approximated:

• Bone - raise your trunk so I can put food in your mouth
• Song - help/let me get on you
• How - stop
• Toy - move backwards
• Pai - go forward
• Pe - turn
• Chalon - let me down

The biggest test, though, at least for me, was just getting onto the elephant to begin with.  In order to get on the elephant, it puts out its bent leg and you use its angles as steps, meanwhile using its ear as a handhold. The problem is that the leg only gets you so high, and when you're my height and not a nimble mahout you still need a big boost. I worried about hurting it but then I realized that I am about 1/50 of its weight, and am therefore a fairly insignificant addition. Once on, you sit on the neck so as not to be wobbled around by the shoulders when it walks. In conjunction to verbal commands, you gently use a dull hook on key parts of the head and shift your weight and use your feet, e.g. nudging the ear opposite the direction you want to turn. When you're ready to get off you shout 'chalon!' and the elephant lowers its head until you can jump/slide off the front.

Out of focus but still illustrates my questionable description
of how one gets on an elephant

Attempting to turn right

Preparing for landing

The three of us tried this a few times, and by the time we were done it was time for lunch. In contrast to the questionable buffet lunch provided with my Chiang Rai tour, which I was actually worried would make me sick, this lunch was both abundant and delectable. Spring rolls, chicken and potato curry, noodles and shrimp, and a glutinous rice dessert. Once we were fed and our stomachs were settled we were ready for a jungle walk. Though we had been practicing our commands, we were all relieved to know that elephant control would be up to the mahouts when we went up into the mountain. My elephant and I were clearly meant to be paired together, as she took every opportunity to eat, displaying the impressivene strength and dexterity of her trunk by ripping off the leaves of everything in her path. Most impressive was when we stopped in a bamboo grove and the elephants snapped the plants down to get at the leaves that were out of their reach.

Eating

 

Eating

Eating!

Our walk ended in a river, where we dismounted and washed our respective elephants. I don't know whether the wash made much of a difference, but the elephants certainly seemed to enjoy it.

Don't the elephants look joyful?

Splash!

Then it was time to feed them one last time and say goodbye. We went to visit a week-old elephant nearby and went to a factory that makes paper out of elephant dung, as it is mostly just fiber.

Mom and baby

Baby up close

It was a great, special day. Just in case you haven't seen enough photos of me and elephants, I leave you with one more that sums it all up pretty well. By the time this is posted I'll be in the air and on the way home, but still with more stories coming your way.