VOL. 3 ISSUE NO. 12

NOVEMBER 2009

The town of Surin is a sleepy provincial capital of some 40,000 folks, with one main street and a decent night market. It isn’t considered a major tourist destination. However, on the third weekend of every November, the city roars to life with the arrival of the annual Elephant Roundup.

The Asian elephant is highly revered in Thai culture, as both a working asset and as an international symbol of the Kingdom. It has been depicted in art, architecture, and literature, and it is as an auspicious symbol of the King.

In Ban Tha Klang, a small village some 60 kilometers from Surin, elephants have been raised and trained for ages by their mahouts, members of the Kui tribe, originally coming from Cambodia. Famed for capturing, domesticating, and training wild elephants, the Kui have taught the animals to become providers, work companions, and lifelong friends.

Elephants were traditionally used in battle, and the Elephant Roundup, which has been held since 1960, is one of Thailand’s top festivals and tourist draws. The festival features the mighty beasts showing off some of their talents and prowess, not to mention their humorous sides.

Upon arriving at Surin’s train station during the festival, one can opt for an elephant ride rather than a taxi to get to one’s hotel, as the elephants get free reign and run of the town for several days. The main events take place on Saturday and Sunday mornings at the Elephant Stadium, where the big changs start the day off by doing acrobatic stunts, playing basketball, and painting t-shirts.

As the morning heats up, the elephants engage in football and polo competitions, with a lot of betting and general hooting and hollering going on from the appreciative spectators lining both sides of the field. Lighter antics include clown performances, and stunts like an “Us-versus-Elephant” tug of war, in which thirty or forty of Surin’s strongest young men take on a single elephant in a rope-pulling contest. Who wins? Who do you think?

Following the fun and games, the roundup then offers a chance to see mahouts tending their charges, washing them down, feeding them, and performing traditional ceremonies like phi pakarn, a ritual done to fend off danger during roundups of wild elephants.

As elephants were a vital part of ancient warfare, the grand finale of the festival involves elaborately crafted mock battles in full traditional costume, with elephants leading the respective armies into their forays. In addition to these activities, there is also a local beauty pageant (er, Miss Elephant 2009?!), colorful parades, and rides on the backs of the mighty beasts, not to mention photo sessions with the big babies.

Just as appealing as the festival itself are the accompanying parties and celebrations that take place all over town. Residents of Isaan are famed for their hospitality, and you will invariably be invited for shots of whiskey, baskets of sticky rice, and maybe even offered a few fried bugs, which are a big hit and local specialty in the central market.

As with most Thai festivals, there is an adjoining arcade and food festival set up nearby, with live bands, food vendors, and shopping galore to keep visitors busy if they have any energy left over after the morning celebrations. There are also beer gardens set up all over the city, and the weather in Surin in November is cool and refreshing, perfect for sitting outside and telling stories of the day’s events over bottles of the appropriately named sponsor of the whole event… Chang, your one and only elephant beer!

Travel Tips: The Elephant Roundup happens the third weekend of November, taking place this year on November 21-22. The main events happen at Si Narong Stadium, from about 8:30am-11am. There are also roundups, rides, and other performances in the afternoons.

Transport: Surin is reached either by train or bus from Bangkok (about 8 hours and 250 baht by bus, and 8-9 hours and a bit cheaper by train, a very pleasant ride through some nice countryside). Getting around Surin is easy, as most of the town can be navigated on foot, although there will likely be an elephant and mahout on every corner offering to give you a lift!

Accommodation: Often booked way in advance, the festival is a huge draw of both Thais and foreigners. The Thong Tarin Hotel, 60 Thanon Surirat, 04 451 4281, has rooms from 800-1400 baht, while the Sangthong, 279 Thanon Tanasan, 04 451 2009, has decent rooms at the bargain price of 150-330 baht, depending on the amenities.

Tickets for the festival are priced at 500 and 200 baht and can be reserved in advance, a good option if wanting the better grandstand seats (Surin Provincial Office, 04 451 2039 for reservations and other information).

Dave is a freelance photojournalist spending most of his time traveling through Southeast Asia. He is the author of “Odysseus’ Last Stand,” which received the Silver Medal from the Society of American Travel Writers. When not out wandering to wayward local festivals, he can be found drinking a cold Chang in the Roundup or any Bangkok establishment with a nice outdoor patio. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

In the true tradition of legends, the exact location of the Suvarnabhumi trading route is open to debate. It was said to be the sea equivalent of the northern Silk Road and was referred to in historical chronicles by sailors as The Golden Land. Somewhere between India and China: A land of plenty, a land of riches, a land where merchants could find their pot of gold. The Suvarnabhumi may have included Thailand, or it may have been the whole Malay peninsula. Who knows? That’s the beauty of legends.

So do we now live in The Golden Land, as many entrepreneurs of the world still firmly believe, or has Bangkok and Thailand had its day as a place to live the dream?

There are probably more madcap schemes going on in this country than anywhere else. It’s a place where people leave their homelands as plumbers and arrive as architects. From the ubiquitous bar owner who sees the world from the bottom of an empty beer glass to the enterprising individual who wants to sell trees to Laos, the opportunities to invest time, money and ideas are second to none.

For those with steady jobs such as those in engineering, teaching or finance, Thailand is still a good place to work. Teachers pay is average, and once the idea of academic teaching is forgotten in favour of being an edutainer, then all will be fine. If a revolving bowtie doesn’t work for the kids, then some slapstick comedy does go down well. Thai children expect their teachers to be able to put on a decent performance, day in, day out.

cap schemes and the people convinced that owning a bar is the way to happiness and a fortune. Sadly in many cases, this is not true, although looking from the Gradually, an increasingly well-educated local population is rightly taking up the more stable jobs in the engineering and finance sectors. So, that leaves the madshores of Europe, Australia and the US, the idea of owning a bar seems incredibly attractive.

But reality soon kicks in. Perceived as a life surrounded by a bevy of booze, beauty and baht, the bar owner looks like he is in seventh heaven. Take the fact that he is drinking most of the booze, the beauties are a pain in the backside and the baht

just isn’t piling up, then we can see why many give up and disappear to live the rest of their days in some cheap backwater.

It would be impossible to list the madcap schemes that abound in Bangkok. We can be assured the get-rich-quick ideas are out there, and surely Sukhumvit is lined with gold. It may be… if you can convince Lao foresters to buy trees from Thailand, or you can sell an expensive “therapeutic” bottled water in a country coming down in buckets of cheap H2O. Despite recessions, global downturns and general gloom, Thailand remains the place for the plumber become architect or the individual who can turn the madcap idea into reality.

met a guy last week I hadn’t seen for ages. He quickly whipped out his business card, which declared him to be a film producer.

So the real estate business didn’t work out then?” I enquired.

It’s that kind of place, the Suvarnabhumi – the Golden Land.