This is Ganga,a Temple Elephant in Sri

Lanka.

What do you do when you can’t turn away? You turn toward…

You get off your couch or your cushion or your pew or your knees and you turn toward the very thing you wish you didn’t know.

Temple Elephants

I traveled to SE Asia to make sense of an injustice I couldn’t quite believe was happening.

Not only does The emperor have no clothes on, but the elephant in the room

is invisible…

Monks walked by in prayer while friendly locals worshipped and

carried their children under Ganga’s belly to be blessed.

Tourists from all over the world walked past her too, but usually

after looking around the courtyard uncomfortably, willing themselves to

make sense of the Temple’s reverential beauty juxtaposed

against the forlorn little creature on display.

tourism

Learning about Temple Elephants only opened up Pandora’s box…

From Thailand to Sri Lanka

I started out in Thailand, researching wild elephants near Myanmar, but with Thailand now

having more elephants held in captivity then there are in the wild, a different conversation

needs to be had.

All of it is connected; from the capture of baby elephants that fuel the temple’s desires to the smuggling of former logging elephants from

one country to the next, to the capture of wild elephants for zoos as well as the unknowing

tourists who demand trekking and circus shows.

Except for all those elephants… WHERE DO THEY GO?

No more logging? That’s great!

Setting all of them free is not an option

After the Bangkok floods in 1988, logging became illegal in

Thailand, leaving captive elephants (and their mahouts)

out of work.

With most of the elephants’ wild homes turned into cropland, they had nowhere to go and mahouts could not feed their elephants or their children.

Elephants in tourism became big money overnight

Last April, logging also became illegal in Myanmar and it is expected that many more

elephants will be smuggled across the border in the next few

years, all to feed the tourist industry.

Baby elephants are highly sought after and many calves do not survive the Breaking of their

Spirits.

Compassionate Tourism can help change this.

that’s Some vacation…

Enter “The Bucket List”.

Circus shows

Everyone loves an elephant, right?

Bull hooks are not spirit sticks

Mixed Messages

Wait, what?

“But your zoo built the rape rack.”

Parallel Universe

Back Home in Portland.

Temples and Tourism in ASIA

=Zoos and Circuses

in the U.S.

It’s a cultural thing…

Not in my backyard

Out of 26 captive births, 15 are dead.

7 calves did not survive 2 months.

2 of 9 surviving calves are in the Ringling Brothers circus.

This is Conservation and Education?

Martin LUther King

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

may compassion fuel our freedom of choice

“Just as you can’t un-ring a bell, you can’t unlearn what

you learn.

After we learn about injustice and suffering of

another being, each of us is presented with two choices:

Action or Non-Action.”

–Margaret Mead

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”