by Tourists Flock To Thailand Jungle Camp To Try An Elephant Massage By Three-Tonne
Being trampled on by a three-tonne elephant is not usually the first thing that springs to mind when thinking about ways to relieve stress. But tourists are flocking to a jungle camp in Thailand for just that.
The spa treatment is being offered in Chang Mai province, where a number of Asian elephants – that weigh anywhere from 2.25 to 5.5 tonnes – administer the massage using their trunks and feet. Tourists are flocking to a jungle camp in Thailand to be massaged by elephants.
But the ᴜɴᴜsᴜᴀʟ massage certainly isn’t for the faint-hearted – with a wrong move having potentially ᴅᴇᴀᴅʟʏ results. Ian Maclean, from Hawaii, USA, captured two foreign tourists – one male and another female – lying on the ground with a towel over their midriff.
The giant Asian elephant is then led up to the tourists by a mahout, before ‘gently’ patting them to replicate the techniques used by ᴍᴀssᴇᴜʀs. The spa treatment, which is being offered in Chang Mai, Thailand, is certainly not for the feint hearted.
The Asian elephant have been trained to replicate the techniques used by ᴍᴀssᴇᴜʀs . It looked quite ᴅᴀɴɢᴇʀᴏᴜs and I saw many years ago the perils when an elephant stepped on a tourist’s leg. You can imagine what happened and the ᴘᴀɪɴ that person was in.
Unfortunately, the truth behind elephant ᴍᴀssᴀɢᴇs isn’t nearly as attractive. Like almost all trained elephants, the animals featured in most of these tourist attractions are stolen from their mothers at a young age and subjected to brutal training procedures designed to crush their spirits.
At the end of the experience, the orphaned elephants are left broken and dispirited – in other words, pliable enough for their trainers to tell them what to do, like making them massage tourists. Many mahouts, or trainers, will also use bullhooks to keep the performing elephants in line – sʜᴀʀᴘ ɪɴsᴛʀᴜᴍᴇɴᴛs ᴜsᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ᴊᴀʙ the elephants if they misbehave. And it’s not just ᴍᴀssᴀɢᴇs. Nearly any elephant used in tourism – including those used in elephant rides, or even U.S. circuses – have been subjected to some sort of training crush designed to make them obedient.
