Touching down 15 minutes early after a fairly comfortable 3 hour flight we had arrived in the world famous Thailand, our transport of choice appeared to be a mix between a fire engine and hearse, it was obviously unsafe as it had no back but careful lads like us kept our stuff together and held on while still relaxing. Tour guide of the year Jack said he knew of a place we could stay so we set off, he was quickly found out as a chancer when the driver with years of local knowledge didn't know what Jack was on about so he handed Jack a map and asked to point it out, after around 10 minutes of head scratching and claims of "I know where it is now" he finally pointed to a place on the map and we set off, wherever we got dropped off was no where near the hotel as we had a further 15 minute walk until we finally found the alley we were looking for, yes an alley.
As it turns out its a nice little hotel, it's pretty obvious but for £2 a night I wasn't complaining, and it had its own toilet/shower unlike the hole in Malaysia.
We gathered our thoughts and some money and headed out to tourist hotspot Tiger Kingdom, we chose to get in the hotel tuk tuk, a vehicle designed for comfortably 2 people was overloaded with us 4 and Mohammad the driver, the engine must have felt violated after driving up hills with us in it and the driver was revving the shit out of it, it got us about though so nobody dared question the Thai manufacturing.
We arrived at the tigers and Muhammad waiting outside, they had 4 sets of tigers, big, medium, small and smallest, Me, Max and Jack opted to have the pictures with the smallest tigers as they were cute and least likely to kill us, Jon "I'm too manly for kittens" Hubbard thought he would throw his money about and get pictures with the big and small tigers and also hire a photographer to take some snaps of him frolicking with the man-eater, then you sign a compulsory form saying if we get eaten it's not there fault.
We arrived at the tigers and Muhammad waiting outside, they had 4 sets of tigers, big, medium, small and smallest, Me, Max and Jack opted to have the pictures with the smallest tigers as they were cute and least likely to kill us, Jon "I'm too manly for kittens" Hubbard thought he would throw his money about and get pictures with the big and small tigers and also hire a photographer to take some snaps of him frolicking with the man-eater, then you sign a compulsory form saying if we get eaten it's not there fault.
We went to the small one first to queue and get one of Jons out the way, we must have been there about 30 mins and Jon hadn't even moved up the list, his ignorant English mentality came out when he decided he shouldn't have to queue, he threatened to cancel his pictures and not see any tigers, he became very irritable during this and even started blaming us 3 for his bad decision, he even called us "cop outs" for choosing the smallest tigers, I was unaware there was a pre written rule that we had to get the big tigers but apparently there was and only Jon had known about it. He decided to cancel the photographer as it would make him shoot up the queue quicker, he demanded a refund, the fact that all the money went to looking after the tigers didn't change his decision he would rather the money in his pocket than see the tigers eat for another day.
Over an hour later Jon went in to see his first tiger, the tigers were clearly drugged and looked out of it, Jon looked uncomfortable around the animals and it was rather humorous to watch, he did relax after a while and looked a little more settled than the awkward actions he had displayed previously. Me, Max and Jack went to see our little tigers and there were many cute moments even though they looked exhausted but had to be kept awake just so the tourists can play with them. We finished up with Jon seeing the big ones, the amount of drugs these animals must have had in there body is unthinkable but it kept them quiet so it's probably in everyones best interest.
As this that wasn't enough animal cruelty for one day next up we went for a brief trip to Monkey School which after witnessing the actual "school" it was more like a concentration camp. We were greeted with the distressing scene of a monkey in a cage the size of a shoebox trying to break the lock off and get out, we went round to the stage bit and saw a monkey being taken to a pool, as we gathered round the man asked us to throw coins in the pool, he must have had the tightest crowd as no one parted with any money until I stepped up and threw close to £30 in the pool, pocket change for me.
As this that wasn't enough animal cruelty for one day next up we went for a brief trip to Monkey School which after witnessing the actual "school" it was more like a concentration camp. We were greeted with the distressing scene of a monkey in a cage the size of a shoebox trying to break the lock off and get out, we went round to the stage bit and saw a monkey being taken to a pool, as we gathered round the man asked us to throw coins in the pool, he must have had the tightest crowd as no one parted with any money until I stepped up and threw close to £30 in the pool, pocket change for me.
Sadly missed the first half of the show, I was gutted my day was nearly ruined when they decided to do the show all over again, I couldn't believe my luck!
We watched the whole thing this time and highlights include one of the monkeys choking after the man pulled its rope too tight, a slutty monkey dressed sexily, monkeys riding bikes, doing shopping and lifting weights, it was entertaining but bad at the same time, at least the monkeys weren't caged all day, according to a sign the monkeys were set free after 5pm, quite where they were set free is anyone's guess as there was no fencing round the place just an open field at the back, if I had to bet I would say they were chained up 24/7. Back at the hotel Me and Max indulged in a marathon sleep from 2pm to around 6am the following day.
We watched the whole thing this time and highlights include one of the monkeys choking after the man pulled its rope too tight, a slutty monkey dressed sexily, monkeys riding bikes, doing shopping and lifting weights, it was entertaining but bad at the same time, at least the monkeys weren't caged all day, according to a sign the monkeys were set free after 5pm, quite where they were set free is anyone's guess as there was no fencing round the place just an open field at the back, if I had to bet I would say they were chained up 24/7. Back at the hotel Me and Max indulged in a marathon sleep from 2pm to around 6am the following day.
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