The Thai Pirate - Thai Blog and Travel Stories

The dogs of war - Just another battle at Pornchai

Being that it's rained fairly hard lately, mutts have been completely excluded from going inside; bar Lucky, who gets everything her own way, all the time (unless she relieves herself inside the house). She happily rests inside, smug.

2. The other mutts are not so 'lucky'. They are reduced to staying outdoors, even though they desperately try to get indoors? Who knows why? It's nice out.

3. What's this? Lucky ventures outside, no doubt to rub the rest of the mutts noses in it. She clearly thinks she has a better status,  'above' them all, and she acts like it.She doesn't need to be 'part of a pack', she's has mummy Sutiya to look after her.

4. At first she feigns subservience to arch rival Pinky (left), and plain dumbass Whitey (right), by sitting down. Don't be fooled, a devastating attack is about to be launched.

5. Pinky gets a speedy and ferocious nip to the ear, Lucky obviously doesn't like the way Pinky was staring at her, and reckons she can 'do her'.

6. Poor Pinky has no option but to retreat from the gnashing, jumpy attacks of the shorter and smaller Lucky, who relentlessly nips at her whilst making highly funny, screamy yips.

7. The attack continues but Pinky calls back-up from big daddy Joe, who is also agitated at Lucky's screamy yips. Amazingly he actually manages to 'get off his arse' (it's not tough being the big daddy around Pornchai).

8. But Lucky is as thick as she is retarded, and continues to believe she is going to win, so battles away as more of the Pornchai pack close down on her.

9. It's not looking good for Lucky; I bet she wishes she had been a bit more humble now.

10. She finally gives in, but still gnashing those pearly whites, never surrender........kind of.

11. After a while, other mutts mooch off, leaving Lucky to go for the door, back the safety of 'her' office, to live to fight another day (or in about 5 minutes, as these types of battles are constant).

Read another of Lucky's battles here.

Places to visit in Thailand 14 - Bung Chawak Zoo, Suphanburi

(I had to have a go with the python, two ten year olds were daring me).

Bung Chawak Zoo, Suphanburi, great day out in the country. Last weekend we had a visitor over from England as well as a friend of the family from Thailand, both young 'uns. Sunday afternoon and we decided to have a day out, off we went to Bung Chawak Zoo.

Bung Chawak has quite a good selection of wildlife, lots of lions, tigers, elephants etc, most lying completely still and as far away from the crowds as possible. Everybody tries to get their attention, whooping and calling out, but the beasts seem to know that, by completely ignoring you, you are more likely to go away.

I was a little apprehensive going to a Thai zoo, but it pleasently surprised me. The zoo isn't very big, nothing compared to say, Chessington, back in the UK, but the animals seem to have plenty of clean shelter, and lots of water. The only real improvement I would suggest would be to increase the zoo's size and give them all a bit more space, but this applies to pretty much every zoo I've visited.

The walkways and tropical surroundings are really pretty, overall the zoo is a very nice place to relax. There are a few little cafes and shops selling novelties; the zoo itself is located on the banks of a large river, which helps cool the place down, as well as offer other attractions (fishing / paddle boating etc).

There are a couple of nice restaurants opposite where you can get a good plate of food and cold drink, away from the masses of over-excited kids (who are not that terrible to be honest). Watch out for the chaotic car park though, if you ever visit you will see what I mean, the phrase 'make it up as you go along' applies.

Pricing is always a laugh in Thailand. There is always this and that written about 'dual pricing', either by tight arse farang, whinging on about it, or the other side, 'do-gooding' foreigners who seem to want to give away all their 'hard-earned' to the poor lickle Thai's.

Throughout Thailand there is essentially a two tier system, one price for Thai's and another for foreigners. I think at the zoo it was 20 baht a Thai and 100 baht for farang. I am not too bothered with this system, everytime I try to reason about the why's and wherefores behind it, it just gives me a headache, I'd rather just pay the extra.

Having said that, I'm not one to chuck money away either, so I guess my view is, get away with it if you can; my method of getting around the dual pricing system is to hide while a Thai pays. If that isn't practical, an ear to ear grin, with loud 'saw wat dee krub' (with wai if they are older) often does the trick. The more Thai language you can throw into the mix, the better....... I find if you are genuine enough with your greeting, and your Thai sounds strong, this usually gets you through without too much bother....

.......and if it doesn't, well, another 50p bites the dust.

At the end of our trip were the pythons in the pictures above. I've never really fancied hanging a large python around my neck, but as the kids in our party leapt in with both feet I had to 'keep face'. All I can say is that they are bloody heavy, and the one that sat on me disliked me as much as I did 'it'. Pretty much the same thing happened with the very likeable 'dressed up' Orangutan; the kids loved sitting next to him, but he took one look at me, and we both decided, we were never going to be best buddies.

Bang Chawak is a good place to go for a morning or afternoon if you are entertaining young ones. The animals at this zoo seemed pretty well looked after and there is a good selection for everyone to see. You do find at Thai zoo's you can generally get closer to the animals than you could back in the UK, and its easy for little hands and feet to get inside the cages of half tonne lions and pacing, hungry, siberian tigers.

BUT, by far the most dangerous thing at this Thai zoo is the car park.

Mommam - Pack leader

The dogs at Pornchai have now become a 'pack'. They roam all over the place, bark at anyone who is unfamiliar, chase birds (and never catch them) and keep other stray dogs out.

The leader of the pack is a female called Mommam. She is a bit of a handful. She must be pushing 4 years old, which is pretty good going for a mutt in Thailand, plus, she has done this without any help from me (my being here has significantly lengthened a couple of the mutts lives out here). She is one tough cookie, she doesn't fear anything.

Except for one thing. Fireworks. When the temple nearby starts blasting off fireworks willy nilly for some event or other, Momman turns into a shivering wreck. Just before Christmas, she disappeared into the bush for 3 days. Everyone was upset as we all thought we had seen the last of Mommam, but she actually found her way back after so long, testament to how tough this mutt is.

In many ways she is a hard dog to like, even for a dog softy like me. She beats up on the other smaller dogs on occasion, chases and barks at anything that moves, including people she knows well / kids etc. She has also growled at me before, to the point where I thought she might go for me. I have had to give her a couple of good solid kicks up the arse to remind her 'who is who' in this food chain.

But she is a great guard dog, and actually very obedient to those she trusts. Still, it was hilarious for me to find her the other morning looking so sheepish (pic above).

She had obviously chased after some bird / frog / squirrel, and ended up falling into a dirt pond.

How I laughed. (Pic above - Mommam isn't amused)

Snake bites in Thailand. Poor little Pinky

Snakes exist in abundance throughout Thailand, as little Pinky will testify.

I came into the office at 7am to find a very sad looking, bloated faced Pinky sitting before me. Little Pinky had been on a reconnaissance mission on the grounds overnight and had fallen prey to an attack from a common Nor kiel, or green snake. (the picture above right was taken after Pinky had been given the all clear, after the mad rush to the vet. The picture above left is Pinky after recovering from the bite).

Green snakes are very common, and can be found mainly in trees where they blend in so well. Now and again when walking through Pornchai one will fall out in front of you as you stroll. They are small and very shy, quick to slither away, so Pinky probably cornered or harassed it to make it turn on her. Thankfully they are only mildly poisonous, non-life threatening, even for mutts in most cases.

Should Pinky have been bitten by something a little bigger or more poisonous it may have been a different story. On this occassion a quick rush to the vet sorted it all out, and after an injection and 7 days of drugs she is as right as rain. The swelling in her face is a reaction to the toxins in the venom.

One of the reasons Thai's keep mutts is to flush out pests and snakes and frighten off potential intruders, so Pinky was just doing her job. She's a bit too good at it though!

Lucky vs Coco. How the great fall.

Here is ten minutes in the life of Lucky, our youngest pooch, and adopted child of my wife Sutiya.

1. A hapless Coco, current big daddy of the TEE Coffee Shop, digs for a mystery prize beside a rock. Who knows what it could be? Coco is happy.

2.Suddenly, a vicious surprise attack is launched by Lucky, a young bitch pup who vies for her share of the TEE Coffee Shop pie, and all the glory that it brings.



3. The onslaught is not pretty, Lucky overwhelms the larger, surprised Coco, and wrestles him into the bush with canny instinct and precision. It looks like curtains for Coco.


4. But Coco, being a more experienced brawler, manages to get a couple of sneaky hits on Lucky, who while still on top, decides it's time for her guerilla ambush to end, and she retreats from the grizzling Coco.

5. A beaten and bewildered Coco looks on, startled at the speed and ferocity of the attack. He is well peeved, and no doubt plotting some kind of heinous revenge on the mischevious Lucky. Or possibly he'll just sit and sniff his balls.

6. Lucky, basking in satisfaction and glory,  sits a top of her rock throne, beast of the hill, king of the jungle, top man. It's her Coffee Shop now.



7. ......A noise behind catches her attention. A possible intruder? This is her god damn Coffee Shop, how DARE anyone enter her domain.




8. But alas, Lucky forgets. She is just a dumb mutt, with a very small head, and brain. As she goes to see off any intruder, she runs straight into a water feature that sits behind her rock throne.


9. A desperate Lucky clambers out of the water, total shock all over her face, with everyone around collapsing in laughter.

What an idiot haha.


10. And as she sits in the dirt, soaked, she is a very different Lucky from the one that, just moments earlier, had basked in victory at the defeat of Coco.




11. And the end of the story? Everyone gets covered in cack. Thanks Lucky, next time I will cheer Coco.