For many visitors, walking around Bangkok will allow them a glimpse of many things they would never see at home, some awful, some amazing. Dudes selling fried bugs, beggars with awful diseases, bike paths that end at brick walls and an alarming cross section of social strata that would make a New York subway station seem like a Ku Klux Klan rally (I'm not even sure if that makes sense). Anyway, anything that can seem a bit odd is desirable - there are so many tourists walking around that to stand out from the crowd will guarantee you a better chance of attracting a bit more attention. One of the strangest sites that visitors can see in the steamy, crowded streets of the Big Mango (lovingly copied in reverence to the Big Apple, but with a decidedly more Asian flavour) is an elephant. A huge, lumbering, real life elephant. In Thai culture, they're highly revered animals, praised for their strength, loyalty and intelligence - one of Thailand's most popular beers is even named after them (see left) - 'Chang' is 'Elephant' in Thai. To see one of these magnificent creatures walking down the sidewalk next to motorcycles, taxis and Starbucks is indeed odd. Their handlers - mahouts - carry little bags of sugarcane or fruit, which they sell to tourists for 20 baht per bag, which you can then feed to the elephant. It's neat and interesting and very, very cool - but please - don't do it.

While it may seem that you're helping the elephant, you're actually only helping to perpetuate the problem. Let's be honest - for an elephant, life wandering the streets and red light districts of Bangkok begging for food is a pretty crappy existence. One could argue that their handlers are simply trying to make some money using the resources they have, which is a valid point - there are only a handful of places in the country that care for elephants with any degree of responsibility - but the fact is, having elephants in Bangkok is illegal. The mahouts either pay off the police or are simply ignored, a phenomenon this excellent article discussed.

It's sometimes hard to ignore the thing - I mean, they are frickin' huge, and the mahouts often go to extreme lengths to get your pity-cash (like the guy in the photo below, who I caught looking through the window of popular Irish pub the Dubliner, which is usually stocked with foreigners). If you see an elephant on the street and are tempted to feed it, take a look in its eyes and ask yourself if that's the look of an animal at peace. It's likely that you'd have the same expression in your eyes if your monkey owner put a chain around your neck and dragged you up to his tree-top neighbourhood to entertain his friends.