Safe space One Thai woman's long quest to protect elephants

Saengduean Lek Chailert was five years old when she saw an elephant for the first time. It was in chains, lumbering past her home in rural Thailand on its way to help loggers pull trees from the forest.

- Patrick Greenfield

Saengduean Lek Chailert was five years old when she saw an elephant for the first time. It was in chains, lumbering past her home in rural Thailand on its way to help loggers pull trees from the forest. Back then, she saw the giant mammals like everyone else did - as animals that served humans. But that changed when she was 16.

The turning point came when Chailert heard a terrible noise from the forest. She scrambled through the trees until she found the source: a bull elephant scrabbling in the mud as it tried and failed to drag a log out of a ditch. Every failed attempt was met with punishment from the loggers and mahout, the elephant keeper.

One would fire a sling shot at the animal, another stabbed it with a knife and a third jabbed a spike into the elephant's leg. With each jab, the animal would let out a scream of pain.

"The elephant looked at me and I felt the fear and anger. I felt helpless and confused. My heart hurt a lot," says Chailert. "I tried everything to get the screaming to stop but I was disturbing their work, so I had to go. I kept asking 'why, why, why?'"

The incident changed the direction of Chailert's life. She was from a poor family - there was no electricity or school in her village - but she vowed to do something for the animals she loved.