MANAGER (Bangkok, Thailand) 16 February 06 Lucky Charmers (Thomas Brecelic)
Photo at URL: Student Jay Defario fixes his eyes hypnotically on two deadly cobras.
Chiang Mai snake school teaches fearless students how to wrangle reptiles
Agrinning bald man clutching a king cobra leaps out from a billboard, startling drivers navigating the winding roads through the Samoeng Valley in Chiang Mai province. There are many animal shows in the area, but the man’s wide smile makes you think that this is one spectacle you shouldn’t miss.
Mae Rim Snake Farm, 15 kilometers from the city of Chiang Mai, is not your regular old snake show. Here you can get your hands on the slippery serpents and learn to be a snake handler at Thailand’s only unofficial snake handling school.
One of the Kingdom’s top snake handlers, Manut Oemme, 45, known as the “Snake Man,” always draws a crowd and today is joined by his student, Jay Defario, 30, who will soon be a certified snake handler.
Defario, a burly Italian-American from the Bronx couldn’t be more different from his teacher, Manut, a slight, skinny man with more than 30 years of snake handling experience. No one can accuse Manut of not living on the edge – he has nearly died four times from cobra bites.
This odd couple is causing a buzz around Mae Rim, as foreigners and locals alike come to see them wrangle some of the world’s deadliest limbless reptiles.
Manut has long been known as the “Snake Man.” The title was previously bestowed on Si Sa Ket snake charmer Boonreung Buachan who died from a cobra bite in 1998 after setting the world’s record for spending the longest time in an enclosed space with snakes.
The veteran liang ngoo (snake handler) seems unfazed by the buzz about the farm. “I just want to pass on my knowledge,” says the Mae Rim local who has trained five foreigners. “And none of my students have died yet,” he says proudly.
There is a three-day introduction where students learn the basics, such as how to handle non-poisonous pythons and rat snakes and how to hypnotize a jumping snake which can strike very vigorously.
If the students pass the early levels and show an aptitude for handling reptiles, they go to the next level which involves poisonous snakes. “It’s all about technique. First, I teach students to overcome their fears. Then they train with non-venomous snakes and learn how to handle them safely,” explains Manut.
This curriculum might not fit the image of mystical men wearing turbans, serenading cobras to the music of gourd flutes, but it’s becoming a niche market attracting foreign students like Defario who are looking for something more than an amazing sunset on a pretty beach.
“The danger element appeals to me most,” says the upstate New Yorker who has been studying Thai in Chiang Mai for the last 18 months. “One wrong move with the cobras can mean the difference between life or death. And that’s the appeal of this course!”
Defario seems to have tried everything at least once. He was a salsa teacher and built bridges in Indonesia as a Seabee in the US Navy. He learned Japanese while based in Okinawa and even worked as an exotic dancer. And though he admits that snake charming is something that he probably won’t be able to put on his resume, he’ll be proud just knowing that he is qualified to handle poisonous snakes.
Ringside at the farm, a small group of Israeli tourists wait eagerly for the midday show. Outside there’s a veritable Who’s Who of poisonous snakes – vipers, adders, taipans and spitting cobras – in cages secured only with chicken wire.
“Welcome to Mae Rim Snake Farm,” announces the MC over a crackly speaker. “Today you are about to see the amazing cobra show.” Her voice trails off with a giggle, as cheesy go-go music begins to play. Snake Man saunters into ring like a game show host.
He fixes his eyes hypnotically on the three cobras, whose speckled hoods are flaring with anger. Then he grabs one and puts its head in his mouth. “Cobra spit poison in his mouth,” the MC jokes, for dramatic affect, “ but cobra sure complain of Snake Man’s bad breath.” The crowd laughs.
The American apprentice takes the two cobras from his teacher on cue and throws them safely into a hemp bag while Manut finishes the shockingly surreal act of milking the cobra of its venom. The tourists, who have never seen the like, snap away at this Kodak moment. “Here,” says Snake Man, to a tourist who yelled out in the crowd. “Take picture of this!” He thrusts the cobra’s head, fangs exposed, in the guy’s face.
“It gets them all the time,” says Defario, who has been bitten more than 30 times since enrolling. “The latest one was a rat snake but fortunately they are not poisonous. But boy, can they bite.” He scratches his nose to emphasize the point. “It bit me on the nose and left marks for two weeks.”
When Defario graduated from rat snakes to deadly cobras in week three, it wasn’t an entirely smooth transition. “One bite from a cobra and you die in 20 minuets. Manut stresses it’s all about keeping the cobra’s attention with a focal point. One hesitant move, and it will strike you.”
Defario shook like a leaf the first day he went into the ring with the cobras. Manut had taught him how to control the cobra by using a extended finger as a focal point. “And as soon as my finger touched the cobra’s nose, it struck and hit my hand, but didn’t get its fangs in. It took a while before my heart got back to normal,” he says of his rite of passage.
It’s late afternoon, and the duo have just finished their last show. Defario is keen to push the envelope again, trying a new repertoire under the watchful eye of his mentor. He’s mastered handling three cobras in the ring, and wants to try his hand at Burmese spitting cobras.
He nimbly jumps in the pit of these frightening creatures who can spit a distance of more than two meters. If their venom gets in your eyes, you go temporarily blind. “I’ve got glasses on,” says Defario with an incredibly laid-back air.
Manut watches his star pupil and gives encouragement. “Keep it steady in there.” In the pit, the cobras are spitting venom left right and center. “You have to be really steady when you go into the ring,” says Defario on the finer points of this art after he gets out of the pit. “If you are shaking at all, they’ll go for the movement and strike.”
Defario says he’s almost done with the course. “I’m definitely glad I did it. It was an experience. The big thing for me in any aspect in life is overcoming fear. Whether it’s fear of failure, fear of rejection or the ultimate fear – death. I measure my success in life in how I have overcome and managed my fears. Never in my life did I think that I would catch a six-foot cobra and put its head in my mouth. Manut has taught me so much about overcoming fear. And there’s no better qualified man to be in the ring with poisonous reptiles than Snake Man.”
And the feeling is mutual. Manut puts a python around Defario’s neck, a tender gesture in this environment. “You work for me?” he asks sincerely, in one of those rare moments when he’s not joking around.
Manut sums up the type of person who will succeed at snake handling: “You must be little crazy and fearless to be snake charmer in Thailand!”
And though Defario might be getting As in snake handling, it’s the touch of the absurd that’s the prerequisite for prospective students who want to take the snake-handling course.
After he finishes the course, Defario plans to go back to the States while Manut will continue to tempt death on a daily basis while training the odd intrepid traveller. Only last month, he had his left index finger amputated after another cobra bite.
“I still do five shows a day,” says Manut who must have more lives than a cat. “Cobras can take down buffalo, but not Snake Man.“
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