CHIANG MAI NEWS (Thailand) 02 June 05 Riding the Dragon (By zig zag)
Driving along the winding road that cuts through the tropical jungle around Samoeng Valley, we pass masses of billboards advertising a plethora of animal shows. The most striking one is a garish cartoon figure of a grinning bald man who's holding, as a trophy, a king cobra. This is the Mae Rim Snake Farm where, as the billboard suggests, 'Snake Man' charms the fangs off the cobras.
Inside this tourist attraction, Snake Man fixes his hypnotic stare on the three cobras in the ring whose jewel-speckled necks are flaring with anger. "Snake Man be quick, don't slowly," shouts the MC, over a crackly speaker in bad English. With a lightning strike of his dexterous hands, Snake Man clasps the three cobras. The crowd goes, "ooooh".
"Now you watch Snake Man swallow snake head," says the MC to the tourists gaping at Snake Man who has two cobras dangling around his throat like deadly necklaces, while he sucks on another cobra's head as if it were a lollypop. After his reptile aerobics, he milks a cobra of its venom while an orchestra of digital cameras click away capturing the venom as proof of danger. "One snake bite can kill a full grown elephant," informs the MC to the awed audience.
In Mae Rim, Manut Oemmee, 43, has long been known as the Snake Man, the title more famously bestowed on Si Saket snake charmer Boonreung Buachan who died from a cobra bite in 1998 after setting the world record for staying seven days and nights in a pit of cobras. Manut, who has nearly died four times from cobra bites, has also earned his title and wears it with pride.
An oddity in today's show is the lone white face in the snake pit. Jay Defuria, a 30 year-old American former engineer in the Navy SEABEES, looks on at his master Manut with affection. He is learning how to become a snake charmer. Jay's chequered past covers the gamut from being a salsa teacher (Citylife featured him in our March 2004 edition), building bridges in Indonesia, learning Japanese while based in Okinawa and even working as an exotic dancer. He knows he won't get a BA in snake charming, "but at least I'll be qualified to handle poisonous snakes," says the upstate New York farm boy who has been a resident of Chiang Mai for the past 18 months and has dedicated the last few to learning the art of snake charming from Manut.
His fascination with snakes began as a child on his family's farm. "When I wasn't chopping wood and visualising it was my father, I'd go hunting for snakes," says Jay, a big burly Navy boy at heart, who loves to get his adrenalin rushing. "I've done bungee jumping and parachuting among many other extreme sports and this opportunity of a lifetime to work with deadly snakes came along while I was teaching computer programming at Payap University, and I just had to grab it."
It's Jay's turn now in the ring. He's the Steve Irwin of the northern hemisphere, and I reckon he'd give him a run for his money as far as venturing where whackos never dare to tread. Manut is shadowing him, and whispers advice the entire time he's with the snakes. Jay moves his head backwards and forward - like his master - keeping the attention of the snakes. "Now put its head in your mouth," demands his teacher. And Jay, to my horror, does.
"This is the ultimate adrenaline rush," explains Jay later, while playing with a Burmese python. "Snake charming is definitely on the top of the list. Never in my life did I think that I would catch a six foot cobra and put its head in my mouth. But now I've done that. It's kind of neat."
Two weeks ago, Jay had a close shave with death. "It's a trick where you stop the snake's movement with your finger," he explains. "And I got all the way up, and as soon as my finger touched the cobra's nose, it struck. And it hit my hand, but it didn't get it's fangs in. It took a while before my heart got back to normal."
Now Jay is leading me to the spitting cobra pit. Before you can say Jack Robinson, he's leapt over the 4 foot wall into the pit with five spitting cobras. The sign outside warns that spitting cobras can hit at a distance of over two metres. If the venom gets in your eyes, you go blind. "I've got glasses on," replies Jay casually.
His trainer looks on and giggles. The cobras are hissing venom left right and centre. He's been spat on twice and simply wipes the venom from his glazed glasses as he jumps out of the pit. "You have to really steady your hands when you go into the ring," advises Jay on the finer points of handling cobras. "If you don't they'll go for any movement and strike."
The former Navy engineer personifies the maxim that if you aren't sitting on the edge, you are taking up too much space. Training with venomous snakes is just another aspect of his life. "I mean, when I first started, I was shaking like a leaf. I'd go to reach for that cobra, and my hand would be bouncing three inches, back and forth, but I've overcome that. I'm still nervous when I grab them. Because obviously I could die every time I play with them."
Manut puts a python around Jay's neck, a tender gesture. "You work for me," he says, in one of those rare moments when he's not joking around.
But Jay says he's almost done with the snakes. "I'm definitely glad I did it, it was an experience. The big thing for me in any aspect in life is about 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."
Future plans? "I'm returning to the States next month to finish my degree and hope to work for NASA one day, making calculations for trajectory. Because of my diabetes and injuries from an accident which damaged my spleen, which is the reason I have to inject myself five times a day with insulin, I probably won't ever get into space, but you never know."
Nothing seems to slow Jay down as he rushes from one interest and challenge to the next. He says his next mission is to go into Free Burma and visit the KNLA rebels. "That should be kind of neat," he says, as he lets out a contagious giggle.
His love for the serpent hasn't been returned however as Jay has been bitten over 30 times since the start of his training. But he's not fazed. "The latest one was a rat snake," said Jay. "Fortunately they are not poisonous. But boy can they bite." He scratches his nose to emphasise this point. "It bit me on the nose and left marks for two weeks."
Not being able to speak Thai well probably contributed to this. "I would misunderstand what my trainer said, and grab hold of the wrong end of the snake or something and get bitten."
Some expatriate ladies in Chiang Mai may remember that Jay has long had an affinity for snakes. During a Full Monty performance at a recent hen's night his tattoo of a dragon with its 'ride the dragon' inscription proved to be very popular.
Riding the Dragon