Pigs in Thailand.
Ahimsa- prohibition of harming and killing living beings.
The unimaginable suffering of animals in the shadow of the Buddha.
A place where animals are objectified to the limit, with an obvious lack of respect and cruel practices during their unloading and slaughter.
It is difficult to tell a story with so much suffering: the suffering of animals, and the suffering of people who fled a country where they could not live, and for whom the slaughterhouse became their home and a playground for their children.
These children and their families are refugees from Burma. The slaughterhouse environment is sometimes the only sight they have on a daily basis.
One in several hundred not out of empathy but in the name of religion.
Animal release is a traditional Buddhist practice of saving the lives of creatures destined for slaughter. They are marked with a ribbon. People become stewards of life and death.
Pigs chased away with metal rods, hooks hammered into their cheeks for easier movement to the slaughter site, pigs killed without stunning, with sharp knives driven into their hearts. The screams of the animals at the site do not disappear.
Thailand, seen through the prism of animal rights, is a quite different place from the image in tourist brochures.
