While you may be familiar with the term “white elephant” as a label for a rare item that is no longer useful to its owner, did you know that there are also real white elephants? Their existence was one of the hundreds of new things I learned upon moving to Thailand for my research assistantship with Think Elephants International!
Although something of a misnomer, white elephants, also known as chang phueak or pink elephants, are not actually white. Often they are incorrectly called “albino elephants” rather than the proper term, chang samkhan, which means “auspicious elephant.” Another surprise to Westerners who use the phrase “white elephant” to describe an odd, impractical object, is that white elephants are not considered to be impractical or worthless in Thai culture. On the contrary, they are used as a symbol of power by royalty, and one white elephant used to be featured on the flag of Siam (1855-1917). In fact, possession of a white elephant was a sign of great virtue and wealth.