Geography of Thailand
Thai people, with the age-old reverence for the elephant, symbol of Siam, like to say their country is shaped like an elephant’s head, Bangkok is mouth, and the south is the trunk. If you look at the map and include Myanmar’s southern extension (it was once part of Siam), the amusing analogy is quite convincing.
From top of the dome to the tip of the trunk, Chiang Saen in the Golden Triangle (of Chiang Rai province) to Su Ngai Golok (of Song Khla province) on the Malaysian border, the distance is around 1,800 km, which is a little more than the vertical length of the British Isles. From top of the trunk (west) to tip of the ear (east), the widest distance is roughly 800 km, from Three Pagodas Pass of Kanchana Buri province in the Mayanmar border mountains to the River Mekong to Ubon Ratchathani province of Thailand.
The area of Thailand is 514,000 sq km, about equivalent to the size of France or that of Texas. Despite its odd shape, the country has a clear and constant centre of gravity in the great rice-growing plains along the Chao Phraya River and her sisters. These water flow principally from the North, the elephant's dome, a regian of forested mountains and fertile volleys centred upon Chiang Mai province. Thai people also flow from the mountains in the north-east which mark off the elephant's ear. This would be the great plateau of Isan, 30O metres above sea level, sparsely vegetated and poor in soil. Beyond lsan lies Laos, separated by the broad Mekong River. To its south lies Cambodia, over the low Dong Rak mountains. The eastern seaboard and interior is flat and agricultural.
The rivers of the Central Plains also flow from the western mountains that form the divide with Myanmar; this is a regian of great timber and wildlife resources,
which unfortunately may be under threat of depretion or extinction at this time.
Southern Thailand is likened to the elephant's trunk. The Myanmar border mountains, averaging ground 1,000 metres in height, is thought to run south of this 'trunk' to Chum Phorn and Ranong province, around 500 km from Bangkok, at which point the true south begins. This is a region of rubber (but however nowadays it spread to across country) and coconut plantations, of coastal fishing and interior mountains and forests, the latter especially near the Malaysian border.
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