LOP BURI, Thailand -- Where else in the world can a tourist be a soldier for a day or two, shoot off an M-16, jump from a parachute tower, climb rocks, ford streams and hike through the jungle?
These are but a few of the martial activities that tourists can participate in at Thai military bases all over the country.
Our two days of very basic training began at the base in Lop Buri, 154 km north of Bangkok, which is the second biggest in Thailand. Thirty-five temporary recruits (men, women and teenagers) from all over Asia and the West, wearing khaki vests and black baseball caps emblazoned with the winged logo of the Royal Thai Army Airborne, gathered in a clearing for a demonstration on how to catch poisonous snakes.