Life in Thailand, part 1: Hilltribe Village

I got back today after spending a couple of nights in a Karen (largest hilltribe in Thailand, live here and in Burma, in the mountainous border regions) village. I don't know what I expected; this is a bit cynical of me but I thought that "homestay" might be pushing it a bit, and that perhaps it'd be sort a bit human zoo-like (as I keep hearing the Padaung - long-neck Karen - villages are). I was wrong, thankfully.

The village has about 20 houses, 100 or so people including about 20 kids of primary school age or younger. To get there, we drove about 2 hours out of Chiang Mai, up into the mountains and deep into Khun Chae National Park. There was an almost-hidden turn-off somewhere, and then a 2km, very bumpy stretch of unmade road down to the village which was completely hidden in the jungle.

We got there and were welcomed by one of the village leaders, had a brief chat, and then had the afternoon to get ourselves settled and check out the village, which didn't take us very long - it wasn't very big! The kids eyed us off curiously, relinquished some of the fruit they were munching on (having pulled it off nearby trees) and then ran away giggling.










Nephew of the village chief; weeding around rice shoots; stepped rice paddies

In the evening we sat in the village chief's house (turns out the guy we talked to at the beginning was the brother of the chief - the whole village is like a sort of extended family) and he told us a bit about the way they live. There has been a bit of tension between the hilltribe population (not just the Karens) and the Thai Government regarding issues of conservation. I guess this is inevitable; the hilltribes are rotational farmers and traditionally have farmed the land for a period (which varies between weeks and years), before moving on to the next bit of land/next temporary village and doing it all again. With the conservation movement becoming more prominent, striking the balance seems to have been a little tricky - but overall it seems to be working for this village in particular at the moment.

In terms of "mod cons", the town has its own drinking water supply that comes from rain-water and also from the stream. The rest of the water supply is pumped directly from the stream, and they have a limited electricity supply from small solar panels arranged randomly in good spots around the village. During the rainy season they generally don't have any electricity at all. They eat the food that they farm - their own rice, fruit, vegetables, meat, eggs. The kids go to a little school in the village which sorts them out for primary school, then have to go further away for secondary. Their curriculum includes Thai language, their own language, culture, practices and agricultural methods, as well as the other "usual" stuff. The girls marry around the age of 20, men around 30. There are a few now going to study at tertiary level further away.I'm not sure what this will mean for the life of the village in the long-term - I guess it's an inevitable change with the times.

On Saturday we went hiking, Thai-style. The guides we had with us (two girls and a guy, the latter seemed to be with us mostly for comic relief and to drive the ute) kept saying, "How far can you walk? It depends on you. Can you walk 1 hour? 2 hours? 4 kilometres? 5 kilometres?". Leah (American girl who came too) and I said, "Oh, we can walk as far as you like - 5 or 6 kilometres is fine, further is fine too."

As it turned out, Saturday's schedule ended up consisting of: 1 hour walk, stopping at bamboo shelter overlooking rice paddies for 3 hours while snacking, then having a nap, then eating lunch, walking 1 hour back. The "timetable" for Saturday had us returning to the village from the fields at about 5pm. We got back at 1:15 and then played with the kids all afternoon. In the evening we were supposed to have another chat with the village leader but all the village inhabitants were totally preoccupied with trying to fix the satellite/antenna thing outside the chief's house so that they could all crowd inside, watch TV and drink beer. So we played cards late into the evening instead.









Picnic, village-style; our new friends (the woman in the background is wearing traditional hilltribe dress)









Flowers from the girls (the boys gave us a lime!); a sign nailed to the wall of the village school










Yesterday we left the village behind in the morning and had breakfast at Cabbages & Condoms. This is a fascinating franchise that has had quite a lot of success in spreading the safe sex message around Thailand - Here's a link that gives you a bit of an idea, although this is about the original Bangkok flagship. The food is good, too.

After having not slept at all for a couple of nights (mice, heat, mosquitoes) I crashed out when I got home and then went out for dinner with friends, then to the walking street (vibrant, busy night market, different from the horrible soulless cesspit that is the Night Bazaar) for the third Sunday in as many weeks. Ate a few things, thought about buying lots of things, came home with just a bag of mangoes.

Life's not bad.

Next weekend, part 2: Bangkok.