Chiang Rai Weekend

I know that everyone has been waiting for a blog post and I'm sorry that it has taken me so long! There's been a lot going on these past few weeks. We started our first two classes, Thai Cultural Arts and Social Context for Community Development. For our Thai Cultural Arts class we learned how to weave in the Lahu tradition. We learned from one of the women on our campus how to weave, and I think if you look on Facebook there are a few pictures of us weaving. This week we will be learning how to cook some traditional Thai food and the next week we will learn about traditional Thai dancing. And then I think at the end of the course we will be learning about Thai painting. I absolutely loved the weaving and it was great to get out of the classroom and do some hands on learning with the Lahu people.

Our Community Development class has been awesome. I've loved every single minute of it. We spent the first week in the classroom discussing poverty and what it really means to be “impoverished.” We also talked about development and what that looks like when you change your definition of poverty. The second week of class was spent putting together a survey in small groups that was intended to be used in a Lahu village about 3 hours from Chiang Mai. We worked together to develop questions that would help us understand the social context of their village in areas such as security, environment, economic resources, and their social fabric. On Thursday of last week we headed out for the weekend to spend some time with the people in the village and conduct multiple interviews with people there. On our second night there we conducted interviews on a large scale, doing one meeting with the men and another simultaneously with the women of the community. The next day we went around town and went to individual homes and did interviews with families.

The interviews were our main goal of the weekend, but we ended up spending a lot of time with the children in the community. As soon as we got there the children started following us around. Our first night there we had probably 30 or so kids just following us around the village in a huge crowd. Most of them were to shy to even talk to us, but they were happy to hold our hands and show us around their village with no words. When we went in for dinner they waiting outside of the building we were eating in so that as soon as we were done we could play with them. By that point they were opening up a bit so we sang songs with them for probably about 2 hours. And even when it was time to go to bed they followed us into our host house and stayed downstairs until they were convinced we had gone to bed! And sure enough, when we came down in the morning they were already waiting outside for us. They were all so happy and comfortable with each other and within the community. It said a lot about the atmosphere about the community. The people of this community definitely looked more “poor” than what we've seen so far in Thailand, but in reality, physical poverty is not where this community is suffering most. Some other kinds of poverty they are face (economic, relationship with the government) are what leads to the physical poverty that you see. But even though they didn't have all the things that, here in western culture, we pin as essential for happiness, they were an extremely happy people. They are a Christian community and it was obvious that the church has played an enormous role in the lives of the people there and it was great to experience service with them on Sunday, even though we couldn't really understand what they were saying. We did get to sing a few songs for them in English and they seemed to enjoy it.

The end product of our work in this village is going to be a proposal of what could be done in this community to enhance their life and give them some of the things that they really need. Our goal, essentially, is to help restore some of the broken relationships that are present in the community. As a class we will present to our professor who is going to work with us to put together an “Action Plan” that will actually be proposed to some “higher ups” (I'm not exactly sure who) and hopefully be implemented into the community. This all seems so crazy to me! To think that the work I'm doing here in Thailand is actually going to change the lives of some of the people here is overwhelming. It puts a whole new perspective on “hands-on learning!” If you think of it, you could keep the people of this Lahu village in your prayers. One of their biggest needs is water and since right now is the dry season, they have even less. They often run out of water in their village and have to walk to a nearby village to get water. 

Traditional Lahu Dancing

Outside of doing interviews we got to do some really fun stuff in the nearby city of Chiang Rai. They have a lot of markets and so we got to visit those and also some children's homes in the area that work with really poor families and orphans. On Saturday we actually got to go elephant riding! It was amazing! In case you were unaware, elephants are huge! The way it works is that you sit on a bench on top of the elephant and then there is someone actually sitting on the head of the elephant directing it. There is an elephant park near Chiang Mai where you learn how to actually ride the elephants and then you get to bathe with them! I'm definitely going to do that before I leave.

 

This is the White Temple. We visited it during our weekend in Chiang Rai. It's hard to explain what it looks like and what it was like, but hopefully this picture gives you an idea. 

This week is mostly going to be focused on compiling all our information from the weekend to put together a final product before our professor leaves to come back to the States. And today we had our first class for Exclusion and Exploitation in the Greater Mekong Subregion. I'm really excited about that class, but it is also going to be a very hard one to ingest. A lot of what we discuss is heartbreaking and it makes it even closer to home because we are living in the country where some forms of exploitation are very prominent. As part of our class we will be making some trips to the red light districts of Chiang Mai and really getting a taste for what exploitation looks like in real life. 

On a lighter note, this weekend we get to go to film festival at Payap University in Chiang Mai, so I'm looking forward to that. And it's been a fun experience to get more comfortable in our community and go out on our bikes to get coffee or explore. We usually get laughed at by the people in our town for our horrible pronunciation, but the people love teaching us how to speak Thai, so they never fail to correct us and help us learn new words and phrases. And the food is still amazing. I'm really looking forward to cooking class this week so that when I come home I can make some of my own Thai food. I don't want to be in withdrawal completely! 

 Sorry this is such a long post, but a lot has happened! Thanks for all of your prayers and feel free to comment on here, email me, of Facebook me if there's something you want to know about or if you just want to say hi :) I also can't remember if I posted my address here, but I'll post it again just in case. I was told that it could take 2 weeks to a month for mail to get here in case you wanted to send me a letter :) 

Emily Cronk

194 M. 5 T. Luang Nua

A. Doisaket Chiang Mai Thailand 50220