Antsy

Ahh yes, the infamous blog....I have to confess, I've been avoiding this. After coming back from my last trip to a children's home in Mae Hong Son, my body decided it was time for shut down, both physically and mentally. So I listened to it, albeit a bit grumpily, and have been taking it slow n easy. Which surprisingly, wasn't the easiest task! For someone who is usually quite slow at home, able to spend a lot time doing well...nothing of real importance, I just was wanting to leave again, get my hands on something to do, something fun to see, interesting people to visit. I think I experienced what you could call the "go go go and crash" syndrome, where the minute you stop, its like your on full stop and your body crashes.
Anyways, haha that's rather uninteresting to read. So Songkran, the Thai water festival celebrating the New Year, was being celebrated in full swing when I got back, and I although I did get to see some of the fun, I have to no pictures to testify :(. I had wanted to wrap up my research stuff, get last minute documents, go over interviews, ask any last questions. But well, a holiday is a holiday! And some now its over a week later, and yes I'm almost done with my wrap up, but its slow going. The last thing will be on Sunday, where I will go over my findings with one of my contacts, check if I'm on the right track etc. And then I'm done, yay! Well with this part at least....oh the joys of writing a thesis when I get back.
Mae Hong Son by the way, was quite a fun experience, though also very HOT. The children's home is a 5 hr ride by minivan into the mountains. It usually has some 30 kids, but there were only about 11 as many had left for the holidays to visit relatives, or even parents in some cases. Although some kids really have nowhere to go, I was admittedly surprised that they just get to "go visit relatives". The situation for these kids seems to be one where being in a children's home is just more beneficial in terms of getting education, getting food and a roof over there heads, than if they were living at home or with relatives. But it doesn't leave the impression that these kids are the 'worst off'. But there were a few, like the cute 8 yr old boy, Ot, that are orphans, or don't have papers and so have to stay at the home during holidays. It was however hard to grasp how these kids landed in the home, and again, how the intricate and closed web of networks among the Shan worked in connection with the Home. The children all speak Shan, learn to read and write it too, and living in Mae Hong Son, a notoriously Shan area of Northern Thailand, really added the feeling that these kids were really growing up with a more solid Shan identity than in other areas.
So the english speakers there were limited, with the one girl that was translating for me leaving mid-way on a mysterious 5.30 pick-up ride to Chiang Mai. Yes, that was the only way she could get around b/c of her paper situation. I only got 2 real interviews, but in all honesty that was good enough. I got to eat delicious Shan food, and take the kids swimming as I was the only driver they had, and sit vegging in the coolest room on the place watching Thai dramas most afternoons, whilest teaching the kids some card games. It was relaxing and enjoyable, with as usual the only drawback being not knowing the language. But the 2 eight-year olds took it upon themselves to teach me some Shan words, pointing at their ears and saying "hoong" and so on and so forth till we covered most everything within a 5 meter radius! The 8 yr olds were easier to connect with, as the barriers of respecting your 'elders' (as I was considered ;-)), were quickly broken for distracting fun. The older ones instead would insist on getting my plate of food for me at every meal, setting a place apart for me, almost afraid to sit with me. This was their way of 'respecting' me, though it was difficult for me to comprehend how deeply this is ingrained, and that they were not to be deterred.
Also fun was seeing Poi Sang Long, the Shan novice monk ordination ceremony, which basically amounts to one big celebration in the community.
I also met up with a fun Canadian gal there, providing a refreshing break form the Home.
That was Mae Hong Son. What have I been doing now? Well, after Songkran week and 'crashing', I have been doing various sorts of random. The weather has become unbearable, so I've resorted to sitting in various cafes with my laptop to get work done. I met up with a few friends and contacts, kind of concluding my time here, saying goodbye. My hardest one by far was Bee, the wonderful Singaporean lady who took me on several trips, visiting Shan communities. I did a wrap-up interview with her, and then just caught up a bit as I hadn't seen the busy lady for a few weeks. I managed to stay dry-eyed, but when I headed back to my guesthouse in town, it hit me that I had just said goodbye. Weird how you can get so connected to someone in such a short time. One thing I will always hate, is saying goodbyes. I don't do well with them, and prefer to get them over quickly, kind of shut off my connection to a people and place without dragging things out, not look back. This time, I haven't been able to do that with this trip. I've been doing some fun things here in Chiang Mai this last bit of time, browsing the night markets, picking up a few gifts, getting a massage, going on a random motorcycle ride into the hills with a Thai friend I met, etc etc. But its dragging a bit too much for my tastes. So tomorrow I finally have my last 'meeting', will purchase my tickets, and leave early Monday morning. I'm heading off to Burma, for 3-4 day trip into one of the areas they do let you visit in Shan state. Then, get back, grab my big backpack and catch a night train to Bangkok, and fly off to Amsterdam the next day! Strange, is the only the word to describe my feeling right now.
I'll let you all know how my last week went when I get back, along with a last piece on my 'impressions'. It'll probably be written on my long layover at the airport :-).

Wanderings

Well, here I am, in Chiang Mai staying at the same place I've been staying the last couple of times here. Tomorrow, I leave again, for my last official research-related trip. This time, its off to Mae Hong Son, an very mountains area in northwest Thailand (so no, I have not been there before). I'm going to and staying at a children's home called the House of Hope.

Songkran, the Thai water-festival, falls right at the end of this week though, so I'm wondering where I'll be, how transportation will be, etc. during that time, as it gets pretty hectic!!

But okay, so I'm sure your expecting just a tiny bit more than just info on where I'm headed off to next. However, I do believe I'm slightly blogged-out. I'll give a quick recap, and post a few photos, and that's it for this time I think.

Last week wednesday, after hanging around Chiang Mai for nearly a week, I headed off to Mae Sai, to a youth camp for the Shan migrant children (though there were a few other minority groups there as well). I took an 4 1/2 hr. air-con bus ride there, with Thai sitcoms blaring the whole time - and yes these sitcoms are well...unique, have their own Thai flavor shall we say-, and was met by a nice couple that has been working in Mae Sai among the Shan migrants for 3 yrs now. On the way up, I had already noticed that the checkpoints were a bit stricter, with every single bus passing through being checked thoroughly for proper I.D. cards etc. I saw one man holding up the infamous 'white paper' that most migrants get to stay here. Farangs on the other hand, don't even get asked for their passports. Once there, Samuel and his wife showed me around a Shan migrant village, and it struck me how set apart the villages here were, as opposed to other Shan areas I had visited. Here, they are really treated as temporary laborers, and Samuel explained that they are really dependent on and exploited by their 'masters'. That is how he called them, and indeed it seems a fitting title for a situation that is comparable to modern-day slavery.

The camp itself was a lot of fun....for the kids. I have to admit, I can count on one hand how many 'camps' I've been to in my life, and well, let's just say I've never been a huge fan for some reason. And indeed, it brought back that wave of feeling from back in the day. I think this was mostly b/c I came to talk to the kids, to interact with them etc. However, #1, I don't speak Thai, and #2, I was not given any defined role or task, so what happened was a lot of hanging around, kind of feeling like an outsider trying to tagalong or something. Which I guess I was, really. Ahh, well, its not that the time was unproductive. I got about 5 good interviews with the kids, via a very helpful young lady Jo who was willing to translate while also having all the camp staff tasks on her plate. And the kids were great, with the added bonus of the location being beautiful!
So camp ended on saturday morning, and I was trying to figure out my plans to get to Mae Ai, and town about 1 1/2 away from Mae Sai, to visit a development project among the Shan. Only problem was, I didn't really have a bed to crash on for saturday night, and I had two options: go to Mae Ai via hopping songthaews with my little communication skills or sit in a random guesthouse waiting until the couple I was to meet would pass through on their way back to Mae Ai. Yeah, songthaew hopping is the option I chose! It was a fun adventure. What was supposed to take 1 1/2 hrs, took me about 3 1/2 hrs. Why? Simply b/c songthaews don't run on time schedules like buses. Rather, they run at the whim of the driver. So if he wants an afternoon rest, okidoki let's wait. If he wants to chitchat at leisure with other fellow drivers, fine. If he wants to eat his lunch, alrighty. If he wants to wait for a ton of passengers to finally fill up his truck, yep that's cool. So I waited patiently, under a nice bamboo-covered rest platform out in, well, rural farming country aka the middle of nowhere. But luckily there was only one road to Mae Ai, so as long as I said where I was going, it got there. And for a very cheap price I might add! Less than 2 euros.

I stayed in a nice bungalow near the Mae Kok river in Thaton, the neighboring town, and then stayed at the Scott's house from Monday to Wednesday, which all was very nice and relaxing. I visited 2 local Shan communities, interviewing a few families, and brushed up on my English-teaching skills during my time there. Next to that, I got to see a slightly different approach to reaching the Shan, namely by setting up a more development-oriented project. The whole idea was to get the Shan to stand on their own two feet by teaching them basic health care, micro-enterprise (like raising crickets to sell), skills to get their roads paved etc., and helping teach the kids. I enjoyed this more hands-on approach, which really strived for involving the locals in improving their own livelihoods.

Yup, and that was that! Took an insanely long (though luckily not too hot) bus ride back to Chiang Mai, leaving at 2.30 and arriving at 7.30, a trip I had previously done in under 3 hrs. I hit the ground running though as soon as I got back, b/c I wanted to squeeze in some important interviews before weekend, leaving for Mae Hong Son, and the crazy holiday period coming up. I got the one I wished for with the elusive Shan Women's Action Network, and was quite happy! Now off to one more adventure, and then I get to look forward to transcribing, transcribing, and wrapping up loose ends as I got back over the last months of research! Yay! My brain in the meantime, is slowly starting to scream, overload! I thought to travel around a bit after all is finished, but well, after all this coming and going, I don't have much energy to go jet off again. I'm afraid would arrive back in Holland dried and shriveled up like an old sack of potatoes, hehe! But we'll see...