Living in a National Park

Chaing Mai, Thailand –

Up the dirt and gravel road the van went.

Up and further up the mountainside.

We were in a national park, so it wasn’t surprising to me that the road was narrow and made of dirt.

Just shy of complete wilderness.

Wander five feet off the road and it might have been complete wilderness.

Suddenly, we came upon a few shacks as we arrived at the village.

From being in thick jungle to being in the middle of a small village, all within a few feet.

We’re visiting a hill tribe from Burma who have settled in the park, and had been allowed to stay by the Thai government.

And the moment we stop and step out of the van, the women in the village all spring into action.

Each of them spreading out the wares they have to sell.

Scarves, necklaces, and miscellaneous other items that they’ve made from the materials they have available in the village.

And the women whose houses are next to the road have an advantage over the others.

Those with a house on the road are able to spread out their ware over their front porches.

They’re able to display the full variety of their inventory.

Those who live away from the road come out with a bag full of one or two types of items.

They’re limited to selling what they can easily carry.

Often while carrying a child in the other arm, further limiting what they can bring out to sell.

It’s an unfair advantage, but one that they seem resigned to live with.

And even those with the road-front homes aren’t even in terms of their advantages.

Walking back toward where we entered the village to get a photo of something I saw as we drove past, I came upon a mother and daughter who, even though they had a good spread of goods to sell, seemed a bit like they were going through the motions without any expectation of actually selling anything.

They were far enough from where we had stopped that I may have been the only one from our group to wander past their home.

So, of course, I had to stop and buy a couple of scarves.

The woman with the centrally located home was doing plenty of business; she didn’t need any of my money.

These two, however, didn’t have any other prospects at the moment, so they were more deserving of my meager purchases.

I found it a bit odd, the only men we saw in the village were workers taking a mid-day break, still wearing their bright orange vests, like they were working in or around a highway, not somewhere off the road in a sleepy village. Otherwise, the only villagers we saw were women and small children.

I couldn’t tell if the men were from the village or from outside, sent in by the government to do maintenance of some sort.

We were in a national park, after all.

Government property and all that.

And it was in the center of the village that signs of the government’s involvement in the village were evident.

There, directly across the road from each other, were two modern buildings that weren’t built in the same traditional manner as the rest of the village.

On one side was a school.

Or at least I think it was a school.

It looked like a school.

Multiple classrooms and all.

Although I didn’t see any kids running around like you normally see during the school day.

Of course, if they were in class, they may not have been allowed to be out running around.

But with open-air windows, you would expect to hear some school-related sounds.

Across from it was the village Buddhist temple.

You could tell that’s what it was because it had no front wall, allowing us to see directly in to the altar area (or whatever they call that spot in the temple).

Come to think of it, I’m not sure there were any walls.

Just a beautiful tile floor, columns, and a tile ceiling overhead, all very ornately done.

These two buildings were quite the contrast to the rest of the village.

It was as if the government felt obligated to provide them with a couple of basic services, education and religion.

Not that I’ve ever thought of religion as a government service, but if it wasn’t I would expect the temple to have been built in the same traditional construction style as the rest of the village.

Not some shiny modern structure.

It was as I wandered away from the road that I got a feel for what life must be like in the village.

A couple of kids out playing.

A trio of piglets coming out of their pen to see me.

And an occasional villager, resting or working in their garden.

All women, of course.

And all of the older women I saw were dressed in traditional clothing.

Which seemed a bit formal to me.

They looked a bit over dressed for working in the yard.

Maybe they were dressed that way for the occasional visitor to their village.

Tourists who might drop in, expecting to see this exotic tribe from the neighboring country.

Like a step away from the modern world.

A step back in time to when life was much less urbanized.

Only this wasn’t some Potemkin village, a façade of what life was like.

No, this was the real thing.

A way of life that they were maintaining, not a historical reproduction that they keep up for the tourists.

It’s just that they’re more than willing to take advantage of the occasional tourist wandering through.

A chance to hawk their wares and make a few extra baht.

After all, they’ve got a lifestyle to maintain…

For more photos from the Hill Tribe Village, click here.