Batman, Fatdog, and a few other things

This week had many random happenings. First was some kids around the school grounds.







The Akha hill tribe girls do this cool embroidery. The girls sit around the picnic table chatting and sewing. The fabric is later sold to help support the school. Originally they use it to decorate their traditional outfits. The middle photo is from graduation. One of the 6th graders graduating, Saifon, is Akha, and her mother came in her traditional clothing. The Akha, have a seperate language, not similar to Thai, and they use the Roman alphabet. There are a lot of students at DEP that are Akha, and because they are born in the hilltribes, they don't have citizenship, so they are not eligable to go to government school without help from some one.
This site has some good information and photos about the other types of hilltribes found in Thailand. At our school we also have Hmong, Lisu, Lahu, Karen, and Thaiyay hilltribes. Its these hilltribe children who are highly at risk of being trafficked either for the labor industry or the sex industry, because if they were just roaming around their villages during the day, it would be easy for them to be kidnapped, or for their parents to try and get them a "better" job in the city, and be tempted to sell them. So its good that they have a free school they're allowed to attend, regardless if they have papers or not.

THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE

We had a niece of one DEP's partners come, and we took her siteseeing to The Golden Triangle.


I'm actually not exactly what the golden triangle is, but its something to the jist of being the area of the Mekong River, where it borders Thailand, Laos, and Burma. As you can see on the map, Thailand is in brown, Laos in yellow, and Burma in green, China is the pink at the top. Back in the day, this area used to be famous for all the poppies that were grown for opium, but the King has since replaced the poppies, with legitimate agricultural crops, that the goverment helps support the lost crops.


Lots of rice patties. Its the dry season. Thats why it looks like downtown L.A. This was around four in the afternoon. There is a lot of burning going on, people burn their fields in preparation for the wet growing season, or they're burning their trash, or just yard rubbish.


Me looking goofy on the back of Pilar's bike. I learned how to drive a motorbike. I would have put a photo of me driving, but that would have been dangerous. I drove the thirty minutes out to the golden trianlge, then Pilar drove back. The hardest part about driving her bike is remembering what gear you're in, because her lights don't work. Other than that, it mostly handles like a bicycle with slow brakes. (update, I have since, driven with Pilar riding on the back sidesaddle. [She wore a skirt one day]. It was a little shakey at first, but I only needed to remember that the faster you go, the steadier your bike gets).


Oh look there's the sun, looking so far away. This is about what its looked like for the past month here up north, warm yet overcast (with smoke and haze)

Weaving for a Living

This student is about 13 years old. She's also Akha. Here she is weaving the purple scarves that we sell on our website to help support the school. The older girls that live on site, have to work to earn their keep, so from 1 to 3 everyday they weave scarves or tableclothes.


I think she's so pretty. Looks like she's making the pink and green scarves to sell.


This is my other weaver friend. She's the one I help tutor English in preperation for her acceptence in the Mekong Youth Net. She's 18 years old but looks like she's 15. She's the one from Burma, and just learned to speak and read Thai.

Happy Saint Patricks Day

Molli, will understand this. Although there's not too much to understand...I like to take pictures of my feet, and sometimes dress them up with drawings and characters (to hide how dirty my feet are- since the water at my house has been out of comission for the past 2 weeks). Here I've drawn four friends, 3 boys and 1 girl, in their black tie attire. They're getting ready for their big party night at:

"BATMAN", or as the secondary sign says "BM pub"

So ya, this crazy place in little old Mae Sai, population like 20,000, has this huge club/concert venue, and its really called Batman, or BM pub. We heard that peolple drive atleast an hour to come and dance or party or listen to music here. It was pretty fun. They also have a lot of ladyboys. I like to check out their crazy outfits.


Our thai friends/coworkers from DEP, Gong, and Glooey. They're actually having a good time, but were tired of dancing. And yes she does have green St. Patricks Day face paint around her eyes.

Graduation

The kids don't have to go to school after the sixth grade here. If they can/want to go to college they can continue to high school. But I think most of the kids here might go to vocational training. But now that I think of it, I was the team teacher with Jamie for the 6th graders, which happened to be 6 girls, three said they wanted to be nurses, one wanted to be a teacher, one said a policewoman, and the last wanted to be a boss or a saleslady. They were all from Burma, so hopefully they'll be able to continue their education even tho they aren't citizens.


Here's Jamie tying on a cotton bracelet on one of the 6th graders. If Iremember correctly, the bracelets are kinda symbolic, you tie them on holidays like mothers day or graduation, then are supposed to leave them on until they fall off by themselves. Kinda like as a reminder of an accomplishment. All the teachers tied a strand onto the graduates.


Even Carol, another volunteer tied some on. Side note about Carol, she's from NY, but her parents are from Laos. Its funny to chat with her about having a South East Asian mom, and all their funny quirks. She also was called 'ee dta doh' = 'ya big eyes', by her mom, like my mom calls me, when I my eyes were bigger than my stomach.


Our little 6th graders...oh but 6th graders are actually like 15 years old here in Thailand.

Fat dog section


This is Oscar, my parents dog in Virginia. He's a miniature pinscher, cinnamon colored. I think he weighs about 10 pounds or less.



Here we have fat dog, he lives with a street restaurant that sells Pad thai. He's a cinnamon colored miniature pinscher too, but I think he weighs about 30 pounds, I'm not sure since it was too hard to lift him up.


As you can see he 's in top shape, sleeping and eating all day and night.


Here is the view of the restaurant with the sleeping doggy. Its my favorite Pad Thai in Mae Sai, because in addition to noodles in Pad Thai, you could also choose to add crunchy won ton wrappers (gil glop glop), or instead of traditional noodles, use rotini pasta, or crunchy green mangos. But most of all I like the name of the place: "Hi-Tech Pad Thai". Awesomeness.


Oh his little jokster owner took him on a run. (Just for the camera I'm sure).


Hi, we're fat! I actually love this dog and think that he's really cute. Every time we go to Hi-Tech Pad Thai, I like to play with Fat Dog. They told me his name but I forgot it. I think its something like Ee Ourn. (ha ha thats a thai joke for thai speakers only).

Thats it for now. Upcoming events...I'm making a solar oven to try and make some baked goods, since ovens don't exist in Thailand. I'm hoping to go to Chiang Rai to buy some cream cheese to make a cheese cake in it.