Hello donors! Thanks again for supporting our project! With your help, we were able to travel to Thailand and build a total of seven toilets in three villages with Dr. David Mar Naw. Above you can see our team, my family for the month. Together we hiked through the jungle, dug deep holes in the dirt, hauled bricks, mixed cement, and built toilets.
The man in this picture is Dr. David Mar Naw, the leader of our projects. He is a medical doctor who was born and raised in Burma and currently lives in Chiang Rai, Thailand. In his first year of medical school in Burma, Dr. Dave was a participant in democratic reform protests that ended when the Burmese army opened fire on crowds of students. Dr. Dave was fortunate enough to survive, but had to flee through the jungle to escape arrest. He fled across the border into India where he eventually managed to complete his medical degree. Upon completion of his degree, Dr. Dave had the option to move to Canada, Australia, or the United States where he could live far away from the violence of his past. However, he instead chose to live in Northern Thailand upon hearing that hordes of Burmese ethnic minority villagers had fled the border from the corrupt and oppressive Burmese army. Ever since, Dr. Dave has dedicated his life to improving the lives of these oppressed people. Dr. Dave is himself part of an ethnic minority group from Burma.
For decades, Burmese ethnic minority groups have been victims of violent discrimination by the Burmese army. The Burmese army has routinely burned hill tribe villages and left land mines in their stead, raped hill tribe women to dilute their "impure" blood, and murdered hill tribe villagers who resist the army's demands. As a result, thousands of Burmese hill tribe villagers have fled Burma into Northern Thailand. Hill tribe villagers continue to flee to Northern Thailand to this day. Unfortunately, Burmese hill tribe villagers that cross the border to Thailand are not Thai citizens and therefore do not have regular access to education, healthcare, etc. As a result, these people are forced to live in remote villages among the rolling hills of Thailand's northern-most jungles. These are the villages in which Dr. Dave operates his free mobile health clinics and runs sanitation projects, including the project completed by our team.
Some of the villages were so far off the beaten path that we had to travel for day-long hikes up and down the hills through Thailand's insane humidity to reach them. But every village we went to welcomed us with open arms. They let us sleep in their huts and eat awesome Thai food. We worked from dawn to dusk each day building washrooms.
Living in the hill tribe villages was an incredibly thought-provoking, perspective changing experience. Despite their unfortunate history and ‘lower standard of living’, the Hill Tribe Villagers actually appeared to live quite happily. It confirmed my understanding that the privileges and luxuries we have in our culture are not all that important in creating real happiness. I could list a million things about the hill tribes that would be considered ‘lower standard’ circumstances. We went to the washroom in squatty-potties, we couldn’t turn on flashlights at night without getting mauled by bugs, we couldn’t wash ourselves easily and when we did the water was painfully cold, it took days to dry clothes in the humid weather, roosters would sometimes walk in our huts and scream at us at 4:00am, we slept in bug nets on hard bamboo floors, and there was obviously no electricity or anything. We might consider these to be really unfortunate living conditions, but it is surprisingly easy to adjust to once you’re there. You get used to it because there is no one with better circumstances to compare to or feel lesser than. There is no neighbor with a better shower. We all wash ourselves with cold water and it sucks for a second, but then its over and you’re clean. Anyone can get used to that, and everyone does.
You realize that a ‘lower standard of living’ can actually be a superficial thing to care so much about. These people are doing just fine because they have what is fundamentally important to being happy. They have an amazing sense of community; they have their safety, privacy, space; they have houses to build, animals to raise, plants to grow; they have places to pray and practice their spirituality; and they seem to be in pretty decent health too (thanks to Dr. Dave and fundraising by volunteers abroad). Let me give you some examples of a few things I saw that made me think this village was a cool place to live:
-Every day before dawn, the teenagers and the men would get together to play soccer or sepak takraw (a cool sport that’s like volleyball and soccer combined. Wiki it.) They have a blast. They’re so lucky to have the opportunity to play sports with such a big group of friends every single day. I can't say the same for myself while I’m living out these busy student years, and from what I hear the working life doesn't make things any easier.
-Every Sunday, a different family would host the rest of the village in their hut to a night of prayer and celebration for life. Every Sunday! They just get together and laugh and hang out and have a good time with all their friends and family. My closest friends and family all live in so many different cities, the idea of weekly visits with all those people together is so farfetched I wouldn’t even consider it. They’re lucky to have that opportunity too.
-Sometimes I would walk around the village just to see people enjoying life in different ways. I saw people sitting in a circle playing guitar and singing, I saw kids running around, playing and having fun (and of course I joined in on the fun from time to time), I saw mothers cradling their babies with genuine expressions of love on their faces. I saw a lot of good things, a lot of the same good things I’ve seen back at home. Playing and listening to music, playing with kids, and having a loving family are all among my favorite aspects of life. They have all that too.
Even though they have a ‘lower standard of living’, there is an incredible sense of community there that is really uplifting. I honestly felt like I could live in a village like that if it came down to it. So I guess if this blog is trying to make a statement it is that we should be careful not to assume that a ‘lower standard of living’ means a lower quality of life. My experience with the Burmese Hill Tribe Villagers has shown me that that is absolutely not the case there. I loved my time there so much that I’m going back in October to build more toilets and spend more time with the Hill Tribes. Can’t wait.
