Hill Tribes of Thailand

Free range chickens , village life Thailand

I awoke curled in a ball (only 7C, 44 F) during the night but finally figured out how to wrap one of the quilts around me like a sleeping bag to keep warm. It was out of the question to crawl under the sheets which felt like a skating pond.  Finally I slept and woke to first light, a misty view out the window. No point now in keeping them closed as the temperature was the same inside and out.  It was absolutely quiet and still.   

Dave and I and Cookie met for a breakfast of fried eggs, home baked bread and home made berry jam, plenty of fresh fruit, tea or coffee.   There was a tiny grill for toasting the bread over coals.  

Cookie got a few pieces of white of egg which she took gently like a lady,  not like boisterous pack of hounds that we would travel with today,  Noi's three other dogs. Today was a trek to a local tribe to eat lunch in the traditional way. 

The hikes for the next two days were not difficult climbs, but were still a series of little challenges: slippery bamboo leaves on the downhill slopes, shale, fires set by farmers next to the trail, village dogs fighting with our pack in our midst, trees fallen across the path and steep rocks to navigate.    I took it slow and I often trailed behind Noi who had done this a million times, no doubt.    I was still remembering breaking my ankle in three bones on such a trail four years ago.

After about 3  hours of trekking through pineapple and vegetable fields we reached a cooking house owned by a local woman and her  young son.  Noi started the fire in what was the kitchen house of her two dwellings.  We waited on the porch on a mat just for us. The shelter was equipped with a pit filled with sand in which the fire burned brightly without harming the floor. 

About a half hour later the local woman came in with a large bundle of sticks on her back and without a word or glance got busy helping Noi.  

 Dave and I  had been instructed to fill the tube of bamboo with uncooked rice and water.  It seemed doubtful that this would turn into a tasty cooked dish.  How could it expand?  Where would the steam go?

Tapping of rubber trees, Chiang Rai

Village life, Chiang Rai

Chicken house in nearby village

Bamboo residence of local farmer's family

Noi cooking our sticky rice in a bamboo stalk in the kitchen house, Thailand

 That is Noi's big knife he carried uncovered on the hike.  It seems he had lost his scabbard but needed the knife to cut the bamboo.  All the farmer's carried one and we saw them for sale in the village.

Noi explains how to cook the sticky rice

Fresh chicken breasts secured in bamboo over the cooking house fire.

Local friend of Noi preparing our lunch

Dave shows how to eat bamboo sticky rice, you peel it like a banana. 

Local woman tends the fire and the chicken

In the end the meal was delicious and the rice and chicken turned out moist and succulent.  The rice comes out easily from peeling down the sides of the thin bamboo.  It is now wrapped in its own little bamboo membrane which holds it together while you take a bite.  

There was also a sort of tomato omelette in one of the bamboo tubes that was a nutritious accompaniment.  No junk food here.  Unforturnately though, a motorbike arrives in the village during the week to sell candy and other modern "necessities". 

Eating our delicious omelette , rice and chicken , village life Thailand

 Village life looks to be a difficult life.   Sometimes the only medicine is herbal given by monks and the work can be grueling with few modern conveniences though wealthy farmers own trucks.  Noi says the average lifespan in the villages is 66 years.

 I heard that down the road one can pick up a wifi signal and we could see a few young people sitting on motorbikes there with phone in hand.  But life is slow and there is still a lot of "slash and burn" farming to rid the hills of trees for farming and a piles of plastic which no one knows how to get rid of. 

    We see that American commercialism has arrived with a vengeance throughout most of Thailand.  Seven Eleven,  Starbucks. Kentucky Fried Chicken are the most notable franchises but there are many.   The only French one I saw was Auchan but I am sure there are others...that's commerce after all.


Before we left the hut, the quiet woman who had cooked our meal with Noi came out with small items she had sewn which she was selling.  We both selected some and she shyly looked up at us.  When we got up to leave we heard a whispered " bye bye".   We both remarked on that later in the day.  It had seemed significant,  a bridge between cultures, perhaps.