The price of luxury

So first, we went to Na Nong Bong village in Loei province, which is a village negatively affected by the nearby gold mine. We were using the unit to collaborate with Dao Din, a KKU student group focused on social issues in Isaan. I was a unit facilitator, so I had a bunch of meetings and extra stuff to do, but in general, the experience was quite enlightening and super fun!

My host family in the village grew rice (kiiiiinda like every other homestay family) and rubber trees (unlike every other homestay family). My roommate was Sai, a first-year undergraduate law student at the university. She was a new member of Dao Din, so the whole homestay thing was all very new to her. We got to the house pretty late, so we immediately went to sleep. But we got back up bright and early at 6AM to go harvest the rubber with the family. After a super confusing motorcycle ride full of hairpin turns and views of the breathtaking mountains around us, Sai and I finally arrived at the family’s rubber tree field. Basically, the trees were equipped with little spigots which guided the tree’s sap to a small black bucket connected to the tree. Our job was to dump the sap in the black bucket into a larger bucket. Then, the sap was to be molded, flattened, and dried further in order to make rubber. It was pretty fun, although as it turns out, I really fail at walking uphill with a bucket of sap. I didn’t giff it, but I certainly came close.

Afterwards, I had a few meetings, so the rest of the day was super boring. Until I remembered that the village’s water was contaminated by cyanide, arsenic, and lead from the mine. And I had been bathing in it. Thankfully, nothing bad has happened so far, but… That was certainly a scare.

The next day, Sai and I had the bright idea to go hiking up a mountain, since Loei is known for its mountains. The first bit consisted of stairs. Lots and lots of stairs.

But after a while, the stairs stopped. And then I resolved to climb up the steep trail on my hands and knees. And then THAT path stopped; we eventually just hit the sheer rock cliff. So Sai and I finally looked down and saw a beautiful view beneath us.

Afterwards, we had an exchange with the Provincial Health Office about, you know, the cyanide in the village’s water. And they, of course, denied that it existed altogether and tried to reason that the mine wasn’t causing any pollution. Instead, it was cigarettes that were causing so much pollution in the water and air. Riiiight. After that, we all painted protest signs for the villagers, saying stuff like, “STOP THE MINE.”

The next two days were filled with meetings ‘n stuff. We went to a community meeting with the villagers and government officials. The government had come to “listen” to the people, but really, they could probably care less.

Maddie with a sign documenting all the horrible things that have happened to the villagers that came in contact with the water contaminated by the mine.

Maddie, Babz, and Ajaan Poi, gettin' pumped.

We students also had the opportunity to “interview” the governor, vice governor, tambon (district) official, amphur (subdistrict) official, and some people from the Ministry of Environment. Aka, we bombarded these people with questions about the human rights violations that our host families were facing every day. And boy, did they get angry.

This guy got super pissed. He's the amphur official. He told one of our group members, Bryant, that he didn't know anything and should go back home to America. I have all 10 or so glorious minutes on my camera, if anyone's interested.

That was certainly an adventure. The next day, we headed to a village close by that faced the construction of a copper mine called Huay Muang. I stayed with Sai again, but we also had Katie and her Dao Din counterpart Aoi in the house with us. The mother in my host family there was actually the headman of the village. The first headman that is a woman in Loei province. The headwoman, I suppose. And she was pro-mine, which was really, really disturbing to me. But that was kind of unsurprising, as her house was pretty freakin’ sweet. The next day, we took a tour of the area surrounding the village that was already carved out, ready to put a mine in. We also got to tour an illegal iron mine, where people come to take the minerals out of the community’s land without the proper licenses or land titles. And the evidence of chemical contamination was more than obvious.

Ew.

Dead snake bits and unidentifiable blue substance everywhere.

Gold.

This unit probably gave me the clearest picture of human rights violations… Ever. After facilitating an exchange with the villagers, where they all vehemently told us about their opposition to the mine and strategies that they would use to fight the construction of one in their community, Katie, Sai, Aoi, and I had dinner with our host family.

We found out that the headwoman/host mom really did care about the environment but thought that the mine would help strengthen the economy of both the community and Thailand.

Now, if you have on any gold jewelry on right now, I would advise you to take it off.

But doesn’t she know the environmental impact of the mine? That for every OUNCE of gold mined, there are 79 tons of toxic byproducts (arsenic, cyanide, lead) that are just dumped into a lake? That those byproducts leach into the surrounding rivers, which the community depends on? Of course not; the woman has money stuffed in her ears and can’t hear the truth. Don’t get me wrong – she was nice and hospitable, but how could she really claim to be on the side of the people if she is in favor of something like that?

Something else I’ve been struggling with is the balance between keeping communities just the way they are and keeping the country just the way it is and developing large-scale products to draw in more investors and money for the country. And the issues of mining and dams in Thailand seem to make it clear that the preservations of local wisdom and culture in communities are more important than development, but it’s still something for me to reflect on.

Anyway, I have less than 1 month left in Thailand. Wow. So for the next month, we’re doing final projects, which means going back to a community and helping them with an issue. Not sure how it’s going to work, but I’ll keep you all updated!