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Published: February 20th 2008
Rather You Than Me!
The brass rings that the Long Neck women wear can weigh up to 20 kilos.(Catherine)
We decided to head further north to Pai after it was recommended to us by one of the people on our Tibet tour. Pai is a lovely, relaxing riverside town that has a festival feel to it - foodstalls and make-shift bars line the streets and there are always bands playing in restaurants and on the pavements. It's also full of aged Thai hippies! Apparently they discovered Pai in the 60s and have stayed ever since!
We booked into a bamboo hut near the river (a bargain at 2.50 a night!) and spent a few days sunbathing, eating, drinking and swimming. We decided to save some money one evening by dining at a local restaurant down a small street (well, I say restaurant, but 'plastic table and eight chairs on the side of the road' is a more accurate description!). The food was lovely and we both ate for less than a pound but the woman who cooked our meals came and sat next to us and watched intently as we ate them! It was quite unnerving so we both ate our food in record time - I guess you really do get what you pay for!
Lovely Pai
Our hut was a little bit further down the river. From Pai, we took a bus back to Chiang Mai and then headed for Chiang Rai (I think it's the law that all the place names in Northern Thailand have to rhyme!). As well as being on the way to the Laos border, one of the reasons we wanted to go to Chiang Rai was to visit the nearby Long Neck tribal village. The woman in this tribe wear heavy brass rings around their necks from an early age which cause their necks to stretch. Legend claims that the rings are worn to protect the women from tiger bites but I'm not convinced by that!
We expected the whole Long Neck experience to be very touristy and we weren't disappointed. On arrival at the village we had to buy a ticket, then we were given a map showing us the route we should take. As well as the Long Necks, there were four other tribal villages including the Palong village where the women wear big brass discs in their ears. After being 'treated' to some tribal dancing at the Ahka village (think bored women banging big sticks onto a log!) we arrived at the Long Neck village. The women,
Cheers!
This travelling business is hard work, you know! who were either manning souvenir stalls or weaving, had posing for the camera down to a fine art!
The whole thing reminded me of going on school trips to castles where they recreate medievil times. The experience was rounded of perfectly when we arrived back at the ticket desk. The woman we'd bought our tickets from asked if we'd enjoyed ourselves. I said it had been interesting but we hadn't seen any of the Palong tribe (the village had been empty when we'd passed through). She replied by saying they were working in the garden, then she told us to wait there for a moment and went off to fetch one of them for us to photograph!
It was a surreal few hours and, as we drove off in our tuk tuk, we couldn't help but wonder what happens when the attraction closes at the end of the day. My bet is that the tribe folk breathe a sigh of relief, throw on their comfy clothes and head back to their real villages for the night, before beginning the performance all over again the next day!
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toria
non-member comment
long necks
Did you feel like you were intruding or are they so geared up to tourism it's now a way of life? It's a toughie this, no wonder the old lady was laughing, she was probably thinking she'd just earned enough for a pie and a pint by banging a drum at these daft tourists! Also, bit macabre but when the ladies 'pass on' do you think they leave the rings on for cremation or take them off? I need to find a book, it intrugues me! Did Matt really eat all the bugs? looking forward to the next installment x