Yesterday, from Luang Nam Tha we went on a 2 day trek to vist an 'Akha' village along the river Li. The kids in the village were the most excited to see us- their shouts of "Sabaidee!" were loud as soon as we were visible to them 250m down the track. We were asking politely before asking any photos but before I even asked these kids took out their cameras and started snapping away at me. When we ate a meal with the chief of this 54-family village he told us about the difficulty of relocating to outside the Nam Ha National Park in April 2007. One of the positives with the new less-remote location is that none of the children had ever seen a 'falang' (literally 'French person', but used for all foreigners) before and now they all are comfortable with (but still intrigued by) us. They also have security of being within 1 day of the hospital, unlike the 3-day trek required in the past. Bundled with this is still the hard call about the impact on their culture that we, the annoying falang, with our plastic cameras, pathetic malaria-susceptible bodies and teeth-destroying lollies have. For now, there is a happy medium.
Sarah asked one woman for a photo, she declined (as Sarah would have I would think, in the same position) but this woman was intrigued by the camera and, after a bit of a play with it, she let Sarah snap her and her children.
I just had to include this one of our 7hr trek to get there. I think I slipped on every step of that slope.
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