Day 1 // 4 Jan

We spent the day at Chiang Mai University, listening to Dr. Vithi Panichapan’s lecture about the history and culture of Chiang Mai, followed by Prof. Andrea’s lecture on Heritage Science and Prof. Walsh’s lecture on his research in Famagusta. They were all very interesting and informative, especially Prof. Andrea’s. I personally enjoyed his lecture the most as it reminded me of what I learned in Geography in the past. Human geography and urban planning was my second choice as a major to study, so hearing about his research and theories on heritage and conservation really caught my interest.

In such a fast paced and ever changing world, we really need people like Prof. Andrea with the passion to make a difference and really look into conserving buildings, culture and the history of places. So often we fail to think twice when tearing down a building to make way for newer, taller, more modern ones. All we see it as is demolishing an empty, derelict and therefore useless building, but what we’re destroying along with the physical structure are the stories, history and heritage behind it. Singaporeans are so quick to lament about the past and criticize the government for choosing to tear down these heritage rich places, but so far no great action has been done to actualize their concerns. It was good that Prof. Andrea gave his lecture in Chiang Mai University, because Chiang Mai as a city has so much culture and history behind its physical structures and national monuments. I think it was very beneficial for the local students as they were further educated about the importance of heritage conservation, and made more aware about the existing and growing number of technologies that will help with the conservation process. Hopefully they will be able to put this new knowledge into good use, and help preserve a sustainable balance between the development and conservation processes in Chiang Mai.

We started conducting our interviews today, but I think we have a lot of room of improvement. We were a little unprepared today in terms of prepping the interview questions, preparing the informed consent forms and getting good video footage. We also didn’t think about the audio recording and transcribing, so we may have missed out or lost a lot of useful information. In addition, after reviewing the responses and our own research topic, we found that they didn’t really tie with one another, which left us confused at what direction our project was supposed to take. At the end of the day I could tell the whole team was a little disheartened and disappointed at the things that went wrong today, but I am proud that we were able to get back up on our feet and regain our determination to do well for the rest of the trip.

We held an “emergency” group meeting at night to sort everything out. As mentioned, after reviewing the responses we gained from the interviews, we realised it did not supplement our 2 sub topics of intangible and tangible culture. After an extensive discussion together with our seniors, we decided to change the sub topics to perceptions of Chiang Mai’s culture from a tourist’s versus a local’s point of view. Doing this gave us a much clearer direction than before.

I am really proud that the group has been so responsive and adaptive. Meticulous planning really helps in efficiency, as “fail to plan and plan to fail”. However, reality will not always go according to the way we wish it would, and it is inevitable that we may face unexpected circumstances and obstacles along the way. Had we not been as open minded and adaptive as we were tonight, it would have been much harder on all of us to continue stubbornly on the path we had planned all along. I believe that flexibility and adaptability is one of the most important traits to have when working on a long term project, and especially so when working in a team. Thankfully our members possessed these traits and were very receptive to new ideas and suggestions, which not only benefits the project itself, but also the dynamics of the group. Looking forward to start afresh on our new direction tomorrow and here’s hoping things will work out better!