4 Jan/Day 1: Next stop, Chiang Rai

Starting the day early, our next destination was Chiang Rai, a three hour ride away with a rest stop at Thaweesin Hot Spring. More specifically, my group and I were headed to the most beautiful university in Thailand, Mae Fah Luang University. Driving in, the surrounding forests and bordering mountains formed an incredibly scenic landscape that did not bring justice to the pictures we had seen online during itinerary planning.

Not before admiring the idyllic scenery spread out before us once again, we proceeded to learn more about Youth Development and Human Security as well as discuss about youths, educational reforms, and censorship with Professor Chirada. We came to realize that what we had initially hypothesized, how social media was increasingly used by Thai youths to voice their opinions of political and social issues online, was rather inaccurate. Instead, we discovered that the youths in Chiang Mai were more cautious in expressing their views on political issues due to the existing government policies in place to curb freedom of expression. Moreover, the prevalent surveillance of media posted online led to self-censorship in which youths did not post their opinions for the fear of the consequences of criticizing the government. Furthermore, from our interview with Professor Chirada, we faced several dead ends in her answers and were initially stumped in how to proceed with our research from this unexpected situation that the youths were in. We had overlooked the position played by the government in the expression of youth’s and their identity.

 

However, in the face of this newfound challenge, I found myself lucky to have my groupmates as together, we only seemed the slightest bit fazed. Rather, we quickly thought of possibilities for our next actions and direction of our research instead of dwelling on the obstacle that stood in our way. With a brief word of advice from our professors, we decided to wait until our next interview and focus group discussion with Chiang Mai University students to make a more-informed decision for our research topic. This experience was our first moment in functioning together as a team outside of Singapore, with each of us helping out another, be it in asking and forming the interview questions or filming and recording. As everyone had a role to play during our time at Mae Fah Luang University, the interview felt like a complete execution. I felt especially pleased that I had managed to ask several questions as being a shy person, it was nerve racking to interview a professor who I wanted to leave a good impression. I distinctly remember my heart thumping and even saying aloud that I was nervous, a feeling I was not unfamiliar with, being a rather anxious person. Being the first to speak to Professor Chirada to explain to her our research topic, I tried my best to keep it concise and brief, hoping to sound clear despite stuttering a little. This first step out of my comfort zone during our trip sparked a little confidence in me and was a great start to the rest of our fieldwork.

Putting aside our challenges, we finished with a delicious dinner and explored the streets of Chiang Rai’s Night Bazaar. Like Chiang Mai, the streets were aglow with small golden lights strung overhead and acoustic music filled the air from a guitar performance in the open air restaurant. With less tourists and a more comfortable walking pace, we strolled through slowly though our luck soon vanished. This was when we chanced upon a filming of a Korean reality TV show, complete with an impressive camera crew including drones and a group of Korean and European stars. Before we knew it, we found ourselves in a middle of the small crowd of gathering fans. Clearly, k-pop and k-dramas alike were not unheard of and far reaching, just as it was in Singapore like a frenzy. Soon after, we turned in for the day returning to the hotel. I hope the following days will enable us to collect more material information to use as well as continue working efficiently as we had done today.