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At about seven, we leave home and ride our motorbikes off into the misty morning. About half an hour on the road from Chiang Dao, a small path leads us through a forest and down to a cluster of wooden houses, where our friend calls us into his home.

 

“O mue che pe,” I greet him and his parents. “Orh mae,” come eat, his father replies. We join him on the floor around a steamy bowl of bone broth with pumpkin and herbs, a plate of brown stir-fried mushrooms and an omelet. His mother scoops spoonfuls of white rice onto plates and we pass them along, and once everyone is set, we dig into a big hearty breakfast.

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We take our first bites and feel the fresh flavours hit our taste buds, the warmth go down our stomachs, and our eyes shone with wonder. As kids from the city, we stare at the food, fascinated by how one can grow food with nothing but bare hands and seeds sown on bare soil – the ability to create life and tend growth in this dirt we call ‘dirty’. To understand time and the seasons so well beyond ‘reason’. To smell an approaching storm and sense the right occasion to bring the land back from its hibernation.

 

This morning, with blessings sought from the spirits, the villagers trudge and wade through the flooded paddy, ducking up and down to plant their saplings in the ground. Though back-breaking it may sound, all I hear is singing and laughing all around. They chatter and they banter, shoulder to shoulder, their motions in rhythm and in sync, coordinated and orchestrated.

 

Just as the sky began to drizzle, bit by bit with all the helping hands, the field was filled and full again. Today, the host family feeds those who have helped, and the next, they’ll be fed by others who they’ll help. This land, though owned by one, is shared by all.

 

At a time of looming natural disasters, collapsing food security and ever-growing social disparities, there is much we can learn from indigenous communities about how we can use and protect our natural resources with kindness and ingenuity — treating our wildlife, as well as each other, with love and respect.

 

On a memorable trip to an indigenous Karen community called Pa Tung Gnam, our friends showed us their traditional culture, one shaped by and tied to the mountains that surround them. They told of their stories and beliefs, passed down from their great-grandparents. This is what we learned from them about “living with the land”, and we’d like to share it with you.

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