The haze enveloping much of northern Thailand has largely dissipated with some Wednesday night storms clearing the air. Light showers in the Chiang Mai region on the night of the 11th to 12th was a good start to getting rid of the haze but quite fierce storms with high winds and heavier rain on the night of the 14th led to a substantial improvement in air quality. In fact, the high winds did actually cause some damage in certain areas -- our office sign blew off the wall in Chiang Mai -- but we reckon most people would consider that a small price to pay.

Fallen tree in Nimmanhemin.

Compare the photo below with that taken a week ago; okay the skies are still not crystal clear, and don't expect them to be so until the rains start in earnest -- usually towards the end of April/May -- but it is a vast improvement. You can now walk around Chiang Mai city without getting a sore throat or red eyes and while we still advise some caution for further north and are aware that conditions can change pretty rapidly, at present the city and surrounding areas do not present any particular problems.

Not great, but better than the below, which was taken five days ago.

Before the rain.

Chiang Mai, Phayao, Phrae, Nan, Tak, Lampang, Lamphun and even Chiang Rai have all improved, though conditions in all parts of Mae Hong Son province, which hasn't received any rain, remain at present critical.  Hopefully further forecast storms may hit the latter province soon and with luck (or government cloud-seeding efforts), some more showers will occur across the region.

Tags: haze, Mae Hong Son

Having been further out and about today we have to state with all honesty that the haze situation is worse than we thought and worse than we may have made it appear in our recent post -- and we're certainly not going to be going out and about anymore in the near future unless we can avoid it. Visibility in downtown Chiang Mai today was down to a kilometre and we hear it is worse in Chiang Rai. And Thai meteorological services now admit that dust particles in the air in some areas of the north (such as Mae Sai, Chiang Rai and Lampang) are over twice the Pollution Control Department's acceptable levels.

Downtown Chiang Mai at midday today.

After yesterday trying to blame slash and burn farmers in Burma and Laos, the Natural Resources and Environment Department admitted it was 99% due to farmers burning stubble and forest clearance by agro-business and have promised radical steps to solve the problem. (Note that this is from the government whose health minister recently blamed the rise in dengue fever cases to the increase in Thai women wearing hotpants and thus making easier targets for mosquitoes. It's also the government that just received stinging criticism for failing to act after last year's floods devastated much of the nation.)

Anyway said radical steps involve the really radical action of actually enforcing the existing non-burning and non-forest encroachment laws! How did they think of that? Anyway upon stating their intent to apply existing environmental protection laws, ones that they presumably thought up in the first place, the Ministry for the Environment have confidently claimed all haze problems should be over within a week. (We're not making this up!)

Unless you are particular fans of sore throats, stinging eyes and respiratory illnesses we do advise against any unnecessary travel to the following provinces for at least the immediate future: Mae Hong Son, Tak, Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, Phayao, Phrae, Nan, Lampang, Lamphun and Uttaradit. Watch this space and we'll watch the wastes of space down in government house.

Tags: Chiang Rai, haze, Mae Hong Son, Mae Sai, nan, Phayao, Phrae, Tak, Uttaradit

Any self-respecting country laying claim to 'wilderness areas' has to have them! Reports of large ape-like creatures emanate from remote mountain and forest areas of every continent bar Antarctica: the Sasquatch or Bigfoot of Canada and the United States, the yetis of Siberia, yowies of Australia and abominable snowmen of Tibet -- and Southeast Asia, with its stretches of dense and often little-known jungle, is not immune.

What lies beneath?

(This post actually comes with a soundtrack, so at this point you may wish to click this link.)

Malaysia in particular has persistent reports of creatures at home in Endau Rompin national park, or check out this report from Setapak forest. Laos and Vietnam have sightings of 'hairy wild-men' from the Truong Son mountains along the remote border area (see here) and Cambodia, the Kulen yeti.

With an estimated 15% forest cover, Thailand is not traditionally a yeti hotspot, but we uncovered similar legends on a visit to Nan province's Mae Charim national park. Mae Charim lies in a mountainous region of eastern Nan, backing onto the Lao border, and contains extensive forest area and very few inhabitants.

Rom Khlao Village

In fact part of eastern Nan is even known as the 'empty quarter' and in Mae Charim there is just one village: the Hmong settlement of Rom Klao. We began our trip in Rom Klao where we met up with our old friend, former communist guerrilla, ex-hunter and now local guide Pha.

Pha, resident of Mae Charim.

As we hiked through the forest I asked Pha what wildlife was found in the area; I knew elephants crisscrossed the border between Nan and Xainyaburi in Laos and tigers had been confirmed in the area but ...

Unsuspecting trekkers in Mae Charim.

"Well plenty of deer, boar, leopards and wild cat species, macaques, some gibbons in remoter areas and then the big hairy black things," he said.

We've known Pha for years and he's a pretty down to earth sort of chap. He's spent his whole life in these forests so our curiosity was piqued.

"You see them most on that mountain over there," continued Pha, pointing to a steep, jagged limestone outcrop we could just make out some way off through the canopy. "Daytime's not a problem. They're nearly always only seen at night but after dark no one in the village would come down here, that's for sure!"

They walk upright, are around six-foot tall, covered in dark hair, and potentially aggressive -- villagers report attacks and even fatalities. Fanciful legend, distant folk memories of when Neanderthals still shared the earth, a result of eating the wrong kind of mushrooms or are they really out there in the forests of northern Thailand just waiting to be discovered?

Whatever your opinion, Mae Charim is a beautiful part of the country and there's great trekking and rafting on the park's Nam Wa. If you wish to do either -- or search for yetis -- then Fhu Travel in Nan are probably your best contacts. Oh and please send us a photo for our blog if you do come across a dark hairy stranger!

A great national park for trekking ... and yeti spotting.

Tags: big foot, Endau Rompin, Phnom Kulen, sasquatch, Setapak, Truong Son, Xainyaburi, yowies

Before starting our brief description of this little known ethnic group, a word on their name. Ethnologists usually refer to them as Mabri (or Mlabri), whilst to the Thais they are the Pee Tong Luang people - which roughly translates as 'spirit of the yellow leaves' tribe. The Mabri people themselves apparently prefer to drop the 'spirit' part and according to this interesting albeit brief site, like to be known simply as the 'yellow leaf' people.

Note the banana leaf shelter in the background. Nan province, 1991.

Traditionally a nomadic, hunter/gatherer group inhabiting the jungles of northern Thailand and Laos, the Mabri constructed basic, temporary shelters of banana leaves in the forest -- eschewing permanent villages. After a week or so when the leaves turned yellow it was taken as a sign that it was time to move on and construct another shelter elsewhere, hence the name.

Ethnically, the Mabri are part of the  Mon-Khmer family, unrelated to the forest dwelling Semang (Orang Asli), people of southern Thailand, who are a Negrito tribe. (The commonly-used term Sakai is pejorative.) They are a relic population of the Mon-Khmer who occupied much of Southeast Asia prior to the migrations of Tai groups into Laos and northern Thailand but who clearly suffered a much harder lot than the village dwelling Mon-Khmer tribes of southern Laos, Vietnam's Central Highlands and northeast Cambodia, where relatively large populations are interspersed with ethnic Malay tribal groups such as the Jarai.

Mon-Khmer, M'nong woman in Vietnam's Central Highlands.

Traditionally the Mabri inhabited the forests of  Nan and Phrae provinces as well as Laos' Xainyaburi province. When we first visited in 1991 some groups still lived in forest shelters in Nan, though to our knowledge, all populations, (the Mabri only total a few hundred people), have since been relocated to villages with at least minimal access to schools and health care. Sad, but their vast forest home was no more, game scarce and as you can see from the previous photo, conditions were deplorable. Health care was non-existent other than herbal medicines, and the state of total poverty meant left them open to exploitation by the local Hmong and Yao groups.

Older Mabri man rather poignantly trying to pass on some traditional lore to village kids.

Nan - Mabri tribal elders.

Some older Mabri men still wear the traditional loincloth.

'Modern' Mabri houses based on local Hmong-style constructions.

The above and following photos were taken in Nan in 2003 -- we're unaware of the current status of Mabri groups in Laos. It's clear that as with Trang/Satun's Orang Asli population, within the next one or two generations they will be  assimilated into mainstream Thai culture. You can no longer visit them in their traditional environment and even if you only want to hear them speak their own language you're probably going to have to be quick.

Note, while you are unlikely to come across members of the Mabri tribe while trekking or travelling around northern Thailand we will, in future posts, be looking at some of the other hill-tribe peoples that you may.

Tags: Central Highlands, Hmong, Jarai, Mon-Khmer, Negrito, Orang Asli, Pee Tong Luang, Phrae, Saiynaburi, Sakai, Semang, Yao