The key question for me is, over the longterm (well, we are all going to have to work until we’re 90 aren’t we?), how can I use my 25 years of travel industry experience as a specialist tour operator in a worthwhile way?

Until recently, in my spare time, I was a school governor and a trustee of a children’s charity but those tenures have ended and now I am looking for something else. I have always been interested in a responsible approach to travel, and a great believer in authentic travel experiences, so the idea of pursuing something in this line appeals. Especially if it meets one of the aims of this site, namely to bring positive change to the lives of under-privileged children in south-east Asia (not all of them, of course, just as many as possible).

Two of my favourite tours at Magic of the Orient were community-based, although I don’t think the phrase ‘Community based tourism” had been coined when we first started promoting them back in the mid 1990s. One tour was to a hilltribe village in Northern Thailand and the other to a longhouse in Sarawak, East Malaysia (aka Borneo). In both cases the community had built accommodation especially for tourists and in both cases the community were involved in planning and running the set-up. These projects brought income to the community via bed and lodgings, guiding services and souvenir purchases.

Here is a definition of CBT from the Thailand Community Based Tourism Institute (1997):

“CBT is tourism that takes environmental, social, and cultural sustainability into account. It is managed and owned by the community, for the community, with the purpose of enabling visitors to increase their awareness and learn about the community and local ways of life”.

Unfortunately, however, there does not appear to be just one definition. According to Harold Goodwin, a recognized authority on Responsible Tourism, “there is no agreement about the meaning of CBT and ….. whenever the words are used the meaning needs to be made clear”.

OK that’s fair enough so we always need to qualify CBT whenever we talk about it but wait! According to a study by Goodwin, the model is not sustainable: “.. evidence suggests that average bed occupancy achieved by CBT initiatives is around 5% and that this unsustainable.”

What? So is there any point? Goodwin goes on: “The research has demonstrated that there are a number of initiatives which are not CBT which have demonstrated very considerable employment, local economic development and collective community benefits….”

OK, so this is more positive. There are initiatives that are not CBT that are successful. Hmm. So if there is an initiative that is deemed successful does it matter that it is not CBT?

This also begs the question. “how is success measured”? For me, back when we started promoting such tours, the motivation was twofold: 1) to give remote communities the opportunity to benefit from tourism and 2) to provide our clients with an authentic experience. For me it was essential that the hosts were proactive participants rather than passive recipients as in ‘goldfish bowl’ tourism: the tours to Paduang villages – the so-called longneck tribes – in Northern Thailand are examples of passive tourism and, in my opinion, are abhorrent . Simplistically, if these objectives were met, it was successful and certainly the two tours referred to above are still operating today (I shall write more about them later).

Also it must surely depend upon whether the initiative is intended to be the sole provider for a community or whether it is to be incremental income. Given the vagaries of the travel industry I would suggest that the initiative should always be for incremental income.

If we forget, then, the constraints of labels and think instead in terms of (lower case) community based tourism, surely this opens up a wide range of possibilities.

What do you think: is Community Based Tourism no more than academic theory; just more marketing hype with little real value over the long-term; or is it a concept worth pursuing?

I wrote recently about my experience of discovering northern Thailand by car (Part 1 and Part 2).

Together with a colleague I visited Doi Angkhang, north of Chiang Mai, close to the border with Myanmar: Doi is the local word for mountain and Angkhang stands at about 1300 metres.

On this trip I saw (mostly by design but partly by accident!) areas of Thailand most tourists on mainstream holidays would not get to see.

In my opinion it is important, both for me personally and for local communities, that the positive benefits of tourism are spread to more remote parts of the country. Personally I enjoy seeing a destination behind the tourist façade and I am sure I am not alone: I get a lot more from the experience knowing that what I am seeing and experiencing is genuine, even though that experience might not always be a pleasant one. Local markets often fall into the latter category!

I do not subscribe to the notion that the flip side for my, sometimes unwitting, hosts is that they get to see glimpses of a life beyond their own, current reality. And I don’t mean me personally of course but rather what I represent.

No, for me the flip side is that tourism (when operated responsibly) is both bringing an income to the community and, potentially, the means to increase the well-being of its members.

I want to be absolutely clear here that I am not advocating the type of tourism where a tour bus turns up, disgorges its camera-clicking contents, money is deposited into a pot, bus sucks back contents and departs. No one is enriched by such an experience.

The type of tourism I am referring to is the type that Amari Hotels & Resorts, a major hotel company in Thailand, is engaging in at Doi Angkhang.

More and more hotels around the world are embracing sustainable, responsible or ‘green’ travel principles but here is a hotel group that has been doing so long before it became de rigeur. It was in 1995 that the group started the Baht for a Better Life Foundation: “Small change, contributed by guests to our hotels and donations from our staff, are used to further the education of children in Thailand. There are no administrative costs in running the Baht for a Better Life Foundation. Therefore, every dollar, pound and euro given to the fund is used for educational projects.” To date, among other things, Baht for a Better Life have rebuilt a dilapidated school in Udon Thani, north-east Thailand, and built ten new schools in underprivileged areas throughout the country.

At Doi Angkhang the Amari-managed hotel is the Ankhgang Nature Resort : a 3-star, 72-room property nestling in the mountains and developed as part of the Royal Angkhang Research Station, under the auspices of the Royal Project Foundation.

During my visit I only had time for a one-night stay but, on a whistle-stop tour of the area, I was able to visit the Royal Angkhang Station Project which “provides agricultural support to neighbouring hilltribes and develops non-indigenous crops for them to grow” as an alternative to the opium poppy which used to be their staple cash-crop. I also stopped at a remote point along the Thai/Myanmar border which was little more than a fence set within a beautiful mountain vista. Other activities in the area include trekking, mountain biking, bird watching; and sightseeing, taking in local hilltribe villages.

Image courtesy of Tourism Authority of Thailand News Room

On this occasion the visits that I made to local hilltribe villages were not of the type I am advocating here because, of necessity, they were brief: they were merely intended to equip me with the information to promote the overall Doi Angkhang experience, just as I am doing now.

There are 7 major hilltribes in northern Thailand but there are many smaller groups and sub groups such that I don’t believe anyone has a definitive count: estimates have put the number at around 20 with a total population of about 500,000.

There are many social and political issues surrounding the hilltribes, but the key point to mention in this article is that, by definition, the villages are remote with limited access to education.

There are four villages in the area surrounding Doi Angkhang, which are home to communities from a number of different hilltribes. Through its foundation, Amari Hotels and Resorts supports a primary school in Baan Khob Dong which provides education for the children of the Black and Red Muser tribes.

In a recently held painting competition with the theme ‘My Dream’, 7 winning students of Baan Kob Dong received scholarships presented by Mr. Wim Fagel, General Manager, Amari Rincome Hotel, as part of the 40th anniversary celebrations of the hotel. (See headline picture above).

As well as general educational support, the Anghang Nature Resort has helped introduce the school children to the concept of tourism. Together with the local education authorities, the resort has implemented a “Junior Guide Program”, where children from the Baan Khob Dong school are trained to show visitors around their village. The Junior Guide Program has become part of the school curriculum.

According to Amari: “The guides are encouraged to take pride in their heritage and the surrounding natural environment and communicate this to the visitors. It also gives an opportunity to take a position of responsibility in the community. Guides who complete the program are awarded a certificate and a guide badge.

The Junior Guide Program enables tourists to have interaction with the local community and receive correct information about the hill tribes and the surrounding area. It also ensures any donations which are given to the villages by visitors are put into projects to benefit the community. Visitors are also taken to a co-operative shop, which sells handicrafts produced in the local villages. In addition, a ‘show house’ has been built so that guests can get an impression of the hilltribe way of life.”

For me it is this type of interaction that is enriching for all parties and it represents what I believe tourism should be about i.e sharing.

Doi Angkhang is just 3 hours north of Chiang Mai and a world away from mass tourism. To book your stay at the Ankhgang Nature Resort visit the Amari website . This is not an affiliate link and I receive no financial benefit.

Have you ever thought of running your own hotel? Maybe a little bed & breakfast on the coast?

Andrew and Kate Kemp had a dream along those lines except their’s was perhaps a bit bigger than most. Rather than a B & B, it was more like a luxury resort in Thailand; and it was to be a hotel that wasn’t a hotel!

The couple had met when they were both 18, they travelled the world together and settled down in Hong Kong for 10 years. They both had good jobs. Andrew was in the service industry, working for a major real estate developer and managing private clubs and leisure facilities. Kate was in sales and marketing for international pharmaceutical and electronic products. It took some 2 years of planning and searching but finally they obtained the finance and the land in Khao Lak, southern Thailand, to build their dream property.

They had been fortunate to stay in many hotels around Asia and therefore knew what both good and bad hotel experiences felt like. They also knew they had to be different so they created a mythical character called Lady Sarojin: an Asian lady renowned for her hospitality. This character was to represent the essence of the hotel around which the business would develop.

In order to deliver the high standard of hospitality that the Kemp’s wanted they based their whole recruitment policy on two things: language skills and attitude. They knew everything else could be taught.

When I met Andrew back in 2005 he explained that “You start with an idea, and then the people. The people we have got have bought into the idea. They understand it and I think they quite like the idea of doing something different.”

The hotel was scheduled to open on 10 January 2005. On 26th December 2004 the Indian Ocean Tsunami struck and wrought havoc on the region.

Andrew and Kate were lucky; because they were not open there were no guests in-house and no loss of life. But much of their dream was washed away. By Boxing Day night they had decided they would start again and that, critically, they would retain as many of their staff as wanted to stay: financially an irrational decision but they were agreed “it was the right thing to do”.

They set the team to work doing things they were not employed to do: the housekeeper was liaising with the Interior designer, the Spa Manager with the landscape contractor and the Front Office Manager managing the project. Probably for the first time in their working lives people were crossing departmental boundaries and really working as a team.

The Sarojin Thailand finally opened on 7 October 2005 and was by then a shared dream.

By 2006 this 56-room boutique hotel had already made it on to the Conde Nast Traveler US Hot List for both Spas and Hotels; and it has won a string of awards including Asia’s Leading Boutique Hotel 2006, 2007 and 2008.

Of course a lot of credit for the success must go to the Kemp’s management skills but for me the most crucial element is their authenticity. They have a purpose that goes beyond shareholder value.

Although I never got to work with the Kemps (I sold my business in March 2005), this is the type of company that I will actively seek out because I want business partners who share my values.

For me it is this type of company that will survive no matter what. The Sarojin might be feeling the pinch at the moment, along with the rest of the world, or it might not; but whatever, the hotel will continue to flourish because Andrew and Kate have the support of their staff, their customers and, equally as important, their community.

In my view, over the long-term, companies that focus on building stakeholder value will always be stronger than those which put shareholder value first. The tourism industry is ideally placed to tackle many of today’s social ills and the world would be a richer place if there were more people like the Kemps in the business.

If you know of any other travel and tourism companies (big or small) working in South East Asia that, in your opinion, are making a contribution beyond shareholder value please leave a comment or email me: tony AT hookedonasia dot org.

N.B. For the record only, I first told Andrew and Kate’s story in my audio book Warts and All: A practical, plain-English approach to branding your business.

The Sarojin images courtesy of: WhiteKaps Resort Company Limited

Bangkok Airways’ Head Office/ August 4th, 2009 – At 17.00 hrs, Captain Puttipong Prasarttong-Osoth, the President of Bangkok Airways, held a press conference about the accident of the airline’s flight PG 266 from Krabi skidding off the runway and collided with the former control tower during the flight’s captain attempted to land at Samui Airport.

The flight, operated by ATR-72 500 series MSN670 with 70 seats, carried 68 passengers, two pilots and two flight attendants. All passengers have been evacuated from the site with four seriously injured passengers sent to the Bangkok Samui Hospital, and two others with minor injuries delivered to the Thai Inter Hospital. The 62 other passengers have been transferred to hotel. Two flight attendants and a pilot were reportedly safe, while the other pilot was dead.

Currently, the airline has dispatched the investigation team from the Department of Aviation to the accident site at Samui Airport.

The airline’s insurance company – Bangkok Insurance, will cover full liability caused by this accident.

For more information, please contact the Emergency Call Center 02 265 8777.

Krabi in southern Thailand is one of my favourite beach resort areas: there is a good selection of hotel accommodation without it being over-developed.

“Singapore’s budget carrier Tiger Airways will resume flights to the Thai resort of Krabi four times a week from end-October. “

Read: Tiger Airways to resume flights to Krabi, Thailand

Pimalai Resort & Spa, Koh Lanta

For an up-to-date perspective I asked Lisa Rawlings, who handles the sales and marketing for the Pimalai in the UK, to give her personal view.

Lisa writes:

Koh Lanta is a really great alternative to Phuket or Koh Samui and I am sure we will be hearing more about it in the future! I first went to Koh Lanta 18 years ago and am pleased to see that although it has developed quite a bit, it is still largely unspoilt, has not been subjected to mass tourism like Phuket and still has a wonderful authentic charm about it which I am sure would be of appeal to the more discerning traveler. Koh Lanta is a very quiet and natural destination with its own charm. The island is still largely unspoiled, offers some beautiful beaches, superb low and green mountain backdrops where wildlife is very well present and is at very short distances of some of the highly rated diving spots in Thailand including Hin Duang, which is about 2 hrs by boat and if you are lucky, you can spot some giant manta rays!

Manta Ray

Pimalai Resort & Spa is built on 100 acres of hilly land of lush tropical forest with direct access to a 900 meters pristine white powder sandy beach (the best and safest beach on the island!). Even during peak season, there are not many people on the beach and no hawkers which in a lot of other parts of Thailand can be a nuisance! There are 5 restaurants at Pimalai ranging from Western, Thai, fine dining at Seven Seas and also a couple offering lighter snacks and poolside food. Also, further down the beach in Kantiang Bay there are a few local restaurants and bars if you fancy exploring a little further.

Pimalai Resort & Spa, Koh Lanta

In December 2005, the new Pool Villas opened. The elegantly appointed one, two and three bedrooms pool villas are located on a hillside with private infinity pools overlooking the bay. They really are fabulous, spacious and certainly one of the best that I have stayed in!

The resort’s facilities consist of: 121 Deluxe Rooms, Pavilion Suites, Beach Villas and Pool Villas, all with a contemporary Thai style design; two superb infinity-edge freshwater swimming pools; a PADI dive centre; a fitness room with high quality fitness equipment; two library lounges offering free high speed internet access; shops and full conference facilities sitting up to 160 persons.

In addition to the above, the resort also offers canoeing, sailing, scuba diving (Nov – Apr), bicycling, trekking, tennis courts, Thai cooking classes, wedding ceremonies – for those looking for a more active focused holiday but also offers the perfect setting for guests who are just looking for a romantic getaway. Pimalai also is a great place to get married – weddings can be arranged on the beach – either a Thai ceremony with Buddhist monks or a western wedding. Whatever, style of wedding Pimalai is a perfect place to get married!

The Spa, Pimalai Resort & Spa, Koh Lanta

The spa at Pimalai is amazing as it is set in the middle of the rain forest with streams running by, giant carp - a beautiful setting which relaxes you before you have even had your treatment. The treatments too are fabulous – again, as a bit of a spa junky, probably my favourite!

Words by Lisa Rawlings, LJR Consultancy (+44 1242 255483)

Images courtesy of the Pimalai Resort & Spa

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How To Get To Pimalai Resort, Koh Lanta

Koh Lanta is just off the Krabi mainland in Southern Thailand. The closest airport is Krabi (KBV) and the journey time (including boat trip) is around 1.5 to 2 hours. The island is also accessible via Phuket (HKT).

Best Time To Go: December to March.

From April to November there is a chance of rain but the sunshine is often not far behind. Off-season rates (May – October) usually represent excellent value.

Hotel website: http://www.pimalai.com/

Have You Stayed At The Pimalai?

If you have personal experience of the Pimalai Resort on Koh Lanta I would be keen to have your comments (below) or, even better, a hotel review.

Bangtao Bay, Phuket. Credit: Tourism Authority of Thailand

Laguna Phuket is now a very well-established integrated resort on Phuket’s west coast, and to the best of my knowledge there have been no new hotels on the complex for a number of years. Well that is about to change later this year with the opening of “Outrigger Laguna Phuket Resort and Villas”.

It all started in the 1980s on Bang Tao Bay, on the northwestern coast of Phuket, Thailand, with an abandoned tin mine. As far as most people were concerned it was waste land, good for nothing. However, an entrepreneurial visionary from Singapore Mr. Ho Kwon Ping, turned it into the first ever integrated resort in Asia.

To quote from the Laguna Phuket corporate web site:

“The integrated Laguna Phuket destination resort, located on the west coast of Phuket Island, Thailand, spans 1000 acres of idyllic tropical parkland dotted by scenic lakes and adjacent to an 8km stretch of white sandy beach.

A collection of deluxe hotels, including Banyan Tree Phuket, Sheraton Grande Laguna, Dusit Thani Laguna Phuket, Laguna Beach Resort, Laguna Phuket Holiday Club Resort, Allamanda Laguna Phuket and a group of private luxury villas, Laguna Phuket Holiday Residences, offer a wide selection of options to accommodate families, groups, honeymooners and friends.”

Laguna Phuket. Credit: Laguna Phuket

Over the years, I have visited the resort many times and have stayed at the Dusit Thani Laguna Phuket and the Laguna Beach Resort: I have visited on business and with the family (disclosure: some stays were hosted others paid for). The hotels on the resort each have their own personality and focus, and they range from superior 4 star to 5 star plus.

As a Laguna Phuket guest you can use the facilities of most (but not all) of the other hotels and that makes it a more complete experience. As an integrated resort, aside from a few local beach-restaurants, this is a tourist enclave. However, there are local restaurants less than 5 minutes away by taxi; and, when we visited, one of the restaurant staff was good enough to bring us back to the hotel at the end of the meal. I suspect they would collect guests at the beginning of the evening too but we never put that to the test.

In addition to spending my own family holiday there (twice) I have sent many clients to the resort and I cannot recall one complaint. It is important of course that you choose the right hotel.

For example the Laguna Beach Resort is very much a family hotel while the Banyan Tree is more for couples. In my opinion The Banyan Tree is the best hotel there albeit a bit too formal for me: it is a great choice for honeymooners.

I do not know too much about the ‘new kid on the block’ at the moment, other than Outrigger Enterprises Group has been selected to manage the new luxury collection of residences, villas, town homes and apartments. When complete, Outrigger Laguna Phuket Resort and Villas will consist of 309 two-, three- and four-bedroom units, many with their own private swimming pools. The first units will be ready for occupancy in the fourth quarter of 2009, just in time for the High Season. I feel some special promotional opening rates coming on!

Important Note: Every year during the rainy season (around April to October) heavy seas are responsible for dragging sand from the beaches. During this period there is sometimes bulldozer activity on the beach as sand is replenished; and there are sandbags along the front. It did not bother us but it might be a surprise if you were not forewarned.

Bangtao Beach, low season: Credit Tony Champion

Most importantly though there is a very strong under-current at that time and there has been loss of life. Unfortunately people have allegedly ignored the red flag.

Sheraton Grande Laguna

The best time to be on the island, weather-wise, is December through to March but you can enjoy the Phuket Laguna at anytime of the year. Although sea-bathing is not an option during the rainy season period, you can use one of the many swimming pools and there is a protected lagoon behind the hotels for certain watersports like kayaking and sailing.

If you have visited Laguna Phuket what was your impression?

On the way to Angkhang Nature Resort

In my last post, Discovering Northern Thailand By Car Part 1 of 2, you left me and my driving companion in our hire car somewhere in Northern Thailand.

I should point out here that there was no signal for my mobile phone so we really were on our own. The good news is that every village in Thailand has at least one telephone (look out for a blue booth); so if we could find a village we could at least speak to someone at the Angkhang Nature Resort and ask for directions if necessary. The not-so-good news was the last village had been many miles back.

What had been a carefree drive through beautiful green valleys and along narrow ridges was now turning out to be an anxious rush in search of civilisation.

Finally we came to a small village and I spotted a group of young teenagers kicking a ball around. Now was the time to get past my innate reluctance to ask for directions and to seek assistance hoping that my few words of Thai (like “where’s the toilet” and “a beer please”) would be sufficient to set us on the right path. I was surprised to discover, in this tiny hamlet, that the youngsters spoke good English and they were able to point out where I had gone wrong. I had managed to miss the turn up toward Doi Angkhang. See map showing Chiang Mai/Doi Angkhang area

With considerable relief (certainly on my part and no doubt on the part of my by now long-suffering travelling companion), we were soon on the right road and once again enjoying the stunning scenery.

Entrance to Angkhang Nature Resort

After a steep climb, we arrived at the Angkhang Nature Resort in the late afternoon just as the temperature was coming down and the smell of burning wood, from the village further down the valley, filled the air.

The day had not gone as I had planned but we had seen parts of Thailand (and possibly Myanmar!) that I had not expected to see so, all in all, it had been a good one.

Angkhang Nature Resort is in a marvellous spot and there is plenty to do in the area from bird watching to mountain biking. I will write more about my stay at the resort on another occasion. Suffice to say I am glad I made the journey, which, if you recall, should normally take around 3 hours from Chiang Mai.

The return to Chiang Mai was much more straightforward. To complete our circle-trip I took the 1249 back to the main Chiang Mai/Fang Road, the 107. The only point to mention is that the descent from the resort is extremely steep and the road very windy: I am sure I wore away half of my break pads on this part of the journey.

So there you have it. I thoroughly enjoyed my drive into the hills of Northern Thailand far away from the tourist areas and, since my travelling companion is still talking to me, I guess it couldn’t have been all bad for him either!

The moral of the story is of course if you are driving in the rural heart of northern Thailand take a very good map and ideally a GPS – oh, and don’t let me drive.

This wasn’t the only time I have driven in northern Thailand and it is to be recommended. If you don’t have much time even a day is worthwhile. You can visit the ‘handicraft’ villages or the elephant camps under your own steam or just enjoy the scenery. I found the route up around Mae Rim and down to the west of Chiang Mai offered some great views.

Road en route to Angkhang Nature Resort

We were driving north out of Chiang Mai, Thailand’s second city, and I have to say I was feeling pretty confident. The formalities for the car rental had been completed swiftly and smoothly at our hotel: driving licence* checked and forms completed. Maps and guidebooks now strewn across the back seat of our hire car: I was ready!

My colleague and I were testing a new fly-drive programme for Magic of the Orient and I got to drive!

The morning traffic was a minor inconvenience and once we had cleared the outer ring road the 107 was a relatively smooth road. In my experience the standard of the roads in Thailand is pretty good. Pot holes are fairly common but then we get them here in the UK too. In fact driving in Thailand is probably neither better nor worse than many other countries: as usual you just have to get used to the local idiosyncrasies. I did have one advantage: they drive on the left, just like at home.

Our destination that day was Doi Angkhang and the Angkhang Nature Resort. The Resort has been developed as part of the Royal Angkhang Research Station, under the Royal Project Foundation: an initiative by His Majesty the King of Thailand to help the hilltribes establish suitable cash crop alternatives to the opium poppy. Four decades on and the project continues to have a positive impact on the villagers.

Angkhang Nature Resort Location Map

I had studied a map (unfortunately not this one on the left) and decided I would take the scenic route along the 1178, then on to the 1340 across to the resort. That was the plan: I estimated 3 – 4 hours for the whole journey.

After around 4 hours we were quite literally in the middle of nowhere. We saw the occasional hut perched on the side of a hill but no people, no traffic and no sign posts (not that one would have done us much good since, away from the main routes, signs are in Thai script!).

The scenery was stunning and amongst the most dramatic I have seen in Thailand. We were surrounded by mountains and green valleys and much of the time the road snaked along the top of a ridge with a steep drop either side. We joked, more than a little nervously, that at some point we must have crossed the border into Myanmar.

Being true to type (stubborn male driver) I was very reluctant to admit to myself, or to my amazingly chipper travelling companion, that maybe, just maybe, I had gone wrong somewhere.

Finally after driving for around an hour along an unmade road I had to admit that something was not quite right. There was little sign of life and I really didn’t want to be stuck in Myanmar, or wherever we were, when nightfall arrived. It was time to turn around and retrace our route.

*A drivers licence from your country of residence (with English translation) or an International driving Licence is required. You must carry it and your passport at all times when driving. For more information visit the Budget Car Rental Thailand site.

Continued: Discovering Northern Thailand By Car Part 2 of 2

I have not been there so I am happy to stand corrected but in the meantime the student making his travel plans is no tourist, mainstream or otherwise. Steve Gomersall is a 2^nd year psychology student at the University of Bath: in 2008 he spent the summer teaching English to Burmese refugees living in Mae Sot as part of a scheme organised by Hong Kong University called Migrant Outreach Education Initiative (MOEI).

Steve with his students at the school in Mae Sot in 2008

Now he is returning - for two years! He is taking a sabbatical to establish a sixth-form school for young people who have fled from the regime in Burma.

This is just the type of initiative that I am committed to promoting via this blog: as Steve says: “An education [for these 6^th form students] will mean the difference between spending their lives in a refugee camp and being able to get a job and start to rebuild their community.”

Steve has managed to raise over £2500 thus far for the school: this money will buy mosquito nets, class partitions and blankets for a number of schools. Steve told me “Mosquito nets are the priority for the prevention of the spread of malaria. One of my students was infected on my previous visit and seeing her in pain was heart breaking.”

At the time of writing Steve is still looking for sponsorship for this school for refugee children in Thailand: he needs 10 sponsors at £10 per month for 10 months. He explains: “The money which I’m trying to collect now, ideally by standing order, is to support my school for the first year. With it being a new school we can’t get secured funding through BMWEC [The Burmese Migrant Workers Education Committee]; however after the first year, when we have results, we will be better placed and should receive full running costs. So basically our running costs are £400 a month, this includes teacher stipends, electricity, food (all students will be living at the school for various reasons), water and sanitation.” Contact Steve: smg24 at bath dot ac dot uk

During his last trip Steve produced a blog: he hopes to do so again and if he does I will publish a link on the Education page.

I wish Steve the very best of luck and hopefully look forward to hearing more as the project progresses in Mae Sot.