The Long Neck Tribe
One image has stayed with me more than the others. A young girl, quietly reading a book, brass coils around her neck, in a place built entirely around being looked at. She was supposed to be part of the attraction. She wasn't interested. She wasn't performing, she wasn't engaging, she was just completely absorbed in her book, ignoring the tourists entirely. I had known in my own way what it felt like to be on show, to perform a version of yourself for other people, to smile when you don't mean it. I think a lot of women know that feeling. In her I saw a quiet act of defiance, and she has stayed with me for twenty years.
But the question I sit with now is this, when does tradition cause more harm than it holds meaning? Not all traditions deserve to be carried forward unchanged. And when a tradition involves permanently changing a child's body without their consent, that is where I think education and choice should take precedence.
The Kayan people fled Myanmar decades earlier, escaping political persecution and violence. Refugee camps were established in Northern Thailand, and over time some became tourist destinations built around the "long neck women." It was survival within an incredibly narrow set of options. Limited rights, restricted movement, few economic alternatives. Poverty has a way of changing what freedom and choice actually mean. It is a choice, technically. But if this is the best choice a parent can make for their child, they are not choosing from a fair system. Much of the entrance fee went to Thai authorities who controlled the women's wages, movements and freedom. It's just another example of women's bodies being commodified.
I paid to take photographs. That wasn't common practice at the time, but it felt like the right thing to do. I'm still not sure it was. I was participating in a system I don't approve of.
I don't regret going. For many of these women, this income is genuinely the best option they have. What I hope is that young girls are no longer part of it. That they can receive an education, grow up with more choices than their mothers were given. And that when tourists come, it's the women themselves who benefit from the exchange, not the authorities around them taking the cut.
I took these photos back in 2007 while backpacking through South East Asia, The women are part of the Kayan Tribe residing in the norther Provence of Chang Rai. The are commonly referred to by tourists as the "Long Neck Tribe."
I was young, travelling with a beautiful mix of curiosity and naivety. Some days I can't help wishing I still saw the world through the same rose tinted glasses.
The village was still relatively quiet when I visited, before mass tourism and social media took their toll on communities like this one. Even so, something didn't sit right. We had visited other local villages that felt authentic. Tragic in parts, yes, but alive. There was a sense the people were happy. Here, I felt something heavier. A distrust in the women's eyes as we admired their costumes, their craft, the brass coils around their necks.