Edinburgh Napier University

  The Lahu people, an ethnic group originating in China and other parts of southeast Asia, began moving into Thailand probably in the 1870s or 1880s due to oppression in China. Lahu hill tribes in Thailand today total between 60,000 to 100,000 people, located primarily in the northern Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai provinces. Most hill tribes are impoverished, with girls and young women at risk of human trafficking and other poverty-related issues. Local NGOs support girls by providing shelters and access to education—places where Lahu and other girls from at-risk backgrounds can live and further their education in safety. In this short documentary Nara, a girl living at a local NGO, takes us back to her home village in Chiang Rai province to visit her terminally ill mother and her younger sister. The documentary is ethnographic and intends to provide a lens on a people and a community typically unseen by western viewers.