Kong Por Neua- Universal peace and culture exchange in Karen community

CODE: TH-DA 4.6812

Description: Immerse yourself in the fresh winter environment of a Northern Hill tribe at Kong Por Neua, a remote Karen community from Chiang Mai province. Staying at the local temple, volunteers will help to organize an important Buddhist ceremony there, a full day of activities with students at the local School and a 3 days-Universal Moral & Ethics Camp at the temple (our living place) with Karen children, youth and adults. Even with the presence of a few translators, volunteers should be ready to practice communication in a multi languages environment (Karen, Thai and English). We’ll create together activities to support values of morals, ethics, international peace, culture exchange, solidarity, team building, leadership...

Type of Work: Volunteers may help with vegan cooking, organization of activities, such as games for adults and children, take parts in the discussions and share their own culture. The last day will be dedicated to local culture and forest discovery/preservation awareness together with our hosts.

Study Theme: Buddhist culture in a Karen tribe community Activities with kids to broaden their perspective on the international world Moral and ethic camp, reflection for all participants and all ages Environment and watershed forest

Accommodation: We will have a cooking team (that you can join). They will provide volunteers with 3 meals a day. The food will be vegan for the whole stay - No meat is allowed in the temple. We will all stay in the compound of Kong Por Neua monastery. There is a communal building and you will be provided with simple sleeping equipment like thin mats, pillows and blankets. We will sleep in communal rooms (1 for females and 1 for males). These rooms will be used in the day time for the camp so we will need to pack up our sleeping stuff every morning.

Language: Only few people in the village can speak good English. We will teach you some basic Thai language during the start of your project. Non-verbal communication will be as well essential.

Requirements: The volunteers should be ready to stay in a remote area, to adapt to the local conditions with only basic facilities. Very few local people are able to speak in English and even most of the elders do not understand Thai language. Volunteers should be able to handle spontaneous working environment. The mentality and way of thinking is very different from the western world.

Approximate Location: The project place is situated 1-2 hours by very bumpy roads from the closest town of Om Koi, itself 3 hours drive from Chiang Mai city. The hilly landscape and surroundings are beautiful and December is the coolest part of the year. Temperature can drop to 10 degrees in the night. We'll go to visit the forest around the area which the top one are the source (watershed) of many rivers. The culture of Karen mixed with the Buddhist print make it a rich culture immersion.

Extra fee to be paid in the hosting country:
9000.00 Thai Baht

• Breakdown:
  Accommodation and food: 4000.00 Thai Baht
  Transportation: 1500.00 Thai Baht
  Activities: 1000.00 Thai Baht
  Hosting organisation support: 2500 Thai Baht
• Purpose of extra costs:
  The fee will be used for living expenses (gas, water, electricity, food, transportation), materials used in projects/activities, and financial support of our organization. Volunteers’ fee is our only income. We are not funded by any governmental sectors.