Excerpts from Josh Vandeburgh's Letters Home:

As I expected, nothing is quite like I imagined. During one of our field visits, we visited some of the slums in Chiang Mai, the second largest city in Thailand. To say the least, it was surreal. If animals were living in these conditions in the United States, their owners would be charged with animal cruelty. It was hard to imagine 20-30 people living in spaces smaller than my living room at home. What made it worse was that these families were working all day in order to pool enough money to "rent" these places, many of them from the Thai government. The slums we visited that day were mostly those housing tribal people of Thailand. Because they are not ethnic Thai and much discrimination exists, many of the hill tribe people do not have citizenship, and therefore are not entitled to the same rights as ethnic Thais, even though their families may have lived in Thailand for generations.

In the two weeks since our arrival, we have also been able to visit other NGO's that work with mothers and children with HIV/AIDS, leprosy patients, patients with disabilities, youth recovering from drug addictions, and refugees from the military government of Burma. After visiting many of the NGO's, I left with mixed feelings of melancholy and hope. There is comfort in knowing that there are people helping those in need and fighting for a more just society. What we are learning and seeing won't be forgotten after we leave Thailand. These experiences will allow us to open our eyes and hearts to the social problems at home and abroad, and will also give us the tools we need to do something about it.