Thailand ready !

The films made in Thailand have been developed by Fotolab Kiekie in Amsterdam and contact sheets were made.
Seeing the Oriental images I had to conclude that in Thailand persons reply in a totally different way to the request to show what nobody has seen compared to the participants from New York, Moscow and Istanbul. It will be so interesting when all the 8 countries have been visited  to analyze what are the differences between the persons documented from the different places, cultures, traditions and religions and to try to find answers and explanations. A challenge for sociologists, psychologists and ethnologists.

In a few days new images of WTWHNS can be seen on its website: www.whattheworldhasneverseen.com
We will replace the current images from New York by a selection of the ones made in Moscow.
This interesting page on the website however is password protected. To see the fascinating replies one man and one woman have been given in Moscow, the visitor of the website must know the password.
We send this password to the persons who have purchased the WTWHNS book and who, by doing so, are making this project possible.

Meanwhile junior producer Sven Gerrets is working on preparing the visit to Buenos Aires in Argentina scheduled for the end of March 2012. He is contacting a range of persons there, interesting them in WTWHNS and making appointments. Persons from the press, from Universities, from the PR world and friends from friends.

Before Argentina, WTWHNS will be performed in the Netherlands. In the town where I was born: Oosterhout. In about two weeks we expect to be able to document the first participant.

A wild ride as a Thai rite

The most efficient way to return from the village of Soppong in the northeast of Thailand to the so called more civilized world, the big city of Chiang Mai with its international airport, is by mini-bus. Small Toyota or Nissan vans in which seats for 11 people. By itself a comfortable way of traveling: good seats and air conditioning. However, a journey with a mini-bus in Thailand is also participating involuntarily in a grand prix of racing. Because the mini-bus drivers can’t stand to see the back of another vehicle in front of them. And as you may know from your own experience, when driving always the back of a car is in front of you. Sometimes it is not there, but that is a matter of time. By itself it is in the interest of the traveler for the driver to try to make the journey as short as possible. But what if this effort is made on a road that fundamentally is not fitted for racing? When overpassing of slower cars is performed in downhill curves based on counting on the luck of the driver? Another car may suddenly approach and that’s it. Or another car does not approach and then it is to the next back of the car.
On the way to Soppong, three weeks ago, I saw three major road accidents that had just took place. But today it went fine. Although at one point approaching a curve, a motor driver and his passenger coming from the opposite side, was not able to control his bike and veered to right in front of our mini-bus. Our alert driver made a swing so that the bike could pass on the wrong side between our vehicle and the trees next to us. I let out a scream, but the other 11 Thai passengers and the driver remained totally cool.
Another attraction of traveling with a mini-bus in Thailand is motion sickness. The vehicle is driven in such a wild way that motion sickness is almost inevitable. On the way to Soppong it went well until the town of Pai. But then the road moved into the mountains and was winding more than the thread on a bowl of wool. By itself this could have been handled were it not that in Pai this extraordinary beautiful Swiss woman joined the journey and was assigned a seat right next to me. Obviously we started a conversation but I noticed that talking and looking at her, made me feel uncomfortable. Not for the cleavage she was generously showing but for being tossed around by the mini-bus. Hence, I had to talk to her focusing on the road in front of us and hoping she wouldn’t notice too much my mooning face. We arrived in Soppong and maybe that’s why I didn’t see her anymore. On the return trip there was no Swiss girl making the trip more pleasant, but another treat was performed. Also Thai people suffer of motion sickness. For this plastic bags are in the mini-bus available. One small boy had a heavy attack and his mother assisted him. It is a rather noisy procedure though but the worst is the smell. Sour and like rotten noodles. But the Thai remain cool and pretend nothing is the matter.

From the Arcade Bus Station in Chiang Mai by taxi to the Hotel Villa San Pee-Seua right at  the brown and muddy river. Good place except that when the persons in the top room flush their toilet, it sounds in my room like their excrements first dance on my floor before to head for the river.

I wait here for my flight to Singapore. There is one major intention of doing in Chiang Mai. To search and find this special gift that I can give to her without embarrassing her. And myself.

Almost dead again

The driver of the black Mitsubishi pick-up truck said: “My wife is not beautiful but she is a good cook”.
An interesting statement to reflect upon while traveling again to the village of Pung Yam in the northeast of Thailand very near the border with Burma.
Through the valleys embraced by high mountains covered with fields giving the farmers soya and garlic.
I was on my way to Pung Yam because some days ago I almost died there. And I have learned it is important to return to a place where life almost ends to avoid any life long trauma.
It is a long story but with two friends we went into a cave with some Bhudist monkboys and we simply went too deep and too far. Miles down, beaten by the lack of oxygen and unmountable cliffs, the mind had to come to fatal conclusions. To get out of the cave-trap physically was impossible. Only willpower could do it and therefore these words are written and published.
Battered, blooded, wounded, exhausted and confused we came out of the cave eventually and breathing and breathing and breathing to get oxygen again in the body and a mind becoming clear once more and a memory back that had disappeared.
When the consciousness kicked in it posed a good question. “Why are you doing these kinds of foolish things?”. Continuing: “You are in the middle of performing a spectacular and unique project and you endanger all that by crawling like a man without senses into a most dangerous cave in Thailand to possibly never return if not for sheer luck”.

Painful questions but the return to Pung Yam and its mortal caves  healed the deep shock of the experience.

If not for this sign that was discovered reading that beyond Pung Yam, in the very last village of Thailand before it becomes Burma, waterfalls could be visited.
The trauma of the cave experience was digested sufficiently  on the balcony of the Bhudist temple to tell the driver to continue because a new challenge was found.
May we ask: “Why are lessons not learned? Why do there always have to be challenges?”
We came to this last village in Thailand. On the rim of the nearby mountain we saw the military fortifications of the Burmese army. We could have walked over there to offer them a soft drink but we remembered these Americans deciding to hike in the mountains in the south of Iraq that had them landed in a prison in Iran for years crying they were innocent or for being fools?
We reached an outpost of the Thai forestry service and they explained the waterfalls were a 6 hours hike away. While a Government Isuzu 4×4 truck was standing there! After some negotiations we avoided hiking for 6 hours, got into the Isuzu truck and took a track that rarely felt wheels. The idea was to reach a spot with the truck at a 2 hour walk of the waterfalls but at the first steep climb, the Isuzu, old and tired, simply couldn’t make it. The engine was not powerful enough anymore. We returned, to base, driving backwards that made the waterfall in the imagination look like a cartoon falling down upwards. The forestry people though would not know of giving up. They came with a simple Honda motorbike and offered to drive me on that machine to close where the waterfall dropped its liquid. It was that very moment the experience in the cave was remembered. That there are limits of accepting challenges. That it is sometimes wise to say: “No, thank you”. To get on that Honda bike build for Tokyo streets to deal with 4×4 tracks only to see a waterfall… What is life about?
It was kindly refused, the generous Honda motor scooter offer.

Later, in their office, they showed me two pictures of the waterfall that possibly could have been the new trap.
They call that a waterfall in this part of Thailand but it was a toilet flush compared to the Niagara!!! Not worth any risk.

The Thai forestry helps.

How to be a gazelle

What a weird state of emotions. Each time I go to a destination to perform the project “What the world has never seen”  I am nervous, tense and fear failure. Questions come up in my mind if this time I will successfully find persons that can show what nobody has seen. I am never sure. I am not able to take it for granted and lullaby myself in thinking it will be all right. I unfortunately can’t rely on passed achieved results in one country as a guarantee for the new investments in time and energy and efforts in a new country.
It is a wild dance with fear and failure that has to be whirled and danced and faced and confronted in order to reach the stage that is possibly hidden behind them: success.
Even after 42 years of making pictures and doing projects, each time I am still full of fear to fail. Believing I won’t maybe find persons who can show what nobody has ever seen. Fear that when I find them, I won’t have the necessary creativity to make a fascinating image of the person.

You should know about my father.
He was a man who first fought the Germans and the Russians in 1939 and 1940. Then he fought the Germans again in 1944 and 1945 liberating France, Belgium and Holland. I imagine he had many moments during the war he was afraid as well. Fearing to fail. Fearing to die. Did he back down? Run away? Get nervous and shoot in the wrong direction? The answers to these questions can be found in a free and democratic Europe we have for many years now. My father mastered his fears and jumped over them like the gazelle outsmarting the fast and mean lion and his Swastika-like tail. My father lives in me and makes me a warrior. I am afraid. I fear. I have doubts. But we will win. Our destination has but one name: victory.

In Thailand 8 persons were documented who show what I and soon you have never seen.
Next stop: Buenos Aires, Argentina

Meet the Thai producer !

It is important to know that the project “What the world has never seen” is performed by a group of people. There are the participants showing what nobody has seen but also producers who manage to find them. In Thailand this is Mr. Tun Tin. He is a man from Burmese origin but living in Thailand for many years. He came to understand the concept of “What the world has never seen’ which by itself in the northeast of Thailand is an achievement that should impress deeply. He was instrumental and essential to find the persons. This is Mr. Tun Tin and we thank him deeply:

Of course you can obtain a book!

The project “What the world has never seen” is not only designed to travel all over the world to find persons, to document them and to publish those images in a book. The purpose of the project is also to initiate a public debate about intimacy and privacy. One of the ways to achieve this is to have a unique approach to the subject that is for many people challenging. Or even provoking.

This purpose is being achieved: in the press stories have been published about the project. There were radio interviews. And in the social media it has become a subject of discussion. Right now on Facebook a discussion rages and it is most fascinating.  As an example, one woman contributed to this debate as follows:

I find it a beautiful and well contemplated project and the way of performing it very unique. But your statement that you can see the results of this project without problems in the book that will be published, is something I don’t agree with. This is because of what the book costs. For the average person interested in photography not having a bank account loaded with money, it will not be possible to see the results of “What the world has never seen”.
Because the book costs € 500 or $ 650. You raise curiosity among many people through your stories on the blog and the images there, but that curiosity will eventually never be satisfied because of the price of the book. That is a pity !

The point made is understandable. Often we desire something that we can’t get because it costs substantially and we think we don’t have the money to pay for it.

There are a few things that can be said as a response to this way of thinking and consequently of acting.

Indeed, the book “What the world has never seen” costs € 500 or $650. This seems to be a lot of money, but in fact it is not. It will be at least 10 more months before the book is actually ready for shipping. If a person puts € 12,50 or $ 16 aside each week for the time to come, the day the book is ready one of the 200 copies is acquired.
The point made by the woman on Facebook of not having the money is simply invalid: the money is there but a choice must be made.
Another way of doing is to make a pool of friends. If there are ten of them and each puts € 50 or $ 65 in the sock, one of the 200 copies of the book is theirs and they can share and enjoy the book and celebrate their successful friendship.
A third way is to find out who has purchased a book. To befriend that person and request to borrow the book and the key.

It is easy to say that only 200 copies will be available of the book of “What the world has never seen” and that they cost € 500 or $650 making it impossible to put that much money on the table.
That it is too expensive to satisfy the curiosity and to put that blame in the laps of the organizers of the project.
Only 200 copies are made because the philosophy of the project is that what is private and intimate should remain private and intimate.
The project is performed worldwide and many people are working for “What the world has never seen” to have the results and this price of € 500 or $ 650 covers the extensive costs of production.

When somebody sees a Rolls Royce and dreams of owning one, the price of the vehicle is the hurdle to take. But makes it sense for that person to blame Rolls Royce for their pricing? Isn’t the car worth the money? So should the person not avoid blaming Rolls Royce and analyze the own situation to come up with a creative solution?
In the case of the book “What the world has never seen” there are possibilities, as mentioned above.

The publication of the person on Facebook ended well for her. Her complain for the book to cost that much and she not able to afford it or come up with any creative idea, resulted in another Facebook-reader who has ordered the book and will own one of the 200 copies, to invite the complaining person to have a coffee and a biscuit in his home while getting the opportunity to see his copy of the book.

A Bhudist dream come true

We left Soppong in an old pick up truck that was driven as if it was an elephant moving around a warehouse stored with eggs. The Hill Tribe driver having his face close to the windshield not to miss any of the many potholes.
We had food with us and water because we were going to the most far location one can go to in Thailand. One mile more and the traveller is arrested in Burma for illegal border crossing. In the back was sitting Thai producer Tun Tin who had organized this oriental safari. Also an 80-year old man, Tun Tin’s buddy.  Destination was the village of Pung Yam where the Hmong people live.

This trip was one of the most magical I experienced. Ever. We reached the village and stayed there for two days. Searching for persons who could show what nobody has seen. At the same time absorbing the harmony and the peace that was in that village. In a very strong way.

Like most villages, there was a Bhudist temple. Where the monk Kanah lives with a group of young boys: disciples who will be monks later too.
We could sleep in this temple and in a kitchen we could cook our food.

At 7 it was dark: at 8 we were under the blankets. It gets very cold at night in the mountains. At 7 in the morning the day announces itself once more: hence, it was a long night.

A long night to sleep. A long night to be awake and listen to the sounds that can be heard in a Bhudist temple somewhere in Thailand. Also a long night to have interesting dreams.

One dream was striking and strongly felt and remembered.
I was dreaming I was sitting in a car traveling. As a passenger. A woman with blonde hair was driving. Between her and me, there was something. At one point I lay my head on her shoulder. And she laid her head on mine.

Late that day the “What the world has never seen”-team arrived back in Soppong and went straight to our favorite restaurant. Where they serve a most delicious noodle soup for $ 0.65. In front of the restaurant was someone on a motorbike asking for directions.
It was a young woman from Holland. We had a soup together and talked. When we said goodbye and had arranged to meet again, she said: let’s hug.
Was that the dream from the Bhudist temple maybe?

Life as a celebration.

The next expedition to find in Thailand persons that can show what nobody has seen is planned and tomorrow we take off. This time not by motorbike but with a pick-up truck and a team of three. The bed of the truck stacked with food and camping equipment because we plan to return but in a few days.
Where we go, I don’t know but it is far away and the guide/translator, being a Burmese refugee and in charge, I suspect we go most likely somewhere there from where he fled.

In spite of not knowing where I will go and what I will find and even not being very sure that we return safely in this turmoiled part of Asia, I am totally relaxed about it. “Sunny” the guide, has a wife and children and therefore has reasons to come back in one piece.

It is this special thing I have noticed in Soppong, Thailand. People here are fundamentally relaxed. There is something in the air that dissolves any feeling of worry. A harmony is in the Soppong existence I have never found in Mexico, the US or Europe.
It is easy to notice. Just watch the Thai drive their motorbikes and mopeds. Often with three persons on one bike or with children everywhere or with heavy sacks of rice. They seem not to ride on the road. They seem to float from here to there. They are on their mopeds only not to attract too much attention for the fact that they travel without any interference of necessary machinery.

Like your mind can still remember, imagine and travel to this romantic beach where once you made love as it never happened again to be relived maybe painfully in the mind’s eye that can see those things from the past.

In Soppong, Thailand, life has no stress with those who are clustering here. Is it because of their Bhudist religion? Or the easy climate and favorable farming circumstances? Things go. By themselves. Here life is not a struggle but a celebration.

In Thailand they are there as well

The first person  found in Thailand who  showed what nobody has ever seen….

Falling deepest to find

First I was sitting during one long night in a KLM airplane during 10 hours to travel from Amsterdam, the Netherlands, to Bangkok, Thailand.
Next, I was flying from Bangkok to Chiang Mai in Thailand.
Followed by a bus ride of over 4 hours from Chiang Mai to the village of Soppong.

Today, from Soppong, sitting on the back of a light motorbike called Honda Dream, Thai producer “Sunny” and me, we drove more than 2 hours into the mountainous jungle.

During that journey, going up and going down, seeing the beautiful jungle pass by, seeing people working in the rice fields, seeing birds flying from one tree to another, seeing the river finding its way between the high mountains, I came to wonder what the heck I was doing there.
Obviously traveling to somewhere but I had no clue where “Sunny” was taken me. We went higher and higher into the mountains, the road getting worse by the mile.
If at that moment a journalist had landed by parachute in front of our Honda Dream and had asked me where I was, I would not have known what to reply.
Well, obviously I was in Thailand and somewhere in the northeast.
Clearly close to the border with Burma because at one point 5 large Army trucks loaded with soldiers and their impressive guns passed by to the nearby area of possible international trouble.
The road was bad and often steep and slippery because of the gravel.
I was not wearing a helmet.
An inner voice was asking on behalf of the Department of Security, Survival and Foolishness, based somewhere in my brains, if that really was such a good idea to sit on a light motorbike on a slippery and dangerous road out in nowhere although somewhere in Thailand but close to Burma. The good point the inner voice made was, what for hell’s sake was driven myself to go to this far corner of the world and this in a total irresponsible way.
Who could deny it was not a survival trip at all but more likely making gambling in a casino look like a way to become an easy millionaire?
But then another thought flashed when the Honda Dream hit another pothole and this one was that a photo project was performed and persons were to be found that can show what nobody has seen.
In big cities this means doing intensive research for weeks and in the countryside it means making miles and miles to reach the end where a man or a woman explains what it is.
What in their case it is what the world has never seen.

Did this trip, possibly considered as absurd and irresponsible, bring a result that justified the effort?
That is the beauty of life.
A man can fall in love, which is a reckless thing to do, but it is the way to find the one.