Southeast Asia - Clean Breaks: 500 New Ways to See the World - page 296

sip cocktails under an umbrella on the beach,
check what time that is.

Need to know Evason Phuket runs a volunteer
programme that allows visitors to stay for four
weeks but pay for two if they participate in various
community and environmental projects while there.
For directions, accommodation details, rates and
booking see W www.sixsenses.com/Evason-Phuket/
index.php; T [phone].

398 Stay in an iSan village,
thailand

It's far too easy to visit Thailand and come away
feeling that you never really got to see what life
for Thais is like outside of the tourist centres. If
you're curious, then a visit to the tranquil rice-
growing village of Ko Pet in the northeastern
Isan region may be just what you're looking for.
Ko Pet is a village like many others in
the region, with the difference that it has
built a lodge so that small-scale tourism can
supplement incomes from rice and vegetable
cultivation. Guests (a maximum of six at a time)
stay in the locally built three-bedroom Lamai
guesthouse at one end of Ko Pet, surrounded
by a garden of palms and mango trees, and are
always accompanied by two of the villagers on
visits into the village - who are there to provide
translation and keep tours unobtrusive.
The activities on offer - joining elders foraging
for edible insects or mushrooms, learning how
to weave baskets from raffia, seeing silk being
produced - are not staged, since they comprise
what the villagers would be doing anyway.
Guides ensure these are rotated between the
twenty or so participating families, so there is
little disruption of routine and income is spread
evenly.
Everything about the project has been carefully
thought through. All goods and services are
purchased locally; kitchen waste is composted;
bicycles are used for tours; plastic bottles are
collected and distributed to fishermen as traps;

and an organic gardening scheme has diversified
the economy and attracted new species back
to the area. Ko Pet may be in one of the more
remote areas of Thailand but the scheme here
is showing the way forward for rural tourism in
Asia.

(Clockwise from top) Learning
to weave from raffia; Woman
harvesting rice; Fishing with
recycled plastic bottles as traps

Need to know The homestay will pick up guests
from the train station at Bua Yai or the bus stop
at Sida. For directions and details of tours and
packages see W www.thailandhomestay.com; T +66
(0) 862 585 894.