A Foraging Trip with Thailand's "Water Barbarians"

[Music] of the 72 million people who live in Thailand just over half are in the cities the places you've heard of are come to visit Bangkok and Paya puket and changmai there and in much of the country life has followed the same path as the modern world but when you leave the highway and head deep into the mountains well you find something very different out there far away from the morning community in the shopping malls it's an Undiscovered land of jungle Spirits ancient legends and incredible Cuisine deep in the most remote and isolated corner of the country on the edge of the Golden Triangle we had a chance to visit one of Thailand's Most Fascinating places spending 36 hours foraging for food learning the lessons of the mountains and trying the Specialties of one of the country's most revered jungle chefs this would be a trip un like any other a fight against the Wilderness a window into a long forgotten culture and a one-of-a-kind food trip to a place called naan [Music] two days ago I was sitting at home in Bangkok when I got a call from Dennis that's him he's a director who's worked with OTR in the past and for the last month he's been staying with his wife she's the one holding the camera at his family's place in one of the most remote parts of Thailand long story short he asked if I wanted to come and make a video before he headed back down so fast forward 48 hours and here I am climbing into the passenger seat of an old van on the way to [Music] somewhere my flight touched down in nonan City the capital of nonan Province one of only three flights a day that arrives at this airport but according to Dennis our direction is a village called Sila Lang more than an hour drive to the north where his mom lives and has stayed for the last 8 years this means right away heading out of the main town and driving almost all the way to the meong river which serves as the national border actually when you look at a map where we are is closer to four other countries than it is to Bangkok La Myanmar China and Vietnam Nan is a big Province larger than countries like Jamaica or Qatar but it's so sparsely settled it makes up only 1/ half of 1% of Thailand's population and while it's not the most famous of the country's 76 provinces it might have the most unique story and the most UN known culture and cuisine as a matter of fact for much of History naan wasn't Thai it was an independent state wedged between large and Powerful Empires a jungle Outpost settled by D refugees who were chased out of what's now China in the 13th century by the Mongolian Invasion the D in Thailand called the TAA to the ancient Chinese the schwe pay or water barbarians weren't traitors or expansionists which is why they're pretty much forgotten to history they lived off the land farmed rice and foraged food and played no part in the Game of Thrones that was southeast Asia in the Middle Ages except when it came to defending their home so what Dept were the naan at surviving in rough terrain that even after centuries of invasions from all sides after battles with Empires like the suctin the Lana and the lanang even after 200 years of burmes occupation none remained independent and in attacked the people simply withdrawing deeper into the jungle during times of Crisis and we're not just talking about ancient history even into the 20th century as the territory at least on paper was passed back and forth between Thailand and French Indochina the local people viewed themselves as nonone first and foremost only formally accepting Siamese sovereignty in 1931 and with insurgents still fighting for Independence well into the 1980s now as a Food Channel all of that makes this trip something fascinating a place all its own and with its own story and Cuisine but it also means I have no idea where we're going or what I'm getting myself into for the next 36 hours I'll be heading into the unknown the vast Wilderness and one of the most undiscovered parts of Southeast Asia the land of the water barbarians t [Music] according to Dennis since the airport opened there's been at least a slow trickle of tourists who found their way here mainly hikers on their way to deuka to service anyone who passes through a handful of houses and homesteads opened and one of them called dib di earned such a reputation for the owner's mom's cooking that a few years back the legendary Thai food Master Chef mcdang stopped by for some jungle food that is of course where we'll be staying that's not here though this is the house where the owner's parents live as far as you can go by car to get to our accommodation we'd need to cross a river which means the rest of the way we'd have to cover by tractor or at least that was the plan it turns out today there's a group from none who made the drive to take a cooking class something on offer to anyone who asks since MC dang's video anyway with seven people now jammed into the back of the tractor that would mean someone would be the odd man out Welcome to the Jungle [Music] so which one of these is my Palace for the night right here this one yeah this is not staged I should take my shoes off I guess got to be polite even in the uh even on the platform what do you think Adam come on in I'll show you I'll give you the tour it doesn't really matter but I do want to point out that when Dennis told me where we were staying this is how he described it nice views no air conditioning so I packed for a normal two night trip electric toothbrush laptop stuff like that yeah no air conditioning no walls either I don't know if we were I don't know we were rolling tape uh Dennis was just telling me that the last time they stayed here there was a python in one of their beds um there's not a lot of hiding places at least it's going to be easy to check all right hammock looks it'll come close it'll hold most of my weight at least little couch in case you just need to take a take a break but you're not ready to sleep this is fine it has everything I need without electricity it hit me that as soon as my phone ran out of battery nobody who wasn't here would have any idea where I was and between the snakes and the Scorpions and the fact that I was somewhere I couldn't even find on a map I was now fully at the mercy of the northern Thai jungle we hadn't even decided yet what we were going to film I felt all of a sudden completely unprepared and cut off from everything and honestly that was okay whatever happened next would be out of my hands and after so many years of the pressures of life in big cities it was kind of a liberating feeling and anyway just look at this place [Laughter] [Music] di di is what's called a Homestay which means it's also a home in this case it belongs to the yanan family a small plot of about an acre and a half where they've farmed rice since as far back as anyone can remember specifically what they grow here is sticky rice something by now sold around the world but endemic to the central Basin of the meong river in other words here the stream flowing through the property feeding into the meong less than 40 km [Music] away the idea to turn this place into a spot for tourists came from the family's Young generation osac or as he's known to everyone [Music] bird for [Music] [Music] fore for bird is one of Dennis's oldest friends from the village they have similar interests while Dennis is of course a videographer bird studied photography and worked in Bangkok before deciding after the airport opened to put his own goals on pause and come back home to try to introduce his own unique culture to anyone arriving especially because as time went by he realized it wasn't just him most of his generation had left the village for [Music] how do I get on Just just jump on J okay uh all right jump yeah like a motor [Music] bik Tony good [Music] boy what like it's F it's it's like a chair it's more more comfortable than the bed [Music] by 7:00 in the evening as the sun was setting bird went to work on his other passion project not photography or tending to the Buffalo but making pizzas with time to kill during Co he watched a few YouTube tutorials and built his own Clay Oven coming up with recipes combining Northern Thai flavors with his best attempt at an Italian style pizza dough he even ran electrical wires to power both a few hanging lights and a beer fridge without any tourists the pizza has made die dip die something of a local hangout and On Any Given night there's a good chance that a few local people might swing through to grab a drink and unwind from a long day of working the land for me I hadn't done any farming but a beer and a slice of npri on pizza sounded fantastic while we sat next to the rice fields and enjoyed the Serene atmosphere Dennis Carol and I talk through plans for filming tomorrow we had a few options I mean this area has become pretty famous for coffee Farm fing for example and Dennis knew of a few restaurants nearby run by people from the local Hill tribes but all those felt kind of like a normal OTR video and this is not a normal place this was something different impenetrable for hundreds of years and impossible to even begin to understand just by spending a day restaurant hopping but still we had to tape something we asked bird what time his dad would be around the next morning to bring us back to our car so that whatever we did at least we'd know what time we could start he told us it would have to be before 9: because after that Dad would be in the jungle forging for ingredients for the family to cook and by the family that would be his wife the one so renowned that Chef mcdang once paid a visit just like that the idea was there after all this was how the die people had lived since they'd first settled the mountains relying not on trade or Commerce but on the jungle on knowledge passed down since long before this country even existed so tomorrow that's where we'd be going tagging along on a quest for a family dinner high in the mountains of the old non Kingdom [Music] [Music] so we've been we've been walking like 1 minute just straight up hill and I'm going to pretend like I'm not like I'm not out of breath but the path is already over so like the the you know what was kind of an easy to follow well- defined path ends here and going forward it's just wherever people want to go foraging that day it's really cool [Music] Bird's dad common chose today for foraging because it's been raining here in the non-summer and now is considered maybe the best time of year to find stuff to cook the local diet is based around the edible foods that grow here including Vines wild Beetle leaves and things like bamboo choots the culture isn't vegetarian but it's close hunting is still done in the wild and it catch is hard to come by so along with the rice grown at every home this is the means for Sur survival but of all the Bounty of the Jungle the real gems the purpose of today's Quest are the mushrooms that appear only during the rainy season anything edible goes into the bag but common is looking for one specific variety one of the rarest and most valuable found anywhere on Earth something that only shows up around this time it's called the astrias odoratus otherwise known as the puffball it's a unique relative of the earth Star Family said to have a flavor and texture like a good steak and unlike other puffballs it's still a mystery to botanists who have yet to figure out how to grow it artificially it's only found here in these mountains but they're camouflaged and notoriously hard to spot and so for now we'd have to make do with more common varieties and any other plants that can go into our dinner [Music] [Music] fore fore [Music] [Music] for for thank you yeah I don't think I'd ever really thought about it this way but hiking Through the Jungle now more than an hour in and with only a small amount to show for our effort I realized I was pretty much conditioned to believe that everything was a simple transaction you need something you go get it then you go home but out here that's not how it works here just finding enough to survive can be a full-time job and it has been for come on for more than half a century like most of the people from nons Mountain tribes common left school at a young age to help support his family in his case he was 9 years old when his education switched from the classroom to the forest today he's 66 he might not have a degree but when it comes to the knowledge that's allowed his people to make these mountains home for 30 Generations well that's not something taught in any book of course I fore spee [Music] spee fore for for [Music] [Music] fore foree [Music] foree for [Music] [Music] as we went deeper and deeper into the jungle absorbing life lessons from Comm on and taking in the scenery there was still the matter of dinner and our basket of food was distressingly empty with almost no puffball mushrooms in sight background there's somebody else here foraging so he's just they're yelling to each other about what they're finding or not finding uh we are we deep gone over a mountain um kind of wound around a little bit we're way off the trail somebody else out here that's that's wild top at this point miles off the trail and disoriented by the dense forest the last thing Dennis and I expected to encounter I mean the last thing was another human being but the mushroom STW crowd and for those looking for the best stuff well the jungle is very much first come first serve we we've been out here for an hour we found two uh but this gent we just bumped into got here at 700 in the morning which was uh 4 hours ago and he has filled this this bag which is still it's not nowhere near a kilo I'm talking about 700 bu for a kilo of this but this is at least let's say three dozen probably three dozen of the mushrooms I I can't believe that anybody can even spot these [Music] cool maybe today wasn't going to be our day to beat the crowd to the puffball mushrooms we had a couple and we' find a few more but it didn't really matter because until this morning I'd never heard of them anyway and I was just excited for whatever common might show us in the jungle to see his way of life and to spend a few hours far away from the land of cell phone service and the fact that there was no service didn't even occur to me because when you're this disconnected somehow you forget about that call you've been waiting for or the score of the Orioles game or whatever felt really important yesterday in another life out here it's just us and the jungle what I did think about was food I mean 15 years in restaurant kitchens teaches you to appreciate quote Farm to Table well this whatever we're finding puffball or otherwise that's not even Farm to Table it's food as it existed before the first Farm was planted or table was built ingredients like few other people will ever get a chance to taste you can't help but be humbled by the jungle it's strength and beauty and self-sufficiency it gives us what we need but it doesn't need us if comeon and the other stopped coming the jungle wouldn't even notice it's a bit of a shock to realize that if you strip away all the decorations of Modern Life those things that make us feel like our lives are important and we're important and our problems are important the truth is when it's just us and the world we live on we don't matter we're just one more animal in the jungle leaving footprints that'll be washed away in the next rain the mountains this Forest well they were here long before we were and if people like common and bird have their way they'll still be here after we're gone too we all know that mountains like this jungles are disappearing almost as fast as the knowledge of what they actually provide but if anyone comes for this place well they'll have to go through the same people who've defended this land for 800 years and thank goodness for that [Music] for foree speee [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] all right there's a lot of parts missing from the next 2 hours right after we finished eating the rain started falling so we had to put the cameras away so they didn't get wet come on led us along the river climbing over stones and boulders soaking through our clothes cutting through thick patches of jungle with the Scythe walking through overgrown paths and pulling ourselves up by hand and then suddenly somehow we noticed we'd been here before there was the termite Mound the place we'd seen the other forager Landmark after Landmark invisible to us but second nature to a man who's not just from the jungle he is the jungle and then 7 hours after we set out hot and drenched and holding a basket full of what would become our dinner we were back to the road Jesus Christ they told us this is like last night when when Dennis says oh yeah it's fine do you want to stay in a hotel with no air conditioning yeah no air conditioning is fine and it turns out there's no walls and and then today I was going to take a little walk in the jungle get some food come back and cook it uh 10 kilometers later uh two flesh wound leg injuries uh a body temperature of about 600 but we made it we survived the Jungle the jungle did not defeat us today should have brought water this this was this was not sufficient for an entire day in the Thai [Music] jungle my feeling of accomplishment after making it back in one piece exhausted and sweaty and thinking only of dinner and a cold beer didn't last for long a quick glance down after getting back in the the tractor proved my words wildly premature I did not in fact defeat the jungle no it got me so I I hit my leg on a rock saving the camera and it turns out it's uh it's quite a bit worse than I thought so we're stepping at a clinic to get it uh to get it taped up and uh the clinic is they have their own cattle in back um this should be pretty straight forward I trust I trust that this is something that the medical system can handle walk it off it's just a flesh [Music] wound I need a stick could bite down on or a shot of whiskey or [Music] both oh God even the staff looks [Music] worried after all that I was really I thought he was going to start putting this like gauze on and wrapping it up I can't see it cuz I'm laying down he just took a little Band-Aid this like little children's Band-Aid so this is this is it's not even going to look like I like I earned a battle SC like [Music] [Music] I'm a I'm a city guy I staying in Bok for [Music] now well I feel like I I need a [Music] drink e [Music] [Music] so this is I am I'm very very excited right now um this is the meal that got me on a plane from um as I'm I'm a mess but I can't see anything it's pitch black um got me on a plane yesterday from Bangkok to nun in a van from nun to Pua um into the jungle uh the local medical clinic onto the back of a water buffalo and all of it for this and man this is this is why we do this channel this is what this is about this is what like we travel to eat so that we have experiences like this I'm I'm going to talk more but I'm going to try the food first um two dishes uh both you know it's not a this isn't a fancy meal but that's not what we came here this is uh two dishes that are made with um traditional methods food we found in the jungle today num prick that she made from uh fresh herbs and uh grilled mushrooms the mushrooms that we foraged and then a soup which has some more of the mushrooms as well as the um the plants that her husband uh picked up [Music] today it's hard to describe the two dishes on the table they're not like anything else I've ever had so the words aren't really there but it tastes like exactly what it is herbs and leaves and mushrooms without that grocery store polish no chemicals or preservatives just the stuff from the jungle seasoned with chilies and a paste made from local fermented riverfish made into a num prick or a simple relish of fresh ingredients alongside a light and flavorful soup both served with sticky rice grown right here on the farm this is just so different it's like I'm going to try it without the sticky rice it's grilled mushrooms which you taste front and center the mushrooms are a dominant flavor but then you have chili um cilantro onion and delish shallot maybe I believe there's just so much going on in this and yet it tastes like uh it's just so [Music] [Music] fresh what an amazing experience and 100% worthwhile for me I like [Music] this now I wanted to ask when we were with Bird's dad in the jungle yesterday he gave a uh little offering to the Jungle Gods jungle Spirits yeah you had your own encounter yes I did can you can you tell me that story yeah so um Dennis and two other of our friends decided we'd want to camp by a riverbed and Dennis knew exactly where the way so he led us there and during the night um everyone has had already set Camp everyone's already sleeping my friends already snoring just next to us and then slept woke up and all of a sudden in that hole in your tent where you could see kind of like the moon you could I could see the moon directly and I know that how much light was coming in there but then there was a window that was opened here too at the back of our tent where I saw a ball of light kind of walking on top of a cliff while we were at the rivered so I'm looking up at it and I didn't really know what it was and I was really afraid to understand what it was because the machete that Dennis brought was outside of our tent because I thought it was dirty I should it shouldn't be in the tent um so that kind of scared me like I have no protection like I'm in this tent this person is walking towards our campsite finding us and then I looked at it closer and it it felt like it was floating I saw that it was floating it wasn't bobbing like a person was walking with a with a flashlight it was just floating and then I and then I kind of got scared I didn't really know what to do I was going to wake up Dennis but there's no real threat yet so I just kind of watched it and for a while I watched it and suddenly just turned back and into the jungle and then I didn't see that ball of light again I can't really explain what that ball of light is I don't know if it's Spirit or anything like that so I just didn't tell anyone until we got to Bird's dad's house and my friend who was snoring uh saw it too on the same night and um he was telling the story and I was like wait wa wait no I know like I I saw that too and then Bird's dad suddenly says oh um that's a spirit you're not meant to follow it it's good you didn't follow it because if you had you'd be lost in the jungle right now [Music] 36 hours ago I was sitting in my house in Bangkok working on another video and settled into a routine and in another 2 hours well that's where I'll be again back to work doing another draft of a script is always talking about history distant cultures and old traditions that led us to where we are what I didn't expect was to actually get to live one of those stories to experience a place a life in a meal that hasn't changed all that much since the first D Warriors settled the jungles of Cam Sila Lang Village Pua District nonan Province a DOT on the map of a country with modern infrastructure tourist destinations and urban cities surrounded by a world that in the 800 years since the founding of the nonan Kingdom has changed again and again and again but not for everyone as some things are meant to be preserved protected at all costs the land that gives life the lessons that Bond families and the spirits deep in the mountains keeping an eye on the land that belongs to them it feels like an anachronism something that doesn't make sense in an easy range of a highway in a modern airport but 36 hours isn't nearly enough time to actually wrap my head around where I've just been so I'll just leave by saying I'm so unbelievably glad to have made this trip and I can't wait to come come back a little more all right be honest just straight up did you did you know did you knowingly keep some of the details about this from me before I came with the actual like accommodations and things like that you there's no air conditioning okay you know yeah yeah I wasn't it wasn't like deliberate but uh want to scare me off no I I didn't want to scare you off but you know uh I also wanted to like have it be a little bit of surpris to you too you know not you not have you like kind of 100% expect that it's going to be like this yeah but I could have I could have packed better hey but I I did tell you like hey man bring some hiking boots I almost brought Like a Rolling suitcase like a business traveler can you imagine I just show up here with like a couple of pressed shirts and you know it was close I mean I was I wasn't that much better than that you did pretty good man like yeah you did pretty good with your how did I handle it how did I handle you did pretty good man I mean like you didn't have hiking boosts you didn't have anything you just had your like old pair of sneakers and you walk through uh what was it like 5 6 km of jungle you know yeah you did pretty good man so now my next challenge is going to be to write this to make this into a video you know and your challenge too what what do you want to come out of this when when we start putting this together in a video cuz I mean again like you and I we didn't come here with like a shot sheet of what we're going to do we came we came here and literally like up until we were filming things we didn't really know what was going to happen we didn't know what the weather was going to do you know we didn't know whether everybody was going to be available we were kind of improvising and so now we have all this footage and what's your hope how do you want this to be presented like what what would you like people to see from this I just want it presented as you know as honestly as possible what like you know what this place is you know it's it's it's not ching myai it's not anywhere it's super touristy it's more raw but I think that's the beauty of it you know and hopefully it'll open up more you know more people's minds to you know getting to coming to exploring places like this you know getting out of their comfort zone uh you know out of their five-star hotel into you know a shack with no walls and and and no AC right well I I hope that that's what we were able to accomplish [Music] yeaha subscribe to the channel for more from thank you so much to everyone who supports us on patreon it makes things like this possible find links below to our patreon and social media and gu ID will link them too see you next [Music] week okay this is so stupid Tony you got to look up we got to take a thumbnail picture Tony can you can you lift your head God Tony we just need one photo just look at the camera Tony just one photo oh my God I'm getting close to the horns that should be good yeah

2024-07-28 07:42

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