These ladies were at the celebrations for their older daughters and are from the Akha tribe - there are about 80,000 living in the hills in Northern Thailand. At the museum we learnt all about their culture and it was spooky that we had just met two members.

A trip to see the Karen long neck tribe is advertised here in Chiang Rai. The ladies add more and more rings round their necks over time and end up with abnormally elongated necks. But we discovered in the museum that the ladies have been brought in to Thailand as a tourist attraction and the founder of the museum calls it a 'human zoo' so I'm pleased we didn't go.

We had a long chat with this lady demonstrating the craft of weaving -  her family still live in the hills, using indigo, mango and other plants for natural dyes.