In the ladies prison in Chiang Mai, there is a rehabilitation program that I had heard about so today it was my mission to check it out. In the prison there is a restaurant, a café, hair dressers, massage therapists, and a few other practicing trades. The services are all provided to the public by the inmates as part as a rehabilitation, reintegration program and I was really interested to see how it was run.
I was quite surprised to see that the prison property is in the heart of Chiang Mai and has a radius of a few blocks. Throughout these blocks I saw many woman inmates walking around from building to building. They were not in cuffs, they did not have prison guards following them, there was no wired fence, watchtower, or any sort of system keeping them within the prison boundaries. They would take laundry from one building to another or walk across the street to the prison canteen, all of it on their own or while chatting away with fellow inmates. The freedom floored me. I couldn’t decide if it was a sign of trust or a scary sign that the ladies knew the consequences all too well to even think about messing around. Either way, after watching dozens of ladies roaming the streets it was clear they have a fairly good unspoken understanding of their own little prison system and no one was stepping out of line.
These programs are fairly debatable as to whether or not they are productive to the inmates, the prison, and the community. Some say it is wonderful, it is a program that is teaching skills to the inmates so they have other means to income once they are released (one of the prison guards I spoke to today said the majority of the women are in jail because of drug dealing/smuggling), others say it is a way for the jail to have modern day slaves raking in a bunch of money for them. Some say it is a degrading show-and –tell type program, others believe regardless of whether or not it is a choice for the women they put themselves in this position and they should have to work, be productive, and earn money for the community. Although the ladies didn’t say much about their thoughts on the program they did seem to really be enjoying it. Ive gotten a few massages now and this environment was much more inviting than anywhere else I have been. The ladies were making jokes, they were all very very nice, and not only going out of their way to make me comfortable but also enjoying one another’s company by giving each other massages, doing each other’s hair, and laughing away the whole time.
I decided to get a massage since it is my latest addiction around here. I went into a fairly big white room that had five or six nice blue Thai massage beds and about a dozen leather foot massaging chairs. The room smelt of delicious tiger balm and tea, and actually felt much more comfortable and inviting than I imagined it too. At first there were two Thai men getting a massage but when they were finished it was me, five female inmates, and no prison guard in site (surprisingly I was in the room for an hour and not once did a guard even come in to check on us). Me and some of the ladies were having a pretty good conversation about my travels, where I was from, and all that fun surface jazz but when it came to questions about the program and how long they had been doing it none of them could understand English.
So my lady was a big mammer-jammer. She had the kindest smile but the toughest hands and she turned my back into putty within a half hour, it was amazing. She was pulling me, twisting me, and bending me in ways I thought my body could never go. She did this thing where she laid behind me, I sat on her feet then she bent me backwards, lifted her knees and pulled my feet and arms back (so I was doing this weird stretchy backwards arch thing over top of her body). When she brought me down I was sitting in between her legs and she gave me a big hug (like full out head resting on my back) and told me how pretty I was. Soon the other ladies chimed in giving me complements on my body, my flexibility, and my “perfect beauty”. Now you would think these are complements that a girl wants to hear but for some stranngee reason they just weren’t peeking my interest at the time. In all honestly the ladies were just being nice and had no ill intentions at all, but come on, tell me that’s not awkward? Out came the most uncomfortable laugh/giggle/noise thing that I had ever heard myself make and with that I stood up, thanked the ladies and was on my way.
Im not sure what to think about the program, I wish I could have spoken to the ladies about it more so I knew how they felt about it, but from what I did see it seemed to be really beneficial and something that the inmates enjoyed doing. It was a really neat experience and I am very glad I did it. The ladies were wonderful to me and my massage was incredible. I am leaving to Pai tomorrow but when I come back through town I will definitely be hitting the prison back up again!
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