legal clinic

We were fortunate enough last week to receive a visit from the Migrant Assistance Program in Chiang Mai. They provided a clearly articulated, well-organized overview of the migrants' rights to social and welfare services in Thailand, their process of potentially attaining Thai ID cards and nationality, and the different laws affecting their status in Thailand. The MAP folks also patiently answered many questions about specific legal cases and scenarios presented by our community members, taking notes so that they could follow up in the future. We are grateful that they were able to travel rather far and send several Thai- and Shan-speaking workers, all quite knowledgeable, to conduct the workshop/ legal clinic in our community-- after the refugees came home from work, at dusk, on a dirt path amidst the refugees' thatch-roof huts, by the light of single lightbulb on a string!