Matti Sarmela
2005
The book is a descriptive overview of the culture of the villages. It contains material on the villagers' housing, rice farming and other means of livelihood, community life, festivals, weddings, funerals, sorcerers and healers, as well as village Buddhism. The author draws surprising parallels between the worldviews of peoples of Thailand and Finland, the past and future of local cultures. Matti Sarmela started collecting material on Northern Thailand in 1972. Based on a longitudinal field study, he wrote his description of three villages in Lampang Province, and the changes in villagers' lives over three decades. The book also speaks through the voices of villagers themselves and village monks. They describe the everyday lives of local people, and how they cope under conditions of a constant flux of change, what they think about life, the future, and the fate of human beings after death.
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