North of the ancient ruins of the Sukothai kingdom the landscape changes.
You enter a land of rounded soft hills and deep rich valleys, where the local farmers grow corn, garlic, ginger, strawberries and tobacco on the fields. Here the rice becomes sticky, and the beaches of Phuket are replaced by waterfalls. The mountains hide the best preserved prime forests in Thailand. The tree of life - teak can be seen in plentiful.  
 
You are now in the old cultural region of Lanna - The Kingdom of a million rice fields. One of the clear signs that you have arrived in Lanna is the kalae, the buffalohorns or the V - sign totem on the roof. The kalae wards of evil spirits. Lanna is usually associated with its ancient capitals such as the Northern Rose of Thailand – Chiang Mai (the new capital), and the old capital Chiang Rai (King Mengrais capital), both founded by the Lanna king Mengrai in the 13th century.
 
However a similar culture, as the northern Lanna-thai, extends all the way to the southern parts of China, in to the land of the 12.000 rice fields - Xip Song Panna, or as it’s called in Chinese Xisuanbanna. In Xip Song Panna, dai people live in teak houses with peacocks instead of buffelhorns on the roof. They proudly relates to their cousins in the northern parts of Thailand.

If you travel eastwards from Lanna you arrive to Luang Prabang, the world heritage city by the mighty Mekong river. Luang Prabang was once the capital of a splendid Laotian kingdom named Lang Chang - The kingdom of a million elephants. Lanna and Lang Chang are sister kingdoms and has a partly shared history. It is here where rural France meets the golden temples.
 
Go north or westwards  from Lanna and you will meet another tai group, the tai yai, or the shan people who resides in the Mae Hong Son region and further on into the Shan state of Myanmar/Burma. The Shanstate covers almost 30% of modern Myanmar. The shans brought handicraft skills and food culture to the regions of Lanna. The areas around the Golden Triangle are also inhabited of a variety of ethnic minorities: colorful hill tribes, chinese hui traders and even leftovers of the old chinese Koumintang national army, who no longer grows opium but tea in the mountains.
 
For us we would like to call this area “The kingdom of Well Being” which is everything that makes this region livable. This is simply the story of why we love to live in The Kingdom of Well Being. Discover the people of the Kingdom of Well Being. View their daily life and their festivals. See their cultural heritage that makes the people of The Kingdom of Well Being the proudest.

Through this blog, follow our journey through a completely different culture, with humor and some fair amount of craziness.

Let the journey begin.

^PS & ^JF

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