I have never so successfully cross dressed before.
For someone to believe that after working with me for an entire day that I was a boy is quite a feat! Granted I am not the girliest of girls when I work on site; I usually wear a short sleeved baggy t-shirt, long shorts to my knees or long pants and a baseball cap - none of which however in the USA would be considered "guy clothes". But in the end it really has nothing to do with what I am wearing on site and everything to do with what I am doing- hard labor. And not only THAT but also directing other men - other white men. All of this together with the baseball cap, the physical building and the management skills was just too much for our new Burmese hired worker to comprehend and he spent the WHOLE day thinking I was a Thai boy until I took off my baseball cap!
He told my friend and roommate, Tha wah, how shocked he was to find out that I was a girl. In Mae Sot, unlike Bangkok and busier cities in Thailand, there are lots of Burmese and Karen refugees here and the community is very small and slightly more conservative. Women almost never wear shorts that are higher than their knees and you will never see a girl wearing a spaghetti strap shirt. Most women continue to wear the traditional long skirts with a loose short sleeved or long sleeved shirt. And while Mae Sot is not repressive towards women it is still traditional about what are women's jobs and what are men's jobs. And one job that is not a woman's job is building playgrounds with power tools out in the sun!
While I do get stared at ALOT while biking around town in work clothes, being all sweaty and unlady like and going into hardware stores to buy new drill bits and the such it does come with an interesting sense of responsibility. At the first school that I worked at, Morning Glory, there was a young teacher around my age from Burma. The first few days that I showed up to work she would sit outside and watch us work and after the 4th day she told me that she was worried that my hands were getting calloused and would hurt from all of the digging I was doing. After I showed her that my hands were neither calloused nor did they hurt she just looked at me, said “but you are so pretty” and went back into the school. Since that day whenever I showed up on site she would follow me around and I would often notice her watching me as I drilled or used the machines. Come the following week she started to help out with the work and soon she was carrying dirt and gravel, painting and all sorts of other jobs. It was quite interesting to see her working because all of the other teachers at the school were older women and while glad to have us building a play ground not in the least interested in helping us build it.
At this new playground I am constantly being watched by all of the little girls and they are often very interested in participating. People in Mae Sot are used to Farangs (white foreigners) coming and doing charity work; some of which I am sure includes women getting dirty and doing building. But to them Farang women doing work is different; it is a cultural difference that white cultures do this and that is okay, but Burmese and Thai cultures do not. So it is very strange for them to see me, a non-Farang and someone many assume to actually be Thai or Burmese, doing "man's work". On top off all of that the culture here is to humbly do and respect what the Farangs tell you to do. I feel that for me to be in a managerial position and often be consulted with about designs or building decisions by Marcus, my Australian boss, must be the weirdest of all and I know the hardest to adjust to for some of the Burmese hired workers that help us.
I must say that even though it is strange for a woman to be giving them directions on a building site they do not be grudge it. All of the Burmese workers that help us have take my role very seriously and often come up and want me to check and make sure they are doing the right thing. I feel that in the USA the same would not be so. A woman at a building site would probably be met with scorn, resentment and even hostility.
I never thought that I would be coming to Mae Sot to question what this small town thinks about it's set gender roles, but it is definitely gratifying to see all of the school girls, teachers and Burmese workers' reaction to me working with Marcus and Tha wah daily.
