ScandAsia assigned its two new interns to report from an accident in Chiang Mai after only one week on the job. Below you can read about their experience.
By Charlotte Nike Albrechtsen and Lærke Kobberup
A bus accident in Chiang Mai sent 13 young Danish citizens to the hospital on 9 February 2024. They had been traveling from Chiang Mai to Pai. Our boss asked us if we wanted to go to cover the accident, and we eagerly agreed to go, fueled by our desire to learn and create journalism. Not thinking of the fact that we had only just finished our first official week of working at ScandAsia, and that this was a very serious and emotional event to cover for someone, who isn’t that experienced.
However our curiosity and perhaps naivety conquered, and we caught the last night bus to Chiang Mai. No reclining seats, but a heavy amount of air conditioning set the tone for our 11 hour long drive.
But, before we even arrived certain questions started to appear. We had been contacted by a Danish media corporation, and they had said that they would cover our expenses, if we could provide them with some content. What was actually our plan? Should we just go to the hospital and hope to bump into someone?
Once again completely new in the game?
We arrived at 9 in the morning, and quickly checked our bags at a hostel close to the hospital where the Danes were hospitalized. We had reached out to the young people involved in the accident on social media, but we didn’t want to pressure them too much.
They had just experienced something traumatic. Some of them were seriously injured, others had carried their friends out from the crashed bus, while realizing the driver had died. How do you get a statement from the victims, like a good journalist would, and at the same time not overstep any ethical boundaries and remain empathetic to their situation?
Being at the hospital didn’t get us very far in getting an interview with the injured as we were politely nudged to leave in proper Thai manner and later again by the representatives from the Danish Embassy in a more direct way.
A New Angle
We weren’t getting anywhere. Frustrated and sleep deprived we tried to think outside the box. How could we contribute? What did we have access to that the Danish media didn’t? And suddenly it hit us.
When you stay at a hostel, as we did, you can automatically join chat groups for other travelers staying in the same area as you. This is usually used to find people to party with or maybe to split a cab. Regardless, we decided to throw a message in the chat about the accident. Maybe there were some Danes who wanted to talk about the accident with us.
This resulted in a video interview with two young Danish travelers, who decided against going to Pai after hearing about the accident. Exhaustedly we sent the content home. Happy that we had something to show for on our first day in Chiang Mai.
A different journalistic culture
We tried many different approaches in Chiang Mai. Sitting outside the hospital for hours, finding other backpackers, driving to the local tourist police station, only to be sent back by the complexity of Thai bureaucracy. It was explained to us that we first needed to talk to public relations at city hall to get permission to talk to the local police station and that we needed to bring a piece of paper proving our legitimacy as journalists and actually it would be better to send an email and wait. We even spent a morning at Chiang Mai City Hall, but no progress was made.
We went to the Chiang Mai bus station, where the minivan had left for Pai, to talk to the colleagues of the deceased Thai driver. We tried talking to the workers with our best google translate capabilities. When we asked about the working hours a supervisor came over saying to call the company’s main phone number. But no one answered the call.
We realized being a journalist is different in Thailand. Language barriers kept us away from the local stories and bureaucratic hurdles blocked us from getting official statements.
“We haven’t officially been working as journalists for more than a week”, we kept saying to ourselves.
We went to Chiang Mai to experience the authentic experience of being in the field as a journalist in a situation of crisis, and we certainly got it. However, grateful to be together and not alone, as it made reflection more natural.
It was a difficult and educational experience. It felt as if we worked non stop the three days we spent in Chiang Mai, and in the end we had very little to show for it. But hey! We are new in the game, and we learned a lot. Next time we get thrown into a new situation we will be more prepared. And at least we learned that we have the will to create.
