Spring 2026 Newsletter
What started with one person has now grown into a cohesive team with a singular mission: Create a meaningful, living CCA Heritage Center in Chiang Mai and satellite Oral Tradition Schools in ethnic villages – a self-sustaining ecosystem that supports the ethnic people, projects, and patrimony of Northern Thailand. Meet our CCA Family.
Cultural Crossroads Asia’s energies have been focused on the letter ‘C’ this Spring – setting the stage for the future of our vision.
Collections
Cultural Crossroads Asia Heritage Center Collections
The CCA Heritage Center is guardian to a vast collection of precious, one-of-a-kind pieces, which offer in-person and on-line visitors an immersive experience to explore the cultural, historical, and spiritual significance they have on the people who make, use, and wear them. This body of work highlights the traditional musical instruments, textiles, ritual objects, and artifacts of the six major ethnic groups in the Golden Triangle – the Karen, Hmong, Iu Mien, Akha, Lahu, and Lisu.
Whether crafted by a master artisan, spirit intermediary, musician, headman, or man, woman, or child, these pieces represent a unique world with profound personal and communal resonance, connecting all who came before with all who will follow.
We are now in the process of detailing and digitizing each and every item – every mouth harp, silver headdress, shaman bell, and spinning wheel. This endeavor is challenging, but oh so important.
Please enjoy our first efforts documenting the winds, strings, and percussion instruments of the Hmong and Iu Mien.
Hmong Instruments
Iu Mien Instruments
Connections
There is a Season to Sow and a Season to Reap. This is CCA’s moment to plant seeds, as we connect, listen, and explore ways to collaborate with like-minded cultural activists and organizations in Thailand and abroad. In the past few months, our CCA team was delighted to meet with these NGOs and cultural leaders:
Eric Booth, Director
Jim Thompson Foundation
Richard Englehardt, Senior Advisor for Culture,
SE Asia UNESCO
IMPECT
Inter Mountain People’s Education Culture in Thailand
PASD
Pgakenyaw Association for Sustainable Development
Akha Oral Tradition School Leadership
Cultural Crossroads Asia Discussion
Commitment
Cultural Crossroads Asia continues to champion the Akha Oral Tradition School in Ban Saen Suk, as Akha youth move from strength to strength, learning Akha songs, musical instruments, stories, and dances.
Now, new initiatives are afoot. With digital story-telling skills and videos under their belt, and with museum curatorship knowledge and exhibits up their sleeve, our students, teachers, and leadership are next planning to create the Akha Tradition Alliance – A Craft Cooperative, overseen from top to bottom by our Akha students.
Though still in the developmental stages, Akha Crafts Apprenticeship Courses with Master Craftsmen and a Beginning Course in Business—Social Media, Marketing, Branding, and Sourcing—are underway. Hold that thought – more is coming!
Learning a New Instrument: Bau Lau Flute
Learning Basketry Skills
Future Akha Alliance Market
March 2026
https://culturalcrossroadsasia.org/akha-oral-tradition-school/
Communication
Presentations
From the Hands of the Hills
Textiles of the Golden Triangle
Australian Textile Tour Group
By Victoria Vorreiter
Chiang Mai, Thailand
22 January 2026
Introducing The Cultural Crossroads Asia Heritage Center
Gateway to a Vanishing World
By Victoria Vorreiter
Chiang Mai International Rotary Club
3 February 2026
To See More,
Please Visit our Face Book Post
Radio Interview
Chiang Mai Voices 98 FM
A Conversation at the Crossroads of Memory and Music
Victoria Vorreiter joins Khun Tom Sughrit Kraseirsook and Khun Wouter van der Stichel
6 March 2026
Exhibitions
Life Through a Lens
A Small Pop-up Photo Display of Vanishing Traditions
The Home of Ikigai Restaurant
Under Master Chef James Douglas Noble
Chiang Mai, Thailand
February – June 2026
VV Photography Site
www.VictoriaVorreiter.com
Complete Gratitude
How do we at Cultural Crossroads Asia thank you? Let us count the ways. To those below, those of many past years, and those in days yet to come, it is you who make this grand archival initiative possible.
Your trust and encouragement, your efforts and contributions have lifted our preservation work out of the jungle and into the world. Please know you are now part of a long line of Good Ancestors who will inspire countless future generations.
Donors
Living Legacy Project – Semester 5
(September 2025 – March 2026)
Laura Rose & Emanual Kuntzelman
Marsha and Phil Dowd
Doree Huneven
Scott Keesling
Bill Reichert
Chiang Mai International Rotary Club
Joanna MacLean
Martha and Avrum Bluming
Barbara and Tom Donnelley
Maria and Neil Nehring
Mary Averill
Doug Van Tress
Gerald Adelmann
Steve Epstein
Olivia Hewitson
Martine & Ilya Levinson
Nadya Lurey
Carol and Brad White
Helen Brunner
Linda McIntosh
Tukata & Don Blankenship
Sequoia Henning
Oliver Toth
Michael Sidell
Candace Chesney
Mark Oscai
Lisa Roberts & John McDougal
Patricia & Nitya Pibulsongram
Karen Vorreiter
Barry and Beth Brooks
Anonymous
Anonymous
Renee Robbins
George McBride
Karen Kaye
Rebecca Leistman
Special Announcement for Donors
Good news! The Cultural Crossroads Asia Foundation has recently been awarded a 501(c)(3) status in the U.S., allowing American donors to receive a tax deduction for their contributions. This means that gifts from those in the States to CCA now help Akha students and their master teachers sustain their culture in mountain villages, while also serving them half way around the world.
Cultural Crossroads Asia relies on the gracious donations
of people like you who believe in the importance
of protecting ethnic knowledge and traditions before they disappear.
Please pledge your support:
