A Tube Ride Across the Moei River
By The Irrawaddy
August 10, 2007—Some strange ferry boats ply the waters of Southeast Asia—but none as strange as the craft that carry passengers across the Moei River separating Thailand and Burma. These ferries are nothing more than large inner tubes, propelled by hand across the river between Mae Sot in Thailand and Myawaddy in Burma.
Safety standards? The pictures tell all…
“It’s really tiring when you row with the hands,” said one ferryman. “But if we use oars, the inner tube will be carried by the river current and it won’t reach its destination. It’s not a boat, you know.”
Boat or no, it’s still the preferred way of crossing the border river for scores of local people daily.
“I’ve already crossed 15 times with full loads of passengers this morning,” said the ferryman, balancing the wallowing inner tube as a new crowd boarded. Many passengers carried donations for temples on the other side of the river.
The ferryman operated from Ball Gate, named after the local term for an inner tube—ball—and one of 20 so-called “gates.” He said it was also known as Police Gate because passengers were checked at a police post there
The cost of a single fare ranges from 600 kyat (nearly 5 US cents), half of which goes to the authorities, for crossings by inner tube, to 1,000 kyat (nearly 8 cents) for a place on a proper boat.
A husband and wife couple on the inner tube said they were making for Mogok Gate, named after the Mogok temple on the Burmese side of the border, but also known as DKBA Gate because it was guarded by members of the government-backed Democratic Karen Buddhist Army and regime troops. The pair were traveling to Mogok temple to make merit on full moon day.
The couple hailed from Rangoon’s Bahan Township and said they had been working for three years in a Mae Sot garment factory.
The river is an escape route for illegal Burmese migrant workers during the frequent raids by Thai police on Mae Sot factories, but one young man drowned last month when he jumped into the water to avoid arrest.
The body was never recovered—“He drowned there,” said Min Oo, a member of Mae Sot’s Yaung Chi Oo Burmese Workers’ Association, pointing at a place in the river.
One Burmese recalled that during the raid illegal migrants who fled from the Thai authorities and reached the river bank were rescued by boatmen operating from the Burmese bank. “We didn’t have to pay to cross then,” he smiled.
