A Personal Story About Statelessness 249 My oldest sibling is my half-brother, Jack. His father is Thai, but my brother didn’t get citizenship from any country because he grew up with my maternal grandmother in China. My mother and biological father lived in Thailand when my three older sisters, Wan, Bow and Kik, were born. They lived by the eggplant factory that my parents both worked at. At that time, they could have gotten Thai citizenship because of government corruption, but they didn’t have enough money to pay for it. When my mother was pregnant with me, she ran away from my biological father because he was drinking and fought with her often. My biological father passed away soon after my mom left him. He died from liver failure because of his drinking. I was so young, so I don’t know anything about him. I have only seen a photograph of him. Even though my biological father was dead, my mother wished for us to remain in Thailand because she believed that the economy was better and that it would be easier for her to get a job. For a while, she lived with an older woman while searching for work. The old woman would often visit her daughter in a small village 15 minutes outside of Mae Sai called San Grit Tong. My mother sometimes went with the old woman to San Grit Tong and that’s where my mother and stepfather met. My mother and stepfather got married. They knew each other for a short time. They had a ceremony and gathering, but they are not recognized as husband and wife by the government and didn’t get a marriage certificate because neither of them have Thai citizenship. 2 Village Life In Thailand, the village of San Grit Tong is considered middle-class because most people aren’t homeless – most people go to school, have a job and own a motorbike. 250-300 families live in my village – about 60% are Chinese, 30% are Thai and 10% are stateless, but the community doesn’t really mix together. Every community in Thailand has it’s own leader in the village and several people that make up a micro-government. This smaller government system helps to control the people and manage village issues. The head of the village is always a Thai citizen. If the city has a new law, if the government has a scholarship for students, if the village needs more money or if the people in the village need help with paperwork, the village leader is the one who speaks with the local government district office. Sometimes, if something happens to the stateless people in a village, the village leader doesn’t care as much because tilburg law review 19 (2014) 248-260