Tao Sattara Hattirat:
Hi, Kunthea.

Kunthea Chan:
Hi, Tao.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
It's good to have conversation with you this morning. It would be better if we can have it over breakfast. But anyway, we get to be talking about something I know we both have shared interest. And we have known each other for a very long time, but I never actually ask you why you come to be interested in collective wellbeing and how that relates to your background. For the friends who are here, this is the way we are going to do it. We are going to have a conversation between the two of us. And at the end of our 45-minute conversation, you get to also join in. So, Kunthea, tell us a little bit about how it comes to be that you are interested in feminist collective wellbeing.

Kunthea Chan:
Thank you, Tao. Before I go to that, I think perhaps I can also introduce myself and maybe you also. So my name is Kunthea Chan. I'm working with JASS, that's in Cambodia, JASS in Southeast Asia. And how I involve with JASS is a long time ago, but experience that I get to know more about how the activism should be because, at that time, it's like, in the last 10-year, I was just a kid working, just want to get the salary and working for other thing. But when I involved with JASS in the last 10-year, I get to know more about the activism and how we can also increase our passion to join the social change. And then, eventually, I see a lot of discrimination against women and also the girl, and the marginalised group, LBT, and also other. In our society, we had the equality is really a big gap, so I think that also drive myself and also increase my passion to work more on this field. So I think that is my background, Tao, and maybe you can also introduce your background.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I am a lesbian activist from Thailand. Before I came to be interested in wellbeing for activists, in Thailand, we work together as a loose network of LBT activists and we have developed common problems, like health issues, and we are constantly poor, and we tend to fight among each other a lot. And I started to think, if this is a common problem, maybe it's not coincidence. Maybe there are some structural things. There are some common causes that make it difficult for us to organise and remain healthy in our movement.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah. Yeah, I think because most of the time when we talking about wellbeing, it sound like therapies. It's because it's normalised, because we ask the woman, girls' in this society to care for other, but not really for ourself. So it's really normalize ourselves to just care for other, but not ourselves. So when we come and step down and step up, to reflect and step up to taking care for ourself, it feel like so many consequence, so many burden, and also so many guilt and especially as a woman being a wife, a mother, a daughter, or even a single mother. So there are so many consequence around this. So I think that is also the issue when we talking about the wellbeing, right?

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
Yes. Even though we don't spell it out, it feels selfish or you are being selfish. It's always there, this feeling. And I have to admit that, even though my main work right now is to advocate for activists to create a culture of collective wellbeing in the movement, I still feel guilty sometimes when I went to take rest. It's very deep internalised.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, true.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
And-

Kunthea Chan:
I think-

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
Yes?

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, yeah. No, you continue, Tao.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
And I think, as activists, we tend to have one rich resource, that is friends. We have lots of friends. We work with lots of people and network. And so, when we have hardship, when we feel sick, when we are depressed, or when we cannot feed ourselves, when we don't have money, actually we should in theory, we should be able to reach out to all of the friends that we have. But in my experience, also me sometimes and the friends in my movement, when we have problems, we don't reach out to our friends. We keep quiet. And when I ask some of my friends why, and they would answer, "I don't want to trouble other friends. We are already working so hard and I don't want to trouble others for my own problem."

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah. I also facing this kind of experience, and some activists also has so much traumatised and they also refuse. One of the reason you have mentioned, Tao, but also sometime about trust, even we try to supporting them to offer therapy or counselor, but they also don't feel trust with others. They always like to talk to us or some specific person. But sometime, we also don't have experience of counseling. We can do a lot of support, emotionally support, but some deep traumatised sometimes is also a challenge and also difficult for us. But I think this kind of thing, it's also one of the challenge when the activist refuse to get counseling.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I like it when-

Kunthea Chan:
And also, I think-

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
Yes?

Kunthea Chan:
When we talking about why this is a issue for us, because this is also somehow we talking about internalise we still somehow reproducing the same, the way that patriarchal are doing in the society, and we repeat it without knowing, also reflect we working very hard, like 8-hour and produce the product. But it's like, what does that mean for us that when it's really impact to our mental and also emotional? But also, sometimes, it's not really effective a lot. Because sometime I'll be talking about timing, everyone's so busy, but maybe sometime when we step back and relax or maybe do some self-care, we can go back and to do those work within one hour. But sometime when we just focus on producing because it's need to make it done, sometime it take it longer because when your brain is not fresh, when you were so stressed, some work that you can spend one hour, it's become two or three hour depend on. So I think something that we also need to reflect the way our work, the structure, and also to not really focus on the products.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I like it when you say we don't see examples of how we can be an activist and be healthy. And you are also talking about, if we take a bit of rest, we become more productive. Do you have some real practices that maybe you have tried out in your collective that gives the members examples of how we can maintain the health of the friends in our collective?

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, I think I can raise example from what we doing in our team, the JASS regional team Southeast Asia. So we try to really normalise the heart, mind, body, and the wellbeing within our team. We keep reminding. But also within our meeting, we... The team meeting, when we have a review or the reflection, is two time a year. And during that time, we also write a love letter to each other, to really see how we see the quality of each of us and how we appreciate. Every week, we have Friday appreciation tree. So you can write something or any appreciation to the team and how that feeling for you within that week because, some week, we have more work, some week maybe a bit relaxed, so everyone can be different, and sometime we also travel, so how we also appreciate that.
And even we discuss about menstruation because, sometimes, some people feel... some people very pained when they got menstruation and that sometimes they need to also slow down. And we just inform each other that, "Today, I'm on my period. I need to be slow down." So it's totally create that kind of space and that we can talk and we can feel, and don't feel guilty because sometimes linked to the first one that I said about the product, when you feel like you are not so productive, you feel guilty. So, sometimes, the body need to relax, the body need to rest, and sometimes you cannot really know it because you like your work. You want to do your work, but your body need it.
So I think this is sometimes you need to also listen to your body. And not just only talking about menstruation, but also at the reproductive issue because that's how we create the space. And so, everyone can share all of those things and building trust among all of us and the culture of openness. I think that is important to collecting all of the concern, express the feeling, but also sharing the power within us. And even we are in the team, but we have different privilege and how we understood that, and how we understand when we need to step back, when we need to make sure that we not use the power over to other. So I think those kind of things is part of building the collective care within the team.
And we have also peer support, like one-to-one, and you're checking on me, I checking on you. I think the most important when we do the mistake, we responsibly collectively, and we make it as a learning. It's not a mistake, that really effective for me because, one, you can also share the burden and you also can see the potential of the team because everyone has different potential, and how we learn from that experience when we share those mistake together and treat it as the learning so that you not really feel so bad. But we also collectively responsible together because that's how the team as supposed to. So when one of us make mistake, all of us collectively responsible for that.
And I think we also start to also change the way how we meet because we work... In JASS, it's globally from other region as well, so switch the time zone, but not all the time our evening. Because when talking about Southern Africa or Mesoamerica, the time is very different. So, most of the time, it's our evening from Southeast Asia. So we start to switch the time, like our morning. So it could be early morning for Southern Africa, so something like this to really change something that used to be normalised and how we, as the team, collectively responsible for that. Because whenever we have a call at the evening or late evening, our brain also not working. And when we do all the time is also very difficult and we don't have input to contribute. So I think that it's also radical to really change from the normal thing that we are doing.
But also, collective security and safety, how the team understand and how we build our risk assessment and contextual analysis that all of us can really discuss and talk and develop the mitigation plan together because how to make you feel safer within other teams as well. So, when you started building from yourself... And we also have some yoga, some Zumba within the team, then we have a meeting. So when we do this in the team, it is a strategy, but also in the strategy that we put it when we work with our partner, when we create a space that our partner can also talk. But also, there's many thing that we can also learn from them, like the way that I learned from you Tao the wellbeing, and also document those resources. So when we need the resource, our partners from other country need resources, we can also reach out to you or we reach out to other. So I think those kind of thing.
When we start to really normalise those kind of care, collective care, it can contribute and impact a lot to the work and to expanding when we work with our partner, when we using the familiarspopular education approach that we try to collect the experience from other. But also all the session, we integrate the storytelling and integrate... So I think those is starting from us and that feel have influence to the way that we work with other partner, network, or our allies. So I think that's from my experience. Tao, maybe you can share from your.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I think we do similar things and I still learn from your practices. I totally agree when you say, "We feel guilty when we are not productive." And I think the most important thing for me and probably my collective network, to be able to create this culture of care is to change how we think about it. When we rest, it's a triumph, I think.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, yeah.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
It's doing something courageous. It's breaking the norm. It's not laziness. I think laziness is a narrative thrown to us by people who are not in our positions. I have never met a single activist who is lazy. We are not lazy. We work our heart off, our heart bleeds. We can never be lazy. We are just tired. And so, when we feel we don't want to do it today, we can respect it. And when we decide to take some rest or some time for ourselves, I think, especially for women and LBTQ people, it's important for our friends to encouraged it, to say, "Yes, take rest! Yes, you are doing the right thing," or when we are pushing ourself to a limit, it's important for our friends to say, "Do you think that's too much? Do you feel tired? Do you want to take some days to rest or maybe a week?"
And when we have practiced that, I discover that we can really keep ourself in check. It's not perfect yet because the internalisation is very strong. This drive for us to do more and it's not enough, that is strong, especially we are taught to care for others and to sacrifice. As taught to be women and also in movement, we have this subculture that other people are suffering, so we need to work more. So I find that it is difficult and impossible for one person in the movement to resist, to say, "I need to rest," but other people are working. So it's more possible if everybody say, "Yes, that's the right idea. You should rest."

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
And for menstruation, too, because the rest of the world tend to ignore our pains when our period comes, and I think we talk more about it. And when people in our group say, "It's my period time," we check. "Are you comfortable? Do you want to just take it slow today? The AC is too cold?" or something like that, make it more because just doing it at a normal level doesn't compensate to how the world has neglected this issue of ours.
In our group, we agree that our work time should be four days a week and only six hours per day. And to be honest, we cannot really do it. We work more than that, but it's good to have a common understanding of what to expect. So when we work more than that, we know this is not expected and actually we deserve rest. We try to take relationship and problems at home into consideration when we work together. For example, in some time, friends have family problems or they have love life crisis, and that should be taken into account that, "Okay, maybe they cannot function well today, that's understandable." I find it's very important for LBQ activists because, in larger world, our relationship is not really that accepted or recognized, and so relationship becomes something very important for us. And in some days, we face relationship problems. When we have relationship problems, there is a tendency that LBQ people deal with it themselves because they don't have social system to back them up.
So, in our collective, we tend to discuss that and allow space for people to bring it up. So it's embraced in our collective and women in general, too, family and relationship. People would say it's a personal thing. And in industrious world, they develop this idea of professionalism. And when you want to be professional, you don't bring in your personal issues into work, but that will be very difficult for women and grassroots women, and women and LBQ people in general when half of their time is taking care of people in that relationship and family. So it's cutting them off.
And one last thing I want to say to also second what you said about collective experiences, you say you want to create a space for people to talk about their experiences. I think this is very important for progressive feminist movement or any social movement at all, and wellbeing is a big part in it. If we center our thought around what makes us unhappy and unhealthy and allow a space for people to share experiences, we can continue to discover the causes of suppression, the causes of inequality that are not already addressed or recognised in the larger movement because we must not forget that, oh, the formal problems or the recognised problems tend to be the problems that powerful people are already talking about, so to allow space for everyone to share what is making them unhappy. Even though they cannot have the words to describe them yet, I think that can keep the movement progressive and push the movement forward to continue to discover causes of inequality no matter how small it is or how submerged or subtle it is.

Kunthea Chan:
Mm-hmm, yeah. Yeah, I think you remind me something within your experience. This is why we always say personal is political because it's how important. And especially when we talking about a movement building, who build a movement? It's human being, it's us. So if we are not healthy, how we going to build a movement? So I think this is very connecting. And when we talking about the crisis of any relationship or family, or professional work, or whatever, it's about us, it's all of us because sometime the issue is because of the gender norm, because of the internalise of the patriarchal. So how are we, as a feminist, to support each other, not to, "Okay, you cannot work. You need to resign"? But how are we going to support that? How are we dealing with those kind of issue? I think that is important because...
And like you said, it's happened. We are not perfect. It always happen. But every day, we keep reminding ourself and what our principle when the issue coming up, and how we try to think the creative way, not normalise the way that how it always solve, and how we really value the people experience, the woman experience, LBT experience. I think that is important because sometime we decide on behalf of the people. Even we said that we are participatory process, we use participatory process, but sometime the way that we are doing is not really, so always keep reflection.
And when we talking about menstruation, it's not just only body pain, but also emotional. Sometime, someone, you really feel down and you don't really know why. Sometimes, you just want to cry or you feeling so down, something like that. So how are we really understand and be together collectively support as a team, and also I know this is also part of the work? And the same with seeing COVID in JASS, we also say we had the policy to only work for six-hour per day, but it's never happened, actually, but we try at the same. After six-hour, we feel a little bit lack like, "Okay, that is our expectation, but it's still"... So I think that is still some issue that we need to address. So I think that maybe go to the next one, that link why it is hard. Maybe you can share why it is hard for us to really taking care, yeah.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I think we have mentioned a little bit about why it is hard because of how... What is it? Socialisation and internalisation of capitalism and patriarchy that make people... I would say the core of it is that the cultures are trying to make us not human and we are not human. We are working with team, or we are professional, or we are perfect, or we are heroes, these terms, these labels are not actually human. And I think we are fighting to be human, to be non-perfect, to learn as we do it, and to have bad days, to not deliver sometimes, and to hold each other, to feel personal, and to bring our personal lives into it.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah. To add something, I think we already talked some of that around why it's hard, but also sometimes is the burden within the system of the donor or the funder. Sometime, the local, especially organisational group, has so many demanding, like one donor have different formal report or period. So it's like, across the year, you're just spending time to really do those kind of administration thing and not really have so much time to think strategically and even to really taking care of yourself. So I think this is something that we also need to discuss collectively, how are we address this and how we talk to the donor or the funder that we can have this global report or something, because different donor have different requirements. So I think that is also important because why people are like, "Why are you busy?" "I'm doing report. I'm doing audit. I'm doing financial report." It's most of the time and, yeah, I think that's something we need to consider. I think we almost run out of time.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I want to add a little bit about funding.

Kunthea Chan:
Okay.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I think funding should sustain the humans more, not just the activities, because it's the humans who do activities. And if human can eat, sleep, pay their debt, and be happy, they do work. Actually, I think what we should invest the most for collective wellbeing in the movement is to pay the people enough, but we have overall lower the rate and expectation because we need to sacrifice, that makes it really difficult.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, I know. And perhaps we also thinking with some of the resources that we already have at the community, how we build, how we mobilise our resource, like what we worked this last week in Thailand, Tao, within our... When we talking about resources, so many resource that we have, like a human resource knowledge and even the money from the community, how are we using those kind of existing resource that we have. So, I think we go to the last point. So what would be the one idea that you would like to end this conversation with me that you think is really important?

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
You go first?
You go first?

Kunthea Chan:
Do you want me to go first?
Actually, there's so many things that we discuss about the issue or the hardship of why we cannot really taking care of us. So even us, we also not perfect. When we met, we like, "Oh, I'm so tired. I travel a lot." But I think keep practice, keep practice it, keep really remind. And like you said, sometimes we might be not feel good and has to take rest, but the reminder from our team or our friend is also important, the system that we have. But to do that, to be able to do that, you also change your mind because some activists or families still not believe that wellbeing awareness is part of your work. It's their feel that is selfish, that feel guilty. So I think how we really change that and try to really think creatively of the way that we taking care ourself beyond the normal that we are doing right now.
So, I think that would be important for me, starting from yourself, because you asking me some other experience that I have. Sometimes, I feel like so exhausted. But when I decide to go one-hour yoga and when I come back, I can definitely focus on the work and I have more power to do that. So, we need believe that it really influence or impact to the way, but it's not mean that yoga is work for everyone because we are different. Maybe other thing can work for you, so what that kind of energy that you can feel, but respect your body. Maybe you don't think that your body need to rest, but actually, it's needed when it used over of the time. So I think that's from me, Tao.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I think for me, what is really important, is probably I want to invite myself and my friends in the movement to think about why we are doing this at a personal level, how can we have a great system, but feel unhappy all the time. At the end of the day, we want us and friends and people around us to be happy and healthy, and that is why wellbeing collectively, personally, it's a means to fight back the system. It's not a side dish. It's how we make the change from within and use that experience to deliver change outside, I think.

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah. I think that really important.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
[inaudible 00:40:22].

Kunthea Chan:
How we really make wellbeing and collective care as also our work. It's not like unnecessary or something special, but also thinking about how the privilege that we also have that can be different from other, so how we also balance those kind of.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
Oh, talking about privilege and wellbeing, we haven't discussed this, but maybe some of the listeners here can share back?

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah.

Tao Sattara Hattirat:
I understand that the West has become active about wellbeing. But for me, I think the more suppressed you are, the more wellbeing is important. It's not the other way around that you are a privileged group, that's why you have access to wellbeing. It should be the other way around that healing and health is very important to sustain people in the movement, that's why it's important for marginalizsd people. And what is important for marginalised groups to have wellbeing, it's their conversation to have. It's best to say, "This is important for us to be included in wellbeing discussion."

Kunthea Chan:
Yeah, great. Yeah, I think that's a lot need to discuss. We can spend the whole time, the whole day to really talk about it, but I think we don't really has that so much time. Maybe we can bring in Bron to join us to go the second session?

Bronwyn:
Hi. Hi, everyone.

Kunthea Chan:
Hi, Bron.

Bronwyn:
Hi, Kunthea. Hi, Satta. Thank you so much. I want to invite everyone here in the room to put your cameras on if you want to and turn yourselves off mute so that we can give our two speakers a huge round of applause for a really, really fascinating conversation.
I just loved the themes that you were-