(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
At the beginning of the 90 century, Thai Sommai married a Danish man and then moved to the northern part of Denmark. At that time, she was the only Thai woman in this area. But during 25 years she has not only made a new life there, she has also become known as a kind of Kirsten Gift Knife, which has helped hundreds of other Thai women find Danish partners.
For a long time, directors Janus Metz and Sine Plambech have made a significant effort to understand not only who these women are, where they come from and what issues they face, but also the reason why many of them dream of a Western spouse. Heart Bound (2018) is the very crown of this work – the film gathers threads between each of the stories, which is revealed over more than a decade. For Heart Bound the directors have also directed Love on Delivery (2007) – a film about Thai women who married Danish men in the countryside, a phenomenon that had already become a trend – while Ticket to Paradise followed in 2008. The latter gives an insight into the causes of many Thai women's dream of marrying someone from the West.
Love or pragmatic arrangement?
Marriages between a Thai woman and a Western man of the type who are not exactly Western women associate with a "Prince Charming" are often looked down upon here in the West, and most Western women will hardly understand this as any dream situation. For the Thai women, however, the choice of spouse has nothing to do with love. Instead, it all appears as a pragmatic arrangement. This is, of course, because they do not necessarily share the established Western narratives of the pursuit of great love and what love is. But why should finding stability, support, and camaraderie be considered less important dreams?
Sommai met her husband while working in Pattaya, one of Thailand's prostitution centers.
Today, the "ideal marriage" of the West is a mixture of romance, community and, on many levels, equality between the partners. Although these criteria are relatively new, and marriage has traditionally been a pragmatic economic arrangement also in the Western world, the current understanding of marriage is tantamount to the very definition of "true love". For Sommai and Kae and all the other women in the film, financial security and marriage go hand in hand and are a prerequisite for a happy life.
Poverty here is so pervasive that many women end up taking up jobs as sex workers in the largest cities in Thailand. Raised and instructed to put the family ahead of everything else, they use their only assets – their youth and their beauty – as an expression of love for their family, which in turn never really asks where the money comes from. When choosing between poverty and selling sex, it is easy to understand that a man who can support them and save them out of the situation appears as a kind of prince in a Cinderella story.
From hares in Thailand to Danish rural life
Sommai met her husband while working in Pattaya, one of Thailand's prostitution centers. She is not ashamed of her past, and it is with the strength of a woman who knows exactly how such a choice is experienced that she encourages Saeng, a young single child who, between the attempts to find a western husband, works in a sex bar.
In Denmark, women learn the language and take simple but decent paid jobs. Living in a rural community in Northern Denmark is far from anything but heavenly, but the life framework is safe and worthy. Had it not been for the new husbands, the Thai women would have been sentenced to a stagnant existence in poverty. The film provides an empathetic glimpse into the complicated web of causes and choices in their lives and allows these women to become heroes in their stories – rather than victims of their circumstances.
The women in the film all come from the Isan region, one of the poorest
the areas of northern Thailand.
However, it is obvious that finding a western husband is not a cure for all ailments. Living in another country means living between different worlds, and there is something Heartbreak manufactures very well. These women live in the middle layer of what is and what is not: a life close to their family and friends in Thailand – some have even traveled from their children.
But in the eyes of family and friends, they are nevertheless successful, and Sommai's story is for everyone the ultimate success story. She was the first Thai woman from her area to settle in northern Denmark, and as she gets older, she dreams of returning to her home country. It is hardly an obvious choice for a Danish husband who has never lived there and who is himself growing old. The recognition that life goes its way, that people can be there or not when they return, and that they have lived their lives apart, is the toughest lesson these women face. It is the high price they all pay, the price that turns the balance between the battles they have come out victorious and the battles they have lost in life.
