First Lady Charts Her Own Course in Pacific

Thousands of miles from a Washington of partisan perils and intrusive media, the young woman--a worker at a clinic for former prostitutes--exclaimed, “I’m very excited and happy that I have an opportunity to talk to the first lady of the world.”

Hillary Rodham Clinton responded with a smile.

As President Clinton has met with foreign leaders in a postelection Pacific odyssey, the first lady has followed her own path.

In the Philippines and Thailand, Mrs. Clinton has been decrying the exploitation of girls and women, delivering her message to audiences ranging from sophisticated professionals to tribal people who live in thatched huts without electricity or plumbing. Opportunity for girls, she has said repeatedly, is key to enriching society.

And while it may be hard to tell what foreign audiences really think about her opinions, their response to the first lady is clear--adulation bordering on reverence. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” she said after an elaborate ceremony in Chiang Rai, a city near the border with Myanmar and Laos.

The political culture of Washington seemed very far away.

In contrast to the critical media coverage she faces at home, the first lady receives great support on her travels abroad.

Thailand was no exception. And Mrs. Clinton appeared to find the outpouring of warmth here and the bucolic surroundings of the resort where she was staying a refreshing change.

Just a few days earlier at the Opera House in Sydney, Australia, Mrs. Clinton spoke philosophically about being a presidential spouse, a role that she said had caused headaches for many first ladies--dating to Martha Washington.

“We expect so much in our country from the woman who is married to the president, but we don’t really know what it is we expect a lot of,” she said. “I think there is something about the position itself which raises in Americans’ minds concerns about hidden power, about influence behind the scenes, about unaccountability.

“And yet if you try to be public about your concerns and about your interests, then that is equally criticized.”

During her Asian trip, Mrs. Clinton has sought to define her role as using her position to cast a spotlight on problems, including those that are global in scope. Aides insist it is the approach she is likely to follow in the next four years, despite her husband’s comments about giving her a role in welfare reform, and ongoing expectations that she would like a substantive part to play in the administration.

The unusual cross-cultural sojourn began Sunday in the hill country of northern Thailand, a region that has long been home to an illegal opium trade and is the nation’s chief supplier of child prostitutes. Mrs. Clinton’s entourage landed at the airport in Chiang Rai and was greeted by musicians pounding drums and cymbals and playing the sah, a stringed instrument with a lilting, bittersweet sound. Adolescent girls in tribal garb performed traditional dances.

Her next stop was a school noted for its efforts to keep families from handing over their daughters to recruiters for prostitution. By some estimates, 10% or more of the girls in the hill country may end up in the sex industry. Those seeking change are struggling to explain to subsistence farmers the importance of education for their daughters.

“When a young woman is educated, the family prospers,” the first lady said. And “when families prosper, countries prosper.”

Virtually all of the village’s 644 residents gathered on a sticky afternoon to stare at the spectacle: a 20-car motorcade, Secret Service retinue and international press corps dominating a normally serene landscape.

On Monday, Mrs. Clinton cast a spotlight on the New Life Center in Chiang Mai, a program launched by Baptist missionaries nine years ago that tries to give prostitutes the skills and support they need to change their lives.

But change isn’t easy in a region where land restrictions are squeezing the traditional livelihoods of tribes, where recruiters offer inviting payoffs to impoverished parents and where language differences make it even harder for girls to join in Thailand’s growing economy.

“Just learning how to hold a pencil was extremely difficult for me,” said AhChau MaYeu, a social worker at the clinic who did not go to school until she was 23 but struggled through low-paying jobs rather than become a prostitute.

Before the first lady left for the next stop--a Buddhist temple--there was a poignant moment as workers wheeled out a resident who is in the advanced stages of AIDS. The woman summoned the energy to put her hands together and nod to Mrs. Clinton in the traditional Thai greeting; the first lady crouched down and briefly touched her arm.

Moments later, a group of younger girls swarmed their visitor in a bid to jam their way into a group photo.

Yet if one moment seemed to capture her hopes for the trip, it may have come in Chiang Mai the night before during Loy Krathong, a festival in which candles are floated down the Ping River. Mrs. Clinton joined in the celebration by placing her own krathong, a candle on a tiny float, into the water.

It is a ritual of purging bad luck and bringing in the good for a new year. At first, the light flickered and threatened to go out. But then it caught on. Soon it was indistinguishable from the countless others drifting down the river.