Mitchell is a father and husband living in Chiang Mai. A DJ of 10 years, he loves music and people who are passionate about music. He throws parties with the crew Joob Joob and you can catch him DJing at many bars around Chiang Mai.

For the past near-decade Citylife has hosted the northern chapter of the Junior Dublin Literary Awards. Here is this year’s winning essay, written under the theme, “Behind the Mask.”

Something dreadful has happened. Simply awful. Peter is dead. After half a decade of almost ceaseless service Peter is no more. He went out with a blood-curdling squeak followed by a low grown and now does little more than hum to himself. Peter fan, my tireless servant during Thailand’s changing seasons, has ceased to be. His blades will whir no more and I am now uncomfortably warm. It is only now he is gone that I realise life is almost impossible at this time of year without, at the very least, an electric fan to keep one’s cool.

If you’re ready to get down and dirty this Songkran, here are a few key spots to get in on the splashing action!

If one thing can be said for sure of modern Chiang Mai, it’s that we can’t seem to get enough cafes. Check out these three new spots, where you can get your caffeine fix as well as a spot of food and spend the day soaking up the atmosphere.

These three new eateries are not your average noodle shop. From a carnivore’s buffet to authentic Hong Kong cuisine to…wait for it…Chiang Mai’s first restaurant served by robots (!) the only thing these three spots have in common is their uniqueness!

Looking for the perfect Chiang Mai staycation or vacation? Here are three lovely lodging options for you, both inside and just outside the city.

If you’ve ever stayed at the beautiful Chiang Dao Hill Resort, stopped off for a “Monk Chat” at Wat Suan Dok, or spent a leisurely afternoon visiting the animals of the Chiang Mai Zoo, then you’ve already been to some of the old stomping grounds of Harold Young, an American missionary, and one of the earliest CIA operatives in Chiang Mai.

It is The Smog – the environmental fiasco year after year seeping into our lungs, our hearts, our eyes and our lives around late-February and extending its visit into the Songkran festivities. Breaths become shallower and outdoor activities lose their attraction; governmental scrutiny intensifies and Facebook becomes a hub for the latest pollution grievances. But this should not be our “normal” – 2015 needs to be the year of forward thinking.

It becomes increasingly hard to keep perky when all about you are abandoning this choking wok that we call home. Soon I began to get a tad snarky. She has been a breath of fresh air here at Citylife (a rarity in these smog-smothered days), but we are going to have to say farewell to managing editor Hilary Cadigan, who leaves us this month after nearly three years to pursue a writing career in the United States.

It was the middle of Isaan winter, and a bite was still in the air 15 minutes before noon when I told Ae, “No, you may not go outside,” for the third time. The class was loud, and as an English teacher with only two months of experience with these particular students, I had no way to control them. Ae was my loudest student, a “troublemaker” who refused to sit down, to stop hitting his fellows, to pay attention. And now he was asking to leave class early for lunch, as he did every class.

For the past two years, I have served as a judge for the Northern Thailand section of the Junior Dublin Literary Awards, an international essay contest for high school students. I am typically informed of this honour by arriving one day at work to find a five-inch stack of print-outs on my desk that I must read and judge in the span of a day or two. This can be rather daunting when you’re on deadline and have to edit and post five news stories before lunch, but I cannot say the task does not bring me some joy. Here’s to you, imaginative physics-hating kid who wrote, “Hail to the durian that smashed Sir Isaac Newton’s head!” And to you, sweet young visionary, who assured us all: “If you wore a panda mask, you will become a panda. If you wore an elephant mask, you will become a elephant. If you wore a horse mask, you will become a horse. If you wore a Selah Moon mask, you will become the Selah Moon.”