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Throughout
the year, villagers share a common interest in gambling,
traveling (pai thieo), national lottery excites imaginations in
every province, as do cockfights and such exotic competitions as
fish and beetle fighting. Card games are a pastime favor ed by
both sexes and almost everyone can play Thai chess.
Pai
thieo by foot, boat, bus, motorbike, or rail is a favorite way
to relax when time allows. Traveling makes the villager less
insular and personal relations with family and friends are
treasured as much for the opportunities they afford for travel
as for the affection upon which they are based.
Besides
national celebrations, there are regional festivals like the
northeast Ngan Hae Bang Fai, or skyrocket festival, in May or
June of each year. Traditionally a time of letting off steam,
the festival's high point comes when, amid much merrymaking,
villagers fire homemade rockets, some of them 20 meters tall, to
ensure a plentiful rainfall for the forthcoming rice season.
Takro
and kite flying are popular traditional sports. Takro is played
by a loosely formed circle of men who use their feet, knees,
thighs, chests, and shoulders to acrobatically pass a woven
rattan ball to one another, endeavoring to keep it in the air as
long as possible and eventually kick it into a basket hanging
high above their heads. (There is a also a professional version
of takro, known as sepak takro, which is played by teams from
various ASEAN countries.)
Kites
are flown mostly during the breezy hot season. Popular in
Thailand since at least the founding of Sukhotai, kites have
been used effectively in warfare: an Ayutthaya governor quelled
a northeast city-state's rebellion in 1690 by flying huge kites,
called chulas, over the beseiged city and bombing it into
submission with jars of explosives.
In
addition to being an individual pleasure, kite flying can be a
competitive sport. Opposing teams fly male (chula) and female (pakpao)
kites in a surrogate battle of the sexes. The small agile
pakpaos try to bring down the more cumbersome chula, whil e the
male kite seeks to snare the female kites and bring them back
into male territory.
During
temple fairs, another popular sport is the unique martial art of
Thai boxing. A form of self-defense developed during the
Ayuthaya period, Thai boxing forbids biting, spitting, or
wrestling. On the other hand, the contestants may punch, kick,
an d shove, and unrestrainedly use their bare feet, legs, knees,
elbows, shoulders, and fists to elbow smash to the eyes, a knee
in the stomach, of a whiplash kick in the chest can immediately
floor the sturdiest of opponents. Nowadays boxers wear conventio
nal boxing gloves, a somewhat humane development considering
that less than 50 years ago they customarily bound their fists
with hemp which contained liberal quantities of ground glass.
The
major portion of Thai cuisine is highly spiced and chilli hot,
thanks to the addition of a variety of chillies, large and small,
some more potent than others. The burning sensation of Thai
chillies has caused much fanning of mouths by stunned foreig
ners on theri first sampling but increased experience often
brings enthusiastic approval, as attested by the popularity of
Thai restaurants today throughout the world.
The
ideal traditional Thai meal aims at being a harmonious blend of
spicy, subtle, sweet, and sour and is meant to be appealing to
eye, nose, and palate. A large central bowl of rice may be
accompanied by a clear soup (perhaps bitter melons stuffed with
minced pork), a steamed dish (mussels in curry sauce), a fried
dish (fish with ginger(, a hot salad (sliced beef on a bed of
greens with chillies, onions, mint, lemon juice, and more
chillies), and a variety of sauces and condiments, of which the
most es sential is nam pla (fermented fish sauce), into which
food can be dipped. This is normally followed by a sweet dessert
(bananas coated with sugared coconut and deep fried, for example)
and, finally, fresh fruit (such as mangoes, durian, papaya,
jackfrui t, watermelon, and many more) of which Thailand boasts
a year-round supply
Thailand's
ditinctive cuisine, is becoming more and more popular throughout
the world. |
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Southern
cuisine makes delicious use of the creatures which team in the
nearby seas. Lobsters, crabs, scallops, fish, and squid are
common ingredients and unusual delicacies like jellyfish salad
can also be found. In the southernmost provinces, where t here
is a large Muslim community, sweet, mild, and spicy curries
abound.
Foreign
foods have also found a place in the Thai diet. Some of these go
far back into history, like the egg-based portuguese sweets
which were introduced in the Ayutthaya period, while others like
bread and cake are more recent acquisitions.
To
please the eye, Thai cooks pursue the ancient art of fruit and
vegetable caring to transform tables into visual feasts.
Originally an aristocratic art practiced at the royal court,
vegetable carving flourished throughout the Ayutthaya period,
when a deft hand could fashion a white radish rose in a matter
of minutes. It reached its zenith during the Bangkok reign of
King Rama II when court ladies created flowers, fish, vases,
bowls, and other decorative objects from watermelons, cucumbers,
tomatoes, onions, and other unlikely garden produce. On a
somewhat broader scale the art is still practiced today: there
are few more charming surprises than discovering tomato roses
and cucumber primroses with a local fast lunch. |
