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decreaseChapter 1 - Magic Dogs and Battery Clocks
“Anomaly is at the heart of all good travel”, said some reductionist. That is, we go in anticipation of the unexpected. And here it is, in a jungle village in the hills of northern Thailand: a Yao tribal woman — dressed in a brilliant vermillion boa and embroidered black turban — handing me a pink, gold-embossed wedding invitation card.
Blue smoke curls languidly above the huts of Khun Haeng, as though from an opium pipe (until a generation ago, the preferred nightcap around here). Pigs squeal uneasily, catching a whiff on the wind not of smoked poppy but fried pork. A four-man band — oboe, drum, gong and cymbal — dins and whines between the huts. And I am trying to read an invitation that might be straight out of Valley Girl land except for its curlicue Thai script.
A quick translation by my Chiang Mai anthropologist traveling companion Dr Chob confirms that, yes, even in Thai, "The parents of the groom and bride invite you to the wedding of ..." In this case, Miss Ching Fo Saejow and Mr San Tiem Saephan. I am honoured.
"This is a tom chin ca, the major wedding of the year for this village," says Chob. "It'll be a three-day ceremony.
Day One. A gold robed Buddhist monk drifts like a marigold amid the woodsmoke and teak of the houses. But it's still a pig slaughter morning. Everyone in this Yao village of Khun Haeng — population 336, crops of cotton, dry rice, mustard seed and corn — is gathered down at the pump, lathering hair, chattering, sluicing pig intestines to form sausage skins. Gold-capped teeth grin to remind the visitor of how important portable wealth is to this Yao hill tribe. Gossip has it that the groom's family — he comes from respectable old opium money — has paid fifteen silver ingots in bride price. That's over 5.6 kilos, and worth around 45,000 Baht or more than US$2000. Plus fifteen pigs for the feast.
In the house of the groom (who's nowhere to be found), the heads and flanks of five pigs are laid out for blessing by the ching sui, the priest, a desiccated old gent, dressed in civvies. He reads from a book of Chinese Taoist texts, a reminder of the origins of the Yao people in southern China some 2,000 years ago.
At two p.m. someone shouts "She's here!" The bride, from another clan some 200 kilometres away, has arrived at the village outskirts. A hastily assembled caravan of pick-up trucks brings a large group of friends, hangers-on like myself and women garbed in rich scarlet and sable clothing to a clearing in the jungle, a kilometre from the village. Here, the bride, a serious, pretty girl of about nineteen, will be installed in one of the most extraordinary headdresses on earth.
Women attendants have coated her hair with beeswax. It is now pulled up into a vertical ponytail and the thick strand passed through a hole in a semicircular board, which then sits on the top of her head. More beeswax cements the board in position. Next, her scalp - from the forehead upwards — is bound with strips of waxed tape, until she appears to be wearing a black skullcap topped by a large mortarboard. This, Chob assures me, is just the beginning.
A triangular wooden frame with sides almost a metre long, apex to the front, is taped to the board, then draped with red, embroidered and fringed cloths which hang down past the girl's face. Other dressers lend a hand, and soon her black skirt and jacket are all but obscured by various sashes, tassels and wraps in crystal white and brilliant red. Heirloom jewellery follows. Four solid necklaces, giant croissants of pure silver, are hung around her neck, then complimented by silver filigree brooches. This, we are told, is her bride price from the groom's family.
The head-dress by now has become a prowed canopy obscuring the girl's face. In all, it weighs three kilograms and she will not remove it for the next two days. Miss Saejow wobbles to her feet then, despite the weight and blinkers of her headgear, steps out demurely on her penultimate walk as a single woman.
Oboe and cymbals go into overdrive as the bridal procession arrives in the village. The drummer and the gong man try to keep up as the quartet weaves in and out of the crush of turbaned, satin and boa-bedecked bridesmaids. I fear that the bride's beeswax bonnet — or the bride herself — will melt in the hot overhead sun, but a large umbrella springs open to shelter her. Village men sit on benches below a shade tree while the mother-in-law-to-be serves them whisky, tea and cigarettes. The women stand in the sun and melt.
Many kettles of tea later, the bride progresses to a small bamboo hut where she will spend the night, sitting up. It is impossible to recline in the headdress, which must remain on, although some of the drapes and silver weights are removed. Wearing perhaps only two kilos now, she must feel positively light headed. Chob explains to me the origins of this extraordinary matrimonial millinery.
"This elaborate head-dress has a fascinating history that's traced back to one version of the creation myth of the Yao/Mien people. In it, Pien Hung, an emperor of ancient China was attacked by another emperor and was facing defeat. A magic dog, Phan Hu, penetrated the enemy lines, killed the attacking emperor and brought his head back to Pien Hung. The dog was rewarded with one of the victor's daughters as a wife. When he took her into the mountains to live with him, she hid her face in shame because of her strange husband. But they had six boys and six girls, from whom we get the twelve clans of the Yao."
Much as I suspected — mythology is part shaggy dog story, soap opera for the oral era, with a dash of animal husbandry thrown in for the ratings. All night long the party roisters in the groom's family house, though the man himself is still nowhere to be seen. The oboist seems to have achieved astonishing feats of hyperventilation, tootling non-stop for eight hours in a trill that would provoke a carpet snake to kill. Then I spot the team of substitute players; the ensemble blasts and bangs in shifts, the output never faltering.
Pork crackling and trotters, entrails and corn whisky. Pig's heads stare balefully back from a banana leaf platter before the lamp-lit altar. Sticky rice, cheroots and chatter. In the kitchen, huge pots on wood fires render a succession of pigs, chickens and sacks of rice down platter upon platter of party fuel. We toast endlessly in Mekhong whisky shots. Long bamboo tobacco pipes and choking smoke. I'm game to eat almost anything, but when the Miss Piggy entrail sausages come round, I find I've suddenly got to change film.
The regal elegance of the Yao women, their black tunics adorned with fine geometric embroidery, contrasts with the appearance of their males, who are dressed in nondescript Western clothing. "The Yao men gave up their traditional garments when they moved into a cash economy." says Chob. "When they go down to the markets they feel uncomfortable among the Thai people in such conspicuous clothing. People laughed at them. But the Yao women stay mostly in the village, so they've kept theirs."
A Thai woman, a guest from far Bangkok, explains to me that celebrations like this are held, "Twenty five percent for the couple and seventy five per cent for the community. The Yao people are very scattered, so this is the chance for people from distant villages to make bonds."
"In what way?" I ask.
"Look around. You see that there aren't many young men and women in the room? Yao people are free to choose their own partners, so that's what the kids are doing. They're outside now ... 'playing cards', as they say." I peer out into the dark village, admiring the night vision of the courting Yao cardsharps, playing bridge or perhaps strip poker, presumably by Braille.
Day Two. The dawn dysrhythmia of pigs, gongs and the snake-enrager's pipe is soon upon us again. My learned pal Chob can sleep through all this. He's got a doctorate in it from the Sorbonne. I don't, and am soon down at the pump with the other villagers. They are pleased to have a farang guest at the wedding and it strikes me that I should give the couple a gift. I decide on something that will be practical, decorative, patriotic — and surely original: a battery clock-cum-framed portrait of the Thai Royal Family. No plaster ducks or toasters for this couple. The gift will be procured from a not too distant village, signed with my best wishes and delivered to the family.
At seven a.m., after what surely must have been a sleepless night, the bride — fully adorned again in her tent-like carapace — emerges in procession to the groom's house. More tea and cigarettes for the males. More waiting for the women. Since dawn the priest has been explaining to the ancestors that a new wife is coming to live in the house. He blesses offerings of rice and wine, chants from Taoist texts, claps sacred stones together, propitiates the water dragon spirits who bring good fortune to the household, and then decapitates a small chicken. It weaves a few blind, prophetic circles in the mud, the directions of which are interpreted as favourable to the union. The bride — a walking, pyramid palanquin of silver, satin and nerves —mounts the stairs to at last cross the threshold of her new life. And still no groom in sight.
Kneeling with her trousseau suitcase before the ching sui, and watched by a gallery of unblinking pig's heads, she is instructed by the priest in the correct ways of a dutiful bride and daughter-in-law. Guests on benches casually observe this quiet discourse. Kids wander in and out. More tea for all, and packets of sticky rice wrapped in leaves. The girl withdraws to the bridal chamber where she will remain until tonight.
Predictably, the party strikes up again. Breakfast is served from metre-wide woks full of all parts porcine. (They're up to thirteen pigs, so far.) The band rants on. I retire to catch up on some sleep. There's just so much Mekhong, tea and trotter that one can take before the sun hits the yard-arm.
Around eight that night the celebration enters a new phase. The main room of the house is cleared of tables, the floor swept, new lanterns lit and the walls hung with red paper banners with gold Chinese characters. Women with babies slung across their backs move to and fro; the little heads bobbing behind them are be-decked in Mickey Mouse ears of scarlet pom-poms. Gamin faces peer in at the windows, then crush in through the door, until there are over one hundred people in the room. Floor struts crack, but props are rushed in. Cushions appear before the main table and altar.
"There he is!" says Chob, pointing to a dazed youth in a blue business suit. "That's the bridegroom." His minders propel him into the room. "He doesn't look too happy." I note. "He's got a very tiring night coming up." adds Chob, without innuendo. "You'll see."
Men dress the groom in a beautiful blue silk Chinese gown, silver brocaded apron and a cylindrical red turban, plus various sashes and ornaments. At last, a man of Yao in traditional finery. Guests of honour take their places at a table adorned with plastic roses and fresh pork. The bride re-emerges. The brand new Mr and Mrs Saephan stand together resplendent in the badges of their tribe's history. The legendary head-dress, the blessings of the ancestors, the attendance of clansfolk from hundreds of kilometres afar, the luck of the water dragon spirits, the sustenance of fifteen pigs, the numerous guests of honour — all converge to bestow the boon of hope upon their new life together.
To pay homage to this venerable assembly, the couple must kowtow. For the groom one full kowtow involves bowing three times from the waist, and then, dropping to the cushions, three more times from a kneeling position. Having completed a cycle, he rises and repeats it. Due to the weight of the draped structure upon her head, the bride simply kneels once each time the groom drops to his knees. Even so it looks taxing. After they have executed this routine a dozen times, I ask Chob how many more remain?
"This is just the beginning. Those first kowtows were to their ancestors. Next there are six to each of the wedding officials, six to each of the parents and grandparents, and three to every guest of honour. Then more to the wedding officials." I note that there are at least a dozen seated guests of honour, plus others standing who also look important. My rough estimate is at least ninety kowtows of six bows each for the groom. Five hundred and forty bows!
"When does it end?" I ask.
"If it goes on until dawn," answers Chob, "It's considered a very good omen, because it shows that there were many people here to honour them."
Day Three. By dawn even the eight musicians of the Khun Haeng Quartet have expired. As the couple concludes their final bows to the wedding officials, they look terminally exhausted — presumably wishing that they had been less honoured than having to do seven straight hours of slow-motion step aerobics.
Then I notice the wall behind the altar. Overnight, the wedding gifts have been mounted on it. There are no fewer than seven framed portraits of the Thai Royals, plus four battery-operated clocks. My offering is one of only three that combine both clock and portrait. Next time I'll give the plaster ducks.
(End of Chapter 1.)
John Borthwick
© John Borthwick. All rights reserved by the author.
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