ICU: Traditional Thai Theater performance

Hello Everyone,

So after a Thai friend of mine called me on a saturday and told me if a was interested in seeing a traditional Thai theater performance i was more than willing to attend, i was more excited because she told me she never had the oppurtunity to see such a perfomance and only saw it on Tv and learnt about it in when she was like 5th grade, this made me feel lucky to witness this rather rare perfomance. so i biked over there and arrived in like 7 minutes later, went through the regisration and proceeded to the hall.

Arriving at the hall the event was graced mostly by students from The university but also students from Chiang Mai University,Chiang Rai, lecturers(Ajan's), even the Television Crew and a host of other personalities and representatives. The event began with prayers which was followed by a speech by the President of our university, in his speech he pointed out the significance of maintaining Thai culture and that this was a step in equipping the audience with an insight as to what it loooks like and means.

Arter about 3 minutes into the performance i couldnt help but notice two unique statues, i was later told by my friend that they were named a Khon(which is a mask that was worn mostly by a male and only performed for special occassions) this character was accompanied by an almost similiar but female like structured mask called( Likay)she was quick to add that it usually performed for celebrities and basically for the general public.

To carry out the musical background needed for the performance, a band is needed..but in this case the members of the band were students like me but more skilled with the art of playing musical insrtuments,these musical instruments includes Kont tap(drum), ching(bell like stucture), long, lanna etc.. these are uniquely structured insruments and as such produce a unique and interesting sounds. I was told that it takes about six(6) to seven(7) years to perfect this skill.

Other characters such as Lam Kean is a character that has been famous for over 400 years, Ramakean( the monkey masquerade)is quite famous amongst little children.

The performance
was later graced by other characters such as "palam" and "likay's performance" that told different stories about Thai culture this was important because i saw the students scribble some important names and details so i evalutated the play as very vital. This was in general a very educative, fun and funny performance as they were severtal comedy sections.
I will keep you updated on other subsuquent events till then Pog Gan Mai Kha( see you soon).