Strings of Life: The Exiles Bringing Traditional Burmese Puppetry to Bangkok

“When they’re not performing, we cover their faces because we believe they have souls”

Khin Maung Htwe and his family, one of the few remaining authentic Burmese Yoke Thé puppetry troupes, fled Myanmar and its brutal military government in June, for the safety of Bangkok. Oo, Htwe’s wife, misses their home in Yangon and worries about her elderly mother, but Htwe and his two children enjoy life here, and his son is hoping to go to university in Thailand. And what still unites them and keeps them going is their art.

Yoke Thé can be traced back to at least the 15th century and reached peak popularity in the 1800s. Like many traditional art forms in Southeast Asia – Thailand’s Chinese opera or Vietnam’s Hát Tuồng for example – it was THE form of mass entertainment before the arrival of radio, cinema and TV, and served as storytelling, news/propaganda dissemination, and an oblique (and therefore mostly safe) way to satirise and poke fun at officialdom.

And like those other art forms, its popularity has waned over the last century – Htwe tells me there are very few puppet masters left in Myanmar and those that remain mostly perform shorter shows for tourists (a real Yoke Thé show should last all night). Thankfully Htwe has taught his children well and they are highly skilled puppeteers, and just as passionate about the art as their parents, and they now perform every Thursday evening at Prince Theatre, in Bangkok’s Bang Rak district.

I joined them one evening to meet them and photograph them as they set up their equipment (most of which – including their 28 valuable puppets – they brought over from Myanmar with them), and performed a short rehearsal for me so I could shoot close-up. Then came the show itself and whilst initially I was too busy taking photos to pay it much attention, once I sat and watched I was amazed at the skill of Oo, Thet, and Paing, as they manipulated their puppets – most of them have at least 20 strings which enable the puppeteers to move them in a eerily realistic manner.

The performances are wordless and accompanied by music, which means there is no language barrier, and the stories themselves are universal tales of love, good vs evil, vice and virtue and so on, and can be easily understood. It’s a truly magical experience and the chance to experience an ancient art close up, and to meet those keeping it alive.

Htwe Oo Myanmar puppet troupe perform every Thursday at Prince Theatre Heritage Stay, from 20:00

GALLERY: Goodbye Phutaret Flats Market

The first time I wandered into the market underneath Phutaret flats, I was smitten. Here was the grimy, dingy, tourist-free Chinatown market of my dreams, a dark maze of hygienically dubious market stalls where the cats and rats outnumbered the people. I’ve since been back dozens of times and it’s by far my favourite market to photograph in Bangkok.

Or rather, was. Sadly a few months back I learned from one of the stallholders that the apartment building is soon to be demolished (to be fair, it’s always looked as if it might collapse at any time), and over the last few weeks the market stalls have gradually moved out, with one stall still defying the wrecking ball and the march of progress and still selling vegetables (see last picture below).

What will replace the flats is as yet unclear, but we can be pretty sure it won’t have the same grit, charm, and aesthetic appeal of what was there before. The building is still standing, and the market – though mostly deserted (even the rats have moved on) – still open for a wander, so go now while you can. Otherwise, here are some memories of one of my favourite spots in the city.

GALLERY: Vijayadashami Festival 2022

Despite living in Bangkok for over a decade I was previously unaware of the annual Viyajadashami Festival, until a journalist friend told me about it. So I headed down to Silom and found absolute mayhem – huge crowds, smoke, guys chopping up coconuts with machetes, and, for some reason, the biggest gathering of ladyboys this side of Nana.

Vijayadashami is a Hindu festival celebrating the triumph of good over evil, and it also heralds the start of preparations for Diwali, the Festival of Light, which begins 20 days after Vijayadashami.

It was great fun, although difficult shooting conditions with the huge crowds and the fact I left my favourite lens at home. But I got some great shots and will definitely go back next year.

GALLERY: Thailand Air Guitar Championships 2022

On 18 June I photographed the 2022 Thailand Air Guitar Championships, back after a two-year hiatus due to COVID. Defending champion Pule was up against some stiff competition, including a motorbike taxi guy and surprise package Hon from Hope The Flowers, but the eventual winner was Donald Trump, aka Rob Palmer, performing to – what else – Green Day’s ‘American Idiot’!

It was a great night of genuinely infectious, unselfconscious fun. As organiser Jacob ‘Airlectric Eel’ Conger said, when you’re holding an air guitar you can’t hold a gun, so air guitar is all about world peace. It’s also about getting drunk/high and having a fine old time, and that’s just what I and many others did (hence the drop-off in picture quality as the night went on).

GALLERY: Earth Day at Wat Dhammakaya

On 22 April 2022 I was lucky enough to get onto the press list for the annual Earth Day celebrations at the controversial Wat Dhammakaya temple in Rangsit, to the north of Bangkok. This huge temple complex has space for up to a million visitors, but due to the ongoing COVID pandemic it was strictly invitation only.

As usual the temple put on a spectacular display, with over 300,000 lanterns creating a world map when viewed from above. Down on the ground it was still pretty spectacular with hundreds of monks and worshippers creating a truly magical scene.

Big thanks to Khun Ket and the team at Wat Dhammakaya for their hospitality, & to photojournalist Adryel Talamantes for getting me on the list. 

GALLERY: Bangkok Comeback 3 Music Festival

After a lengthy absence due to the COVID pandemic, live music is BACK in Bangkok and on Saturday night (5 February 2022) I was at Brownstone for the Bangkok Comeback 3 festival. Photographing live music is always a fun challenge, especially when you have punk bands playing & moshpits occasionally breaking out, & I had an absolute ball photographing The Greed, Stay Awake and headliners Young Wolf, all of whom were absolutely bloody fantastic.

Big thanks to Paul from Stay Awake for the free ticket!

GALLERY: Children’s Day with Duang Prateep Foundation

Last weekend the lovely folks at Duang Prateep Foundation arranged a special gift bag giveaway for the kids of Khlongtoey to celebrate Children’s Day 2022. The local kids have been stuck at home since April last year due to the local schools being closed because of COVID and many of them have a had a rough time not being able to go to school or see their friends, so the day was a chance for everyone to come out, have fun, and get a bit of sunshine in their lives.

The DPF team all wore fancy dress (and even I donned a rainbow wig) and handed out around 3500 gift bags to local kids, along with free drinks, snacks and ice cream, and the railway track through Khlongtoey was lined with thousands of people. Factor in the 35C heat and it was probably the hottest, most exhausting session I’ve ever done! But it was great to see so many happy faces during what has been a fairly miserable time for many locals – well done Khun Prateep and team!

Here are some of my favourite shots of the event.

GALLERY: The Big North Thailand Road Trip 2021

With international travel out of Thailand still complicated, we decided to spend our main 2021 holiday at ‘home’ this year, and my wife put together an itinerary taking in the mountains of Northern Thailand in Nan, Phayao, Lampang and Pai. We stayed in a homestay, a hilltribe village and a farm; saw some amazing views and low-lying cloud; and did almost 3,000km in total. An absolutely amazing trip and, I hope, a few amazing photos too.

GALLERY: Thai Band Hope the Flowers in Rehearsal

Back in those distant days when gigs were still happening here in Bangkok (March), I went to a one-night mini-festival featuring several Thai indie bands. Hit of the night for me were a band called Hope the Flowers, whose Mogwai-influenced post-rock/shoegaze sound had me swooning from the first song, since when I’ve been playing their Sonorous Faith Pt1 album (see below) on a regular basis.

A few days ago I saw on their Facebook page that they were going to be rehearsing their new album this week, so I dropped them a message to ask if I could come along & take photos. They happily obliged, so last night I headed down to Brownstone with my gear and spend a couple of hours in their rehearsal room photographing them & getting in their way. If what I heard last night is any indication, that next album is going to be an absolute corker, and it was a real pleasure to spend the evening taking photos, drinking beer and hanging out with a lovely, talented bunch of people.

GALLERY: PK Saenchai Thai Boxing Gym

For a long while I’ve wanted to do a shoot at a muay thai (Thai boxing) gym, but didn’t really feel confident enough to just show up at a random gym & see if they’d let me in. Fortunately I few months back I connected with renowned muay thai journalist Matt Lucas on Twitter (@mattlucas1968) and he said he’d be happy to take me along on one of his regular visits to the gyms of Bangkok. So early this week we finally got together & headed down to one of the most venerable gyms in the city, PK Saenchai.

PK is a former boxer himself and the gym is now run mainly by his son Game, and staffed by some tough, grizzled – but extremely friendly – old trainers who were putting the boxers through their paces when I arrived. Fighters train for around six hours a day which involves running, weights, bag work, pads and sparring, in a space with no aircon or fans. I was sweaty and exhausted just taking pictures so it was a testament to how fit they all are that they do this six days a week.

I also met Ognjen Topic, a US-Serbian fighter who is one of many foreign fighters in the sport, as he prepared for his next big fight this weekend. “Thais love foreign fighters” he told me, “and even when we’re fighting against Thais they cheer for us”.

I spent a very enjoyable couple of hours shooting at the gym – everyone was really friendly and the boxers and trainers were far too focused on their training to bother about me wandering around photographing them, which is just how I like it. It turned out to be my most enjoyable shoot of the 50+ I’ve done so far this year. Big thanks to Matt and everyone at PK Saenchai!