đź“– Weekend reads from Southeast Asia

Another Whang-od profile? Don't mind if I do!

Hello friends!

I promised a look at Indonesia’s soccer woes today, but it’s still developing and I expect we’ll see more action over the weekend so I think it a good idea to hold off on that for now. 

In the meantime, here are a bunch of links to stories I’ve read in the last week and a bit that I loved but couldn’t quite fit in elsewhere in the newsletter. 

I can’t stop raving about this memoir from Craig McNamara, who was a young teen when his parents moved the family to Washington for dad Robert to serve as Secretary of Defence under Kennedy. There’s a glut of American Vietnam war-era memoirs, from on the battlefield to the protest frontlines — but there’s nothing like this. Craig is a very talented writer and spends the book unpicking his relationship with his father and how it changed alongside the war and Craig’s own political awakening. 

This review from The Guardian last year does a much better job than I can of explaining it all: 

Americans love to criticize the Germans and the French for failing to do enough to come to terms with what their fathers and mothers did in the second world war. But in our usual myopic fashion, we have done almost nothing to come to terms with our own disastrous war, except to build a brilliant monument in Washington where Robert McNamara often retreated, late at night, to revisit his personal pain in silence.

Whang-Od is an icon. That’s it. Click through for the gorgeous photos.

According to lore and to interviews conducted by tattoo anthropologist Dr. Lars Krutak, Whang- Od was 16 when she began her career as a tattooist under her father’s mentorship. The first and only female mambabatok of her time, Whang-Od would travel to far and neighboring villages, summoned by host communities to imprint the sacred symbols of their ancestors on individuals who have crossed or about to cross a threshold in their lives. 

A brilliant overview of Paetongtarn, the youngest daughter of Thaksin Shinawatra, from Patpicha Tanakasempipat at Bloomberg ahead of May’s elections in Thailand. This piece speaks to not just Paetongtarn and Pheu Thai’s electoral odds, but to the political clan’s enduring influence on Thai politics.

“I love her vision, determination and sweet personality,” said Mayures Kotchompoo, a 62-year-old longtime supporter of the Shinawatras who brought red roses to a recent rally in northeastern Thailalnd. “Everything she’s seen happen to her father and her aunt have molded her into a strong woman.” 

Things have never been great for Myanmar's Karenni people, who have been in a war with the military for decades. It’s no better since the coup. This from Nikkei Asia tallies the brutality against the Karenni and other ethnic groups battling the Tatmadaw.

On Dec. 24, 2021, fear spread among the villagers of Mo So as they prepared for Christmas, the year's most festive celebration for the largely Christian Karenni. Then the sound of gunfire swirled around them. More than 40 men, women and children were tortured and shot, with many corpses burned beyond recognition.

The atrocity, known as the Christmas Eve massacre, was perpetrated by soldiers of Myanmar's 108th Light Infantry Battalion. But it is only one of hundreds of acts of brutality against the Karenni.

Officials in Thailand have issued travel warnings for northern Thailand which is experiencing the worst air quality in the world. Not great for tourism bouncing back, sure, but devastating to Thai children who have no choice. 

For the past few weeks, Thommamoon Khowasat has painstakingly explained to his four year-old daughter that the yellow cloud they see outside their window - which has tickled her imagination - is actually a danger to her health.

Penang gets the New York Times travel section treatment in this beautiful piece. I was only in Penang just over a week ago but the photos in this make me wish I was on my way there again now. 

Some of the shophouses are perfectly restored plaster cornices gleaming with fresh pink, baby blue or buttercup yellow paint. But this is no movie set: The neighbor of the hidden door that leads to a nightclub might be a garage resounding with the clang of tools being dropped and car bodies being hammered. For all its hidden charms, George Town is still noisily alive.

There’s no such thing as being too old to love Korean pop music. Or, that’s at least according to these Filipina fans who are giving the Gen Z stans a run. This piece digs into why South Korea’s Hallyu paid off so highly in the Philippines — and I’d wager it’s the same story across the region.

"When you're a teenager, it's a different kind of fan-girling, right? It's more about, he's so handsome. He dances so well. There's a different appreciation," she explains. "When you're a bit older, you see other things. Like, we focus more on their relationships with each other and the way they convey their messages."

Taiwan isn’t quite in the Dari Mulut ke Mulut scope (although I do have a hot take about that). Still, Yang Bing-yi, who died this week, founded Din Tai Fung and we must all give our respects to the legend. 

Mr. Yang and his wife, Lai Pen-mei, had been running a cooking-oil company for more than a decade, selling peanut and sesame oil to restaurants and hotels. When orders started to decline, a friend suggested that the Yangs start making dim sum, with a focus on Shanghai cuisine since it was already popular in Taipei.

Partnering with his wife and two hired chefs, Mr. Yang began selling noodles and delicate, handmade soup dumplings from his company’s narrow building on Xinyi Road. He and his family grew the restaurant from four tables to more than 250 seats, establishing Din Tai Fung as one of Taiwan’s most popular dining destinations — even as a signboard near the entrance, an out-of-date relic from the business’s early years, continued to identify the storefront as an oil shop.

Reply

or to participate.