CHONBURI , Thailand — Boys scurry, duck, and
weave through crowds sheltering from the suffocating heat before upending
buckets of cooling water on beefy bovines waiting to compete at the annual
traditional Thai buffalo races in Chonburi on Sunday.
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The riotously noisy, muddy, and slightly chaotic
annual tradition marks the beginning of the rice planting season — with the
festival-like atmosphere in the eastern province taking place for the first
time in two years.
The main event sees four pairs of harnessed
buffalo gallop across a decorated paddy field, with intrepid racers sprinting barefoot
through the shallow muddy waters and attempting to both control their beasts
and remain upright.
“Before the race starts, we are a little excited and
nervous,” said Sompong Ratanasatien, 33, drenched and breathing heavily after
his latest bout.
The trickiest point was the start line, he said,
where racers must wait for the official start whistle as they attempt to
maneuver the heavy beasts into position and keep them calm.
“After that it depends on our buffalo and how he
matches with my skills,” said Ratanasatien, who was enjoying a winning streak
with his two-year-old bovine Kao.
Urged on with a small metal-tipped bamboo whip, the
usually placid animals are unrecognizable as they rampage down the watery
field.
Bouts are divided according to weight and size, with
the heaviest creatures slightly slower to a practiced eye but requiring
significantly more skill to control.
And the racers, who work and train with the buffalos
for weeks in preparation, don’t always have the upper hand.
Numerous races got off to false starts as the
hapless human racers were — literally — dragged through the mud.
“I think normal people cannot do (it),” said Within
Lueanguksorn, who had traveled from Bangkok to watch the races.
“There is a relation between the people and them
(buffalos),” the 38-year-old added.
The animals often looked close to careening out of
control as they thundered across the finish line, scattering any spectator
foolish enough to stand nearby.
Racer Noppadon Yindeesuk, 45, admitted that
tradition can be hazardous.
“It could be a bit dangerous if the buffalos are
running too close to each other because it could cause an accident -- so the
riders must be careful,” he explained.
Still, he said he would be racing two of his buffalo
— worth around 150,000 baht ($4,200) each — Parewa and Pete.
“They are over two years old, and they won the race
last year,” he said, grinning ear-to-ear, adding that he trained with them
every three or four days.
But there was an important point to Sunday’s
spectacle, Yindeesuk said.
“I compete in the buffalo racing because I am trying to
preserve our Chonburi traditions about good rice, good buffalo.”
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