Word: khao
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...acclaim, Thompson still pounds the streets for inspiration. "Street food is not always purely Thai food," he tells me on a stroll through Bangkok, his second home after London. "It's often food that's been imported from other cultures and assimilated." Satay hails from the Malay-speaking world. Khao man gai, a popular chicken-and-rice dish, was introduced by 19th century immigrants from China's Hainan province; their descendants still sell it on Bangkok streets. Pad Thai, perhaps Thailand's most recognized dish, is also indebted to China. "It's Chinese noodles stir-fried, but with additional palm...
...distributes firearms to everyone from teachers to government officials. In Narathiwat's Tak Bai district, for instance, none of the 56 village chiefs owned a gun before 2004. Now all do. "Guns can't totally protect us against insurgents," says Yoon Yerntorn, chief of Tak Bai's Buddhist Sai Khao village, where five locals have been killed over the past few years. "But at least we can try to shoot back." (Read "Despite Outreach, Violence Is Up In Southern Thailand...
...Forty other Sai Khao citizens have banded together as a unit of a village militia called the Or Ror Bor. Nearly all of the 25,000-strong Or Ror Bor operating in the three provinces are Buddhist, and their corps was inspired by no less an authority than the Queen of Thailand. In late 2004, after three Buddhists were brutally beheaded by militants, Queen Sirikit gave an impassioned speech advising the military to teach villagers how to defend themselves with firearms. Facing the cameras, she announced that even she "would learn to shoot guns without my glasses...
Packing for Thailand usually doesn't involve more than throwing sunblock, insect repellent and a T shirt or two into your bag. But if you're headed to Khao Yai National Park, the country's oldest nature reserve, there's one more advisable piece of gear: a Stetson hat. Three hours' drive northeast of Bangkok, this forest and grassland plateau counts as Thailand's cowboy country. Locals work the nearby ranches, occasionally dressed in Wild West outfits likely inspired by American soldiers who passed through during R&R from the Vietnam...
...Half an hour away is Khao Yai National Park itself. Though it may no longer teem with tigers - except for the stuffed, moth-eaten relic languishing in the visitors' center - there are plenty of gibbons, deer and colorful birds to keep amateur naturalists occupied. The waterfalls are lovely, although the leeches are pernicious, particularly in the rainy season...