From Festival Love to Harbingers of Doom: Animals in Thai Culture [S8.E68]

Greg begins by explaining that a trip to the Chonburi Buffalo Festival got him thinking about the strange and special place animals hold in Thai culture, what with an entire festival built around an animal whose name is often used as an insult. The hosts agree to skip obvious examples like elephants and monkeys and dive right in with the water buffalo, once the engine of the rice economy. Ed points out an urban and rural divide, since the buffalo is revered in the countryside while Bangkokians use the word khwai as an insult. Comparisons to North American bison lead Greg into a tangent about Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump in Alberta. It's a real place, look it up.

Next, Greg turns to the house gecko, or jing jok, whose chirping as you leave home is taken as a warning, and Ed confirms his students still believe this. They then discuss the larger tokay, which appears in lullabies threatening restless children with having their livers eaten, prompting Ed to recall a girlfriend teasing her daughter that foreigners eat children's livers.

The hosts go on to fighting roosters and a legend linking them to King Naresuan, then the Siamese cat and the lucky black cat, and the Siamese fighting fish, which reached Western science as a gift from King Rama III. Ed then raises the water monitor, whose Thai name is a serious insult. Finally, Greg introduces mythical creatures, including the naga, a legged look-alike often confused with it, and the Garuda, Thailand's national emblem.