The whole idea behind the Nakmuay Review is to serve as a window into a fighters mind. It doesn't matter that the words that you read here do not come from famous (at least not yet) or unknown fighters, what matters is that we are just that,...FIGHTERS. We are in love with this sport and feel that it has shaped our lives in some way or another.
Part of the reason I established the Nakmuay Review was because other than training Muay Thai and punching people in the face, I fancy myself as some kind of writer. Or at least I enjoy to write and share my thoughts. Especially when it comes to Muay Thai, travel, and my philosophy behind fighting. Needless to say, writing for me, is akin to punching the heavy bag, it is an alternate way of keeping stress, insanity, and frustration at bay.
My blog today isn't so much about fighting as it is about a personal connection I made with a faraway land and its amazing people. A place I desperately want to return to and a place that constantly fills my dreams. Southeast Asia is that place, specifically Thailand.
Now as many of you know I am an avid reader, and for some reason I have become even more of a bibliophile as of late. Most of the time when I am not training or taking care of the website, I am reading something. Lately, it has been anything and everything by world traveller and food writer, Anthony Bourdain.
Having actually had the opportunity of meeting Bourdain recently, I found he shared the same fondness for Southeast Asia as I do. Watching his Travel Channel series, No Reservations, I understand him when he says that everytime he visits Southeast Asia, he walks off the plane and is hit with that familiar smell that reminds him that he is, in fact, in Southeast Asia. It is the smell of rare spices, dew and mist emanating from mountains, steamed rice, boiling noodles, Mekong whiskey, mystery, and adventure.
Ever since history class in high school, I have been obsessed with the disaster that was the Vietnam conflict. The pictures and videos from that war showed such brutality and such confusion that one was able to understand why people stateside reacted the way they did towards the war. No one wanted us there, not even the people we were supposedly there to help.
That war did so much to shape pop culture in America. I wasn't even around at the time, but I grew up watching movies like Apocalypse Now, The Deer Hunter, Hamburger Hill, Platoon, and Full Metal Jacket. In each movie you get the sense that it was a war where absolutely all hope was lost from the beginning. No one knew why they were there, what they were fighting for, who they were fighting against, or where the enemy was.
The entire conflict started a creative revolution, especially in the music scene. "The End" by The Doors, and "Paint it Black" by The Rolling Stones are two songs that are synonomous with the conflict and are considered classics to this day. You can't watch a Vietnam war era flick without the sounds of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, The Rolling Stones, The Stooges, etc...The entire conflict spurred a rebellion against authority stateside which in the end had horrible consequences for the soldiers that returned from duty. They were spit on and ostracized by their own people.
I always find it intriguing that a seemingly small unknown country in Southeast Asia, with a rag tag army of soliders was able to throw the entire military machine that was the U.S., into such disarray. The secretive CIA missions into Laos and Cambodia, and the after effects of the conflict in the region, served to only fuel my obsession with the place. I read how CIA agents stationed secretly in Laos, living amongst the Hmong tribes, fell in love with the country and never came home. I read how Vietnam veterans stayed behind in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, etc...simply having become enchanted by the region and its people.
Why?
What was it about this place that bewitched so many people. After all the pain and destruction that existed in this region, during the 1970's, why did westerners keep flocking back to this region on vacation, deciding to go off the grid and never return home.
Was it the ruins of Angkor Wat? The reclining Buddha at Wat Po? The Tunnel systems at Cu Chi? The beauty of Halong Bay? The Kuang Si Falls of Luang Prabang? The beaches of Phuket, Krabi, and Koh Samui?
Maybe it was the wild red light districts of Patpong in Bangkok or Walking Street in Pattaya. The fresh baguettes on the Mekong, or the Pho in Saigon and Hanoi. Maybe it was a twisted interest in seeing the aftermath of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge or trying to decipher the enigma of The Plane of Jars in Laos.
When I stepped off the plane in Thailand, my only goal was to train like a Muay Thai champion and become a better fighter. I came away from Thailand, however, a changed man. I fell in love with the beauty of the country, the warmth of the people, and the spirituality of the entire culture. For any westerner the journey to Thailand and Southeast Asia is an assault on the senses. It is a place where the minute your passport is stamped, you feel how far away from home you truly are. How different the culture is from your own.
That feeling alone, is an adrenaline rush.
I was able to communicate with the Thai boxers, just through the art of fighting, but what we shared was so much more than just fighting. It was a cultural exchange and no one can help but walking away a changed person.
I left my heart in Southeast Asia. Although I have yet to visit Laos and Vietnam, they are two places I will definetely visit, as I still have so many lingering questions relating to my obsession to the conflict there. But I know that by going there, I may in fact be enticed to venture off the grid, "go bamboo", and never return home.
Maybe the fact that I am whole heartedly a Muay Thai fighter, connects me more to this land. But when one reads Graham Greene's "The Quiet American", or John Burdett's "Bangkok 8" and "Bangkok Tattoo", with their imagery, mystery, and exotic intrigue, there is no denying the fact that there is something that draws people to this region.
This is a place where pain, lust, aggression, compassion, love, peace, warmth, and stoicism can coexist with a backdrop of utterly beautiful scenery.
Muay Thai is but one of the many amazing things I have discovered in this exotic land. I know that at least with my involvement in this great sport, I will eventually be back. Question is, will I come home? Would you?
Part of the reason I established the Nakmuay Review was because other than training Muay Thai and punching people in the face, I fancy myself as some kind of writer. Or at least I enjoy to write and share my thoughts. Especially when it comes to Muay Thai, travel, and my philosophy behind fighting. Needless to say, writing for me, is akin to punching the heavy bag, it is an alternate way of keeping stress, insanity, and frustration at bay.
My blog today isn't so much about fighting as it is about a personal connection I made with a faraway land and its amazing people. A place I desperately want to return to and a place that constantly fills my dreams. Southeast Asia is that place, specifically Thailand.
Now as many of you know I am an avid reader, and for some reason I have become even more of a bibliophile as of late. Most of the time when I am not training or taking care of the website, I am reading something. Lately, it has been anything and everything by world traveller and food writer, Anthony Bourdain.
Having actually had the opportunity of meeting Bourdain recently, I found he shared the same fondness for Southeast Asia as I do. Watching his Travel Channel series, No Reservations, I understand him when he says that everytime he visits Southeast Asia, he walks off the plane and is hit with that familiar smell that reminds him that he is, in fact, in Southeast Asia. It is the smell of rare spices, dew and mist emanating from mountains, steamed rice, boiling noodles, Mekong whiskey, mystery, and adventure.
Ever since history class in high school, I have been obsessed with the disaster that was the Vietnam conflict. The pictures and videos from that war showed such brutality and such confusion that one was able to understand why people stateside reacted the way they did towards the war. No one wanted us there, not even the people we were supposedly there to help.
That war did so much to shape pop culture in America. I wasn't even around at the time, but I grew up watching movies like Apocalypse Now, The Deer Hunter, Hamburger Hill, Platoon, and Full Metal Jacket. In each movie you get the sense that it was a war where absolutely all hope was lost from the beginning. No one knew why they were there, what they were fighting for, who they were fighting against, or where the enemy was.
The entire conflict started a creative revolution, especially in the music scene. "The End" by The Doors, and "Paint it Black" by The Rolling Stones are two songs that are synonomous with the conflict and are considered classics to this day. You can't watch a Vietnam war era flick without the sounds of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, The Rolling Stones, The Stooges, etc...The entire conflict spurred a rebellion against authority stateside which in the end had horrible consequences for the soldiers that returned from duty. They were spit on and ostracized by their own people.
I always find it intriguing that a seemingly small unknown country in Southeast Asia, with a rag tag army of soliders was able to throw the entire military machine that was the U.S., into such disarray. The secretive CIA missions into Laos and Cambodia, and the after effects of the conflict in the region, served to only fuel my obsession with the place. I read how CIA agents stationed secretly in Laos, living amongst the Hmong tribes, fell in love with the country and never came home. I read how Vietnam veterans stayed behind in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia, etc...simply having become enchanted by the region and its people.
Why?
What was it about this place that bewitched so many people. After all the pain and destruction that existed in this region, during the 1970's, why did westerners keep flocking back to this region on vacation, deciding to go off the grid and never return home.
Was it the ruins of Angkor Wat? The reclining Buddha at Wat Po? The Tunnel systems at Cu Chi? The beauty of Halong Bay? The Kuang Si Falls of Luang Prabang? The beaches of Phuket, Krabi, and Koh Samui?
Maybe it was the wild red light districts of Patpong in Bangkok or Walking Street in Pattaya. The fresh baguettes on the Mekong, or the Pho in Saigon and Hanoi. Maybe it was a twisted interest in seeing the aftermath of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge or trying to decipher the enigma of The Plane of Jars in Laos.
When I stepped off the plane in Thailand, my only goal was to train like a Muay Thai champion and become a better fighter. I came away from Thailand, however, a changed man. I fell in love with the beauty of the country, the warmth of the people, and the spirituality of the entire culture. For any westerner the journey to Thailand and Southeast Asia is an assault on the senses. It is a place where the minute your passport is stamped, you feel how far away from home you truly are. How different the culture is from your own.
That feeling alone, is an adrenaline rush.
I was able to communicate with the Thai boxers, just through the art of fighting, but what we shared was so much more than just fighting. It was a cultural exchange and no one can help but walking away a changed person.
I left my heart in Southeast Asia. Although I have yet to visit Laos and Vietnam, they are two places I will definetely visit, as I still have so many lingering questions relating to my obsession to the conflict there. But I know that by going there, I may in fact be enticed to venture off the grid, "go bamboo", and never return home.
Maybe the fact that I am whole heartedly a Muay Thai fighter, connects me more to this land. But when one reads Graham Greene's "The Quiet American", or John Burdett's "Bangkok 8" and "Bangkok Tattoo", with their imagery, mystery, and exotic intrigue, there is no denying the fact that there is something that draws people to this region.
This is a place where pain, lust, aggression, compassion, love, peace, warmth, and stoicism can coexist with a backdrop of utterly beautiful scenery.
Muay Thai is but one of the many amazing things I have discovered in this exotic land. I know that at least with my involvement in this great sport, I will eventually be back. Question is, will I come home? Would you?
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