KOH SAMUI AN ISLAND IN THE GULF OF SIAM (in 1965 )
First Hotel in Nathon 1965
We had travelled by train along the narrow spit of land which links Malaya to Thailand and Burma. We had set out with the intention of looking round the south of the country : Songkla, Patani, Narathiwat, and perhaps the island of Puket in the Indian Ocean, After fourteen hours in the Singapore express we were sitting in Surathani, 430 miles south of Bangkok, on the shores of the Gulf of Siam on a Sunday afternoon. The face that there was a daily ship to the island of koh samui, whose "paradisal beauty" has been mentioned in passing by our guide, gave us the idea of breaking our journey for a day or two and making a trip there.
We were given a general picture of the island by Dr.Suvit,a young man of Chinese origin who practised on the island and spoke fluent English. On a sheet of paper he blocked out a sketch map of the place, roughly asquare in shape, saying it was twelve miles long and ten wide. We learnt that from the market of Angtong, which was our base, there were two roads, one running north and the other south, which made a ring round the island all except for one stretch where the craggy mountains dropped sheer into the sea. Apart from Angtong, he told us, there were six other smaller villages on the island, of which two were inhabited by Mohammedan Malays.
In a jeep-like Japanese car we set off south along a sandy road which was deeply pot-holed in places and plunged straight through any scream that crossed its path. We found that the flat outer rim of the island was covered by a fairly sparse coconut-tree wood which took thirty minutes to an hour to cross on foot. As the ground began to rise farther in land, the jungle took over from the palms and formed a dense light green mantle that cloaked even the highest tops and peaks. Towards midday we reached a village, or rather a market as they say, at the southern end of the island. There the flat sandy beach and its palms gave way to rock, and the tiny temple and its precincts were raised on a terrace that looked out over the see. And there we saw for the first time (it has been night when we crossed over) that Koh samui lies in the middle of an archipelago of smaller islands whose shapes, jagged or softly rounded, rose in tones of dark and light blue against the horizon. Even the promontory that juts into the gulf from Surathani could be clearly seen.
As we set over a glass of mekon (rice whisky) on the evening of our first day there, Burri summed it up in these words: "The scenery of the island is more beautiful and varied than anything we have seen in this country so far. The people are more friendly, intelligent and quite definitely more agreeable to the eye than the inhabitants of the mainland. Going by what we have heard of the south of Thailand, there's nothing we should see there that cannot be found here, and in a more characteristic and unspoiled form too. So why not stay here? I thought just the same, so we decided to spend the rest of the time at our disposal on Koh samui. A further inducement was the restaurants where we were holding our council of war. Like all the restaurants in Thailand, it was run by Chinese. It consisted of a high, deep room, open to the street, with four or five tables for guests and also shop where transistor sets, neon tubes, stationery, thermos flasks and the like were sold. All these goods came from Japan, and so the islanders thought of these technical achievements as being Japanese, and hence Asiatic, rather than Western or American. A cinema showing Chinese, American and Thai films, and a billiard room where the doctor, the head of the local school, and other dignitaries could be met in the evening, added to the amenities of the village. All of which shows that although Koh Samui might be somewhat off the beaten track and quite unspoiled by tourism, it is far from being " underdeveloped."
The climate at the beginning of February was pleasant at all times. Early morning and late evening were cool, but the day has a summery warmth about them without ever being so hot that we could not work over midday.
The heat and bountiful water supplies bring forth an inexhaustible abundance of fruit. Pride of place goes to the coconut. Then there are bananas of every kind, pineapples, a variety of mandarin as big as an orange with a thick, golden green rind, melons, sugar cane and any number of fruit for which there is no word on our language, although the mango and papaya have found their way to Europe. Flowers are scarce, so scarce in fact that I thought it was perhaps the wrong season for them. But we were told that we were actually in the middle of the flowering season. Yet neither in the palm wood nor in the jungle could we find more than a dozen varieties of flowers and flowering bushes and trees. To make up for it, however, there was an endless variety of shapes and forms in the foliage of the jungle. And every day we met new animals.
buffalo
Koh Samui lives on the coconut-lives on it, indeed, with an exclusivity which can hardly be exceeded by any other region with a mono culture. There are a few rice fields on the island and the coconut +6the field and garden produce is brought over from the mainland. This is not because the island cannot grow there crops but rather because the people there can afford to import them. Growing coconut palms is a paying proposition. And what is particularly remarkable is that the palm yields all this bounty and demands almost nothing in return. The owner does not even have to pluck the ripe fruit; his monkeys see to that. These are trained animals, which are kept as pets and looked after very well by their masters. Once the nuts have been plucked and gathered, the first-and last-real work has to be done: the thick protective layer of fibre enclosing the nut has to be removed. Down by the sea about an hour's walk to the south of Angtong there is a factory where the fibres are torn from the green shells and laid out on an open space like freshly mown hay, turned, dried and finally raked together. Only the fibres themselves are processed on the island; the nuts are taken down to the harbour and picked up by ships which call at Koh Samui every eight or ten days to carry them to Bangkok. The islanders are very much aware of the debt they owe to the munificent palm tree, for in the temples there is always a particularly large and beautiful coconut in brass holder on the altar. The coconut palm gives the island not only its wealth but also its beauty.
Marked off from the village by a little palm wood and only a few paces from the beach stands the temple. " Temple" is the usual translation of the Thai wood " wat, " but it is not really correct since "wat" means not only the temple itself but also the dwellings of the monks, their communal dining area, the school rooms, the cemetery and so forth. But neither is monastery quite the right word, for it has overtones of seclusion whereas the "wat" is a place where everyday life bustles in and out all the time.
The last day of our stay on Koh Samui happened to coincide with the February full moon. This is the day when the villagers flock to the temple to bring the Buddhist monks offerings of food. The women take great pride not only in preparing a tasty dish but also in topping it off in an appetizing and artistic manner. The night before the festival of the full moon there is a kind of church bazaar within the temple compound. Lights are strung from palm to palm, and between the monks' huts a number of stalls are set up for the sale of fruit, dainties and even household articles. The entire population of the village throngs through the fair, and the air is filled with the ear-splitting music of several percussion and brass bands all playing at the same time.
The monks live in pairs in huts which are scattered round the temple in the palm grove and look hardly any different from the usual farmhouses perched on stilts. Two wooden trestles are the only furniture in these airy cells, the walls are covered with book-shelves, pictures from magazines and souvenir photographs. Each cell is half student's room and half alpine hut and looks remarkably snug.
The monks were treated by the population and particularly by the school-children with respect but at the same time a degree of familiarity that showed how closely religious and everyday lift were woven together. This was brought home to us very vividly on the day before the full moon festival in the temple.
The temple is an undecorated hall at the upper end of which a statue of Buddha presides over an altar covered with sacred vessels and offerings. In the middle of the room there is a low wooden platform on which the monks sit cross-legged and at the front end of which there is a pulpit in the form of a capacious arm-chair. The faithful squat on level ground of the aisle running round the platform.
Koh Samui lies roughly half way as the crow flies between the capital Bangkok and the Malayan frontier. Being an island, it has always been open to the influence of the neighbouring country to the south. This is why two typically Malayan institution, cock-fighting and bull-fighting, have become popular not only with immigrants but also with the local people. There are cock-fights in every village on Sunday morning. Each place has its own pit consisting of a roofed timber building, circular in shape with seats in tiers all the way round. Cock-fighting is strictly a male affair and women are not admitted either to the arena or the forecourt. The fights are not so cruel as in some other places because the cocks attack only with their beaks and natural spurs and no knives are fitted. The people of Koh Samui go in forcock-fighting not so much through a desire for bloodshed but rather because it gives them a chance to indulge their passion for gambling.
The bull-fighting is an altogether more exciting affair, but it takes place only a few times a year. The fight is staged in the open palm wood not far from the village.Once again, the audience consists of men and boys only ; the women are found a place on carts at some distance from the scene of battle where they can usually see next to nothing. There are no end of ceremonial preparations as the two bull buffalos are groomed for the contest: they are sprinkled with holy water and censed with the smoke of pine splinters, their foreheads are rubbed with rice pap, their horns decorated with tinsel and gold leaf, special flowers and herbs are tied to their fetlocks, and all the time there is a singing of sacred songs and murmuring of spells. All of which shows that these fights are survivals of ancient religious practices.
monkey

Photographs by Rene' Burri: Text by M.G.
du atlantis cultural monthly: July 1965

[ Samui in 1965 ] [ Environment ] [ History ] [ Service ]
[ Nathon Town ] [ Chaweng Beach ] [ Big Buddha ]
[ Lamai Beach ] [ Monkey Show ] [ Waterfall ] [ Local Fruits ]
[ Commentation ] [ Map of Samui ] [ HOME ]