by Jim Goodman
 |
| gate to Chiang Mai's Chinatown |
Ethnic Chinese constitute the
largest minority of Thailand’s population. Though Chinese had always lived in Thailand as merchants in
Ayutthaya, they began seriously migrating in the early 19th century,
after the establishment of the Chakri Dynasty. At first, they moved mainly into the capital Bangkok
and the cities on the east coast.
Chiang Mai may have had a few resident shopkeepers at that time but
large-scale Chinese immigration to the northern city only got underway from
about 1870, when the semi-autonomous state of Lanna was becoming more fully
integrated with Siam.
 |
| Chinese shop in Kad Luang |
The first Chinese community
was in Watgate, on the east bank of the Ping River, outside the city
proper. They later took up residence
on the other side of the Ping River in what is today Warorot Market, or Kad
Luang (Big Market in the Northern Thai dialect), as well as the lower part of
Tha Pae Road. It was a small and
slow influx in the beginning, of pioneers from Southeast China originally,
setting up shop-houses and angling to establish themselves as merchants. A population count in 1884 put their
numbers at around 2000.
Most of them originated from
Bangkok and spoke the Guangdong, Hokka and Teochow dialects of southeast China. Others were Hui from Yunnan, Muslim
Chinese who spike a Chinese dialect close to Mandarin. They had fled the fierce reprisals of
Qing Dynasty troops at the end of the Muslim Revolt (or Panthay Rebellion) in
1872. Hui refugees from Yunnan
settled downriver from Warorot, around what is now the upper end of the Chiang
Mai Night Bazaar on Changklang Road.
They built a mosque on the first lane, renamed Halal Street today, which
was long ago replaced by a modern building more in the Middle Eastern style. Local Thais referred to them as Jin
Haw.
 |
| Chinese gold shop in Warorot Market |
Over the next few decades, as
Siam began reaching out to integrate economically and politically all parts of
the country, one result was a movement of more Chinese to the north. By 1919 Chiang Mai had 3600 Chinese
residents. The initial wave of Jin
Haw had subsided, but non-Muslim Yunnanese were trickling in, eventually
establishing a neighborhood around today’s Anusarn Market, a few blocks down
from Halal Street.
The bulk of the immigrants,
however, came up from Bangkok. They
were an overflow of successful immigration to the capital, who moved north to
cities like Tak, Lampang and Chiang Mai where there was less competition in
their particular trade, profession or business. As a newcomer community, one that relied on commerce rather
than land for its maintenance, its success depended on the close bonds it
knitted within itself.
 |
| Chinese temple near Muang Mai Market |
Chinese could plunge
confidently into the adventure of relocation because they could count on the
solidarity and assistance of already established, resident Chinese
communities. Moreover, they could
also benefit from the extension of credit by their contacts back in
Bangkok. The attitude of the time
(and conditions then) was that Chinese should help other Chinese to
succeed. It was good for the
community.
Based around Warorot Market,
Chinese ensconced themselves as the principal merchants of the city. They controlled the retail trade, money
lending and the commercial river traffic.
At the dawn of the 20th century Chiang Mai-Bangkok river
commerce consisted of one thousand sampans annually, carrying two and a half
tons of cargo.
 |
| Pung Tao Gong Chinese temple |
Chiang Mai exported animal
hides and horns, lac dye, lard and
teak logs. From Bangkok it
imported clothing, fabric, thread, matches, kerosene, soap and iron tools. The balance of trade was always
unfavorable to Chiang Mai. The
journey could take three weeks, though some only went as far as Nakhon Sawan
and met cargo boats there coming up from Bangkok.
Another occupation the Chinese
got into in the late 19th century was tax collector. They could do this because the
local autonomous government had a lot of powerful nobles who were responsible
for tax collection in their spheres of influence. Wealthy Chinese businessmen simply bribed the nobles to get
the tax collection concessions. In
a particularly notorious case, a Chinese businessman named Teng Sophanodon,
from the Kim Seng Lee Company, constructed a Bangkok palace for Lanna’s King
Inthawichayanon, in return for the right to collect taxes on pigs, cattle,
opium, tobacco, betel nuts and leaves and coconuts.
 |
| stone lion at Pung Tao Gong |
 |
| making s lantern at Pung Tao Gong |
Sometimes the Lanna nobles
agreed to the tax collection concession after accepting the bribe, but then
changed their minds when a competitor offered a bigger bribe. This led to lawsuits, aroused the
attention of Bangkok and led to Rama V’s reforms of the whole tax collection
system in Lanna, at the same time further reducing Lanna’s autonomous
authority. In 1899, resistance to
the new system spawned a revolt in which animosity was particularly directed at
Chinese tax collectors.
Subsequently, government tax collectors took over the job.
 |
| Warorot temple at New Year |
The nature of Chiang Mai
commerce changed again in 1921 with the inauguration of the railroad link to
Bangkok. A highway followed a few
years later. Trains and trucks
could now carry greater amounts of cargo much faster than boats and at a
cheaper rate. Chinese in Chiang
Mai began consolidating control of all the import-export trade. With greater contacts across the
country and access to credit, the Chinese were able to displace the Shan,
Burmese and Indian competition, who had no such advantages, and from 1932 began
buying out their rivals.
Foreign manufactured goods,
primarily from Great Britain, but also from Germany and Japan, began flowing north. With a dramatic expansion of rice farms
throughout the north, rice became Chiang Mai’s principal export south. Chinese traders were involved in every
step of the production process.
They purchased the rice brought in by caravans from distant places. They set up rice mills in and around
the city. They tendered
high-interest loans to farmers and confiscated their lands if the farmer could
not repay the loan. They
constructed irrigation canals and dikes and controlled the rice shipped to
other parts of the country.
 |
| New Year--a time for serious selfie-examination |
 |
| making noodles on Wichayanon Road |
Their rising prosperity
encouraged other Chinese immigrants, who knew they would be accepted and
assisted by the Chiang Mai Chinese community, as well as draw credit support
from their connections in Bangkok.
When the Warorot area became congested, the Chinese community expanded
north, past the Nakhon Ping Bridge to the Muang Mai market area, today mainly a
food market, open all night.
 |
| Chinese specialities on Chang Moi Road |
While it was a very tight
community, it did not remain a purely Chinese one. The majority of the immigrants were male, so there was a
shortage of ethnic Chinese brides.
Many of them took Thai wives, though in this highly patriarchal society
their children identified as Chinese, even in later decades when they used the
Thai language domestically more than one of the Chinese dialects. The men of the Jin Haw community,
augmented by ex-caravan members, sometimes married women of the Muslim Malay
and Bengali communities, from colonial Malaysia and Burma, who began arriving
in Chiang Mai in the early 20th century.
Now in the 21st
century the Chinese no longer control the Chiang Mai economy as extensively as
they did in the past. Yet they are
still the most important players, expanding into real estate and banking in
recent decades. The Warorot and
Muang Mai neighborhoods are still dominated by Thai-Chinese and the markets
there are quite active, even with the modern competition of shopping malls and
supermarkets.
 |
| scribe writing messages to gods and ancestors |
 |
| a well-known symbol of China |
A big, red wooden gate on Chiang
Moi Road, about a block west of the Ping River, marks the entrance to Chiang
Mai’s Chinatown, otherwise known as Warorot or Kad Luang. Typical Chinese-style, curly-headed
stone lions, like the kind commonly mounted in front of bank buildings, stand
at the base on each side of the gate. All kinds of shops and sidewalk stalls exist in this area,
both inside and outside the covered markets, selling all kinds of products,
including those traditionally marketed by Chinese merchants, like temple and
festival decorations, herbal medicines and the numerous gold jewelry shops.
On Kuangmane Road, the first
lane to the right down Chang Moi Road after passing through the gate, stands
the most venerable Chinese temple, a rather simple structure with yellow walls
and tiled roofs, upturned at the corners in the typical Chinese style. In more recent decades, Chinese
residents have built two more temples in the Muang Mai area and quite a fancy
one on the riverside road past the flower market.
 |
| stage performance on Kuangmane Road |
 |
| singer in classical Chinese costume |
Called Pung Tao Gong, this is
the moat outstanding Chinese temple in the Kad Luang area, with most of its
buildings added in the 21st century; the gate, a two-tiered pavilion within and a seven-tiered
pagoda with a ceramic vase on top.
Dragons flank the tops of the entry gate and pavilion, writhe around a
tall pole in the courtyard and the pillars of the entrance gate and flank the
way to the altar inside the main temple building. The deities within are mostly Taoist ones but a small shrine
to the right houses a Thai Buddha statue as well as a Chinese bodhisattva
image.
Besides new temples in Warorot
and other sites, the other main development in the Chinese community this
century has been an increasing ethnic awareness, resulting in a much more
enthusiastic celebration of traditional Chinese holidays, Lunar New Year in
particular. Kad Luang holds three
days of celebrations. The streets
are closed off to vehicular traffic and stalls go up all the way down Chang Moi
road and on WIchayanon Road between the two covered markets of Warorot and
Tonlamyai.
 |
| Chinese opera performance, 2014 |
Red lanterns
saturate the whole area, suspended above the streets, strung on poles, hanging
in front of the temples and flanking food stalls in the streets. Tables and chairs, set up in the middle
of the street, provide convenient places to dine on the meals, drinks and
snacks offered in the rows of stalls on either side. A couple tables on Chang Moi Road are reserved for a
checkers tournament.
Besides the special foods,
stalls also market clothing, lanterns, jewelry, handicrafts and dolls. The red color also dominates the
people’s clothing, from the red t-shirts worn by dragon dance teams and shop
workers to the high-collared, side-fastened, red and gold Chinese dresses, with
split sides, donned by the women.
There’s lots of selfie action these days by folks dressed in their
festival best.
Beyond shopping and eating,
entertainment also draws people to Kad Luang. Until a new coffee shop replaced it, a stage opposite Pung
Tao Gong featured classical Chinese opera performances at night. These have disappeared from the
program, but in some years a small stage goes up at the end of Kuangmane Road
to hold afternoon shows of classical dances and songs. Temporary bamboo gates are also erected
on this lane for the occasion.
 |
| Chinese opera character |
 |
| pole-dancing, dragon-style |
At the corner of Chang Mai and
Wichayanon Roads, during the festival a red stage becomes the venue for a
beauty contest, with the competitors dressed in classical silk dresses and
elaborate headdresses in the Qing Dynasty style. Singers and dancers also perform here, but the show ends
rather early the night before New Year as attention shifts to the dragon dances
whirling around in the plaza in front of the stage.
A dozen or so team members
prop up each of the two dragons as they cavort in the street accompanied by two
lions, one red, one yellow. After
this the lions perform separately and in the final act one of the dragons
climbs a pole and spouts fireworks and flames from its mouth when it reaches
the top.
 |
| lion dancer inside Warorot Market |
On New Year’s afternoon a
dragon and the two lions emerge from a lane near the Kad Luang Gate and head
for the market. Their purpose is
to collect donations from the shop and stall keepers, so they don’t perform any
dance. However, they enter the
Warorot covered market and make a route through most of its lanes and even the
dining area downstairs. When they
pause, people place money in the dragon’s mouth or tie banknotes to one of the
strings making up its beard. In
return, the dragon master severs beard strings to give the donor as a
souvenir. The procession lasts two
hours and makes numerous stops, especially at the gold shops.
At night song and dance
performances take place again on the stage. One or two acrobatic acts or kungfu demonstrations might add variety to the stage
entertainment, which is augmented in the evening by a burst of fireworks
illuminating the sky behind the stage.
The day after New Year is more
subdued. The street stalls are
still up and busy and some shows are on stage again after dark. But many shops in the lanes close for
the day for their proprietors and employees to spend time with their
families. New Year activities—renewing
kinship ties, venerating gods and ancestors and putting their ethnic identity
on display with decorations, dances and temple action—come to a close. The rest of the year the Chinese
community reverts to its principal pre-occupations of business and making
money.
 |
| the dragon collecting donations inside Warorot Market |
*
* *
No comments:
Post a Comment