A young man from Satun has been fascinated with shadow puppetry, a local performance, since he was a child. He trained and developed himself until he became a shadow puppet master, earning extra income while studying.
Mr. Worawit Maskaew, 22 years old, studying at Satun Community College, performs at the Saturday Night Plaza Market in Satun Province every Saturday and Monday, attracting the attention of people visiting the market.
Mr. Worawit said that he has liked nang talung since he was 4-5 years old. When his parents brought him to buy things, he would buy CDs of nang talung to watch and hoped that there would be a small nang talung theater to open for performances, to be able to puppeteer like the nang talung masters he liked. Whenever he saw a nang talung performance, he would go and watch. When he grew up, he practiced carving by drawing and carving from paper, practicing puppeteering and singing. Until the age of 12, he started to gain experience and collect jokes. When he had money to save, he bou
ght equipment such as a movie screen, lights, microphones, and nang talung, and brought it to perform. The first performance was at the Saturday Night Plaza Market in Satun Province, which received attention from the audience until a nang talung master, Rungjit Rungthiwa, came to walk around the market and saw him perform, so he accepted him as his student and learned how to perform nang talung seriously. Currently, he still works as a nang talung puppeteer and performs at the Saturday Night Plaza Market. He performs in 2 styles: performing alone with the sound from a CD, or on days when he has students, he performs live, and also accepts work at various venues. He also makes nang talung key chains and sells carved nang talung.
Source: Thai News Agency