Our guest, Songkran Jantakad, is a well-educated anthropologist with a political science degree from Chiang Mai University. He is named after the Songkran Festival which in 2024 will last from 1 to 21 April. The word, Songkran comes from a Sanskrit word meaning 'passing' or 'approaching'.
We kicked off our conversation on the Chiang Mai Uni campus by discussing the freshly graduated students’ trajectory in life, and education in the modern world in general. Expect to hear about the chronicles of Thailand by an anthropologist who has studied it extensively - from Siam to the Lanna Kingdom and to the colonial times of King Rama 4th - 5th till now. We discuss multiculturalism in the kingdom, from Myanmar, Laos, and China. How agriculture around this area of the world is the main way of livelihood - switching up gears to talk about change in human life through the light of the Buddhist point of view. Using the lenses of Krishnamurti, Tich Nat Han, and others to illuminate the points of metamorphosis in a person’s life.
We round it all up by talking about the sociological aspects of the region, the unavoidable conflict between generations and cultural identities, interracial marriage, the cultural influence of the Western thinking systems, and how Thailand is not as easygoing as it appears on the surface.
This conversation was the most informative one I have had about the culture of Thailand, Songkran was so nice to spare his study time for us to cultivate information about this wonderful kingdom.
