Saynor: Thailand/Year Of The Child

Riverboats weave between wooden houses poised gaily on thin stilts. Green rice paddies stretch across Thailand's alluvial plains. Bees drone, birds argue over small baitfish, and floating marketplaces hum while bargains are made. Thailand is a land of water and rice, exuberant people and bustling businesses. It is wedged into Southeast Asia in a spot about three-fourths the size of Texas. The people are as gentle as the quiet rivers they depend upon for their livelihood. These rivers comprise a system of floating highways along which the people live andwork. They irrigate the rice paddies and provide abundant mackerel, shellfish, anchovies and tilapia to be shipped to neighboring countries and eaten fresh or salted. But these waterways also provide recreation. The scene depictted in thisartwork shows typical Thai children splashing in the cool, green rivers. They learn to swim even before they can wallk, and it is a rare day when the family water buffalo doesn't follow them into the refreshing river. The children cavort and dive from the patient buffalo's body and when they have finished swimming, they climb on his back and ride slowly home. At other times, the water buffalo labors in the rice paddies completing heavy work that would otherwise be impossible, and most Thais, especially the children, respect the animals as working members of their close and happy families.