PRATOOMRATHA Pratoomratha Zeng was born in Ubol, a

northern district of Siam, in 1918. Edu-

Zh,NG cated in Bankok, Siam, and at New York
University, he has worked for the Siamese
A/f M 'T'Jn^'t t^yri-f- Government. During the war, he was a
X ' J-T JL- fOCZl KjCpt translator for the United States Army.

SII SWARD was our Thai or Siamese cat in my home town Muang,
a northern village in Thailand. She was a gift from my father's
friend to me when I was live years old. She had piercing blue eyes
and delicate dark brown fur which she constantly cleaned with her
tongue. I was completely devoted to her. She was also very popular
with my entire family, and later was to be well known in the whole
district.
During the drought in 1925, our Sii Sward was a heroine; she
had the great honor of being elected the Rain Queen.
We had been without rain for three months that summer. It was
hot and dry. Our public well vvas reduced to mud; the river was at
its lowest ebb. The grass and the trees were dry as tinder. Many of the
buffaloes and farm animals on our farms died of heat, so we took the
remainder to be fed far away on the bank of the river Moon in the
north. It seemed as if farming that year would be impossible. We
were on the verge of chaos and famine. Already there were reports
of forest fires in the other districts. Families from other villages had
migrated southwest seeking for new places for farming.
Every day the villagers gathered in the village Buddhist temple
praying for the rain. All day long the Buddhist priests chanted the
sacred ritual for water from the sky. All the farmers were worried
and thought only of rain, rain, rain.
Then someone suggested that we perform the old Brahmo-Buddhist
rain ceremony called the Nang Maaw, the queen of the cats. This
ceremony has been performed by the peasants since time immemorial.
No exact date can be given when the ceremony asking for the
rain started. In Brahmanism, Varuna, or the god of rain, must be
pleased. Varuna was the god or guardian spirit of the sea, water or
rain. He was one of the oldest Vedic deities, a personification of the
all investing sky, the maker and upholder of heaven and earth. It
is said that once Varuna who was very militaristic appeared in the
form of a female cat to fight a demon. He won the battle and
thus continued to give to the world rain and prosperity.
Whether the Thai farmers knew the story of Varuna I do not
know. All they thought during that time might be only to please
Varuna, the god of rain.
One day, an old lady and her friends came to my father and
begged him to help in the rain ceremony.
That day my father approached me and my cat seriously. He patted
Sii Sward's head gently and said to me, "Ai Noo (my litde mouse),
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850 PRATOOMRATHA ZENG
the villagers have asked us to help in the ceremony asking for the
rain. I promised them to use our cat—your Sii Sward."
I was stunned. How could they use my cat to get rain? I thought
of those chickens that the Chinese killed and boiled during their annual
Trut-Chine, the Chinese ritual days for sacrificing to and honoring
the memory of their ancestors. To have my cat killed and boiled like
a chicken! Oh, no.
I almost shouted to protest, "Oh, no, father, I cannot let anyone
kill my Sii Sward. Rain or no rain, I don't care."
In the Thai family, the father is the sole absolute authority of the
house; to deny his wish is sinful and inexcusable. My father, however,
was a very understanding man. He looked at me coldly and said
calmly, "Son, no one is going to kill Sii Sward. Instead of doing that,
and because our cat is the most beautiful and cleanest of all the cats
in the village, she was elected by the people to be the Rain Queen
of our district. This is a great honor to her and to our family."
I was reluctant to consent until father said, "We can take Sii Sward
back home as soon as the ceremony is over."
That evening there was an announcement from the temple ground
by the old leader of the village that there would be a Nang Maaw
ceremony starting in the afternoon of the following day.
Next morning everyone in the village went to the temple ground.
The women were dressed in their bright blue skirts, Pha Sin, and
white blouses, and the men in their white trousers and the Kui-Heng
shirts. Children of all ages put on their new clean clothes; they
walked along with their parents. Two artists built up a big bamboo
cage and the people fastened flowers and leaves to it and dressed it up
until it looked like a miniature castle.
At noon time, my cat Sii Sward had her usual lunch of dry mudfish
and rice, then my father gave me the great honor of carrying her to
the temple ground. Some old ladies brushed and sprayed sweet native
perfume upon her proud head. Sii Sward protested vehemently; she
struggled to get away, and I had to put her into the adorned cage.
However, once inside the cage, she became calm and serene as befitted
her role and soon curled up in silent slumber. Buddhist priests came
to sprinkle sacred water on her, but Sii Sward slept on.
In spite of the heat and the sun, that day people packed into the
monastery to see Sii Sward, the Rain Queen, and to pray for rain.
They carried the cage into the big Vihara, our best and most beautiful
temple; and then the priests chanted a sacred prayer in front of the
image of Lord Buddha, Pra Kantharaj (the image of Lord Buddha
asking for rain). Sacred water was sprinkled onto poor Sii Sward as a
high priest lit a candle near the cage and chanted long moaning prayers
in the sacred Pali tongue.
In mid-afternoon the sun was so hot that the villagers took refuge
under the shade of the big mangoes and Po trees on the temple ground.
A group of people began to chant the Nang Maaw song, softly at

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 MY THAI CAT 851
first, then louder and louder until everyone seemed to shout. Long
native drums, Taphone, began to beat in chorus. People started to
dance while chanting the song:

Oh, mother cat, please give us rain from the sky

So that we can make sacred water
We need silver for the mother cat
We need fish and we need honey
If we do not get it, we will be ruined.
Don't let the widow down to sell her children.
Let them have all white rice
To have pleasure, we need gold and silver
We want to buy bananas
We need provisions for the priests and the people
Let us see the lightning and let us have rains
Oh, let us have rain.
It was a most impressive ceremony and made me feel warm and
confident of the queen's powers.
Sii Sward still slept peacefully in her adorned cage. Cool as a
cucumber, she ignored the noise and the chanting until two men came
to her miniature castie and lifted it to their shoulders, and then led the
people out of the temple. A procession was formed; two drummers
with Taphone drums led the crowd. They beat the drums incessantly
as the people chanted and made a lot of noise. After the drummers
there were a group of dancers dressed in the Thai theatrical style.
They danced in front of the cage as if to perform the show for the
Queen of Rain.
The procession moved toward the market place. There was a
huge crowd following the procession; all of them chanted the Nang
Maaw. On the narrow street people laid cakes and water which the
pedestrians ate after Sii Sward passed. Some people gave the two men
who carried the Rain Queen some rice wine. Both of them toasted the
queen and drank the wine happily. These foods and drinks were to
impress the Queen of Rain that ours was the land of plenty, and that
the goddess of rain must give us water so that abundance of life
would be preserved.
Sii Sward slept all the way; she was not impressed by the demonstra-
tion. Before we entered the open market place there was so much
noise; someone fired many big fire crackers. A few women who were
traders in powder and perfumes approached the cage and poured cups
of sweet-smelling perfume and flowers onto the poor Rain Queen.
At this moment, the noise of frantic shouting, of chanting, of fire
crackers, and that perfumed water proved to be too much for the
poor Sii Sward. More water and perfume were poured and splashed
into the cage. Sii Sward stood up, her blue eyes staring at the culprits.
Her brown and smooth hair was soaking wet. She began to cry and
tried to find the way to escape in vain.

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852 PRATOOMRATHA ZENG
Seeing the whole condition going from bad to worse, I was almost
crying asking father to rescue the poor cat. However, father said that
everything would be all right. After a while, everyone seemed to be
satisfied giving the Rain Queen perfumes; they stopped the noises
completely as if to listen to the tormented noise of the Rain Queen.
At that moment Sii Sward stopped crying, too. She was soaking wet
and trembling with fear.
People chanted softly as they led the procession back to the
monastery, even the drummers and the two men who ten minutes ago
were chanting frantically now calmed down. Sii Sward continued
crying on the way back to the temple as if her heart would break. I
was helpless, but I followed the procession closely to the monastery.
When we reached the Vihara, the men placed the cage in front
of the temple, and then all of them went into the Vihara to pray
for the rain goddess again. At this moment, I saw the opportunity
to help my poor Sii Sward. Having seen the last person enter the
temple, I took Sii Sward out of the cage and ran home with her.
At nine o'clock that same night, it was pitch dark. Sii Sward now
calmed herself down and seemed to forget the whole event in the day
time. She lay down under my bed and slept soundly. My parents
were not yet returned from the temple ground; they joined the
neighbors praying for rain in the monastery. I still wondered about
the whole procession in the day time, but I was too tired and did not
know when I went fast asleep.
When my people came back from the temple ground at eleven
o'clock, there was still no sign of rain. Someone came into my room
to see Sii Sward, but seeing us asleep they went out quietly. It must
have been about three o'clock in the morning, a sound like a train
running and a big hurricane was heard. Later there was a strong
sound of thunder over the mountains, and a few minutes later, a
shower, a real tropical shower, came down. Everyone in the village
got up from his bed. We were happy. The farmers started at once
to their farms. It rained for three days, and three nights, and it
seemed as if the showers would never stop until the water in the sky
would be gone. Our crops were saved.
But Sii Sward ignored the whole rain. She slept happily the whole
three days. Farmers and their families dropped down to see her
afterward. The patted her delicate fur and left dry fish and meat for
her, her favorite food. That year the farmers thought that Sii Sward
saved their crops and their families. Sii Sward was a heroine.

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MANUEL
A xr T XT Manuel Buaken was born in the Philip-
D U A Jv ili IN pines and educated in American univer-
sities. In 1943 he joined the First Fihpino
T'In/y T—fn'l/'Cfi (^f Infantry, U.S. Army, and was stationed
JL UC n u n c UJ at Camp Beale, California. [From Asia
Magazine, August, 1943; used by permis-
ffiP ^'IDO'Vn *'°'^ "•^ United Nations World.]

"BOY, GET RID OF T H A T HORSE," said one of the wise old men
from Abra where the racing horses thrive on the good Bermuda grass of
Luzon uplands. "That's a bandit's horse. See that Sign of Evil on
him. Something tragic will happen to you if you keep him."
But another one of the old horse traders who had gathered at that
auction declared: "That's a good omen. The Sword he bears on his
shoulder means leadership and power. He's a true mount for a
chieftain. He's a free man's fighting horse."
As for me, I knew this gray colt was a wonder horse the moment
I saw him. These other people were blind. They only saw that this
gray, shaggy horse bore the marks of many whips, that his ribs almost
stuck through his mangy hide, that his great eyes rolled in defiance
and fear as the auctioneer approached him. They couldn't see the
meaning of that Sword he bore—a marking not in the color, which was
a uniform gray, but in the way that the hair had arranged itself per-
manently: it was parted to form an outline of a sword that was broad
on his neck and tapered to a fine point on his shoulder.
Father, too, was blind against this horse. He argued with me and
scolded: "Maning, when I promised you a pony as a reward for good
work in high school English, I thought you'd use good judgment in
choosing. It is true, this horse has good blood, for he came from the
Santiago stables—they have raised many fine racers, but this colt
has always been worthless. He is bad-tempered, would never allow
himself to be bathed and curried, and no one has ever been able to
ride him. Now, that black over there is well trained—"
"Father, you promised I could choose for myself," I insisted. "I
choose this horse. None of them can tame him, but I can. He's wild
because his mouth is very tender—see how it is bled. That's his ter-
rible secret."
My father always kept his promises, so he paid the few pesos they
asked for this outlaw colt and made arrangements to have the animal
driven, herded, up to our summer home in the hills.
"I used to play, but now I have work to do," I told Father. "I'll
show you and everybody else what a mistake you made about my
horse."
Father agreed with me solemnly, and smiled over my head at Mother,
but she wasn't agreeing at all. "Don't you go near that bad horse
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