Photo: Takeaway / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Phak Kat Cho: Kham Mueang Food Words from a Jaran Song
Phak Kat Cho is a Kham Mueang (Northern Thai) folk song sung by Jaran Manopetch. It tells of a poor young man who falls for a girl from a rich family, but at home there is nothing to eat but phak kat cho (ผักฯกาดฯชํอฯ, Kham Mueang reading phak kat cho, a mustard-green soup) at every meal. The song is funny and easy to follow, but almost every line hides a Kham Mueang word about the home, the time of day or food. This lesson unpicks those words one by one.
Listen to the song first
Phak Kat Cho, sung by Jaran Manopetch, from the Nititad AOA Official channel, which says it comes from the album Folk Song Kham Mueang. The study by Ueamporn Thipdet and Siriwan Nanthachanthun (2023) places the song on the album Folk Song Kham Mueang Amata, Chut Amata 1, the same album as the song Noi Chaiya, Sao Motorcycle and Ui Kham.
The sources do not yet agree on who wrote it. A listener's blog gives "words and music: Nikhom Khanthorot", while the study above groups this song with the songs Jaran wrote and sang himself. Moradok Lanna has not yet found primary evidence to confirm either, so we say only that the song is sung by Jaran Manopetch.
What is cho?
The word cho (ชํอฯ, read cho) has several meanings in the dictionary, including a remote corner far from people, a screen, and the Year of the Dog. But in the Lanna kitchen, cho is a way of cooking vegetables: boil water with shrimp paste, salt and fermented fish, add the vegetables when it boils, make it sour with tamarind and sweet with cane-sugar cakes. Some places also add thua nao khaep (fermented soybean sheets). Once cooked, the dish is named after the vegetable used, as in phak kat cho or phak nam cho.
The vegetable most often used for cho phak kat (ชํอฯผักฯกาดฯ, read cho phak kat) is Chinese mustard greens (kwangtung) that are putting out their yellow flower shoots, which the dictionary says Lanna people call "phak kat chon". So the song sings "kua nak kua na kua cho phak kat" (กั๋วนักกั๋วหนากั๋วจอผักกาด), "I'm so very scared of cho phak kat", because he has eaten it until he is sick of it.
His home and her home
The first verse begins with "ban ai pen tup tit din" (บ้านอ้ายเป๋นตูบติดดิน, "my home is a hut on the bare ground") and then compares the young man's life with the girl's, pair by pair. This table takes only short words from the song; the meanings come from the Moradok Lanna dictionary.
| His | Hers | Kham Mueang words to know |
|---|---|---|
| tup tit din (a hut on the ground) | a bungalow | tup ตู = a hut, a shack |
| tiao lo with the maeo lot buang brand | trousers in Wacoal | tiao ต่ยฯว = trousers · ka กา = a brand, a trademark |
| at my place (phe) we eat phak kat cho | at her place they eat kaeng hang le | phe เระฯพ้ = this, here · kaeng hang le แกงฯฮังฯเล = a rich pork-belly curry |
| rides a "motor car" | sits in a car | ai อ้ายฯ = elder brother, and a pronoun a man uses for himself |
These contrasting pairs are the song's joke. Tiao lo are cheap trousers sold by the dozen, while Wacoal is a brand of underwear. This observation about the pairs is Moradok Lanna's own reading; the study by Ueamporn and Siriwan (2023) reads the song as building a representation of Khon Mueang who live and eat simply, through the names of local dishes.
Eating it at every meal: words for time and for being full
The chorus tells how he gets up in the morning, goes to the kat, buys mustard greens to make cho, adds som ba kham (tamarind) and then eats until "khap diao, khap diao bo po" (one meal, one meal isn't enough) and "kin phak kat cho chon tong kai tong pong" (eats phak kat cho until his belly is bloated and swollen).
| Word in the song | Lanna script | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| som ba kham | บ่าฯขามฯ | tamarind (the dictionary writes ba kham), used to make the cho sour |
| khap | ระฯคาฯปฯ | a time, an occasion, a meal, as in toeng khap khao (it's mealtime) |
| bo po | บพํอฯ | not enough, as in bo po kin (not enough to eat) |
| tong | ท้อฯง | belly, stomach |
| kai | ไค่ | swollen, puffed up, bloated |
| pong | พอฯง | swollen, bulging, puffed up |
So "khap diao bo po" means one meal is not enough, and "tong kai tong pong" is eating until your belly is bloated and swollen. Paired expressions like this are common in Kham Mueang: two words with similar meanings are set side by side to make the picture stronger.
Then the song sings "ma kham, ma ton, ma chao" (evening, midday, morning): every time he opens the food cupboard, there is nothing but phak kat cho. The researchers point out that these time words stress that he eats it regularly, at every meal. The words to know are:
- kham (ฅํา, read kham): the time when it gets dark, at the start of the night.
- ton (ทอฯร, read ton) does not mean "a part, a section" as in central Thai, but daytime, midday; the midday meal is called "khao ton".
- chao (เชั้า, read chao): the morning, before sunrise.
Off to aeo sao: Northern dishes eaten with phak kat cho
The later verses move from his own home to the girls' homes, starting with "ai pai aeo sao ban nuea" (I go courting at the north end of the village), followed by "sao mak sa ba khuea kap phak kat cho" (the girl loves sa of eggplant with phak kat cho). Then he goes to the south end of the village and visits a fair-faced girl, but every home ends up with phak kat cho just the same. aeo sao (แอ่วฯสาวฯ, read aeo sao) is visiting a young woman at her home in the evening (read more in Kham U Bao U Sao), and mak (มักฯ) means to like very much, to be pleased with.
| Food in the song | Lanna script | Meaning from the dictionary |
|---|---|---|
| sa | ส้า | a dish of chopped meat or vegetables mixed with chilli paste |
| tam | ตำ | to pound, as in tam nam phik (one verse sings tam ba khuea) |
| ba khuea | บ่าฯเขิอฯอ | eggplant (the dictionary writes ba khuea) |
| khaep khai | แฅปฯไข | beef or buffalo fat rendered until the oil is gone |
| nam phik ong | น้ำฯระฯพิกฯอ่อฯง | tomato and pork chilli dip (Kham Mueang: nam phik ong) |
The girl in every home has something different to eat with phak kat cho. Ueamporn and Siriwan (2023) point out that listing local dishes such as phak kat cho, tam ba khuea and khaep khai portrays Khon Mueang who cook from ingredients close at hand, and cho phak kat itself needs only mustard greens and tamarind as its main ingredients.
At the end of these verses there are also words for the poor young man's feelings: kuet (คึดฯ) = to think, to brood, and "khrai hui", which is close to khai (ไฅ่) = to want, and hui (หุย) = to weep and wail, so it can be heard as "thinking about it, I want to cry". As for "a-long-chong" in the phrase "na khao a-long-chong", it is not in the dictionary; from the context it probably stresses a fair, glowing face.
Kham Mueang sounds you can hear in the song
When you compare the words in the song with the Thai forms the dictionary gives, you see the same sound changes again and again.
| Thai sound | Kham Mueang sound | Examples from the song |
|---|---|---|
| ท (th) | ต (t) | thong → tong (belly), thon → ton (midday) |
| พ (ph) | ป (p) | pho → po (enough), phong → pong (swollen) |
| ช (ch) | จ (ch, like "j") | chao (morning) → chao, cho → cho |
| ร (r) | ฮ (h) | ruean (house) → huean (เริอฯร), rak (to vomit) → hak |
| ค (kh) | ก (k) | khit (to think) → kuet |
| consonant clusters | no clusters | klua (to fear) → kua (ก฿ลฯวฯ), tra (brand) → ka |
| มะ (ma) | บ่า (ba) | makham → ba kham, makhuea → ba khuea |
Another thing you can clearly hear is the rising tone in words that are mid tone in central Thai, such as kin → kin (กินฯ, to eat), kaeng → kaeng (แกงฯ, curry) (mo kaeng, curry pot → mo kaeng, หํมฯอฯ), phak → phak (vegetable), tam → tam (to pound). This table sums up this set of words only; it is not a rule that works for every word.
The rhymes and the ending of the song
The first verse uses rhymes at the ends of lines in pairs, such as din with (Yu)phin, and an -o sound that runs through seso, Wacoal and lo. The aeo sao verses do the opposite: every line ends with the same words, "kap phak kat cho" (with phak kat cho), turning them into a joke the listener waits for.
The ending counts "nueng cho, song cho, sam cho…" (one cho, two cho, three cho…) up to seven, and closes with "po kon no". po (พํอฯ) means enough, and no (หํนฯอฯ) is a word of musing, so it can be heard as "that's enough for now, please": the song ends, with a laugh, sick of phak kat cho.
This count of rhymes and reading of the ending are Moradok Lanna's own.
How the different versions of the lyrics differ
This article quotes the words as given in Ueamporn and Siriwan's study (2023) and on a listener's blog (bloggang, 2008). Another lyrics website writes some words differently.
| Words in this article | Another version |
|---|---|
| ฮากเลือดผักกาดจอ | กิ๋นผักกาดจอ |
| ส้มบะขาม | ส้มมะขาม |
| บ่ปอ | บ่พอ |
| ต๊องไก้ต๊องปอง | ต้องไก้ ต้องปอง |
| มะค่ำ มะตอน มะเจ๊า | มะค่ำ มาตอน มาเจ๊า (the study) |
| ศรีมอย | สีมอย |
The spellings differ because each person wrote down what they heard. The forms closest to the dictionary are บ่ปอ (bo po) and ต๊อง (tong).
Summary
- phak kat cho is mustard greens cooked by the cho method: boil water with shrimp paste, salt and fermented fish, add the greens and make it sour with tamarind.
- The song compares the life of a poor young man with that of a girl from a rich family, such as a tup (hut) against a bungalow, and tiao (trousers) sold by the dozen against Wacoal.
- khap means a meal, ton means midday, and tong kai tong pong is eating until your belly is bloated and swollen.
- Dishes eaten with phak kat cho in the song include sa ba khuea, tam ba khuea, khaep khai and nam phik ong.
- Kham Mueang sounds change from Thai in regular patterns, such as th → t, ph → p and r → h, and in words like kin, kaeng and phak with a rising tone.
Look up more words from the song in the Moradok Lanna dictionary (in Thai), learn more Kham Mueang food words from another song at Kin Lam Kin Lam, and hear Jaran Manopetch sing with Soontaree Vechanont at the song Noi Chaiya.
More in the same series: Ban Bon Doi · Kin Lam Kin Lam, or see the whole series at Kham Mueang through songs and literature (in Thai).
Sources
- Moradok Lanna dictionary (in Thai): ผั๋กกาดจอ · จอ · จอผั๋กกาด · คาบ · ไก้ · ตอน · ฮากไก้
- เอื้อมพร ทิพย์เดช และสิริวรรณ นันทจันทูล [Ueamporn Thipdet and Siriwan Nanthachanthun]. (2023). ภาพแทนคนเมืองในบทเพลงของจรัล มโนเพ็ชร [Representations of Khon Mueang in the songs of Jaran Manopetch]. Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, Uttaradit Rajabhat University 10(1), 167–184. In Thai.
- Nititad AOA Official. ผักกาดจอ – จรัล มโนเพ็ชร [Phak Kat Cho – Jaran Manopetch]. YouTube.
- Lyrics used for comparison (as leads only): บล็อก "โฟล์คซองคำเมือง ชุดอมตะ ๑: เพลงผักกาดจอ" [blog post "Folk Song Kham Mueang Chut Amata 1: Phak Kat Cho"] (bloggang, 2008) · เนื้อเพลงผักกาดจอ [Phak Kat Cho lyrics] (lyric.in.th). In Thai.
Look up "ผั๋กกาดจอ" in the Moradok Lanna dictionary (in Thai)
