This interview is from THE SELF-DESTRUCTION ISSUE of VICE magazine. Find it in a store near you, or get 4 issues each year sent straight to your door, by subscribing.
Every year in Phuket, Thailand, hundreds of people between the ages of 12 and 80 starve themselves of meat, booze, sex, and stimulants and spend weeks meditating for the honor of having holes gouged in their faces with metal skewers, which they then stuff with items that sum up their contributions to the world. For fruit sellers, it might be pineapples. For military engineers, a gun and a wrench. For musicians, a baby pink Fender Strat.
This is the Nine Emperor Gods festival, a celebration held every fall by the Taoist Peranakan community with participation limited to its most devout. Polish photographer Kuaci Kontrasocial attended last year. We called him up for a chat after he sent us these eye-catching images.
VICE: Tell us about the festival.
Kuaci Kontrasocial: After almost 20 years working with tattoos and body modifications, I thought I was prepared, but I completely underestimated it. Honestly, it was mind-blowing.
Basically, it’s nine days long. The piercing ceremony takes place in different monasteries or shrines at around 6AM every day. Hundreds of observers gather around the people getting pierced. And they don’t use needles, they use this triangle-shaped metal thing to stretch out their body parts. After the ceremony, they all walk in a procession to the main shrine in the city center, in 30-degree heat and the full glare of the sun. Sometimes, it’s six hours away. The lack of emotion in the eyes of the participants is what hits hardest.
Why do they have no emotion?
Participants follow strict rules of meditation, vegetarian eating, and prayer to prepare. When the piercing happens, there’s a faraway look in their eyes. Usually, when you see something harmful, you can see in people’s eyes that they feel the pain, and this makes it more normal. But these people look through you during the piercing.
Like they’re in a trance state?
Exactly.
“I thought I was prepared, but I completely underestimated it”
Do they take any drugs or whatever? Anesthetic?
No, nothing like that is allowed. People are selected each year. It’s a pretty big deal for the chosen ones.
Why are some of them stuffing guns through their cheeks?
The piercing is related to the lives and professions of the people getting pierced.
So when you see somebody with a gun, it’s because they were in the military? And if you see somebody with spanners, they were working in construction?
Absolutely. Sometimes if you don’t tell people that, they don’t get it.
What effect has social media had on the festival? Are there lots of annoying people filming for TikTok and Instagram?
I was part of it, as a tourist. It was strange to see photographers with their cameras literally 10 centimeters from people’s faces, and there was no reaction, no anger. The world of TikTok and the sacred ceremony coexist. Even during the ceremonies they will stop so you can take photos, if you ask.
How old is the festival?
It started 200 years ago when Chinese theater troops arrived in Phuket. They became very ill and tried to find a solution because they were almost dying. And they realized that by adopting a vegetarian diet and sacrificing themselves to local shrines, they felt better.
We have folklore traditions in England that have only been going for, say, 150 years, but they feel much older. Did you have that feeling with this—that it feels ancient even though it’s not?
Yes. You could tell me it started 2,000 years ago and I’d believe you. Maybe the clothing is different.
Yeah. I guess maybe the pistols, too.
Follow Ben on Instagram @benditto
This interview is from THE SELF-DESTRUCTION ISSUE of VICE magazine. Find it in a store near you, or get 4 issues each year sent straight to your door, by subscribing.
The post In Your Face: The ‘Chosen Ones’ of Phuket Are Hard to Ignore appeared first on VICE.
