In defence of pad kaphrao and those who ban it

Have you ever walked past a roadside food stall with an empty stomach and the cook happens to be frying chicken with kaphrao? There, I rest my case. 

The ban – an eye-catching bulletin at the canteen before the media uproar caused it to be pulled down – stated that the smell of pad kaphrao could “disturb” senior officers. But you have to read between the lines. Pad kaphrao “disturbing” high-ranking officials is the equivalent of models in bikinis “disturbing” male corporate executives.

How many of you had pad kaphrao for lunch after learning about the Army canteen controversy? That’s how much control this influential Thai dish has over our appetites. We don’t even have to smell it to feel like eating it. Imagine hungry men in uniform sitting all day in the seductive path of pad kaphrao’s aroma. It must be like sitting in a torture chamber to say the least.

Armies can only be mobilised when stomachs are full. Remember? General Prayuth Chan-o-cha, the poor guy, has just expanded this old adage a little. Moaning stomachs craving pad kaphrao may not threaten national security, but Army leaders “disturbed” day in and day out by the smell of freshly cooked fried pork with basil served with rice and a fried egg deserve our utmost sympathy.

This is advanced human rights. It’s easy to cry for the food vendors and their customers, but “Bravo!” if you have compassion for Prayuth when he, rather rudely, asked pad kaphrao lovers to “go eat it somewhere else”. The vendors can cook pad kaphrao elsewhere and their customers can eat it anywhere outside the canteen, but the Army chief and his men are stuck where they are.

What if the ban was a conspiracy among top officials who genuinely hate pad kaphrao? Some of you must be asking this. 

Of course, there is the remote possibility that some unfortunate human beings may honestly find the smell of pad kaphrao repulsive, but have you ever been to a hotel that bans durian? Is that a condemnable human rights violation? I don’t think so.

My bet, however, is on the wearing-bikinis-on-the-street theory. Pad kaphrao must be too alluring in the eyes (or noses) of some generals. The word “ban” is always wrongly associated with total negativity, when the truth is that what is being “banned” is not necessarily bad. They surely ban sex in schools. Many workplaces have prohibited Facebook. Above sickbeds, there are often signs saying “No food or drink allowed.”

Pad kaphrao may not be as famous as tom yum gung or as internationally favoured as pad Thai, but never ever underestimate pad kaphrao’s strong presence in Thai cuisine. In fact, the dish is so common that teenagers call it sin kid (absolutely unimaginative or thoughtless). That’s not to suggest the pad kaphrao tastes no good. It’s just like when you are asked who your favourite pop star is, and you can only come up with Justin Bieber. 

Which means that those responsible for the ban should not be deemed dictatorial. Few food stalls or restaurants can survive without this dish on the menu, and Prayuth was being entirely rational when he said that if you crave pad kaphrao so much, you should go somewhere else. He was right in saying that the ban was a non-issue, but what’s really disturbing is the fact that the prohibition has been regarded by some as a political crime.

By the time you read this, the uproar will likely have died down. In this era, even a controversy involving an immortal dish can be just a flash in the pan. Yet the issue should not simply fade away with Prayuth seen as a grave human rights abuser. A crime against humanity is not banning pad kaphrao at a canteen, to save soldiers from temptation, but putting photos of kaphrao kai khai dao (fried basil and chicken with rice and a fried egg) on Facebook after midnight.