manifesto!

We are a group of young people coming from multicultural upbringings, with emphasis on mixed and Southeast asian perspectives. We believe in art as a means of interpersonal connection, and a prompt for multilateral reflection.

We want to bridge the gap between young people of mixed cultural and racial backgrounds, and spotlight the common ground shared between children of 2nd or 3rd cultures.

We are all currently living outside our places of birth, and are always looking to reconcile our heritage with the influences around us through film, poetry, writing, art and photography.

website: fishsaucemagazine.com content by:

Anya Somwaiya (graphic designer + editor)

Alex Taylor-Anton

Bambi Thammongkol

Mina Anttila

Cleo Nicholson

Jake Roiter

Kamori Osthananda

Mariana Serrano

Prudence Rakamnuaykit

Abby Igbosoroeze

I'm hanging out the back of your friend's pickup truck. Ghostly arms limp toward the hot earth, my body the wrong side up, the sky melts into the static roll of asphalt when I go down, down, down.

We work the same nighttime hours. Dust is dancing in the space. Empty, orange highway. The roaring cold counting my raven hair, beehive taller than Bayok.

Cement powder licked hands on the waist of my babydoll dress. If you let go, I die.

One day, I'll just sing. My pictures will be on every construction boy's wall. We'll both go home up-country in the cold season and throw gold around like tamarind seeds. Sometimes, I put them in a big bowl and take handfuls. Shiny shells that feel like they should be worth something. But they're not.

They're worth nothing, because everyone says so.

Everyone says so. I won't let them say anything about me. I'll be more than you'll let me be.

Who says I'm not the queen mother draped in gold? Hanging over your family's dinner table.

I'm a girl with gills in the murkiness of a jungle waterfall. I've been this way for more than a thousand years.

by anya somwaiya

So, don't look at me so sordidly. Don't say we've nothing to eat but fishsauce and kanom jeen. The world is empty. Ours completely. Nighttime eternally. Hold or die.

Change is more than a pain-point. No matter where you are living or where you are in history, when you're young, sometimes you feel like you have the whole world to run after. Below are gems from cinema dedicated to the nostalgic, love-struck, vibrant, turbulent, disillusioned and hopeful transitional phase that is adolescence, through the lens of Thai youth.

เเฟนฉัน (My Girl), 2003

Jeab, receives word that his best friend from childhood, Noi-Naa is to be married. While driving back to his hometown, the memories of his friendship with her come flooding back.

A kind of film you keep coming back to no matter how old you get. Beloved by generations of Thais for its memorable casts and pop culture references to early 80s rural Thailand. 'My girl' is sweetly nostalgic through its portrayal an idyllic age of innocence and bonds of friendship shared between the protagonist and his childhood friends. Not only revolve around the story of childhood, the film highlights common shared human experiences, from reenacting soaps you see on tv to the petty rivalry between girls and boys, somehow this is guaranteed to fill anyone’s heart. A complete classic and a great introduction to the genre.

2. มหาลัยเหมืองเเร่ (The Tin Mine), 2005 Dir.

Jira Maligool

A failed engineering student from Bangkok gets the unexpected education of a lifetime by working for four years in a remote tin mine in the south of Thailand .

Based on the autobiographical stories of Ajin Panjapan's time working in a mining camp in the Kapong District of Phang Nga Province from 1949 to 1953. Despite discussion of heavy topics, the film does so with tenderness via the beautiful cinematography, which captures a certain charm regardless of the seemingly endless downpours and laborious work. A ‘school of life’ approach to appreciating growth and change, the film brings to the table a lot of heart, a lot of humour and realistic portrayal of a young man's journey.