Sepak Takraw tournament in Chiang Mai

So during our nightly poopy-walk, me and the doge decided to go a bit further so she could show off her new haircut to some strangers. As we walked on we noticed a bunch of lights in the distance and it turns out there was a takraw tournament going on.

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For those of you that don't know what sepak takraw is, it is quite similar to badminton or volleyball in that there is a net and a group of people on each side. However, there are no racquets and you are only allowed to touch the ball with your feet, knees, chest or head. The net is also lower than volleyball or badminton to facilitate some wild almost martial arts looking kicks.

This appeared to be some sort of youth league mixed teams. Both sides had to have at least one girl on the team. One of the competitors was warming up and walked over to pet doge and she was very tall. She was nearly as tall as I am which is extremely rare for an Asian woman.

I really admire the athleticism and flexibility of the athletes because many times they are doing near flips in order to try to slam the ball or an attempt to block such a spike.

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The ball is made of a sort of varnished rataan and i can assure you that you do not want this thing hitting you square in the face, or really anywhere on your body.

I was quite pleased to encounter this tournament and unfortunately they wouldn't let me bring the dog into the stands and well if she can't go, i don't go. It's as simple as that. I was able to see quite a lot of it though because I am a friggin giant in this country.

This is not the tournament that I was watching but it is edited well so that you get to see only the action. The rounds rarely go more than once or twice over the net, and it is understandable why that would be the case. Things like this are the reason why I moved to a larger city. It is fantastic that stuff like this happens and for the small city that I lived in the south, they simply don't have the population to host this.