While they are both traditional martial arts, Vietnamese kickboxing, known as Vovinam, seems to be introduced to the world in a less appealing way than its Thai counterpart – Muay Thai. The Vietnam Vovinam Federation (VVF) has extended efforts over the last few years to bring the country’s martial art closer to the world by launching drives to have the sport included in many region- and word-level tournaments. The VVF will support India to host the South Asia Vovinam Tournament in November, and is soliciting support for a Vovinam competition to be organized at the upcoming 2015 SEA Games in Singapore. But besides trying to have Vovinam included in such tourneys, Vietnam does not seem to have any other channel to increase its practitioners and fans across the globe compared to what Thai people are doing with their traditional kickboxing sport. Muay Thai live show The State, a theater located at the heart of the Asiatique, a riverfront shopping area only 5km from Bangkok, is filled with an exciting atmosphere at 20:00 every night as the “Muay Thai – The legend lives” show begins. Unlike the violent Muay Thai performances elsewhere across Thailand, the live show at The State wows audience with amazing fights, stuns and stories from the performers, who are either Muay Thai practitioners, stuntmen or actors and actresses. The show “tells the untold stories of the origins and heroes of Muay Thai, spanning 300 years, from the past to present day,” according to the organizers. At 8 pm, when the 600-seat venue is packed with foreign tourists, the host tells the audience in fluent English that the show is about to start. The performers begin to run to the stage to treat audience members to amazing and stunning Muay Thai moves and fights, all arranged into stories like the ‘Tiger King in Disguise‘, the ‘Prisoner with Eight Limbs‘, and ‘The Warrior of Broken Swords‘. Whenever the show transitions to a new story, an introduction in four languages – Thai, English, Japanese and Chinese – emerges on the giant LED screen behind the stage, explaining the stories being told and the martial techniques being performed to the audience. The performances are facilitated by a sound and lighting system with perfect timing. After the show, all of the performers come out to a long table in the entry hall to take photos with fans and give out autographs. The “Muay Thai – The Legend Lives” show debuted on January 15, and there is one daily show all year long, according to the Tourism Authority of Thailand. Tickets range from 1,200 to 1,500 bath ($37 – $47), depending on seats. A similar show for Vovinam? Last year marked a huge leap for Vovinam in its journey to become widespread across the globe. The martial art has for the second time in a row been included at SEA Games, while the 3rd World Vovinam Tournament in France also concluded in flying colors. State-run Vietnamese textile giant Vinatex announced in February that it will fund VND1.2 billion ($56,481) for VFF activities this year, and the federation is hoping it will continue to bear sweet fruit. But when will there be a Vovinam live show like that of Muay Thai? Vovinam has a number of beautiful and stunning techniques that are totally suitable to be featured in a movie-like show. And it is not so tough a task to turn the martial art’s profound history into a screenplay for the show. The Muay Thai live show is directed by Thai famed filmmaker Ekachai Uekrongtham, who is globally known for his Beautiful Boxer film and had one of his works screened at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival. The VFF should consider adopting this approach to bring Vovinam to the world, and it is definitely not an impossible task.
Posted on: Wed, 20 Aug 2014 06:48:52 +0000
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