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| Koh Panyee: A floating village in Thailand inhabited by Muslims from Java |
Koh Panyee: A floating village in Thailand inhabited by Muslims from Java
Around the Andaman Sea, precisely off the coast of Southern Thailand, stands a floating village called kopani with the majority of the population being Muslim. This village is hidden in a bay in southern Thailand which is protected by a very large limestone formation with a height of about 20 meters and accommodates more than 400 families with a total population of 1680 people who are descendants of three Muslim families of sea explorers from Java This floating village was founded in about 200 last year by 3 fishing families of Javanese descent.
At first the three men were looking for a good location to catch fish, they sailed down the Malaysian coastline towards the Andaman Sea until they finally reached Thai waters and found an island located in Panga province. When they found the desired place, they told other fishermen by raising the flag on top of the hilltop, so that others could join them in looking for fish, they found shelter near the rock; The big chalk then raised the flag on it.
Slowly many people started to join the three fishermen and started building the village until then the village now houses 400 families living on the water they have cleverly circumvented Thai law where Thai law states that foreigners are not allowed to own land in Thailand but when later more and more tourists came to Thailand and made the village a favorite tourist attraction in the end residents The immigrants from Java obtained land ownership rights.
Thanks to three fishing families who discovered this place and decided to settle there, a village was formed complete with almost all the facilities owned by other villages The first thing built by the residents of Kopani at that time was a freshwater well as a mosque and today Copani village also has one school where children have classes and become part of their daily lives.
The village also has a hospital, cemetery, market, shop, small museum, restaurant and of course fish farm, even today copani village also has a simple hotel, the central part of kopani village consists of concrete that connects dozens of small souvenir shops and forms a narrow labyrinth that leads to people's houses, a network of Footpaths and small shops, all selling batik t-shirts and items made from shells.
And one of the most interesting parts of this floating village is the existence of 3 floating football fields, the floating soccer field was built after the World Cup in 1986 made of wood, trying collectively to create recreation and game spaces so as to create a football field that defies geographical challenges in the location in the past, most of the residents of this village lived by fishing and being fish, but nowadays tourism has also been unfortunately only the older generation in Copani Village still uses Indonesian while the younger generation has switched to using Thai and now the expansion of the area in this village is no longer possible therefore for future generations they have to find a place to live on the mainland.