Introduction:

I have visited Medan city, Indonesia on July 19 – 24, 2012. The purpose of the visitation was to collect data for my research projects and I also would like to learn about fish fighting practices in Indonesia and its differences comparing to other countries that I have been visited. I have heard many stories about Indonesia fighting fish from Thai fighting fish sellers. He called them “Plakat Indo”. They claimed that Plakat Indo have very tough scales, very sharp teeth and look similar to Malaysia fighters so and so, etc. I have never seen an Indonesia fighting fish and what it looks like. All I heard were just commercial verbal claims. Another source about Indonesia fighters came from an Indonesian friend through ICQ chat 10 years ago. He mentioned about “Bagan” fighters. (Sadly enough at that time my awareness the fighting fish outside Thailand was very dim and vague. I thought it was simply a name of a fighter batch in Indonesia that the players talked a lot about and made it to be the legend hero fighter). He told me his father said that Bagan fighters were very tough fighters. None of the fighters in Indonesia can match with these Bagan fighters. Now a day he can find no more Bagan fighters. This information has sparked the interest in me about Indonesia fighters rather than the words from Thai sellers. He told me a lot of good stuffs about Bagan fighters. This is very natural and normal when a person feels proud of his country and its fighters. Recently, I heard Bagan fighters again from an internet seller’s homepage under the name “Super Bagan” fighters. This solid information had encouraging me to set up my trip date to Indonesia.

This article does not want to justify the above claims whether they are right or wrong but rather to say that I simply wanted to witness myself the real practices of the Indonesian fighting fish players. I also wish to have a lucky chance to exchange knowledge and participate in a group discussion with breeders here about the fighting fish and that they were already waiting for me.

Medan in North Sumatra, players here can represent the fighting fish activity in Indonesia. There are many fighting rings and breeders in Medan that supply fighters to many players in various provinces in Indonesia. Luckily, Mr. Remon a fighting fish breeder in Medan and a member of bettafightingfish.com board has accomplished my plan by offering me a buddy along this trip. Without him, this report could not exist.

Indonesian players called short fin fighters “Katong”, which preserved the original word equivalent to “fighting fish” or “Plakat” in Thai, "Ca Choi" in Vietnamese, "Ta Yuw” in Cantonese, all referring to the same meaning “fighting fish”, which means the using of fighting fish as a hobby game are common acknowledgeable terms widespread in SEA region. “Siamese fighting fish” is a term western people used referring to “the fighting fish of Siamese”. This term implies some distance relationship between the speaker and the object that he referring to, "this fish come from Siam. Using this similar term to refer to something is important because it implies the gap of cognitive sphere of the speaker to an object. Since fighting fish does not exist in their daily life but come from somewhere else.

Using language implementation I can say that, there are two concepts concerning about the fighting fish in SEA. One is that these are domestic fighters that local people learned in their daily life and named their fighters using their local language. Another concept is that these are imported fighters and they named them by referring back to its original source such as “Ikan Siam” in Indonesia for long fin and “Ca Siam” in Vietnam for short fin fighters that imported from Siam just like westerners called them "Siamese fighting fish”. The Idea of imported fighters from Thailand to improve the local fighter quality was easily accepted by the local players even though they already have native fighting fish, and since they have their own ground on the using animal fighting habit. (In Hong Kong, China, Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore already acquainted with using crickets and birds to fight as their hobby game out of basic fighting fish using in common).

The story of Indo fighter started from an invention of using wild Imbellis to fight by the farmers in a group of friends and slowly moving to the Katong (Plakat Thai) as they realized that this imported captive fighters were much tougher than the fighters available in the wild or Imbellis fighters. This practical knowledge base would be enough for the Indonesian players and the breeders to develop their own fighters imported from stronger fighter sources.

By physical and cultural geographical connection, at my first thought, the fighting fish in Indonesia could be introduced by Malaysia players or by some players that have moved to Indonesia from Malaysia. This introduction of fighters to Indonesia could be happened about 100 years ago. This period of sea trade commercial boosted by western colonization in the very popular high traffic. The ships from this period not only carried valuable goods and spices but also local people on board who play fighting fish game on the commercial ships. They were the workers on the ships or the re-settlement people who seeking the new hope.

However, my above assumption was wrong after a few interviews with some old time players. They said in common that Indonesia fighting fish was introduced straight from Thailand and its starting period was about the same period as Malaysian players started the fighting fish game and that period was around the end of 19th century. The first town in Indonesia started the fighting fish was Bagan siapiapi, a Chinese fishery village that moved from the south region of Songkhla province of Thailand to re-settlement in Bagan siapiapi in 1878. Songkhla province is one of the most active fighting activity in south of Thailand and also play a role as a gate way exchange of fighting fish stock between Thailand and Malaysia for a long time. Later, the Chinese in Bagan siapiapi moved to Teluk Gong, a town in Jakarta, one of the most active players in Indonesia. Then Siamese fighting fish in Indonesia began.

The Beginning:

The story of fighting fish in Indonesia is the same as the story of fighting fish in Thailand. From an interview with the old time Imbellis players in a fishery and farming village in the suburb of Medan, the villagers still play the wild Imbellis over 100 years or unknown starting date since an ancestor, the grandfather passed to the old man today. The stories begin from a farmer saw wild Betta Imbellis fighting in the buffalo foot prints in the rice field that he was working. Curiously he caught some of them back home, jarred them in the glass jars and watching their aggressiveness nature of flaring and actively display with one another in the neighbor glass jars. So they let them fight as they saw them fought in the rice field. The process of challenging to fight the fish among the friends could started at this point when they want to know whether his fighter fight better than his friend's fighter. The challenging and gambling habit are common in most of SEA men.

Ikan Laga, the wild Imbellis fighting fish:

Medan players called wild Imbellis fighting fish “Ikan Laga” means fighting fish. Using a Bahasa Indonesia language without borrow the word “Siamese” as the western term “Siamese fighting fish”. We may say that Indonesian players learned to use the wild Betta Imbellis to fight by themselves and not get introduced from the Thai players. Playing fighting fish already acknowledged and is a wide spread game by the farmers in Malaya peninsula from ancestor time without knowing its starting date. So a germ of playing complicated fighting fish already waiting there which easily accepted when the captive Siamese fighting fish was introduced to their circle.

The Imbellis fighting ring is inside a farmer fishery village located at 25 kms, north east of Medan city. The fighting ring starts at the late morning every day or when the players finished their daily work. People are gathering slowly at the public area in the village, old man, young man and child. The fighting ring becomes a playground platform for all ages of villagers to come and join the activities and fun. Like other countries the fighting fish players limited themselves to men that likely to play challenging gambling and exciting game. The players carry Imbellis fighters in a half liter round shape form bottle and placed it in the small shelter or in the shade under the tree. They are talking and discussing about fighters, and doing rough matches and challenging for bet when a match is set up. The matching method is using both sight views from top and by sides of the bottles. The matching by digital weighting method that seems widely accepted by the players of captive Siamese fighting fish may not applicable to the wild Imbellis because a tiny fish may accidentally jump out from the net or its ratio weight of the fish with a mini-gram may affected highly difference size of the fish. Once agreements on matching of both players were setup, one fighter pouring to another bottle; a top of the fighting bottle was closed by a hard sheet plastic and it will be opened when the fighting ended or the owner surrender to an opponent. A fighting bottle then slowly be moved and placed on a stand under the shade of a tree and then the fighting game begins. The players and supporters sit around the bottle but keeping distance one or two meters away from the fighting bottle. This is to prevent the fighters frighten by the players noise or the reflection of the light from the cigarettes. The fighting period generally takes 30 minutes but some players said it can take over 60 minutes.

From my intensive interviews, I found that Imbellis fighters that players use are the hybrid fighters that the breeders supplied the captive splendens in the same pond of wild Imbellis and let them crossbred among themselves naturally in the pond. Then the breeders choose the one that look closely similar to the wild caught Betta Imbellis to fight in the ring. This breeding concept technique is to develop the tough fighters but preserved the wild type fighter appearance. This practice is the same as I already discussed in my article on Betta Smaragdina hybrid in North East of Thailand. I believe that both two groups of breeders know to cross breed the wild type fighters with the Siamese fighting fish by imperative thought without exchange their knowledge to one another. Because breeding the fighters to be par excellent is a sole goal for all the breeders. To step up quality of wild caught fighters, the breeders welcome the new tougher strain to fulfill his goal.

The village has provided Sunday for Siamese fighting fish along with the Ikan Laga.

Ikan Katong, Bagan fighter:

Indonesia players called Siamese fighting fish, “Ikan Katong” means “fighting fish” and call Siamese fighting fish long fin type “Ikan Siam” or fish from Siam. The story of Siamese fighting fish in Indonesia open its page in the end of 19 century, or 120 years ago, when the first group of Chinese people in Songkhla of Thailand sailed to the shore of Bagan siapiapi, then the story of the legend of Bagan fighter begins. I do not think Siamese fighting fish came with the first survival group of 17 people landed safe on the ground but two wooden boats (barges)  unfortunately could not reached the shore. They were a pioneer group to welcome the new arrival of their relatives and friends that came after with the Siamese fighting fish. I think the first group of Chinese breeders in Bagan siapiapi breeds the fighting fish just to play among their group. Then slowly spread to other provinces that already play the wild Betta Imbellis. And some of them come along with the re-settlement to other major cities such as Jakarta, Bandung and Surabaya.

Shira a Indonesian player gave his short comment but clear picture on an existing of Bagan fighter that coherence with the historical event I have showed above.

Now what is Super Bagan come from, the legend story of superior fighter that loses it lines ? From an interview Uncle Tambi, the 59 years old player, he acknowledges an existence of Bagan fighters but the name of Super Bagan was a re-creation name by the modern breeders, who believed that his fighter lines derived from the legend Bagan fighters. Whatsoever the Bagan fighters were the first generation of Indonesian fighters that spread over many cities of the country and its related closely to Thai fighters than the Malaysian fighters that I first thought.

Medan fighting fish:

Medan city is the capital city of North Sumatra and the fourth biggest city in Indonesia. Medan considered being the most suitable place for breeding and playing the fighting fish by its own geographical location and the typically moderate city complex. The city is semi industrial and agriculture that has a lot of free land available for harvesting the live food such as mosquito larvae, water flea. These two kinds of food are essential feed for the every age of the fighter. Medan players preserved themselves a fishery and agricultural village that have a long story on playing wild Betta Imbellis fighter. Just a few minutes drive out of the main city, the small rice farm can be seen everywhere even on the side path to the fighting ring.  Medan city is an open traffic port that international travelers can easily exchange the fighter stocks from Ipoh city, the centre of fighting fish in Malaysia by simply crossing the cape by ship and Thai fighter stocks from Bagan siapiapi or import direct from Thailand.

As have been said above, playing the Ikan Laga already known in Medan a long time ago by the farmers learned to see Ikan Laga fighting in the corner of the rice field and they caught and brought them back home. But Ikan Katong or Siamese fighting fish has been accepting quite recent. The first experienced on Siamese fighting fish was not the short fin but the long fin. In the year 1968, the pet shop in the city import long fin directly from Thailand and named it “Ikan Siem” or fish from Siam. The long fin fighters show its aggressiveness even more powerful than the Ikan Laga and one can bet that he used them to fight to see how good they were. When the long fin fighters got the warm welcome from the customers, the short fin fighters introduced from Bagan come in the pet shop the next year (1970). Then an impressive of Bagan fighters sparked when they used to match with the long fin that may look even more powerful fiercer and much bigger but the long fin still lose badly. The legend of Bagan fighters was born from first impression of witness of a player telling to another player and then another. The story has gathering and grown up by its own way and imprinted as a heroic symbol that never erased.

The development process of Medan fighters is the same steps of development of fighting fish in general. It begins from an awareness of the weak point of his fighter when the challenger from the outside easily beat his fighter. The fighter, he first thought his was the top, the best and unbeatable one. Theoretically, another end of lost is a path way we want to achieve. The simple scenario is: The Medan’s fighter lost to Bagan’s fighter. This was challenge the Medan breeder to step up their breeding program. The most importance factor in developing the quality of the fighter is a spirit of open mind of the breeders. The Medan breeders claimed that in 1978 Medan fighters started to pay back Bagan fighters and show up one of the top breeding place in Indonesia.

Fighting fish ring in Medan:

Fighting fish ring in Medan is similar to other countries that I have been visited (Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong). There is no official judge and there is no strict regulation for the players to hold as Thai ring does. Though there is no official judge to conducting the game, conventional fighting fish procedures still there and depend solely on agreements of the players in that particular match. Matching method is one of the most importance practices to cope the game to be fair at the starting point. If fighter’s size is one of the importance factors of winning or losing the game, then the fair matching method is a first step to start a fair game. It is ironically and funny to say that if fighting fish game is a bamboo stick, let the left hand side is the beginning of the game then the right hand side of a stick is an end of the game. The Medan players and also other countries place heavy at the left hand side or the beginning of the game. They are all using a digital weighting the fighter before enter to the inner fighting ring. While Thai fighting ring is still using conservative flat liquor bottle with transparent sight sides matching (this seems to be easy on an agreement of the players, though it hides a lot of trickery to play with), then put heavily on the strict regulation to follow. Both practices have pro and con.

There are around 10 fighting rings in Medan some located in the city and some located outskirt of the city. There are 20 – 50 players in each ring, and like other countries each fighting rings share the days to open 2 - 3 days a week. So the players can move around to play the fighter as they wish. But they will be known among the players that which ring is the toughest ring. The meeting place of the hardcore players always implies the high bet.

The players who carry the fighters to challenge other players need to weight his fighters before place his fighter on the matching desk. The top view matching to reassure the size will be operating here also. The weighting procedure is simple, a man who responsible weighting the fighter net the fighter from player’s bottle and gently place a net with fighter inside on a soft cloth. A soft cloth would absorb a few drops of water on the net off and leave the only necessary wet fighter on the net. Then he gently quickly drops a fighter into a prepared cup that already reset adjusted the zero weight. A fighter has returned to the player’s bottle again when a weight is gained and a man jotting the fighter weight on sticker tape cover on the top of his bottle for easy noticed. So far so good as a weighting boxer before fight. All weighted fighters placed on the matching desk to find agreeable match.

The owners of the fighters shall be checking the written weight on the tape, if they agree on weight then each owner recheck the fish size again from above by sight to make sure and agree to fight. Then the owners of the fighters placed their fighters beside the fighting bottle for booking its place and net his fighter into the prepared four liters round fighting jar and the fighting fish game has started.

Like other countries, the fighting jars array on the stand 1.5 meter height attached with the long plate wooden seat for the players sitting and watching his fighters on both sides. There are two rows of stand for placing the fighting fish bowls. Since there is no strict rule of the game after drop the fighter into the jar. The owner and the supporters of the fighter may challenge the higher bet if he think that his fighter has very high potential to winning the game, if not otherwise then they just let the fighter fight until one of them runaway. If both are stop to fight and if none approaching to closer with aggression to another then, it is highly expected to draw when an end of the ring at 5 PM.

Breeding the fighter in Medan:

I think Medan is a beginning of breeding fighters for commercial purposes. What I have been informed was, there are only 2 breeders that own more than 50 ponds and supporting to many players in other cities in Indonesia.

The pond format is dig into the earth closed to traditional pond in Padrew of Thailand and the Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam that I have been visited. The size of the pond is around 2 by 2 meters and 1 meter dept into the earth, covered the pond with native water hyacinths or domestic tropical grass. The raising pond is open air surrounded by banana tree enjoy the full sun light with the shaded of banana leaf and various types of plant. There are many benefits on raising the fighter in the dig pond. But the most importance one is, it keeps the fighter fresh and less depression from the water temperature changing from the problem of global warm. An immediate changed temperature is main cause of the sickness of the fighter.

The parents stock what I heard on that day was imported from Malaysia and Thailand but I can guess that fighters from Vietnam also welcomed into the breeding program as well. This I can observed the fighters structure in the fighting fish ring. This is very common in the fighting fish breeding program that the breeders seeking the new and the best line to developing what he has available in hand. So the common pairing the parents is using male from outside with Medan female that available in the farm.

The fighters were net to test and fight when 6 months age onward. One thing very surprising me, the first time I saw a breeder cut anal fin and pelvic fin to balance its shape. I am sure this came from a believed that a balance structure form of the fighter help the fighter swim fast, though I do not think that this would help. As I also know that each player has his own private technique to support his fighter to be a winner, though he knows that fighting result may not always bear as he expected. The point is a breeder try to find one way or another way to supporting the winning chance for his fighter. This is a meaningful lesson that I can learn from the fighting fish practice. That one may apply to every part of their life.

Fighting fish in Jakarta: (5/11/ 2014)

6 – 13 June, 2014 I went to Jakarta the Capital city of Indonesia for gathering more data. I have been Medan city in the third week of July 2012. Jakarta is the large city that players consumes a lot of fighters from Medan and import many fighters from other countries. I wanted to hear the players outside Medan, talk about the fighting fish in Indonesia. It may have more stories than I have heard from Medan.

What I got from Medan was, Indonesia farmer used wild Betta (Betta Imbellis) in the rice field to challenge among friend long time ago but they did not know the started date. The hobby was sent from one generation to next generation in diary live without aware to record them. This was very common to all farmer societies and it becomes the hardest part of my study.

From an interview the ringmaster age around 60 years old. His name is Acai Sinshe an owner of fighting fish ring in outskirt of Jakarta city. He moves from Palembang (south of Sumatra and north of Jakarta) to Jakarta when he was 25 years old.  Another interview source was 70 years old (1944), “Acuan” Betta seller in Jakarta who moved from Medan to Jakarta 37 years ago (1977), both confirmed that they knew the fighting wild Betta from the elder whose played the wild fighter when they were young.

They said that, the second phase of using captive fighting fish in Indonesia was in 1960. This also was confirmed by Medan old time players. The players did import fighters from Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore. They were also asserted that Bagan’s breeder was the first place succeeds and introduced the fully captive fighting fish to other cities of Indonesia first Medan and then Jakarta.  The captive fighter from Bagan won all wild fighters in Medan. Then the new phase of history of Indonesia fighting fish had begun. 

The 1980 seems was the booming age and tremendous change on the captive fighting fish, most of the excited events of fighting fish in Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore happened in this year. They were endeavoring imported and exchanged theirs stock. The sole purpose was to develop the captive fighter stronger and tougher scale than other breeder. By the help of mineral water in the old tin mine, Ipoh breeders were succeeded in developing the tough scale fighter. The fighters from Ipoh were spread to Singapore then Indonesia or Ipoh breeder’s pond direct to Medan breeder’s pond. Since Medan seems closer to Malaysia and easily access the fighter from Ipoh by ship, simply crossing the Strait of Malacca.

It was hard to determine the factors of contributing the popularity of the captive fighting fish in that period of time. There was no personal computer and internet for public used in that year. But one may guess that the last quarter of 20 century was the period of western colonization had faded. Economic crisis around 1980 in South East Asia awaked people to realize to depending on their owned feet and not waiting supported from United State. The crisis in turn, was rolling up the country to the new era on her own history maker. Enhancing and supporting by the new concept of modern education and international industrial trader. The people were open theirs’ mind and welcome the new trend of thinking on modern style of living. Anything that offers the improvement was accepted. New living fashion jostle the old living styles and push them aside. The fighting fish society was also in the current of changing. The humble wild Betta was replaced by the sophisticated bred captive fighter. The most impact on modern thought was that “everything money may valued”. The good fighting fish can be sold the very good price. 

The breeding practice in Jakarta:

The Indonesian players use small fighter, this may came from the compromising the old style player on used wild Imbellis fighter. (Imbellis fighting rings are still available in various villages). The period of fighting is 4 hours, which considered quite long fight period for small and medium small size fighter (1.5 – 2.10 grams). During the fighting time, there is no supportive rule used by the owner of the fighter boosted his fighter wins before time as in Thailand players do. If one of a fighter does not run in 4 hours, then both fighters shall send to police fish to hit 10 times. Any fighter can bear more strikes of the police fish and open his gills against the police fish, it shall be the winner.

To serve the tough quality of small fighter, the breeder has to raise the fighter in small tank. This breeding strategy is doing the same in Siem Reap (Cambodia) and in Davao (Philippines). The cement tank size is around 1*1*1 meter. The breeders build up the small tank to control the size of fighter not growing too fast. The water flea and mosquito larvae can easily harvested in the city’s cannel and wasted water area. To standing in this long game period, the fighter has to comes from the proven tough heart blood lines and be trained in the tough situation. So the jantur training method is applied.

Fighting fish ring:

Jakarta players also use digital weight sizing the fighters.  The players have to weight his fighter before enter the ring room. A digital weight is controlled by the member of referee. But absorb water from the fighter’s body by the cloth is doing by the owner of the fighter. So the owner of the fighter wants his fighter’s weight as light as possible. He may dry a fighter as much as possible.  But he has to realize that more he removes the water resided in the fish, the slime of his fish which is the first guard of the fighter also removed. And once the fish’s slime is removed it tends to be the weak fighter. So an owner handles his fighter very gentle and softly to preserved all advantage to his fighter.

A fighter’s weight and an owner name were written down on a sticker patch covered on the top of the bottle. All weighted fighters were placed on one table waiting for proper match. The weighting method avoids a problem on the mismatched size which is the main problem on the fighting fish game. The good point is, it makes the fish fighting tended towards the sport game and not playing gambling trick alone. (Thais players just apply the weighting method to theirs ring in the beginning of this year (2014) it was well accepted and spread to other major rings).

The challengers just check the weight written on the sticker and asking for the match. If both owners of the fighters are agreed to fight then they will drop theirs’ fighter to the bottle that the ring master already provided water for them.

Fighting fish club:
There are two types of fish fighting in Jakarta, fish fighting as a gambling. This is a traditional practice which players may gather in one place to fight theirs’ fish as a gambler oriented for money and fun. Another type of fish fighting is something like football tournament, the owner of the fighter seeking winning the game by fighting score. This type of fish fighting similar to fighting fish clubs in Philippines. The fighting competition held every month and announced in advance on the competition date. The trophy, frame and money will be given to the champion and second etc. The fighting ring was busy but relaxing atmosphere. The simple buffet was contributed by the member who entered the ring. The breeder would show up the certificate of champion to guarantee his bred product.  This would turn to money on selling the fighting fish, later. This is interested that the Jakarta and Philippines players have upgrade the stage of  fish fighting from gambling alone to the competition on breeding, one more addition stage of fighting fish development process.

I would like to express my thankful to Mr. Emilio Gacad from Philippines and Mr. Riska Dewantoro from Indonesia who sponsors me air tickets and full range of my living cost during my stayed in Indonesia. Especially for Mr. Riska Dewantoro who invited me to stay in his lovely Bali style house. He took me around Jakarta city, visited the fighting ring and many breeders’ places, helps me interviewed and was translator the ring masters and breeders. He also generous to manage the tickets for me to visited Borobudur the world heritage and the holy Buddhist pilgrimage, this experiences I will never forget the charm of Indonesian people. 

This addition article will never exist without theirs supported.

Conclusion:

For me the short visit to Indonesian fighting fish club gave me very importance pieces of jigsaw that filling the gap between playing wild caught fighting fish and captive fighting fish. By now we can draw general conclusion that there are two stages on the story of fighting fish, the first stage is the playing wild caught fighting fish and the second stage is, playing captive fighting fish which introduced by Thai breeders, known as Siamese fighting fish. This means that the term Siamese fighting fish referring to the complex captive bred fighting fish, the western gave its name they saw Thai people playing on the street side. Where the practice of playing wild caught fighting fish already acknowledge widespread in Malaya Peninsula beyond the predictable date. Or we can say that fighting fish game has been playing in the SEA countries even before an existence of the term "Siamese fighting fish". Siamese or Thai people in the past could be the most serious players and gain developing the fighting fish strain from the wild to be the complex captive fighter. There were a lot of factors on supporting this success, an availability of various bubble nest Betta species in the rice field should be one of the major supported factor.

Playing wild caught fighter of the people in SEA in tradition was the basic ground for them to adapt more complicated practice of playing fighting fish in complex situation, such as playing fighting fish in cold weather in Metropolitan city such as Hong Kong, Hanoi and other big cities across the continent in Europe and America. They try to find the most fair matching method to prolonging this trickery game.

If we are looking at SEA’s physical geographic map without the boundary of the countries, we may notice that 80 percent of the main area are platform and low land, presenting by green color which good for agriculture and planting rice. In an ancient time before an existing of the states and the borders line of the countries, people can easily move and resettlement as they wish. So people in this region some more or less are very close relative. An existing of bronze drum thorough from south China to Indonesia proved very well on the close relationship among the people in this region over 3000 years ago. They shared the same Indo-Chinese cultural language and practices that they adapted from the source of Ancient India and China to suited to theirs environment. Where the Indonesian use Bahasa Indonesia, Malaysia language (Bahasa Malaya) and Thai use "Pasa Thai" (ภาษาไทย) which shorten from the term "Bahasa", all referring the same meaning that is "language", the term came from the same root, Sanskrit language.

So playing the fighting fish is shared traditional game of the people in this region before the western saw and named it as Siamese fighting fish. As we can see Indonesian player call wild Imbellis fighting fish “Ikan Laga” and call “Ikan Siam” for long fin fighter that really came from Siam. We may draw a conclusion that the term “Siamese fighting fish” limited its meaning only captive bred fighter that successfully bred by Siamese breeder and generally play on the street corner before export to other countries that already play the wild caught fighters. Siamese fighting fish was well accepted because of its toughness of body and heart which is an ideal type of breeding fighting fish of all breeders.

The modern sea traders also play an importance role on spreading the good stock of Siamese fighting fish over the large island of Indonesia. The story of playing modern Siamese fighting fish outside Thailand, say, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and Vietnam started at the same period around an end of 19th century. The popular sea trade of western ships those were able to move mass people and goods to the new destination in expected period of time.

(16/10/2012)