▣ There are several versions of the white snake folktale that exist in Chinese mythology and other Asian mythologies. However, all focus on the "forbiddenness" of the snake demon and human man relationship.

▣ The Legend of the White Snake is one of four of China's greatest folktales.

▣ The Legend of the White Snake has been adapted many times into television dramas and movies. Some of the most notable include the 2011 film The Sorcerer and the White Snake starring Huang Shengyi, Raymond Lam, and Jet Li and the 2019 television drama The Legend of the White Snake starring Ju Jingyi and Yu Menglong.

The story of Chalawan begins with a magical kingdom located in an underwater cave where crocodiles live. Inside the cave, a magic crystal ball floats above, shining like sunlight during the daytime. The crocodile who ruled this world was Lord Chalawan. Every crocodile who entered the cave would turn into humans and never needed food. Unlike his grandfather, Lord Chalawan wanted to feast on human flesh.

There were rumors of crocodiles killing humans in the surface world. And one day, two daughters of a wealthy man decide to play in the canal, against their father's warnings of the crocodiles. Chalawan left his cave and fell in love with one of the daughters, Tapao Thong.

He took the daughter into the cave and when she woke up, he tried to make her fall in love with him in his human form. When he did not succeed, he cast a spell on her to make her fall in love with him and agree to be his wife.

When it was discovered, the other daughter was injured by another crocodile, he offered a reward to anyone who could defeat the crocodile king and return his other daughter. No one was able to defeat him, until Krai Thong appeared. He was trained to defeat crocodiles, so he volunteered to rescue Tapao Thong. Given a magical spear by his teacher, he set out to Chalawan's home.

Before Krai Thong arrived, Chalawan had prophetic visions of his death. His grandfather warned him to stay in the cave for seven days to escape his fate. However, Krai Thong cast spells to lure the crocodile lord out of his cave. Chalawan is stabbed in the back by Krai Thong's magical spear and retreats to his cave.

When Chalawan's other wives begged for help from his grandfather, there was nothing he could do. Krai Thong invaded his cave, seducing one of Chalawan's wives so that she could take him to Chalawan. Once inside, the battle between Krai Thong and Chalawan began, but Chalawan was killed.

Krai Thong retrieves Tapao Thong and returns her to her father and he was rewarded with many treasures and married to both daughters from that family.

▣ Tell us what you thought about this folktale in the comments! What is your favorite part? What do you wish was different?

▣ If you could rewrite this story, what would you change?

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