In my previous post I mentioned that I’d
continue with DotW and today’s doll belongs to this amazing series. She’s Thai
Barbie 1997. She joined my collection just a day before I published my
anniversary post so she’s in the pictures and she’s waited quite a while for her
presentation. At last here she is. Now purchasing her wasn’t easy contrary to
her wide availability and low price. To keep a long story short it took three
auctions before she was mine and the first one was very unfortunate. She was
listed at a low price and I was the only bidder, but before I could pay for
her, her owner sent me an email apologizing that he forgot he’d sold her
already and he'd only listed her accidentally and such. I hate such practices!
When you put out a hardly popular doll you may expect that the starting price
may be the final one. Another seller turned out to be more honest so without a
further ado, Thai Barbie.
Before I publish any post I try to make a
thorough research, however I haven’t found any information whether there’s any
other edition of Thai Barbie. It appears she’s the only one. It seems Mattel
paid Thailand and Poland equally little attention – unless I’ve missed
something. I discovered Thai Barbie quite by accident when I was flipping
photos of the ever elusive Korean Barbie doll. I thought her outfit overall
great, but the doll’s face was just captivating. The Oriental facemold is
always beautiful, but the facepaint that Mattel applied to it – so simple and
modest enchanced the natural beauty of the headmold’s features. The doll’s eyes
are narrow, just like they should be and the lovely hazel gaze needs nothing
more than the faint smokey eyeshadow. Yet Barbie’s facepaint is by no means deficient in color or too placid, her lips are vivid red. Her hair is quite unique – cut short and
just held in a ponytail and well … stiff like hell for the product that the
company applied.
I’ve made some effort to study the outfit, but
the topic exhausted me completely. Dance is crucial in Thai culture and it
requires a special outfit to perform it. To further complicate the matter, each
piece has its own name and meaning in the ritual. So I won’t bother copying all
the Wikipedia content on this subject and I’ll be using simple vocabulary as
befits an ignorant person. So Barbie’s wearing a skirt, long, fitting and
elaborately patterned. The green cape that covers her shoulders is tucked in
the skirt in the front and it hangs low at the back. It holds its shape
beautifully. But apart from being so rich and regal, Barbie’s outfit holds some
surprise. Underneath the cape, there’s a simple, orange top made of lurex, so
when you strip her of her headpiece and cape, she can be stylish and elegant in
a more contemporary and day to day way.
The most distinct part of Barbie’s entire
outfit will be her headpiece in a form of a „golden” temple that has been
secured to her head with three tabs shot right through her skull. How cruel
that is! I cut them off to remove the headpiece but they’re still there and in
order to get rid of them I’d have to take her head off which I’m reluctant to
do. Anyway, her jewellery is boring to death! Mattel gave her some generic
earrings and a matching ring plus some Lame bracelets made of some scraps of
the material to minimize waste. Thai Barbie has no shoes and Mattel informs us
on the box that traditional Thai dancers perform barefoot. Be that as it may it
wouldn’t hurt to give her some shoes. Since I like to keep my dolls in their
original condition and customizing fascinates me not, she remains the only doll
in my collection without shoes. But she’s got her stand which she gave to another
doll, and I also took off her headpiece because it makes her one extra inch
taller and she doesn’t fit in the space on the DOTW shelf. That’s ok, because
she’s still very pretty.
So far I’ve managed to collect 4 Oriental dolls,
and here they are: Japanese Barbie, Malaysian Barbie, Thai Barbie and Nia.
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