#this is for a very specific subset of u

[andromedism]

me and who

[lautakwah]

i need tumblrinas to explain to me every phrase and term theyve ever heard of dictionary style before they can use it on a post btw bc how is someone essentially saying "if you choose not to work youre morally reprehensible" in any way a leftist, let alone a commie, much less a tankie of all things

[kuiinncedes]

hehe

[hirazuki]

I've always sympathized with Melkor, even as a kid, but re-reading the Ainulindale in its entirety for the first time since coming to a certain understanding of things as a child of narcissistic parents really makes it hit different.

I really just want to offer him some reading material, a highlighter, a pencil, and more sticky tabs than one should rightly possess.

[stormblessed95]

https://www.tumblr.com/stormblessed95/759014665010479104/oh-god-storm-my-tl-is-a-mess-after-the-last?source=share

"Where's the difference between them and Us" where exactly has y'all had stated there's difference between two cause since the time i have joined Tumblr all i see is jkk blogs saying "tkkrs and jkkrs are the same" so ig it's about time ppl show what being "same" as tkkrs mean. It's still nothing cause for every 100 deranged tkkrs you have some 10 deranged jkkrs. And the difference in followers of those 100 tkkrs nd 10 jkkrs is still jarring cause you have Tkkrs with 20k,30k,40k,50k,100k,300k followers while jkkrs won't crack that 5k. And yes more hate comments does make difference cause u can easily ignore hate tweets that has less engagement but not Tkkrs who get 10k and 20k and 30k likes calling jm thirdwheel on his own Fking show. but jkkr bloggers here kept saying they're same as tkkrs. So again it's time ppl show what same means. Y'all go around saying jkkrs r same as tkkrs even when they are not but get upset when showed exactly what being same means? Although jkkrs still don't get that engagement so that shows who's still deranged ones.

You know who has never personally attacked me, taekookers. You know who has started a targeted hate campaign against me and threw derogatory terms at anyone who tried to stand up for me for months, simply for saying I'll block anyone who makes hate comments about any of the members.... Jikookers. Yeah, for months that went on and 99% of all my followers here, silent.

I don't like shippers, and jikookers here have given me a very specific reason to not like them. I don't like shippers. Yet, I can still be sane about it and know that majority of shippers aren't bad and nothing is wrong with shipping in general.

You have issues with the hate towards the members, me too. Take it up elsewhere. Take it up towards a blog that hasn't been given ample reason to dislike certain subsets of shippers specifically. And don't excuse shitty behavior because it doesn't do "the same numbers" as other shitty toxic behaviors. That's how you allow the bad behavior to take root and get worse and worse. Why do you think tkkrs are as toxic as they are now. They were allowed to fester. Maybe don't let the rotten Jkkrs fester until it gets to that point in a few years.

[some-mari-thoughts]

im ootl, whats up with the manga? i havent been reading

Nice! Probably its best u dont

From ok to bad:

Events have been rearranged to unknown extent to adapt to faster pace.

We start with the christmas memory dream instead of headspace, and we are introduced to everyone that way. The dream is very very short.

We then go to start 3 days left skipping the phobia fight for its unneeded at this point, and see kel, basil and aubrey (no mention of their friend groups)

Sunny freaks out and leaves to white space right upon ending Aubrey fight (after seeing a photo of Mari) and thats where we meet mari properly

That said, Mari. In the dream/memory she is introduced via visual horror, stress rising as soon as she comes into frame and when we see her face it is already kinda terrifying! Her name and sight alone continues to scare sunny into panic for the entirety of chapter. Almost as if he is scared of her rather than anything else

We dont feel any easier as we meet Dream Mari either because she sneakily guilt trips us about taking too long and making her wait

Sunny is treated a bit better but he is freaking out almost the entire time we see him and his reactions seem a bit misplaced. I am also pretty sure he doesn't even get to throw up the steak. He does get several gay tension moments which shippers are extatic about but for me doesnt make it literally any at all better or easier. Just raises my brow higher. Seems like its the only place where manga will have any success. The sunburn lovers are also happy bc in the dreamworld omori gets to help aubrey out instead of kel

Other events have been slightly changed. We start with not seeing any of the hooligans which leaves us with aubrey alone. So she alone is doing a lot more bullying than she originally was doing. Then she also focuses on bullying sunny alone and verbally hitting where it'll hurt, also reminding him that mari is dead here instead of church (which causes him to collapse and then slice her with the knife)

What does not help is the artist consistently fails to make a good line of motion or guide the viewers eye where it needs to go, so 90% of people will first miss that 1 - aubrey doesnt hit basil in the head with her bat, but trips him instead; 2 - she then seemingly misses at kel and aims to hit sunny straight across with the bat; 3 - Easily missable detail that sunny stops freaking out as he handles the knife, either bc of smth abt him or bc of omori (unclear, sunny is the one drawn there), 4 - Sunny looks like he is trying to kill Aubrey; 5 - Unclear who is panicking and thinking "no" as Sunny readies the knife

The manga is not at all beginner friendly and in theory can only be enjoyed by a member of the fandom. Well. It fails at that too bc only very specific ppl will be actually happy abt this retelling. (Shippers. And another subset of ppl who are there for different reasons)

The artstyle is making anyone with good internet background tense and for good reason too (shotacon/CP classic artstyle) People have spoken out about more evidence to the manga's artist drawing messed up things (including for OMORI fandom) not too long ago. Omocat's rep is once again in shambles and i cant and wont defend her til we get a goddamn good explanation

[owcaunion]

just wanted to say i love your human perry design so much i feel like it captures the style from the show and it’s just a very fun design and i love his outfit very good i wasn’t a perryshmirtz truther but you’ve converted me LMAO

so much love for my human perry recently 🥺🥺🥺🥺 anyways i wanted to draw regular platy! perry but all my asks are abt my human perry atm so anon, i hope u don't mind if my reply is perry in a suit...but my human!Perry's suit hehe

AND WELCOME TO THE SPECIFIC SUBSET OF THE PNF FANDOM ANON, GLAD TO BE PART OF THE CAUSE

kofi ☕

[punkeropercyjackson]

I hope this okay to ask, I am making one my of characters punk bc it's just so in character from them to be punk that it would feel wrong, I am not punk and I wanted to know if u had some advice for making a punk character (also it's fine if u don't!)

NOT ONLY IS IT VERY MUCH OKAY BUT I GOT SO FUCKING HAPPY YOU ASKED ME SPECIFICALLY!!!!Tell me about them and i'll tell you what to add :]]] So i can get their punk type right-Not just in aesthetic but in the subset of punk culture!!

[intertexts-moving]

while i'm talking abt ff8 i will say one of my absolute favorite parts of its story is the way all the main characters are just... kids trying so fucking hard to be adults and being so bad at it. because of course they've grown up in a world at war & they're all a very specific subset of people being trained to be weapons. quistis being a professional mercenary at fifteen & a teacher at 17& then immediately getting her teacher's license canceled because she wasn't good at it. squalls whole lone wolf cool tough miserable isolated kid schtick. irvine being like ohhh im a sharpshooter... im a womanizer... no!! u are seventeen & trying so hard to be a specific type of guy. rinoa's everything. selphie is maybe the closest to acting her age but even that's forced & a trauma reaction. seifer literally doing the thing because he was an angry directionless kid who wanted to be powerful and respected and an authority. & there are real whole adult characters (laguna & co, cid, ellone, julia, even edea, etc.) who DO act differently from the kids in a way that hammers down the intentionality of that difference. and also zell is there. but even then it's notable that his mom is like. the only sympathetic parent we meet in the whole game!!!!

[lepertamar]

i figured holies were the thing that stands in for it the most (regarding the teen rebel post)

oh in that post i had in mind things that were more transient, smth you could actually Have An Experimental Teenage Phase About, instead of smth that extreme and subject to g-d going 'u are swagless u disgust me, i refuse to fuck you' and crushing ur ability to make this into an activity you can do to yourself unilaterally, due to g-d also being a Person with preferences lol. (though hm. within holy-circles, tongue-price holies (eg the option that can be explicitly nonconsensually done) specifically perhaps? but that's a subset). but yeah certainly it seems it was historically seen as an extreme option of this thing in some periods of time according to epigraphs. ofc this is like. how the distinction between experimental rebellion and major life choice is not actually very solid -- and is in fact used to denigrate and undermine teenagers all the time.

oh and i bet also at some period of time teenagers going I SHOULD HAVE BEEN A DEMON either because they're right and were missed, or because their family changed for the worse as they got older, or smth, and running off to join a demon group, either just for a while or permanently, was a rebel thing? and probably there was a time where it was a thing with fallen, between lu and whenever it became more solidified as normal post-covenant, or stuff like asriel's uh....whatever that was. but again no evidence either of these is that kind of thing in the current time period, and isn't really one in cultural awareness either. same with i think theurgy, or some types of it, which by kids at least was a Kids These Days newfangled disrespectful thing according to at least one dude in 21 AC.

so like there are so many options in history, but which are Not An Edgy Or Rebellious Thing anymore, and maybe this itself suggests that the lack of these is a current time period phenomenon, which perhaps emphasizes my point about sand dune guy, and also my recurring point about how like, the entire Everything about the way tamar did it in stars speaks to some extent to a maybe wholly unintentional but maybe nebulously-subconscious side effect to Make at least eliya, think about the fact there are things in life that can function as actually dangerous and appalling.

and i think this all kinda can support a reason why this point in time is the time when the gods thing burst through into common knowledge.....as yenatru and tesena speculate in Lives, maybe most people in history who were gods never knew in part because they weren't particularly desperately wrong-feeling in such a way as tesena was. i could go further and speculate that possibly, if even someone as extreme in malcontent as tesena had some second-best outlet that was not foiled by the particular circumstances of aer particular life setting, ae too might have never realized, and this is mb why many others over the course of history never realized or at least never demanded it like ae did.

[abyssalzones]

Just curious as to what u think a worst case scenario for the book of bill would be specifically relating to bills backstory? I’ve seen a lot of fan stuff that makes me shiver and I wanted to know if you’ve thought about whether this new stuff could follow in the same direction,, I mean some sides of the fandom have always been more sympathetic towards bill than canon but its gnawing on my brain and I’d say you have a pretty good grasp on the whole new GF content thing! Love your art too!! you can really see how much you care about the show with every piece :]]]

best case scenario:

THERE IS NO BACKSTORY

I LIED

worst case scenario: they elaborate on it (legitimately) at all.

outside of the subset of fandom behavior that bothers me at large (if you'll allow me to take things "Too Seriously" for a second I think abuse apologia is rampant in fan spaces- but that's always been true- and the 'tumblr sexyman' obsession largely speaks to white fascinations with men as the subject, of course. lest we forget the original archetype was "skinny white guy in a suit") I don't actually care about fandom interpretations irt bill just in general. I don't think it's the end of the world when, especially nowadays, it's mainly teenagers goofing around putting their creative interpretations forward. is it for me? nope. but I'm a 21 year old adult and my priorities for who and what to criticize lies a little beyond what kids do online. I block shippers I make fun of ao3-poisoned adults and then I move on

what I'm mainly worried about would be alex trying to hook people with that weird nostalgia shock-factor-- like maybe I'm going nuts but has anyone else noticed this? like the whole valentines day cards thing and the new bipper statue merch deal...? it's just very off from what the attitude was back when the show was coming out, and I feel like there's no way that it isn't influenced by that general subset of fandom hype. I don't think alex is "pandering" or whatever but I do think he knows what a large subset of his audience was here for and unfortunately the largest common denominator = who is going to still buy gravity falls merch in 2024. that's the main and only reason I could see them actually elaborating on bill's "backstory" and if you asked me to tell you what I could see happening... I have no idea. I've always assumed it was meant to be vague because it added to the mystery, and it was vague in the writers' minds at the time, and I'm still pretty sure we're either going to get several non-answers or the whole book is going to be a massive tease. maybe it's that weird coin flip theory thing. who knows. I think bill is perfectly fine as an antagonistic hammer and kids' choice awards killer BOB but I'm not the one who has an IP in need of selling.

true answer:

it's the whole book

[tequeguava]

hello! i've just discovered this blog and am very excited about all the words here, as someone who is interested in learning hawaiian (the music is so beautiful...) do u know some other good resources to look at for pronounciation, verb conjugation and hawaiian history? where do u source all of these words? do u have some info you'd like to share about hawaii regarding stereotypes and misconceptions?

I'm glad that my WOTD series has been helpful for you! I've been meaning to be more active on here and starting it back up again for a while now 😅

My source for vocab words is this English-Hawaiian and Hawaiian-English dictionary (https://www.trussel2.com/HAW/eng-a.htm)*. I also have a physical copy of the Pukui & Elbert dictionary (which is one of the main sources for this combined dictionary), although I tend to prefer the online one since it's much quicker to find specific words. The Trussel page for Hawaiian also has topical subsets (https://www.trussel2.com/HAW/topical.htm), which you can use to create themed vocab sets for practice.

For pronunciation, it's hard for me to give tips since I learned it by just getting exposure to the sounds while I was growing up, but the resource I use for grammar does have a brief introduction to pronunciation guidelines (https://hawaiian-grammar.org/current/#h.35nkun2). The best way to improve your pronunciation is probably to just listen to people speaking Hawaiian a lot, though. Continuing to listen to Hawaiian music would probably be helpful for learning pronunciations!

Hawaiian grammar is deceptively simple, but can be pretty difficult to learn from an English-speaking perspective because of how different the rules are. To give just one example, Hawaiian doesn't have adjectives or adverbs in the same way as languages like English or Spanish do. Instead, stative verbs, which refer to a state of affairs, rather than to an action, event, or process, are used. For example, in the sentence "Ua maʻi ʻo ia" meaning "He is sick", where "maʻi" is the stative verb meaning "to be sick" but used to represent the adjective "sick". Verbs also don't actually conjugate at all in Hawaiian. You add verb markers (māka painu) to indicate tense and mood, but the verb itself doesn't change. In the previous sentence, the verb marker "ua" is used to show that becoming sick is a completed action.

There's so many resources out there for learning about Hawaiian history that it's difficult to choose any in particular, but to keep it brief I'll just recommend a couple books. The first one is "Hawaiʻis Story by Hawaiʻis Queen" by Queen Liliʻuokalani. The second is "Aloha Betrayed: Native Hawaiian Resistance to American Colonialism" by Noenoe K. Silva.

I can't think of any specific stereotypes or misconceptions off the top of my head, but I definitely think that certain parts of Hawaiian history aren't very well known outside of the islands. One of these things is the history of how Hawaii became a state in the first place. Unlike most other states prior to becoming part of the US, the Hawaiian Kingdom was a recognized sovereign nation. It was illegally annexed in a coup d'état in 1893 in which Queen Liliʻuokalani was overthrown. After being deposed, Queen Liliʻuokalani was held in her home, ʻIolani Palace, under house arrest. (An actual fun fact to finish this out though is that ʻIolani Palace is the only royal palace on US soil!)

*For anyone interested in other Austronesian languages, trussel2.com also has dictionaries for Kiribati, Marshallese, Mokilese, Palauan, Pohnpeian, and Yapese!

[moondirti]

pleasee how do you get your pinterest to be so beautiful like what do you search for to get the most visually delicious pins for your boards

they're absolutely stunning

thank u so much darl! i spend an egregious amount of time on pinterest, so here are some things i picked up –

aesthetics have subsets. i usually get as niche and specific as possible when creating my boards, otherwise you’ll end up with a less-than-cohesive colour palette/subject matter. for example, if you’re looking into cottagecore, consider the different variations of it. fairy, gothic, witchy, country, etc…

on that note, there are a standard set of tags you can apply to any aesthetic that’s bound to get you the results you’re looking for. adding vintage, funky, soft, cute, or other adjectives in the search bar will help you narrow down.

but to answer your main question, i don’t use specific keywords (mostly because i dont know what im searching for half the time). it usually starts off by finding a picture i really, really like on my home feed which doesn’t fit in with my pre-existing boards. from there, i add it into a secret, nameless board and scroll through the ‘more to explore’ section below that pin. usually the vibes are a close match, and i keep on adding until pinterest’s algorithm has enough to recommend me other pins like it! i’m usually very picky while sifting through them though, which might explain why you feel my results are more curated. they’re not! im just a design student with way too much time on my hands lol

naming comes last. once i have a good idea of what the vibe is, i’ll come up with something so hyper specific you’ll wonder what the hell it even means. it’s my favourite part and usually adds an extra ‘yum’ element, if that makes sense. by making it decipherable only to you, you’re adding your own touch on a board that’s otherwise impersonal

i hope this helped? there isn’t rly a secret, just a tedious and picky process :) if you have a specific board you like, you’re always welcome to just pull pins from it until you see it manifest on your home feed <3

[shinji-hibiki]

Gimme your top 5 genres (however niche u want) you like to listen to!!

oh my god Awesome question. generally im a big enjoyer of rock and metal but ill get into some of the more specific genres i like!! (not really in any order)

Shoegaze/Blackgaze/Dreampop

This one is a little broad because there are so many genres and artists that overlap and I get a bit confused at how people categorize music. However. Fuzzy guitars incomprehensible vocals... the distortion...the Reverb...god

I got into this genre at the beginning of the pandemic and it completely bore itself into me. I could gush about how it makes me feel forever but this subset of music was just made for me. Here's some of my favourite fuzzy tunes for u...

Progressive Metal

Ohhh yeah. having a true Music Liker moment but i love it when songs are 11 minutes long and have like 3 separate breakdowns.

You got your Tool. you got Dream Theater. Caligula's Horse. My mom even recently got me into Sleep Token (lol) Hell, dir en grey has some prog metal under their belt dude it Rules

If you want to have a Really transcendent progressive metal experience lay down before u sleep and listen to This Shit:

Darkwave/Gothic Rock

Covers classic staples in the gothic scenes like Type O Negative, Sisters of Mercy, Siouxsie, The Cure, Bauhaus, etc.. and newer contemporaries of overlapping genres like Drab Majesty, Cold Cave, Linea Aspera, Rendez Vous!!

listen 2 some truly sexy darkwave stuff i dare you. its so good. both of these examples are really gay especially workout

Indie/Contemporary Folk

During and after the pandemic, my musical sensibilities shifted considerably based on my relationship with my immediate surroundings. Long story short, now that I didn't have to go to fucking Public School, it was a lot easier to realize that I lived in a beautiful town that I could explore and connect to all on my own.

This was the kind of music that I listened to while drinking tea on the porch with my cat, biking to the shore, walking into the woods, thinking about the boy i still liked. those days kind of served to clue me in that i was a real person with a real life to live i guess lol

Post-Punk (The Weird Kind)

I'm not very good with music labels so I really didn't know what Post-Punk entailed for a while. But looking into it, I realized it's a really broad label covering a lot of shit that I really like.

Post-punk mostly encompasses some of the experimental artsy type nerd music I like!! Devo! Talking Heads! Squid! Viagra Boys! Technically it also encompasses the gothic rock stuff above too but. Oh well. Hey you should listen to squid listen to them do it

if u listen to any of the above i will love you forever. i am holding your hand and leading you. do not be scared

@good-wine-and-cheese thank u so much 4 prompting this and now im curious!!! whatre YOUR top 5 genres..

[doomed-era]

RAMBLING ABOUT CULTS TIME!!!

HELL YES

OKAY SO! CULTS. if any of this is interesting to you and you like weird indie animation movies or comics uhh you could check out the final exit of the disciples of ascensia and joe vs. elan school nooo im not shilling things i like nooo

OKAY. LET ME MAKE A LISTICLE. though there are clear indicators of cultlike behavior, the way the word cult is used is often relative and ill-defined. as a fair warning, i'm not an expert on any of this; it's just a casual interest of mine. feel free to correct me if i get anything wrong!

ONE. i think it's generally agreed upon that there's not much of a difference between high-control groups and cults. however, i think when people think of a cult, their idea of what that is is a lot more nebulous and associated with religion. cults do not have to be religious! also, i think high-control group in general suggests that it's just controlling, and so idk cults seem more like a subset of high-control groups to me i'm not going to argue about this if someone actually told me they are synanonymous (haha gotcha) but

TWO. ANYONE CAN JOIN A CULT. anyone could be vulnerable to a cult; it doesn't matter if you're smart or cool or famous or whatever. the primary reason people join is to be part of something, for acceptance and community and joining others under a common banner. people in cults are just as human as everyone else, they are not stupid or crazy or inherently bad. oftentimes, even though they may do horrible things to others, they were preyed upon themselves.

THREE. okay so I know I was like "you should look at the BITE model" earlier but it is a flawed model </3 namely there's things about it that seem to apply more to western cultural norms and i don't know if i'd apply them to others (for example, some cultures are more communal and less individualistic. the definition for what is a healthy amount of individualist or collectivist behavior depends a lot on who you're talking to.) also though there are definitely controlling religions if a controlling religion is considered an acceptable mainstream belief generally i would not consider them cults. a lot of these things are still relative.

FOUR. cults are all about control!! this above all else is what sets them apart from any other type of gathering or organization. they will isolate you from others and attempt to control you by any means necessary. some of these are more obvious, like physical isolation, keeping you from accessing information that isn't approved by the cult (they'll usually give a reason for this), or frequent monitoring. some of them are more subtle, like sending you out to "see the outside world" for a specific task to reinforce how "bad" the outside world is. there's very much an "us vs them" mentality going on. think of cults as a bit like an abusive relationship, except on a broader scale!

FIVE. cults often have a charismatic leader and a strict hierarchy! also honestly the things cult leaders do sometimes can be just so goddamn funny like these guys will buy 27 yachts and watches and sex fifty people while the rest of their group lives in complete squalor but it's fine because Reasons!!! they frequently break their own rules it's kinda funny. people further up on the hierarchy will usually get more privileges than those at the bottom. also if the cult leader writes a book they get bonus points from me because lmao

uh i'm kinda out of things to ramble out for now unless its something specific hope u enjoy

[southeastasianists]

In Thailand, traditional food can be exquisite and elaborate. Nothing epitomizes this more than the use of tian op, Thailand’s culinary candle.

Though its name simply means “scented candle” in Thai, this double-wicked curl of beeswax is no ordinary room freshener. Tian op is a flavoring agent, or rather, a scenting agent, used to enhance specific dishes in Thai cuisine.

Chefs light the U-shaped candle at both ends, place it on top of the food to be scented, and cover it with a lid. Lack of oxygen snuffs the flames and the enclosed space fills with flowery smoke. Minutes or even hours later, the chefs lift the lid and serve the food, now garnished with the candle’s delectable aroma.

Tian op is infused with numerous ingredients also found in perfume and incense, like patchouli, ylang-ylang, mace oil, sandalwood, frankincense, and musk, to name just a few. The candle’s smoke contains a complex blend of scent molecules, including vanillin, named for vanilla but also found in woodsmoke.

This gives the scent of tian op a unique, musky sweetness which lends itself especially well to desserts. “It’s very, very distinct, very recognized,” says Thai cookbook author Leela Punyaratabandhu. “For me, traditional Thai desserts don’t taste the same, basically, unless they smell like the candle.”

In some recipes, tian op is a finishing touch, as with flower-shaped kleeb lamduan cookies, which are infused with smoke after baking. Other preparations call for ingredients to be individually smoked, such as sarim, which combines smoked sweetened coconut milk with multicolored starch noodles and crushed ice.

Though nearly all traditional applications of the tian op are for sweets, the candle is also used to make khao chae or “soaked rice,” a cold dish popular in the summertime. Chefs smoke rice with a tian op, then chill it in jasmine-scented water to provide fragrant refreshment between bites of crispy side dishes. “This candle is part of the bigger picture of Thais liking to scent things,” says Punyaratabandhu. Though chefs around the world use aromatics to infuse food, Thai cuisine has a particular appreciation for fragrance. Especially prized are fragrant ingredients like the herb pandan, which owes its nutty, roasty aroma to a flavor compound shared with jasmine rice.

Tian op isn’t even the only form of enclosed smoking used to aromatize food in Thailand. There’s also dhungar, a technique of sizzling ghee on hot charcoal in a closed oven, which is particularly associated with the cuisine of Thai Muslims. Though dhungar and tian op are superficially similar, Punyaratabandhu, who has written on both, believes that they are unrelated. Dhungar is primarily used for savory dishes, not sweet, and while dhungar originated in India and is found in other South Asian countries, tian op is unique to Thailand.

Tian op’s spectacular blend of aromatics carries, for Punyaratabandhu, “the scent of home, of tradition—of something that is dying these days.” Originally derived from the exclusive cuisine of the Thai royal court, tian op is still largely the provenance of professional dessert-makers, rather than home cooks. Those dessert-makers now have the task of preserving a tradition that is at risk of disappearing due to decreasing demand.

Traditional Thai sweets are fading in popularity, in the face of competition from foreign desserts like macarons and cupcakes, which are sometimes more affordable than the labor-intensive traditional options. And as Thai desserts go, so goes the tian op. Punyaratabandhu describes the candle as a “uni-tasker,” intimately tied to the purpose it was made for. “The candle doesn’t have a life outside of this,” she says. “We have to talk about it as a subset of what's going on with traditional Thai desserts.”

Yet while globalization threatens tian op’s original context, it also presents new opportunities. Modern Thai chefs have created fusion recipes with tian op, scenting Western-style cookies, cakes, and pastries. New York City’s Spot Dessert Bar formerly offered a candle-infused cheesecake, the brainchild of consulting chef Ian Chalermkittichai. In 2023, the show-stopping signature dessert at San Francisco restaurant Prik Hom earned its own profile in the San Francisco Chronicle: coconut ice cream smoked with a tian op for 15 seconds under glass. It’s served with the lid on, so that diners can release the sweet smoke themselves.

Punyaratabandhu cautions that because the scent of tian op is so specific, it doesn’t necessarily improve every dessert. When she used the candle on shortbread cookies, she didn’t like how it masked their original scent. “You're supposed to smell butter, not frankincense!” she says.

Like any flavoring, tian op’s power to elevate and transform must be used with care. But it’s a testament to the allure of this royal ingredient that chefs, in Thailand and beyond, are still drawn to experiment with its fragrant smoke.