SOUTH FLORIDA, U.S.A. | BY NICHOLAS SPANGLER

Sepak Takraw: A sport with kick

BY NICHOLAS SPANGLER

nspangler@MiamiHerald.com

This much we know about the Southeast Asian sport of Sepak Takraw: It is 1,000 years old, or maybe 500, and looks a lot like badminton, or soccer, or possibly volleyball, but not really.

Also, ''the game is so hard to play. Many people have tried and failed,'' according to Aor Saiyabatha, who was sitting on a bench next to the court at the Fruit and Spice Park in the Redland on Saturday afternoon, opening day of the Asian Culture Festival.

Saiyabatha doesn't actually play but has a boyfriend, Tee Rataiea, who does.

At the moment Rataiea was fooling around with some friends on the court, kicking the takraw -- a hollow ball woven from heavy plastic strips -- back and forth over the net, preparing for Sunday's tournament. Every so often he or one of his friends -- Sin Sayavong, Tommy Kong, Kak Phomm and Seiko Pool, men in their 30s and 40s -- would jump a few feet into the air, flip like a high jumper clearing the bar and scissor his legs to kick, spiking the ball down on the other side of the court.

It was easy to see how many, if not most, people would try this and fail.

''I knew a guy who was trying to learn this,'' Saiyabatha said. ``He ended up breaking one of his legs.''

There are three players to a team. No hands are allowed, except when the takraw is tossed to the server to kick. The takraw must cross over the 5-foot-1-inch net in three touches or fewer; one player may take two or all of the touches. Games are to 21.

Most of the players this day were Laotian, friends who'd met at the seven or eight tournaments held every year in the United States (it tends to be the same 40 or so guys who show up at all of them, according to Kong).

They hailed from unlikely places like Lancaster, Penn., where it is impossible to scare up enough takraw players for a game.

''It's just me and my family,'' Kong said. ``I just ask them to throw the ball at me from up on the deck, so it's like somebody's spiking it.''

They started to play points. A rhythm developed: bump, set, spike, all without the benefit of arms or hands. Sometimes the spike was blocked with a loud, no doubt thigh-stinging thwap; if it was not, it bounced hard and flew into the Thai cooking demonstration crowd or the benches where people were eating Laotian takeout.

Whenever this happened, all the players held up their hands in apology.

Newcomers arrived, beginners who were invited into the game and given vigorous encouragement: Ray Haar, a Miami-Dade cop, and Xavier Villena, a plumber, tae kwan do and soccer coach. Neither man broke any legs, though Haar did at one point get tangled in the net. He quit after 20 minutes, covered in sweat, Villena after 30, not sweating so much but with a seriously smarting right instep.

Hours passed, and the game went on.

''The only thing I hate about this,'' said Saiyabatha, ``is that once they start playing, they never stop.''

They didn't stop, so she went off toward the jewelry booth, in search of something nice for her niece.