Just as an army marches on its stomach, food is a key factor in keeping the redshirt rally in Bangkok very much alive.
Food is aplenty and free at the rally site from Sanam Luang to the Royal Plaza and the Misakawan intersection.
There are now four big kitchens for the redshirt demonstrators, with 50 or 60 volunteers taking turns to cook food all day. Although somtam (spicy papaya salad) is the most common dish, Muslim food is also available.
All red shirts are welcome to enjoy buffetstyle food for breakfast, lunch and dinner - and they are assured the food served is safe.
Apart from dishes cooked by the redshirt comrades, all donated food must pass a safety check. All donors are required to register their names and list the items they have brought to the rally sites.
Although free food is freely available, many demonstrators prefer cooks from their own home towns, which explains why a large number of cooks are to be seen around the rally sites.
"I've cooked 10 kilos of sticky rice each day," Thongphan Hemwipat said.
She is the main cook for the Huai Pheung 53 Group from Kalasin, which consists of about 50 red shirts.
"I have also made sure somtam is available all day. If anyone feels hungry, he or she can always drop in for a bite," the 44yearold woman said.
Also from Si Sa Ket, 48yearold Janpen Khunwong has four or five assistants as she cooks a meal for 500600 red shirts each day.
Asked where her food ingredients came from, she said her group had received donated food from people in their home town.
Boonchuay Kamales, another cook at the Phan Fa Bridge on Rajdamnoen Avenue, said common ingredients were sugar, salt, fish sauce, vegetables, vegetable oil, meat and other seasonings.
"Because I've not brought any ingredients from my home town, I have to buy food items from a nearby fresh market every morning," the 33yearold woman from Chanthaburi said while she was cooking fried basil pork with baby corn.
She said fried vegetables, stir fried noodles with pork and fried basil with pork or chicken were the most popular dishes among protesters from Chanthaburi.
A female cook from Khon Kaen said natives from her home town liked papaya salad with fermented fish, fried meat, fermented fish sauce and sticky rice the best.
"I think they are favourite dishes among northeasterners," she said.
She said red shirts from any corner of Thailand were welcome to enjoy her food.
A Nan resident said she usually cooked boiled eggs, omelettes and fried hardboiled eggs with tamarind sauce for her comrades.
"These dishes are easy to cook," she said.
Although most red shirts agreed to share their food, some cooks were concerned about dwindling food ingredients.
"I have no idea how long I can stay here, but clearly we're in need of more food," Boonchuay from Chanthaburi said.
She hoped some redshirt supporters would donate rice, vegetables, vegetable oil, fish sauce, sugar and meat to the demonstrators.
Thongphan said her group had ingredients for only one week's food consumption.
"But we trust that villagers from our home town will send us more food if we really have to hold out longer than that," she said.
