MasterChef’s Nat Thaipun’s 90+ Tattoos Are A Deep Dive Into Her Heritage

If there's one person who has really captured people's attention on this season of MasterChef Australia, it's Nat Thaipun. The 28-year-old from Victoria works as a barista and is already building a name for herself in our favourite kitchen thanks to her innovative and fresh approach to Thai cuisine, taking home the first Immunity Pin win of the season.

But besides pushing the boundaries in the dishes she's plating up, Thaipun also pushes the boundaries in her personal life. An avid lover of travel and adrenaline-fuelled adventures, she's often found snowboarding, skateboarding, surfing and skydiving. And as you might have noticed: she's covered in tattoos. Over 90, to be exact.

When asked about the story behind them, Thaipun tells Refinery29 Australia that it's even more personal than you might think. "I never thought I'd have this many tattoos, but the idea of marking is so ingrained in traditional cultures," she explains. "I felt like I was connecting to my ancestors almost."

The MasterChef contestant shares that her tattoos serve as a profound connection to her Thai heritage. "It's an ancient form of expression," she explains. "You would never think of that when you think of hunter-gatherers — like why would people back then have had time to tattoo or put stretchers in their ears? But it's such a big part of our [Thai] culture."

Thaipun shares that her journey with tattoos began during her travel adventures overseas. "I started marking myself every time I travelled," she says. "Then I noticed that every time I was leaving or travelling was because I was going through some stuff mentally, so it was tying that together."

For many people with tattoos, the act of marking their body can be a way to process hardship or significant experiences. For Thaipun, it's a distinctly therapeutic act. "You don't have to mark yourself in order to remember that you've gone through those experiences and accepted them and moved on, but that's kind of my thing with tattoos," she says.

Most of her tattoos were inked during a specific period in her life, and in a special place. "I got probably 80% of my tattoos in New Zealand," she says. "I felt really connected with that because obviously in Maori culture, [tattooing] is so deeply ingrained."

"I've got pretty high pain tolerance, but I love doing anything that is really pushing me mentally," she says. "I want to see how resilient I am. It's why I do skydiving and snowboarding and even making food."

One word that Thaipun constantly returns to is resilience. "MasterChef has changed something in me when it comes to looking at my past," she shares. "Humans are so good at going, 'Oh, I should have done this'. We're trained to be regretful about so many things."

"But now I'm very appreciative of everything I've done and gone through and the choices that I've made," she says.

While it's often said that a picture can paint a thousand words, in the case of Nat Thaipun, it's her tattoos that do the talking. And they have plenty to say.