Temporarily Thairish

One day last week, my normally relaxed landlord Mr.Pong came running up to me in an obvious state of distress. “Oh no, oh no, oh no!” he cried, before adding for emphasis, “Oh no, oh no, oh no!” He seemed to be on the verge of tears.

“What’s wrong, Pong?” I asked. “Somebody skip out on their bar bill again?”
“No, it’s... it’s...it’s…” he stammered. “Olaf, somebody has… somebody has...” The words caught and died in his throat. He thrust the three CDs he was carrying out at me. “Look! Somebody has…somebody has…” Unable to speak, he covered his face with his hands and began shaking his head, mournfully.
I examined the CDs: Bob Marley’s Songs Of Freedom, Legend and The Best Of Bob Marley.
“I don’t understand, Pong,” I said. “What’s the problem?”
“Look!” he shrieked. “Look! Somebody has…killed them!”
On closer inspection, I could see that all of the CD’s were deeply scratched and almost definitely mortally wounded. Marley would still be “jamming”, but in the wrong way. The depth and angle of the scratches left little doubt that this had been a deliberate and premeditated act.
“Oh Buddha!” I exclaimed. “But Pong, these were your favourite CD’s!”
“I know, I know,” he said sorrowfully.
“I mean, you loved these CD’s,” I continued. “Like, really loved them. You played them all day long.”
“Yes, yes,” he agreed, wiping a tear from his eye.
“I mean, you loved these CD’s so much you played them all day long – every single day.”
“I know, I know,” he said, sadly shaking his head. “Olaf, who would do such a thing?”
“I don’t know, Pong,” I said, sympathetically laying a hand on his shoulder. “The world is full of all sorts of sick twisted fuckers.”
Neither of us said anything for a moment. Then I did what had to be done. I turned to the shore and, with a quick flick of my wrist, deftly Frisbeed the CD’s out to sea. Separating in mid-air, they skimmed lightly over the surface, like silver flying fish, before sinking out of sight (surprisingly, they didn’t Bob in the water).
As they disappeared beneath the surface, I began humming the opening bars of ‘Redemption Song’. It just seemed appropriate. Pong looked a little startled at first, but soon joined in. I put my arm around his shoulder, and then held my lighter aloft. Pong followed suit and began bellowing the words, singing with all his heart, defiantly. It was quite an emotional moment.
When we came to the end of the song, neither of us spoke for a while. Eventually, it was me who broke the silence. “Oh, before I forget, Pong, here’s that knife I borrowed from the kitchen. I needed it to, em, cut…something.”

Me and my big mouth, part 786: Soon after Bob’s funeral, I found myself sitting in a nearby bar discussing the weather with a couple of local farmers. The country is currently experiencing its worst drought in years, and so I conversationally posited that they must have been relieved at the recent spate of heavy rain showers.
Predictably enough, given that the jungle has been turning brown of late, the farmers agreed that the rain was long overdue and most welcome. However, I was surprised to hear them thank their king for it. “The king made the rain come,” one of them earnestly informed me. “He’s a very great man.”
Now, there can be little doubt that the Thai people love their monarchy with a fervour practically unimaginable in the royal-slagging west. When the Jodie Foster remake of The King And I was banned by the Thai censors, because it was historically inaccurate, the people unanimously approved. Look at any photograph of a Thai athletic champion receiving a medal and, chances are, they’ll be gratefully holding a framed picture of their beloved king in their sweaty grip.
Visit any region of the country and you’ll see images of bespectacled King Bhumibol Adulyadej and his family literally everywhere – from Saddam-like statues on the motorways and in town centres, to framed-with-burning-candle photographs in every household and business premises. From banks to brothels, the Thai royals enjoy levels of adoration that the Windsors can only dream about.
Even so, you can take adoration too far. So I thought, anyway. The king might be a great man, but he doesn’t control the weather. Trying not to sound too patronising, I explained to my simple-minded farmer friends that the rain came about naturally, and not by royal decree. They insisted that the king was responsible, and called the bartender over to verify. The bartender assured me that the king was personally responsible for the rain.
“The king makes the rain come,” he assured me. “The king is a great man.”
We called another barfly over, who immediately concurred. The king made the rain come. Great man. End of story.
I’ve written here before about how insulting the Thai king is a criminal offence – a crime known as lese-majesty, which is punishable by seven years imprisonment. Back in the early 1980’s, one of Thailand’s leading intellectuals, Sulak Sivaraksa, was arrested because of a passing sarcastic reference to the King’s fondness for yachting (he referred to His Majesty as “the skipper”). Although he got away with it that time, Sivaraksa couldn’t keep his filthy mouth shut, and when, in 1991, he publicly described the royal family as “ordinary people”, he had to go into exile. Eventually the skipper granted a royal pardon and he was allowed return. Even so, the message was clear. You don’t diss the king.
Bearing all of this in mind, I chose my next words very carefully: “Bullshit! You’re a bunch of fucking idiots! Your king might be a great man, but – sorry! – duh! – he can’t make it rain!”
A row swiftly developed, only slightly hindered by the language barrier. They seemed aghast at the impudence of a western farang, daring to doubt the meteorological magnificence of His Majesty. For my part, I thought they were a coco shy of coconuts. We couldn’t agree to disagree, and it ended quite badly.
The following day, though, once I was discharged from the hospital, I Googled the king and discovered that they were actually right. King Bhumibol Adulyadej did – personally – make the recent rains come. Oops!
Even on the Net, I couldn’t find a bad word about the man. The world’s longest-reigning monarch (he’s been on the throne since 1946), King Bhumibol is fluent in three European languages, a gifted jazz composer, and a talented painter and artist. A Harvard graduate (engineering), he’s also responsible for four separate industrial and agricultural patents.
In 1991, he was granted a patent for an “aerator” – a contraption which cleans water by injecting oxygen. A few years later, he was granted another, for an advancement on this technique. In 2001, he developed a cheaper alternative fuel for diesel engines, using palm oil. And in June 2003, he was granted his fourth worldwide patent for a “super sandwich” technique, where clouds at different altitudes are “seeded” by airplanes with sodium chloride and/or calcium chloride, thereby producing rainfall.
Believe it or go to prison for seven years, it actually works. In the last few weeks, the number of Thai provinces suffering from drought has been reduced from 72 to 16, using the king’s patented cloud-seeding technique. According to the reliable Bangkok Post, after a total of 1,070 seeding flights, the number of villages facing a water shortage had been reduced from 21,968 to 10,339.
The King of Thailand doesn’t just reign, he also rains. I’d go back to the bar to apologise, but I don’t think I’m welcome anymore. Lese-majesty and all that.

Drought isn’t the only problem affecting Ko Pha-Ngan at the moment. They don’t go out of their way to advertise it to farangs, but the whole island is on red-alert for a terrorist attack at the moment. Before the monthly Full Moon party last week, rumours were rife that a bomb had been intercepted on an incoming boat. Even though there was nothing in the press, in the days leading up to the party, you could see regular Navy patrols on the water and hear low-flying military jets in the skies. I decided not to go, and got bombed on my own beach instead.
As it turned out, the Full Moon party went off without a hitch, but the threat of terrorist attack is omnipresent – not just on Ko Pha-Ngan, but throughout the country. Following recent deadly bomb attacks by Southern separatist rebels at Hat Yai, the government is under big pressure to do something about it.
In fairness to them, they are doing something. The Hat Yai bombs were detonated by mobile phone and, for the last fortnight, newspaper headlines have been screaming about the easy availability of SIM cards. In response to this, Prime Minister Thaksin’s government has brought in emergency legislation, requiring every mobile phone owner to register their personal details with the authorities within three months, and by the time you’re reading this, it’ll be impossible for anyone to buy a new mobile or SIM card without showing proper identification.
The whole of Thailand can now breathe a huge collective sigh of relief, safe in the knowledge that if any terrorist detonates a bomb with his mobile phone, they’ll be instantly traceable. The obvious fact that most terrorists aren’t that stupid, and mobile phones are easily stolen anyway, has been mentioned but not particularly dwelled upon.
Of course, the fact that PM Thaksin owns one of the biggest mobile phone companies in South East Asia, and will soon have complete listings and details of all his Thai customers (making direct marketing that much easier) is just an added bonus.

My better-half is currently doing exams 7,000 miles away, and, as I write this, I haven’t had sexual intercourse in seventy-six days, fifteen hours and twenty-three minutes. It’s not the longest period of self-imposed celibacy I’ve ever had to endure, but it’s certainly been the most difficult.
All day, every day, I’m surrounded by gorgeous females, of all ages and nationalities, usually wearing nothing more than a coating of Ambre Solaire and tooth-floss bikini bottoms. It’s at the point where I’m getting my sexual kicks by mentally dressing them. Needless to say, I’m extremely frustrated.
This frustration is manifesting itself in funny ways. With Pong’s Bob Marley collection sleeping with the fishes, I’ve been assigned the role of house DJ in his bar and restaurant. I don’t mix tracks or anything as fancy as that. I just stick CD’s on and then change them when they’re finished. My good DJ friend Des Free – whose Friday night Naked Radio residency in Galway’s Cuba is one of the country’s best indie nights – gave me a few pre-mixed CD’s before I left, and I usually play those for a while. I’ve also been playing an unfair amount of Irish stuff and albums by the likes of Autamata, Blink, Coade, Perry Blake, Damien Rice, David Kitt and, of course, U2 always seem to go down quite well.
Obviously though, I’ll pick the music to suit the mood or taste of the customers. For instance, the other night three sexy young French couples came in. They’d just arrived in Thailand, seemed giddy with excitement, and were obviously out to have a good time.
I started their night off with mournful Irish albums by Martin Finke and Steve Fanagan. Then I hit them with some full-blast Leonard Cohen and Palace Brothers. They left before Radiohead’s OK Computer had finished but, from the sad and depressed looks on their faces as they called for their bill, I could see that my work was already done.
I don’t get laid, nobody gets laid.