Photos of the king and queen are everywhere--billboards, banners, government offices, town halls, official businesses, unofficial businesses, every classroom, every school, every shop, every major intersection and over crossing and under crossing has one or both of them proudly displayed in a frequently-changed format.
Everybody loves the king, and he was a grown man and reigning monarch in time to play with Benny Goodman and a youngish Duke; he was well established by the time Satch came through Siam. And he's still on the throne today--five generations later, roughly?
Information about his reign is pretty easy to come across, but not so much the queen.
Queen Mum looks, in the billboard/banner images, to be a lady of the hat generation. She has the rich, dark hair of modern technology, and she wears conservative Thai clothing, but she could easily wear five hats during any engagement and each would be appropriate and striking.
So I'm in Had Yai, walking toward the train station, when I come across a blissfully empty street--easy crossings are not to be taken for granted, and I lunge into the road.
To be confronted by a military officer in full dress regalia including a sword he's rattling at me. And then I realize that both sidewalks are lined with pedestrians, pushing forward and staring but not setting a foot in the road.
I pull out Brutus, thinking something interesting is brewing, and four traffic police cars roar through, probably doing a hundred down the city street. Then there's a hum and people push forward and a Lexus sedan goes through, followed by a handful of Benz saloons, an ambulance, a Land Rover with a forest of antennae and a Thule box, and a smattering of civilianized military vehicles.
Boy I sure saw someone, right?
Just for kicks--really, who wouldn't?--I follow the stream of people a couple blocks, and run into a Spanish expat who I've seen a few times, always holding an animated debate with herself.
"Do you go to see the princess? I think maybe I go but am not Islamic. Now is Buddhist with the praying, but soon is Islamic in the building, and I think I not get in. Maybe if I go down here first I find someone, someone who will let me in and be Islamic for me because I am not one of them, no, not Islamic, will you see the princess?"
Hmm, the princess is here, who could miss that?
A couple of blocks down, the armed officers hold back a surprisingly calm and quiet crowd--I really, really wish I could make a similar number of seventh graders make so little noise. There's a band in white uniforms, and a tent across the street on the other side of the intersection, and a lineup of shaded chairs in front of an elevated platform on which sit lotus-legged figures in saffron robes. This is the Buddhist portion of the proceedings, evidently.
Need I mention the number of farangs in attendance? (The señora had taken off in the opposite direction and disappeared).
It certainly helped having a foot or so on the average, aged, wrinkled and bent Thai in attendance Some of the younger generations came up nose-high, and by the time I stopped the one six-footer in the crowd came directly in front of me, otherwise standing with my back to the building, my view had only the one obstruction.
A gentle, rhythmic chanting comes from the tent--maybe pavilion would be more appropriate: four metal posts with a tarpaulin roof and open sides--until eventually the band kicks into something peppy. Lackeys swarm the pavilion and form a colonnade up the steps of a building I had not noticed for all the pomp: a brand new branch of the Islamic Bank of Thailand, only two blocks from the branch outside the train station and a five minute ride from the main branch.
First comes a youngish guy in a painfully white and crisp uniform, carrying a double-tiered umbrella/parasol--picture two oversized lampshades made of royal purple silk on a ten foot pole, a watered-down version of the ones shading elephant-riding kings of yore. Presumably, this keeps the Princess shaded and radiant and free of bird poop, but as soon as the glaring white uniform slips through the wall of silk-gilt dignitaries or bank managers or whatever they were, the parasol is all I can see of the procession until the colonnade collapses itself to stand at ease in the shade.
A brief digression to politics--why the heck would the Royal Princess of Thailand be at the opening of another branch of a bank?
Remember that this is Thailand and she's the King's daughter so everybody loves her. But this is also Southern Thailand, where there's been an Islamic insurgency carrying out bombings and beheadings and all such fun stuff for a goodly number of years. Had Yai is north of the worst of it, but a few years ago the prince's caravan was attacked down south, and there's been a big upsurge of violence this year (side note: it is not a good idea to look up terrorist attacks and bombings when it turns out there have been quite a number in the town where you happen to be).
So a new Islamic Bank is a good thing, as is goodwill and friendliness between Bangkok Thais and Southern Muslim Thais. And even if she's not the King, the Princess is part of the royal family so everyone loves her, Buddhist or Muslim, and how nice that she's here.
Eventually, the colonnade reappears, this time leading to the Lexus. People begin filing out of the bank, and I somehow have a view of most of the procession. An odd hum builds around me: it’s not so much a murmur as the Thai version of July 4th “ooh-aaah!” a chest-heavy anticipatory whine that sounds more like begging--an American would follow this sound with, “pleeese?”--until the parasol reappears at the same time a man in a yellow tropical shirt--batik fish and turtles--walked up and pulled Brutus down: NO PHOTOGRAPHING THE ROYAL FAMILY!
And I noticed that nobody around me had cell phone cams or other devices up--remarkable!
And then the Princess appeared, and it explained a lot: while the queen's banners show a woman of the hat generation, the princess's thinning hair, smile lines and general heft make her a perfect candidate for the Thai version of Mrs. Clause. And she's the Princess.
Right, when did the King take the throne?
And if he had kids at a reasonable age, that makes them how old?
Oh, right. Interesting.
So I got to see the Princess of Thailand, who's of an age to be on the waning end of a (western) political career, and her bearing and appearance gave me the overriding impression of--dare I say it?--a jolly elf of European folklore.
What I take from it is a question of succession. It's one thing for Charles to give the throne to his kids, but the Thai situation is closer to Victoria still reigning, with the complication that face is everything here, and once something becomes a matter of having, keeping, or saving face, ain't nothin' in the world that can no-how make no one back down. It'll be interesting to see what plays out over the next few decades.
