Thailand 25: March 4, 2003

Consular work continues to provide the occasional funny story, though it can be draining work. My adventures over the past month have included getting up at 3:30 am to put a mentally imbalanced American chicken farmer, clad only in baby chick pajamas, on a plane back to the U.S. His son's answer to his father's unwanted visit had been to buy him a one-way ticket to Phuket. Once he got to Phuket, the local police called me to ask me to direct them to arrest him. I, of course, could not do this, so the schizophrenic American continued to threaten the local shopowners until they took up a collection to send him back to Bangkok. Once in Bangkok, he was picked up by the local police, who, instead of arresting him or taking him to a mental institution, dropped him off at the Embassy for us to deal with.

Another American ran into some problems at the Teakwood Palace, a popular tourist site in Bangkok. Upset that she would have to pay a 20 baht (45 cent) fee to enter the palace and leave her purse and shoes at the entrance, she began to curse out the ticket taker and then spat on him. She then entered the palace and began to throw the ropes that separate the entrance from exit lines down stairwells. When personnel from the palace went to calm her, she fled into a clearly marked VIP area and refused to leave. When the police arrived, she spat on a police officer. After being arrested, she refused to apologize and pay a 500 baht fine. Instead, sticking to her "principles", she spent the night in jail. Only after visits from Embassy personnel did she agree to pay a 1,000 fine and get out of jail. Had she not paid the small fine, she could have (and likely would have) spent 90 days in jail.

Last month, an American citizen passed away. He had been living at a local hotel for several months and had quite a few high-end possessions. The hotel refused to allow Embassy personnel access to the room, so I had to go down with the police, who threatened to arrest everyone at the front desk if they did not give us the key to the room. Things were a bit tense when we began to go through the American's belongings, particularly when we came to a locked drawer to which the hotel personnel did not have a key. After using a screwdriver to break the drawer open, we all leaned over to look at the valuables, which, naturally, turned out to be a dildo collection.

On a less pleasant note, I've also seen the less savory side of Thai society after the deaths of American citizens. An American sadly died of a drug overdose last month. He had a lot of cash on him, which was witnessed by numerous persons, including the attending doctors and ambulance staff. However, the investigating police officer failed to note the money in his police report and when we went to the police station to pick up the American's possessions, the money was not included. When we asked to speak to the investigator, we found out that he had called in sick. Only after meeting with the police station commander and noting all the witnesses to the money, did the police investigator "recover" from his illness and locate the money, which he had "secured" in a separate locker in the police station. We were lucky for the forthcoming witnesses, often Americans who die are stripped of their valuables before we are notified. An American who died this past week, apparently had his wallet taken from his body in the ambulance on the way to the hospital.

The other day's issue was the remains of an American who passed away a few weeks ago while in the company of his short-term financially-compensated female companion. Apparently, the fellow would come to Thailand frequently and sought out this particular woman's companionship resulting in, what seems to have been, a close relationship (of course the AmCit's partner back home did not know about this). Anyway, after he died, his family requested that his remains be cremated and returned across the Pacific. We arranged his cremation at a local wat (temple). His friend located the temple and somehow managed to convince the priests to provide her with some of the ashes which she could then take back to her community in Northeastern Thailand. Eventually, we found out about this and I had to explain to the American's family that they'd only be getting back about 7/8ths of their father.

Periodically, consular officers go out to various areas in Thailand to provide consular services to Americans who are unable to make it up to Bangkok. Last month, I went to Phuket. Much like my work for Royal Caribbean while at Venable, I got to visit a tropical paradise and spend my time in a windowless conference room. However, instead of having the Royal Caribbean General Counsel yell at me, I was able to notarize marriage applications for 60 year old Americans and their 21 year old fiancées. Phuket is a beautiful island, but parts of it are overwhelmed with European package tours. Should a European friend ever complain about the tackiness of, say, Ocean City or Disneyland, ask them if they've ever been to Patong Beach. A beautiful piece of sand completely corrupted by go go bars, German steakhouses, and Scandinavian beer halls, mixed in with massage parlors and trinket stalls. At least we Americans only ruin the natural attractions of our own country.