I used to live in a town house that had a ghost on the second floor.
That is about as ludicrous an opening paragraph as you're going to get this Sunday morning, but at the very least, believe that the house emitted a strange thud-thud-thud sound at intermittent and often inopportune occasions.
It came from the spare bedroom on the second floor, similar to a ball being bounced. I put it down to small animals or weird shenanigans of my neighbours, but none of these excuses seemed to ring true. One night, drifting off to sleep, an idea popped into my head -- it was the spirit of a child playing ball.
I had a group of Thai work friends over and we were into our third bottle of Mekhong when the noise started.
"Pay no attention to that," I announced to the group, ancestors of Bang Rajan's courageous heroes who warded off the marauding Burmese, sacrificing their lives in the process, all those centuries ago. "It's just a ghost of a child."
Dear reader, have you ever witnessed "courageous" turn into "ashen-faced"? I may as well have announced their parents had been collectively killed in a freak plane crash. Nothing I could say could rescue the once-festive atmosphere. For 20 minutes I tried to explain the ghost was completely harmless; in fact it was kind of nice to hear him bouncing his ball late at night. They weren't convinced. By the time they got on their bikes and rode home, I had spooked them all.
Three of those guys never returned, despite the lure of free Mekhong. The fourth one agreed to mind my house for two weeks when I went to Australia; his girlfriend lasted three nights, claiming (rightfully) she heard weird noises in the second bedroom. A Canadian friend who minded it another time said she heard noises from that room without my ever telling her of the ghost.
Soon it was common knowledge. About the only people I failed to tell were the nice couple who bought the place off me in 1998; I do hope the child behaved itself, at least for a couple of months.
There is a reason I bring up this story in 2016, and I ask you to scan the story for the one salient fact I have deliberately buried within it.
Two weeks go, three big identical billboards went up overnight at the Lasalle flyover not one kilometre from my old town house, each about 50 metres apart. Big red circles, each with big red diametrical slash right through a silhouette of a motorcycle.
Clearly some crackdown was going on, not that anybody had informed any motorcyclist. As I zoomed past the trio of signs, the only things breaking the speed limit faster than your columnist were the dozen or so motorcyclists in the lane next to him.
If the signs didn't pique the interest of the city's motorcyclists, they certainly did mine.
The police had launched a new measure in an effort to alleviate the road toll -- no motorbikes on 45 bridges and flyovers around town. Motorcyclists were not adhering to single lanes, zipping in and out of lanes every 2.5 seconds at literal-breakneck speed. It's fascinating that they do this, then have the gall to blame karmic retribution from a past life for ending up in the spinal injuries ward being fed rice soup intravenously into a hole in their neck.
Motorcyclists were enraged about the ban and I don't blame them. I'd be mad too if I were a baby and somebody told me to stop pulling wings off butterflies. Things were particularly heated over at the Bhumibol Bridge, because motorcyclists were forced to line up for hours to take the ferry instead.
Over the last five years authorities have been getting tougher and tougher on drunken motorists over Songkran, the most dangerous seven days of the year for road fatalities.
The more the police crack down, the more the toll rises. This year it rose 20% on last year -- a record 442 deaths.
I am one of those bleeding hearts who advocate education as a means of changing behaviour. It hasn't worked. Crackdowns and alcohol restrictions haven't worked either. So what is the problem?
The problem can be demonstrated in my ghost story.
Let's answer that question about the most salient fact of my story. Here it is: after being freaked out by the fact they were sharing a house with a ghost, those ashen-faced friends got on their motorbikes and drove home. A harmless spirit of a child renders them scared shirtless. Driving while plastered is water off a duck's back.
This is the core problem of Thailand's increasing road toll. Thais are simply not afraid, for there are no consequences.
Thais are quick to tell you that they are different to other cultures; as a foreigner, you will "never understand the true psyche of a Thai". It's rubbish. Thais are exactly the same as the rest of us, especially in the field of getting away with murder.
I come from a country that used to have staggeringly high road carnage thanks to our obsession with alcohol. Some 35 years ago the country turned our attitude around with a simple notion; if you drive drunk, you'll be arrested and you'll lose your licence. The severity of the enforcement surprised us all, and soon judges and cops themselves were being arrested for DUI.
In a nutshell; we became afraid. And this surely is the last-resort solution here in the Land of Inebriated Smiles.
Thais need to be less afraid of ghosts and more afraid of breaking the law. Thais believe the consequences of coming face to face with a ghost are very clear and final -- you die.
That fear ranks way above the fear of being caught drink-driving. In that scenario, you don't die. You may part with an underhand 100 baht, or even spend a night at the local station, but that's kind of a good anecdote to relate next time you meet your mates for a drink.
In short, there's no major consequence of breaking the law, although there is one Lat Phrao police officer this week who'd disagree strongly on this.
Early last Monday morning, Pol Lt Chaiyan Thongkhamchum, 31, picked up his 22-year-old girlfriend, a fourth year university student, to go on a biking trip.
He needed to cross the Chao Phraya but didn't choose the ferry. He used Bhumibol I Bridge, currently a no-motorbike zone, only he ignored that rule.
At 5am, halfway across the bridge, he lost control of his bike and struck a concrete barricade. His girlfriend riding pillion was thrown onto the road right in front of a truck. She was killed instantly. He walked away with minor injuries.
My heart goes out to everybody in that story, including that policeman, who has learned a bitter life lesson. Perhaps the story should have been used to publicise the very reason why bikes should not be allowed on bridges. That poor guy should have become a poster boy for road safety, educating the public on the perils of taking no heed of road rules.
It didn't happen.
On the very same day, a group of motorcyclists petitioned the courts and the police to lift the law saying it was unfair on bikers. The morning tragedy should have subdued this group but it didn't. And as tragic as the accident was itself, the police took heed.
Last Wednesday night, two days after the Bhumibol Bridge tragedy, those three signs on the Lasalle flyover disappeared.
The campaign has clearly been abolished. The tragedy of our roads continues unabated, no doubt like the thud, thud, thud of that unearthly ball in the hands of my little ghost. n
