Let's say, modestly, that Toon Bodyslam is Jesus Christ.
Let's say, modestly, that Pai Dao Din is also Jesus Christ.
This Christmas, Buddhist Thailand has two choices of Saviour, each forging his own path, each enduring a display of public suffering on our own streets of Jerusalem while addressing onlookers, "Do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children". One of them is nearing his final Station of the Cross and his goal of redeeming our woeful public healthcare; the other -- arrested, chained, imprisoned and crucified -- will remain locked up for another year or so to pay for not just his own but also for our ideological sins.
Toon, rocker and super-marathoner Artiwara Kongmalai, is experiencing a Passion of the Christ on his 2,191-km run across Thailand to raise money for 11 public hospitals. Pai, activist Jatupat Boonpattararaksa, is going through a darker Passion of the Christ in his Khon Kaen jail cell, where he's serving terms for a lese majeste verdict for sharing an article that over 2,000 people also shared. Do not weep for them, as Jesus rightly said, weep for ourselves and our children.
Sweating a thousand litres, posing for several thousand selfies, spraining hamstrings and Achilles, tormenting his limbs and liver, Toon is currently nearing his destination in Mae Sai, the northernmost tip of Thailand. A big celebration is planned, fireworks, concerts and all: Like the Great Pyramids, his run has become a national project of a colossal scale, a larger-than-life endeavour whose aura of sentimental do-goodism is hitched upon by politicians, government officials and the military, and cheered upon by thousands of locals, children, doctors, nurses and millionaires.
There were many points during the run when things looked bleak (heat, health, etc) but in a feat of indomitability, the man has stuck it out and is now cruising towards his Holy Grail. Toon's run -- supported by a large team of medical experts, scouts, live-broadcast crew and product sponsorship -- is at once passionate and spectacular, an expedition of faith as well as a spectacle. He's carrying a cross as well as a victory medal. The donations he has raised are likely to surpass one billion baht, a whopping number, and while he deserves adoration and immortality, some people wonder how many times the man still has to put on his Nike and Garmin and run to rescue all public hospitals and poor patients at the risk of losing the 30-baht health scheme.
In his epic trip, Toon is suffering for all of us. So when he met PM Prayut Chan-o-cha during his Bangkok stop, I thought he would raise the issue of public healthcare, at least to mention the word, to hint that he's doing all of this in the hope that he wouldn't have to do it again every year, that he was bearing the cross of physical torment so that all of us do not have to. Jesus has met Pontius Pilate, the saviour and the Roman punisher, and it turned out to be all cosy and pally. At least, I thought, Pilate should have run a few hundred metres with him.
The other Jesus Christ of Thailand this Christmas, however, appeared in court on Thursday.
Pai Dao Din denied the charge of unlawful assembly (the different crime for which he's presently jailed) in May 2015 to protest against the military regime. Last year this week, he was taken into custody and has not been released since, for the crime of sharing that unfortunate article. For a whole year he has suffered behind bars, smilingly, so that everyone else who also shared that article did not have to, and so that everyone else who harboured a resentment -- a rightful resentment -- against the junta can have some breathing space since the chief nuisance has already been nailed to a cross.
Pai's appearance on Thursday was also a chance for him to wear a graduation gown for the first time, though only briefly, and to pose for pictures with his parents and family -- like all university graduates do. After all we've seen, the education the man has received outside school has proved more intense, and more dangerous, than anything imparted on campus. It's supposed to be our education, too, about the times we're living in.
That's the tale of our two Jesuses. Unlike Toon, the Passion Pai is going through came to him unexpected, uncalled-for, and unwarranted: he has become a symbol of indomitability and pain without him wanting to. He was stoned and cursed at, and who would want a selfie with a prisoner?
So while we thank Toon for his charitable run, which we should, let's not forget another young man who's pursuing a simpler and as important a cause: the right to speak and think freely. That's the great redemption we're all waiting for.
Kong Rithdee is Life editor, Bangkok Post.