It was early two thousand and two when I touched down on the humid sticky Bangkok tarmac! I was after landing in the old Don Muang airport. 9/11 had only happened a few months earlier, and whereas I used to holiday in the US before, now the new rules regarding Iris scans, finger prints, as well as the very real possibility of hearing the words ‘spread your cheeks and give me two loud coughs’ from some red neck with a badge, a hard-on and a gun! Well put it this way, it had turned me right off my cravings for pancakes n syrup for breakfast.
It caused me the utmost genuine concern that the ’Feds’ might just bust me with a little baggie had played a large part in my decision to no longer visit US shores. After-all I didn’t want to spend my hols in a prison being treated like a criminal. It wasn’t my first time being in Thailand but it was the big one!
A few months on my own, traveling around a land I swore I’d return to and explore properly, and return I promptly did, and as an added bonus I got to avoid the cold European winter.
It was dark by the time my boat pulled up on the shores of Koh Tao. (In Thai Koh simply means island) I’d spent a few days traveling down the side of Thailand arriving in dirty Surat Thani like many had before me on this most sacred of backpacking pilgrimages.. Next day I hopped on the Koh Samui ‘love boat’ which crosses the Gulf of Thailand and a few hrs later found myself on Chaweng beach. A few days of tanning myself to get the ‘cool well traveled bronzed look’ whilst listening to ‘experts’ convinced me I had to check out the Full Moon Party/Money making fuck fest (You decide) on Koh Phangan.
The party consisted of a huge sound system on the beach pumping out ear deafening techno for about twelve hrs, give or take with various DJs taking to the decks. Now whilst Samui was small Phangan was even smaller. Anything between eight and thirteen thousand lived there depending on who you listen to and most natives claim (believe it not time) Chinese origins and not Thai that stretched back over a century. Now come full moon time ‘which seemed to me to be every Saturday night’. Everyone and their aunty (Thai/Chinese/Farang) who lived there, made a killing from the young tourists.
The ice bucket challenge was the thing to do and I’m not talking pouring cold water over your head to cool down either. Tourist’s party goers were encouraged to partake the insane activities by everyone from the chemist (will get back to them) to the local taxi vendors and hotel owners. Ice buckets were basically a kid’s sandcastle bucket filled with Ice (No brainer) and then filled up with cheap Thai whiskey etc. You were peer pressured into sucking as much and as fast as you could through a plastic straw. Hell why share when you can buy a bucket all to yourself? With fireworks going off, thumping music and millions of fake smiles it’s easy to see why some just get caught up in the moment. Needless to say within a short period you found yourself shit faced and unable to make a rational decision.
The drug dealers or fraudsters who swooped were supplied by ‘said chemists’ with pills they knew would make you sleep/not recall events/vomit. Sh-rooms were in abundance as was weed (same same but different). In bygone days the cops would light up joints, smiling as they took a smoke before passing it on. Once you had inhaled they slapped the magic cuffs on your wrist, and screamed in a Thai version of Monty Python ‘you’re fucking nicked me old china’ before marching you off to the house of pain or the ATM (UP2U). Other times they waited for the boats to pull in and searched everyone.
But this was before it seems the whole island suddenly woke up one day and said’ Fuck um, fuck um, I’m so fucking sick of those fucking fa-rang bastards doing the fucked up weird shit fa-rangs do. If it’s getting off their tits they want, let um have it and we can earn in a few weeks what it would normally take a year of coconut planting (hard laborious work that has now been given to Burmese illegal immigrants or slaves depending on who you ask)
Fast forward to Koh Tao Sept 2014 and the brutal double murder of two British travelers. Hanna Witheridge and David Miller. They were discovered hacked to death on a beach on the island made famous for its turquoise waters, easy living, coral reefs and diving. Word had got round that where’s one time Samui was cool and hip ( That is until moms and dads started arriving on package holidays). Phangan then became cool and hip until police busts, beach rapes, Faliraki style drinking binges, overdoses, those fucking full moon parties and posh rich kids that had watched The Beach one too many times came to town. Now it was Koh Tao’s turn.
Sometimes referred to as the tiny island/nothing much to do there etc now became cool and hip. No apartment blocks or package tourists, you’re not very likely to bump into Moms and Pops, and if that didn’t tempt you it was still a place where you could still get a beach hut with a fan with free cockroaches/ mosquitoes all for a handful of shekels. You could live the backpacker dream in this Island. Not many knew it was once used as an isolated prison to for political prisoners around a hundred years ago (Only Chinese would work there) who opposed the Bangkok elite. You could reinvent yourself, become a proper hippie and get a road side dinner for a quid, a bag of herb for a few more and not be harassed by hookers or hawkers alike.
The Thai media (as has become standard practice when anything really bad happens). Straight away pointed the finger of blame at illegal immigrants as the most likely killer, or failing that possibly a Thai! But he would clearly of been deranged on YABA (crystal meth- most likely supplied by an illegal immigrant) without one shred of evidence. Next up the was La Farang!!! All the while valuable time and evidence was being wasted following this ridiculous protocol. Thailand’s military ruler Prayuth Chan-Ocha got in on the act, one can only assume thinking it would make him statesman like, but it only served in making a cringe worthy moment of legendary proportions. (It surly caused someone in the Thai tourism committee to commit Harakiri in an office somewhere in Bangkok) He ignorantly stated on national television that “beautiful” female tourists to Thailand should not expect to be safe in bikinis. Just imagine the Mayor or Miami or Marbella saying that on the 6 o’clock news.
“They’re always problems with tourist safety! “He continued”. They think our country is beautiful and is safe! So they can do whatever they want, wearing bikinis and walking everywhere. Just when you thought he couldn’t possibly shoot himself in the foot any more he added. “Can they be safe in bikinis? Only if they are not beautiful”.
My heart truly and honestly aches and feels for the families involved, and what they must be going through, and will continue to go through for a very long time I suspect in their quest for justice. I cannot for one moment possibly imagine their pain and suffering. I myself was in Thailand when the Tsunami stuck on Boxing Day and I remember still to this day how the political elite behaved so selfish at the time.
I was also there when Prime Minister Taksin announced there would be no more drugs in Thailand in 3mts! He ordered the police to go out and kill anyone suspected of dealing. 12 weeks later nearly 3000 were dead and it was only after getting a phone call from George W Bush that he halted the onslaught. The bureaucracy, red tape and yet more pointless time wasting instead of coordination and action.
There will be no further mention of this crime on Koh Tao as soon as the foreign media depart as it will be bad for business. Ask a local, and you will get that look, that look you would expect to get if you asked about an uncle who had molested a kid. It will become a no see, no hear, no speak topic.
I noted with interest how the mainstream media in the UK failed to mention that it was nearly 10yrs to the day( September 9, 2004). That Adam Lloyd and Vanessa Arscott were enjoying a meal in the S & S Restaurant in Kanchanaburi. It was owned by a Mr Wisetsingh, a heated argument was started by a drunken Wisetsingh, whom it was said made a pass at Vanessa.
The couple left as they clearly felt intimidated and rightly so! For Wisetsingh followed them back to the Sugar Cane Guesthouse in his car. It was here he shot Adam three times; once in the head, arm and chest killing him outright! Vanessa ran for her life screaming but was chased by Wisetsingh in his car for over 200 meters, before knocking her down and driving over her. He then got out and shot her, once in the chest and once the head.
Wisetsingh vanished after the incident, fleeing a police manhunt over the border into Burma. He later returned to Thailand on October 7, 2004, he immediately confessed to the crime and performed re-enactments of the incident on television for the police (as is standard practice in Thailand)
During his trial, Wisetsingh suddenly changed his guilty plea to not guilty and denied the murders, instead blaming them on one Mr. Ya. A mysterious secretive drug smuggling informant, who he claimed shot the couple whilst trying to protect his handler. Wisetsingh indicated he was coerced into the previous confessions. He was found guilty of murder and sentenced to two life sentences, only escaping the death sentence because of his ‘record as a decorated police officer’ and his initial confession to police.
These latest murders bring to thirteen the number of Britons that have been killed in Thailand in the past five years alone! One foreigner a day dies in the land of smiles, and whilst most are bike accidents amongst the young and Viagra heart attacks amongst the more mature, it generally is a nice pleasant and safe destination to visit.
Hopefully they will very soon find the evil monster that committed this unforgiving crime, and once convicted hand down the ultimate sentence.
So is Thailand beautiful? Yes. Is it safe? Yes. How careful do you need to be? Only as careful as you would in any British city at night. The problem is not safety or street sense, more a woefully under-trained inadequate police service. Coupled with a corrupt aging elitist criminal justice system and a mainstream media incapable of decent reporting. Unless pressure is put on the Thai government from Downing Street, then sadly I think very little will change, if anything at all.
Ken Roche is the author of the backpacking thriller
‘The Luke Steel Chronicles’.
ken1roche 