Bangkok!
What a place! I don't think I was prepared for how big and populous Bangkok is. I arrive around 11:30 am on June 30th at the Suvarnabhumi Airport. The girl sitting next to me, who's perhaps nine-years-old, is singing the name of the airport. She's extremely excited as this is the first time she's traveling to another country. She holds her stuffed Panda as she talks to me in English, which is quite good. She tells me she has learned it in her school in Vietnam.
I stand in a long line to clear it with immigration. A guard screens the people and their passport and upon seeing mine asks if I have seen the doctor. I am tired, thirsty and probably pale, but her interest in my health takes me by surprise. I tell her no, I have not seen the doctor and feel no need to see one anytime soon, thank you very much. She explains that, since I'm Brazilian, it is mandatory that I check with the airport doctor. So, there's an old, self-deprecating saying that goes something like "in an attempt to avoid taking one step, Brazilians take two". My nationality had spared me from having to get a visa to Thailand, right? But I do need to see a doctor when I arrive in Bangkok, because of my nationality. Fine. I walk the mile to the doctor's booth, which I had previously seen and wondered about the poor person who has to see a doctor right at the airport. I fill out a questionnaire with personal data and all the expected questions; have I felt dizzy in the last two weeks? Have I coughed in the last two weeks? Have I had a fever? I answer truthfully that I have experienced none of the above and take the form of the nice young lady sitting beside the serious-looking doctor behind the glass-booth. I wonder whether this was the job he had in mind when he graduated from medical school. Not a bad job, mind you, but not a diagnostician at Princeton–Plainsboro either. They checked my forehead for fever. Now, that was nothing like your mom checks for fever, with a cool hand on a warm forehead. This was done with a laser pointed at my forehead, without ever touching me. Actually, based on the bottles of hand sanitizers they have laying around they might be a little germophobic. I almost ask them if there's something they want to talk about. Then again, maybe they need the precaution. Most people in Southeast Asia seem exceedingly concerned about airborne germs, hence the facial masks, but I'd opt for better sanitation. That's all my visit to the doctor entails. Once I'm cleared I go back to the huge line, but as soon as I tell the guard I've been to the doctor she rushes me to priority clearing. That's when I see, for the first time, the warning about disrespecting the Buddha. According to the sign, in Thailand, it's a serious crime to disrespect the Buddha, and that includes any of the following: wearing a T-shirt with the Buddha's picture on it, wearing jewelry with the image, having tattoos of the holy man, or placing his statue on the ground. This is the first time I see such sign, but not the last. Actually, I'd see the message over and over again in my stay in Bangkok. I don't see anything about any other type of crime until the next day and that's just a reminder to be careful with pickpocketers. As I understand their legal stance, if you disrespect the Buddha you will face serious consequences for your crime. But if a crime is committed against you, we're sorry about that. Don't say you weren't warned. Not that I'd want, in any way, to disrespect the Buddha or Thailand's official religion. But sometimes, with another culture, it's hard to know what is considered disrespect. I also agree with their point of view; Buddha is not decoration, is the father of the religion of 94% Thais, which means that the King probably didn't have any opposition implementing this law. At any rate, I am glad for the warning.
Another quick takeaway about this is that policies like these might actually have something to do with the public safety I enjoy so much in Southeast Asia. I'm talking here about the Broken Windows theory (Wilson and Kelling, 1982), which associates disorder and incivility with community crime. By reinforcing respect and civility for their religion, Thailand government might be reminding its citizens and visitors of the importance of these same qualities in their daily interactions. I, for one, appreciate the respect and even reverence with which I was treated while there.
