Thai Christmas Carols
The Post Whingebag column of the Bangkok Post has recently contained the almost obligatory pre-Christmas brouhaha about the noises coming out of department store sound systems. And they do have a point.
We have to disregard the idealists who expect commerce to occur in silence, ignoring the fact that noise, for most Thais, is a necessity of existence. Let me instead try to placate those who object to (pseudo-)Christian carols being used to celebrate what is in fact a triumph of Oriental capitalism. The cultural impropriety argument.
Songs, loud, repetitive and derivative, appear to be an economic imperative. So what we need is just different songs, something more appropriate to contemporary Thai capitalism. And since Thailand is culturally very comfortable with stealing farang music, we have no need to write new melodies.
We just need to write new, more culturally appropriate lyrics for the tunes we already have. And since the cachet of English is de rigueur in upper-end retailing in Thailand (name me a department store with a Thai name), these lyrics should be in English.
I here offer a few examples. And I invite the plagiarists of Thailand to add to the corpus.
(to the tune of ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’)
Oh little town of Buriram,
How still we see thee lie.
Above thy bribed complicity
Newin Chidchob rides high.
Yet in his dark dreams shineth
The everlasting fear.
Despite his guiles and all his wiles,
He may not make Premier.
(to the tune of ‘O Come All Ye Faithful’)
O come all consumers,
Spend in exultation,
Spend till your credit cards
Are a-all maxed out.
Glory to Mammon, in the highest.
O come let us go shopping.
O come let us go shopping.
O come let us go sho-opping,
Ti-ill we drop.
(to the tune of ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’)
Hark! the exile Thaksin sing,
Phuea Thai is just the thing.
Keep the faith and win the polls.
Bring him back and save his gold.
Joyful will the nation rise
When he frees Cambodian spies.
With th’angelic voice proclaim
‘He will be PM again’
Lo! there’s Thaksin in the pink,
Glory to the video link.
(to the tune of ‘God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen’)
God rest ye merry PAD,
Let nothing you dismay.
Remember you can always mob
If things don’t go your way.
With party leader Sondhi Lim,
You’ll always win the day.
With a threat to shut down Suvarnabhumi,
Suvarnabhumi,
With a threa-eat to shut down Suvarnabhumi.
(to the tune of ‘Deck the Halls’)
Deck the streets with reds and yellows,
Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la.
’Tis the time to club your fellows,
Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la.
Don we now our riot gear,
Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la.
And cause mayhem far and near,
Fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la.
(to the tune of ‘O Tannenbaum’)
O Abhisit, O Abhisit
How do you get away with it?
With choir-boy grin and PR spin,
You somehow always seem to win.
Your Foreign Minister’s a joke
And Newin soon will go for broke.
Your party’s going to flop, I fear,
You’ll barely last another year.
(to the tune of ‘Once on Royal David’s City’)
Once in loyal Pa Prem’s city
Stood a house on Soi 32,
Where the Privy Council met in secret,
Making plans to have another coup.
Who was there, the state betraying?
No one knows. Pa Prem’s not saying.
(to the tune of ‘Santa Claus is Coming to Town’)
Oh you’d better not march,
You’d better not squat,
’Cause if you’re a Red,
You’re gonna get shot.
ISA is coming to town.
They’ve been making a list.
They know what you think.
And if you think wrong,
Then you’re in the clink.
ISA is coming to town.
They know who’s DAAD.
They know who’s UDD.
They know who’s wearing red or pink,
So wear pink and you’ll stay free.
Oh, you’d better not whinge,
You’d better not moan,
Keep your thoughts to yourself,
So they’ll leave you alone.
ISA is coming to town.
About author: Bangkokians with long memories may remember his irreverent column in The Nation in the 1980's. During his period of enforced silence since then, he was variously reported as participating in a 999-day meditation retreat in a hill-top monastery in Mae Hong Son (he gave up after 998 days), as the Special Rapporteur for Satire of the UN High Commission for Human Rights, and as understudy for the male lead in the long-running ‘Pussies -not the Musical' at the Neasden International Palladium (formerly Park Lane Empire).
Comments
:) nice one HG
:) nice one HG
Let me instead try to placate
Let me instead try to placate those who object to (pseudo-)Christian carols being used to celebrate what is in fact a triumph of Oriental capitalism.
Christmas has long since descended to the level of a commercial, pseudo-Christian feast in the Occident as well. In fact the Oriental capitalists have merely done away with "sectarian inessentials" thereby broadening its appeal. Your tunes have a Thai flavor to them, but they could be respun in any Xtian country as well.
O come all consumers is a good example of a World-Beat version.
Just imagining the din you describe in Bangkok, or New York, makes me happy I live in Chiangrai.
" name me a department store
" name me a department store with a Thai name": Pataa, Pingklao; Senn - trunn; Lobbin-sonn ! (Is there a prize?)
Complaints of the season 2 U, H.G. Thanks for all the great columns in the noughties!
There is no prize and you
There is no prize and you wouldn't have won anyway. It says 'upper-end'. Pata? And I don't think it's Thai anyway. But thanks for the complaints of the season.
Gaysorn?
Gaysorn?
Thanks HG, for warming me up
Thanks HG, for warming me up for the upcoming holiday season.
I can spare you some Mae Khong and 'som taam' which I think(after finishing your article) are more appropriate for 'Thai style' celebration. cheer!
Readers should be warned that : regularly reading HG's 'Alien Thoughts' can lead to addiction. : )
Uuummm Prachatai English site
Uuummm Prachatai English site seems to have relapsed back to a creepy mutural admiration salon. :) HG also sounds conceited. All right. Go on.
'Tis the season... to spend
'Tis the season... to spend like a fool?
To love your neighbor?
At least to turn off your TV and stop mindlessly acquiescing to murder? to mayhem? to the willful and "profitable", to the vicious and violent suppression of human rights?
A man in Nashville, Tennessee challenges us Americans to imagine the day.
Imagine The Day
By Jon Taylor
Imagine the crowd
In a football stadium remaining seated
On the announcement of the singing
Of the national anthem
The notes dying
On the lips of the singer
The bewildered staring of the coaches
And rushing of the teams off the field
The mid-sentence cutoff
From the broadcast booth
To a string of commercials
Then crime show and sitcom reruns
The M-16s dropping from the hands
Of soldiers in forty overseas countries
The president fleeing in his helicopter
Imagine the day
Chotisak Onsoong helps all Thais, all of us in Thailand, to imagine the same day, both more and less, via his direct action.
HG, re. Pata: some years ago
HG, re. Pata: some years ago when I was living in Pingklao, I was told that Pata's owner was a Chinese immigrant, who started with box, then a barrow in the street, graduated to a market stall, etc. That makes it as "Thai" as any business here. One could argue that even a 7/11 is "upper-end" to the majority of Thai people (i.e. outside of Bangkok).
For my prize, I would like 2 lifetime contracts with the most 'missionary' of NGOs, to be awarded to plaadip's daughters, & a ban on 'smilies'.
Very cleverly done, HG. I
Very cleverly done, HG. I would like to hear these sometime over the speakers at the mall!