I deeply appreciate Susan Kepner’s thoughtful review of Bombay Anna, and also the many follow-up comments, both positive and critical. Let me contribute to the conversation by saying, first, that there is now available a second, significantly corrected and revised, 2010 edition of Bombay Anna, published by Silkworm Books in Thailand. It is available in Southeast Asia from Silkworm Books and in bookstores, directly from me, and can also be ordered online through Asia Books at: http://www.asiabooks.co.th/Book_Search_Internet.aspx?keyword=Bombay%20Anna.
This new edition has benefitted from my own corrections (several at the suggestion of Thai scholars) and from new information various readers have generously sent to me, including genealogical materials from a descendant of the Wilkinson family. This second edition also includes a new, third, appendix, consisting of facsimiles of the letters from King Mongkut to Anna, referred to by Carol Dann in comment #8. The letters first appeared in print in 2004 in the Bangkok magazine, Sinlapa Watthanathan. I hope Bombay Anna, as the first full biography of Anna Leonowens, will be of use to future scholars of her life and work. Scholarship, after all, is at its best a communal affair.
Rather than offer here a long response to readers’ various comments about Bombay Anna, I will follow one small thread. I insist quite explicitly in the book that many of Anna’s written accounts of events (e.g., the story of Tuptim) in Siam are false, that Romance of the Harem is fictionalized, that the book’s title clearly implies this, and that some American contemporary reviews expressed their sense of this. Thus The Nation review called Romance of the Harem a collection of loosely bound tales that “deserve the name of romances.” The book Anna named a “Romance” had been carefully shepherded into publication by James Fields, the very man who had famously transformed Hawthorne’s career by publishing and brilliantly marketing The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables (the two books that articulated Hawthorne’s notion of “romance”). Hawthorne’s discussion of “romance” was well known, at least in the very small literary world of the American east coast. It seems ingenuous to assume that the reference, the association, was accidental. So yes, I do think Anna’s choice of the term, and its invocation of Hawthorne’s term, was a conscious one. I add that Fields was more than just an editor, to Hawthorne and then to Leonowens. Anna had very close personal as well as professional connections with James and Annie Fields, as had Hawthorne and his wife, Sophia. The strong friendships between Sophia and Annie, and between Anna and Annie, exemplify, it seems to me, the deep ties between women that so often shaped Anna’s life.
Don’t be like that. Only because Thailand was fascist in WW2 and after the war the same Mussolini loving fascist leader took power again doesn’t mean that they have anything to do with Nazism. Or Adolf Hitler. At all. And those red swastika flags and rings they sell at the markets are just funny paraphernalia. Everybody knows that.
Andrew @#15 :
Excellent comment.
Of course, in a fuedal society – “gifts” (with their expected reciprocal obligations) from further up the hierarchy are paramount.
Whereas under capitalism : everything is a commodity – and that is paramount.
Thailand now torn between these two – at every level.
Thanks for this nicely argued, concise take on the conjunction of regional access, land and capital in northern Laos. I particularly like how you’ve used the visual element in order to organize the ‘componentry’ of the assemblage.
On your point about ‘availability,’ incidentally, Lawrence Cohen has an argument about new organs trade in India in which he argues that immuno-suppressants have made Indian kidneys ‘bio-available’ for illegal and quasi-legal trade. I note first the under-utilized connections between medical and environmental social sciences, and wonder if it’s helpful to think about the ‘bio’-technical component of the emerging territoriality?
Second, for Cohen bio-availability is complemented by operability and exception. Operability refers to the primary political relation to the citizen-subject organ ‘donor’ (the converse for the political subject is ‘commitment’). Through what process is it possible for the state to operate on subjects? Exception is not Agamben’s problem of sovereignty, but rather a matter of ‘loving exceptions’ in which kidneys are donated to kin or quasi kin relations oftentimes under duress of intimate obligations, such as a longtime household servant ‘donating’ an organ for his or her master. As a matter of intimate commitment, then, I might donate a kidney for you, i.e. as an exception. All of a sudden organ ‘trade’ looks like something else altogether.
Is any of this suggestive for your work? For myself I often wonder how to characterize the relations established in Lao developmentalism that makes complex the commitments of Lao subjects. Your work seems to resonate with possibilities, as you nicely put it, opportunities and risks.
The Cohen piece is in Global Assemblages, edited by Ong and Collier.
Years later I went to university and studied anthropology. I learnt about the difference between a gift and a commodity. Grandma was gone by then.
So Andrew we must take it to logical conclusion.
In your mind it would have been OK if John Howard had been handing out crisp new banknotes at the gates of ANU a few years back. You would of course have taken one and said ‘No worries John, I’ll be there for you cobber’. Afterwards you would have met Nich down the pub and said ‘That silly b******* Howard just gave me this to vote for him, but I’m not going to. What a wheeze don’t you think mate?’
Can’t have one rule for the Thais and one for the Aussies can we?
Great article, and many thanks for sharing some of your research in a public forum. The article is a engaging insight into what I would call, for lack of a better term, the decentralization of foreign investment decisions to local militia groups. This happens all across Myanmar, not just with paramilitary/ceasefire groups, but also with tatmadaw battalions. As you had mentioned – each battalion is responsible for their own food sourcing and the regional commander is given a great deal of independence in their control over economic resources in the areas under control… Sidenote: it will be interesting to see how the role of the RC changes with the brand new institution of the Chief Minister under the new constitution.
Your article has a lot of great information, but something that is missing to me is numbers. In order to understand the scale and breadth of that this is a serious and growing problem, it would be very helpful to have some sort of numbers (number of farm acres changing to the chinese agribusiness model, or number of affected households) to understand the magnitude of the issue.
Les you are right about how degrading it is to take money. When I was a child my grandmother used to send me a birthday card with $5 in it. “How dare you, Grandma, I cried. What do you think I am. Do you think I sell my affections so easily. F#*@-off.”
Grandma pretended to be very hurt, but I knew that she was just ashamed that I had exposed her corruption.
Years later I went to university and studied anthropology. I learnt about the difference between a gift and a commodity. Grandma was gone by then.
While I agree with the “health warning” that Jim Taylor (c2) attaches to ABAC surveys, I don’t have a problem with NM introducing them. IMO, all data should be welcomed – it’s just that what we make of them has to come from consideration of the source and context.
“Although Thais in general feel their neighbors are susceptible to vote-buying, an overwhelming majority (84%) feel free to make their own choice. Even if a voter has accepted money or a gift from a party, just 7% would then feel a moral obligation to vote for that party. Our findings on vote-buying suggest that people perceive it as a bigger problem than it actually is, and that politicians who try to buy votes are probably wasting their money, unless the race is quite close.”
That seems to match Chang Noi’s view that I quoted earlier.
Well if not, then you must think it OK if you yourself took the money, or if Andrew and Nich took money in Canberra. If you don’t think this, then surely we are looking at ‘double standards’.
Now as for pork-barrel politics also being vote buying, you are of course correct. In the West elections are often won on the value a politician may add to the voter’s wallet. It’s not right of course, but it happens. We hope that candidates and parties of the left can appeal to a longer term, more principled view, but often they don’t succeed. I won’t give examples otherwise the thread will flooded with outraged right wing American, Australian and British people;-)
Does this constitution make it hard for politician to corrupt?
Well perhaps ‘harder’ rather than ‘hard’. It must have some affect as two political parties have been wound up and MPs have had to resign (hence the last by-elections.) The perfect constitution in my view would have corrupt politicians going to prison as has happened recently in the UK.
To backtrack slightly – I do suspect that winding up political parties is not the best answer and that punishment against individuals is a better answer.
Very handy comment. I do wonder if anyone out there can shed light on the village, tambon, district or provincial level of things. If somebody has attended a relevant meeting, rally or what have you then New Mandala would be very keen to publish a report. Would be useful to know how this is being rolled out across the country from the local perspective…
On January 26, 2011, the government department of the ministry of the interior informed the public via an advertisement in Matichon that it had been pursuing a countrywide project for the recruitment of “monarchy protection volunteers” (asasamak pokpong sathaban).
According to this ad, four million people had already joined this project. This would mean that each of Thailand’s about 75,000 villages had 53 such volunteers. Obviously, one would like to know more about how this project proceeded in practice in the provinces, districts, tambons, and villages. Certainly, the advertisement gave the impression that a major propaganda effort had been under way, with the potential to narrow the people’s political space at the local level, especially if they happened to belong to the opposing camp, the UDD (since the ministry “belongs” to the Bhumjaithai party, the volunteers would also come in handy at election time).
The advertisement also informed readers that Thailand had always been a united, secure, and peaceful country, “because we have had stable principal state institutions, namely nation, religion, and monarchy.” However, democratization had made the country clearly be divided into different camps of thought. Besides protecting the monarchy, a vital task of the volunteers therefore was to reestablish unity.
I think you’ve been asking the same question to me for the last, what, 2 years? and I always gave you the same answer. First corruption is still pretty much flourish after Thaksin left, look at GT200, the blimp, and other projects such as the “Por Pieng Village” (so corrupt that Abhisit himself has to push the break, but of cause no one go to jail for that). Does this constitution make it hard for politician to corrupt? you can’t be serious if the answer is “yes”.
Furthermore, about vote buying, as I already explained is not easy like the old day. If you want vote buying to work first of you have to be able to check if the guy who you pay the money to really vote for you. In the past, vote buying works because election was hold at the village head’s house and so on so the village head was able to check who is voting for who, now the election is hold at the district center control by people from the central government in stead of village leader. People are not that stupid that they just do whatever you want them to do for a measly 500 baht.
Is that an insult to the farmers? of cause not, I said that because its the insult to the people who still believe the traditional vote buying still works the same way it did 30 years ago. Now vote buying is about who is selling the most suitable policy.
An interesting report on one military man’s view on the clash of the 10th. April 2010 in the Bangkok Post. Now he seems to have a different idea of what sort of grenades killed Romklao.
Certain surveys one could almost immediately be ignored as dubious and unworthwhile. And so with the Meisburger (#10) alluded Thai survey on “vote-buying behavior and found that while 58% thought other people might be influenced by money or gifts; just 7% felt they personally were under any moral obligation to vote for a candidate or party that provided money or gifts.”
People who sell their votes are most certainly liars and should not be expected to respond honestly to polls pertaining to their ‘illegal/immoral’ behavior. Expect these people to deny (a) that they sell their votes, or, (b) acknowledge the practice but adamantly say’they personally were under no moral obligation to vote for a candidate or party that provided money or gifts’.
Rampant corruption begins from rampant vote-buying and vote-selling. It is ridiculous to find any justification for vote selling. And speaking of Constitutional Reform – – is there any country in the world where selling one’s vote is cherished and explicitly allowed and not illegal? Australia perhaps?
BTW SteveCM(#6) lies with his “Given that all (Thai) parties hand out cash to voters . . .” Recall Phalang Dharma Party during ‘Chamlong fever’ and Chamlong and his party won by a landslide in a Bangkok gubernatorial election without buying a single vote.
To call him an English-speaking Thai is very flattering, as His English is pretty rudimentary. By that
standard I must be a Thai-speaking
Englishman; I would be reluctant to call myself that!
The archetypal bourgeois elector invariably sells his vote. He votes for the representative who is most likely to maximise his total assets in the long term. He merely has a longer-term vision of his own pecuniary self-interest than a poor, hungry man who takes a bribe.
A nervous-looking Thai gentleman was sitting a couple of rows in front of me on a business class flight from Bangkok to Sydney. Before sitting down he opened his bag and took out an impressive arsenal of assorted buddhist trinkets, floral garnishes and amulets which he then placed lovingly over his armrest for the duration of the flight.
He then sat back to endure a variety of good-humoured taunts from the boozed-up Aussie contingent, such as: “We’re all going dooooooo-ooowwwnnn!”
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Review of Bombay Anna
I deeply appreciate Susan Kepner’s thoughtful review of Bombay Anna, and also the many follow-up comments, both positive and critical. Let me contribute to the conversation by saying, first, that there is now available a second, significantly corrected and revised, 2010 edition of Bombay Anna, published by Silkworm Books in Thailand. It is available in Southeast Asia from Silkworm Books and in bookstores, directly from me, and can also be ordered online through Asia Books at:
http://www.asiabooks.co.th/Book_Search_Internet.aspx?keyword=Bombay%20Anna.
This new edition has benefitted from my own corrections (several at the suggestion of Thai scholars) and from new information various readers have generously sent to me, including genealogical materials from a descendant of the Wilkinson family. This second edition also includes a new, third, appendix, consisting of facsimiles of the letters from King Mongkut to Anna, referred to by Carol Dann in comment #8. The letters first appeared in print in 2004 in the Bangkok magazine, Sinlapa Watthanathan. I hope Bombay Anna, as the first full biography of Anna Leonowens, will be of use to future scholars of her life and work. Scholarship, after all, is at its best a communal affair.
Rather than offer here a long response to readers’ various comments about Bombay Anna, I will follow one small thread. I insist quite explicitly in the book that many of Anna’s written accounts of events (e.g., the story of Tuptim) in Siam are false, that Romance of the Harem is fictionalized, that the book’s title clearly implies this, and that some American contemporary reviews expressed their sense of this. Thus The Nation review called Romance of the Harem a collection of loosely bound tales that “deserve the name of romances.” The book Anna named a “Romance” had been carefully shepherded into publication by James Fields, the very man who had famously transformed Hawthorne’s career by publishing and brilliantly marketing The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables (the two books that articulated Hawthorne’s notion of “romance”). Hawthorne’s discussion of “romance” was well known, at least in the very small literary world of the American east coast. It seems ingenuous to assume that the reference, the association, was accidental. So yes, I do think Anna’s choice of the term, and its invocation of Hawthorne’s term, was a conscious one. I add that Fields was more than just an editor, to Hawthorne and then to Leonowens. Anna had very close personal as well as professional connections with James and Annie Fields, as had Hawthorne and his wife, Sophia. The strong friendships between Sophia and Annie, and between Anna and Annie, exemplify, it seems to me, the deep ties between women that so often shaped Anna’s life.
Foo Foo and the international press
Don’t be like that. Only because Thailand was fascist in WW2 and after the war the same Mussolini loving fascist leader took power again doesn’t mean that they have anything to do with Nazism. Or Adolf Hitler. At all. And those red swastika flags and rings they sell at the markets are just funny paraphernalia. Everybody knows that.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Andrew @#15 :
Excellent comment.
Of course, in a fuedal society – “gifts” (with their expected reciprocal obligations) from further up the hierarchy are paramount.
Whereas under capitalism : everything is a commodity – and that is paramount.
Thailand now torn between these two – at every level.
Territorial affairs: The production of available land in Laos’ Northern Economic Corridor
Hi Mike,
Thanks for this nicely argued, concise take on the conjunction of regional access, land and capital in northern Laos. I particularly like how you’ve used the visual element in order to organize the ‘componentry’ of the assemblage.
On your point about ‘availability,’ incidentally, Lawrence Cohen has an argument about new organs trade in India in which he argues that immuno-suppressants have made Indian kidneys ‘bio-available’ for illegal and quasi-legal trade. I note first the under-utilized connections between medical and environmental social sciences, and wonder if it’s helpful to think about the ‘bio’-technical component of the emerging territoriality?
Second, for Cohen bio-availability is complemented by operability and exception. Operability refers to the primary political relation to the citizen-subject organ ‘donor’ (the converse for the political subject is ‘commitment’). Through what process is it possible for the state to operate on subjects? Exception is not Agamben’s problem of sovereignty, but rather a matter of ‘loving exceptions’ in which kidneys are donated to kin or quasi kin relations oftentimes under duress of intimate obligations, such as a longtime household servant ‘donating’ an organ for his or her master. As a matter of intimate commitment, then, I might donate a kidney for you, i.e. as an exception. All of a sudden organ ‘trade’ looks like something else altogether.
Is any of this suggestive for your work? For myself I often wonder how to characterize the relations established in Lao developmentalism that makes complex the commitments of Lao subjects. Your work seems to resonate with possibilities, as you nicely put it, opportunities and risks.
The Cohen piece is in Global Assemblages, edited by Ong and Collier.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Andrew Walker – 16
Years later I went to university and studied anthropology. I learnt about the difference between a gift and a commodity. Grandma was gone by then.
So Andrew we must take it to logical conclusion.
In your mind it would have been OK if John Howard had been handing out crisp new banknotes at the gates of ANU a few years back. You would of course have taken one and said ‘No worries John, I’ll be there for you cobber’. Afterwards you would have met Nich down the pub and said ‘That silly b******* Howard just gave me this to vote for him, but I’m not going to. What a wheeze don’t you think mate?’
Can’t have one rule for the Thais and one for the Aussies can we?
Rubber planting and military-state making: military-private partnerships in northern Burma
Hi Kevin,
Great article, and many thanks for sharing some of your research in a public forum. The article is a engaging insight into what I would call, for lack of a better term, the decentralization of foreign investment decisions to local militia groups. This happens all across Myanmar, not just with paramilitary/ceasefire groups, but also with tatmadaw battalions. As you had mentioned – each battalion is responsible for their own food sourcing and the regional commander is given a great deal of independence in their control over economic resources in the areas under control… Sidenote: it will be interesting to see how the role of the RC changes with the brand new institution of the Chief Minister under the new constitution.
Your article has a lot of great information, but something that is missing to me is numbers. In order to understand the scale and breadth of that this is a serious and growing problem, it would be very helpful to have some sort of numbers (number of farm acres changing to the chinese agribusiness model, or number of affected households) to understand the magnitude of the issue.
Thanks,
DG
Malaysia’s Operasi Lalang: Who is telling the truth?
More tall tales from Malaysia’s Machiavelli.
He actually wanted to end the Internal Securities Act (ISA) but was prevented by the Police.
Fact or fiction? Read here.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Les you are right about how degrading it is to take money. When I was a child my grandmother used to send me a birthday card with $5 in it. “How dare you, Grandma, I cried. What do you think I am. Do you think I sell my affections so easily. F#*@-off.”
Grandma pretended to be very hurt, but I knew that she was just ashamed that I had exposed her corruption.
Years later I went to university and studied anthropology. I learnt about the difference between a gift and a commodity. Grandma was gone by then.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
While I agree with the “health warning” that Jim Taylor (c2) attaches to ABAC surveys, I don’t have a problem with NM introducing them. IMO, all data should be welcomed – it’s just that what we make of them has to come from consideration of the source and context.
Here’s a link for the AF survey that Tim Meisburger (c11) mentions: http://asiafoundation.org/resources/pdfs/ThaiConstitutionReportenglish.pdf
The figures he cites carry this notation:
“Although Thais in general feel their neighbors are susceptible to vote-buying, an overwhelming majority (84%) feel free to make their own choice. Even if a voter has accepted money or a gift from a party, just 7% would then feel a moral obligation to vote for that party. Our findings on vote-buying suggest that people perceive it as a bigger problem than it actually is, and that politicians who try to buy votes are probably wasting their money, unless the race is quite close.”
That seems to match Chang Noi’s view that I quoted earlier.
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Tarrin – 13
Is that an insult to the farmers?
Well if not, then you must think it OK if you yourself took the money, or if Andrew and Nich took money in Canberra. If you don’t think this, then surely we are looking at ‘double standards’.
Now as for pork-barrel politics also being vote buying, you are of course correct. In the West elections are often won on the value a politician may add to the voter’s wallet. It’s not right of course, but it happens. We hope that candidates and parties of the left can appeal to a longer term, more principled view, but often they don’t succeed. I won’t give examples otherwise the thread will flooded with outraged right wing American, Australian and British people;-)
Does this constitution make it hard for politician to corrupt?
Well perhaps ‘harder’ rather than ‘hard’. It must have some affect as two political parties have been wound up and MPs have had to resign (hence the last by-elections.) The perfect constitution in my view would have corrupt politicians going to prison as has happened recently in the UK.
To backtrack slightly – I do suspect that winding up political parties is not the best answer and that punishment against individuals is a better answer.
Volunteering to protect Thailand’s “institution”
Thanks Michael,
Very handy comment. I do wonder if anyone out there can shed light on the village, tambon, district or provincial level of things. If somebody has attended a relevant meeting, rally or what have you then New Mandala would be very keen to publish a report. Would be useful to know how this is being rolled out across the country from the local perspective…
Best wishes to all,
Nich
A question for Thaksin about Twitter
Thanks Chris B,
I take the point — he isn’t always that fluent. And then, of course, there is always this document to ponder.
Best wishes to all,
Nich
Volunteering to protect Thailand’s “institution”
On January 26, 2011, the government department of the ministry of the interior informed the public via an advertisement in Matichon that it had been pursuing a countrywide project for the recruitment of “monarchy protection volunteers” (asasamak pokpong sathaban).
According to this ad, four million people had already joined this project. This would mean that each of Thailand’s about 75,000 villages had 53 such volunteers. Obviously, one would like to know more about how this project proceeded in practice in the provinces, districts, tambons, and villages. Certainly, the advertisement gave the impression that a major propaganda effort had been under way, with the potential to narrow the people’s political space at the local level, especially if they happened to belong to the opposing camp, the UDD (since the ministry “belongs” to the Bhumjaithai party, the volunteers would also come in handy at election time).
The advertisement also informed readers that Thailand had always been a united, secure, and peaceful country, “because we have had stable principal state institutions, namely nation, religion, and monarchy.” However, democratization had made the country clearly be divided into different camps of thought. Besides protecting the monarchy, a vital task of the volunteers therefore was to reestablish unity.
Rocking and rapping the Karen diaspora
Karen people gorw up….
we will bit the burmese “Na Ah Pa” soon……
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
LesAbbey – 7
I think you’ve been asking the same question to me for the last, what, 2 years? and I always gave you the same answer. First corruption is still pretty much flourish after Thaksin left, look at GT200, the blimp, and other projects such as the “Por Pieng Village” (so corrupt that Abhisit himself has to push the break, but of cause no one go to jail for that). Does this constitution make it hard for politician to corrupt? you can’t be serious if the answer is “yes”.
Furthermore, about vote buying, as I already explained is not easy like the old day. If you want vote buying to work first of you have to be able to check if the guy who you pay the money to really vote for you. In the past, vote buying works because election was hold at the village head’s house and so on so the village head was able to check who is voting for who, now the election is hold at the district center control by people from the central government in stead of village leader. People are not that stupid that they just do whatever you want them to do for a measly 500 baht.
Is that an insult to the farmers? of cause not, I said that because its the insult to the people who still believe the traditional vote buying still works the same way it did 30 years ago. Now vote buying is about who is selling the most suitable policy.
Understanding Bangkok’s bloody April-May 2010
An interesting report on one military man’s view on the clash of the 10th. April 2010 in the Bangkok Post. Now he seems to have a different idea of what sort of grenades killed Romklao.
http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/local/222004/we-were-overwhelmed-says-colonel
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
Certain surveys one could almost immediately be ignored as dubious and unworthwhile. And so with the Meisburger (#10) alluded Thai survey on “vote-buying behavior and found that while 58% thought other people might be influenced by money or gifts; just 7% felt they personally were under any moral obligation to vote for a candidate or party that provided money or gifts.”
People who sell their votes are most certainly liars and should not be expected to respond honestly to polls pertaining to their ‘illegal/immoral’ behavior. Expect these people to deny (a) that they sell their votes, or, (b) acknowledge the practice but adamantly say’they personally were under no moral obligation to vote for a candidate or party that provided money or gifts’.
Rampant corruption begins from rampant vote-buying and vote-selling. It is ridiculous to find any justification for vote selling. And speaking of Constitutional Reform – – is there any country in the world where selling one’s vote is cherished and explicitly allowed and not illegal? Australia perhaps?
BTW SteveCM(#6) lies with his “Given that all (Thai) parties hand out cash to voters . . .” Recall Phalang Dharma Party during ‘Chamlong fever’ and Chamlong and his party won by a landslide in a Bangkok gubernatorial election without buying a single vote.
A question for Thaksin about Twitter
To call him an English-speaking Thai is very flattering, as His English is pretty rudimentary. By that
standard I must be a Thai-speaking
Englishman; I would be reluctant to call myself that!
Preparing the vote-buying bogeyman
The archetypal bourgeois elector invariably sells his vote. He votes for the representative who is most likely to maximise his total assets in the long term. He merely has a longer-term vision of his own pecuniary self-interest than a poor, hungry man who takes a bribe.
Khmer voodoo at the frontlines
A nervous-looking Thai gentleman was sitting a couple of rows in front of me on a business class flight from Bangkok to Sydney. Before sitting down he opened his bag and took out an impressive arsenal of assorted buddhist trinkets, floral garnishes and amulets which he then placed lovingly over his armrest for the duration of the flight.
He then sat back to endure a variety of good-humoured taunts from the boozed-up Aussie contingent, such as: “We’re all going dooooooo-ooowwwnnn!”