The ‘Thai Sang Greet’, a poky candle lit café on the outskirts of Bankok, Thailand
December 1967
I was there sitting around a square distorted kitchen table, one of several that decorated the dark dungeon like café, chewing the fat with a few fellow travelers
Bankok then was home to the King of Siam, the former name of Thailand, the most stable country in SE Asia.
To many in Western Europe, a far away mystical place not easy to get to unless you could afford the high price of air travel
The alternative, if you were an overland adventurer, to hitchhike and endure the long journey across the wide semi arid expanses of central and south Asia.
Bangkok then was a favorite destination of American GI’s, on leave from their military service in Vietnam.
They dominated the city, had all the money and drove up prices, especially in the better restaurants and eating houses in Bangkok at the time.
The more affordable restaurants, at least to suit the very shallow pockets of the few independent, pre-hippy travelers in SE Asia, were right on the outskirts of Bangkok. – Such was the Thai Sang Greet.
I remember it well. You entered the place through a dense hanging screen made from multi colored beads. They were quite common at the entrances to public places in SE Asia at that time. Perhaps they still are. I don’t know, I’ve never been back!!
The type of screen suited the climate because they provided ventilation in the hot steamy interior of some of those little cafes, but for the most part, they kept out the natural hot burning sunlight. A closing door would have created an oven. Not too practical in that part of the world.…..Only the most modern buildings had air conditioning.
It was just as well in a way that the light was suppressed because you didn’t really want to see too well. Not in the Thai Sang Greet.
All sorts of deals went on in that little cafe, but more especially you didn’t want to see the kitchen, which was all part of the single room venue where the owner and his wife cooked Fried Rice in all its variations, in a single great big Wok that sat permanently on a gas fired open hearth. Each variation came at a different price, and was always available, twenty four hours a day, depending on what tickled your palette on any particular day, not that you really wanted to see what you were eating, as long as it tasted okay and it always did to my less sensitive palette.
Sitting around that candle lit table, talking about the impending escalation of the war in Vietnam, one of my colleagues on that occasion had been an American Peace Corp worker. He had only just finished a two year assignment somewhere in a remote village in the north west corner of Thailand, not far from the Burmese border. He was intent on going back to America to become a Passive Resisterà and swore blind that he would not return as another GI.
Another was Swiss, who was intent on going to Vietnam, for no particular reason than simple curiosity. The other two were Australian and I don’t recall either of their backgrounds.
As we sat around the table talking that day, engrossed on hearing the latest theories on what might happen in Vietnam, our attention was suddenly broken by a flood of light from the café entrance.
Three men suddenly broke the suppressed light, as they passed through the screened entrance, and for a few moments we could see more clearly around the small café and a glance at some of the other patrons occupying the square kitchen tables, but as soon as they were through, the light again became suppressed and everyone once again, a silhouette.
The focus of our discussion was completely broken as our attention went to the three men, who were now standing at the entrance looking around as if expecting to see someone they were supposed to meet.
Then their attention seemed to focus on the five of us, seated around the candle lit table. To them we must have been no more than five human images in that dark silhouetted room.
Moments later the three of them were looking down at us from where they stood on both sides and in front of our table, peering at us with straight intimidating expressions, even though they weren’t particularly big men. People are generally quite small in that part of the world.
For a few moments neither of them said a word, as the five of us sat in silence, in anticipation of what would happen next.
The tallest of the three, who appeared to be the leader, broke the silence. In a very harsh, pidgin English accent, he asked, did either of us want a short term sales job?
This question was a bit of an anti-climax, especially after their dramatic entrance.
He went on to say that he would pay 200Baht for the evening, but didn’t elaborate on what it was he wanted one of us to sell.
It could have been anything, but probably not drugs or guns at that time in Thailand. This was before the drug and gun running era that became quite prominent in the latter part of the 60’s.
He emphasized that whoever accepted the job, would have to wear a white shirt, a tie and grey or dark blue trousers, none of which were part of my wardrobe or pack-sac. No jeans he said and definitely no shorts.
He couldn’t or wouldn’t elaborate on the job venue, only that it involved selling!!!… but selling what????
He struggled to say what he had already said, so I came to the conclusion that his English skills were simply not sufficient to explain more than what he had already told us.
We all looked at each other, a bit mesmerized by the offer. Neither of us where too flush at the time and 200baht was quite a lot of money in those days. To me it would have been helpful to finance a side trip I wanted to make whilst in that part of SE Asia, so the offer was worth considering.
There wasn’t much debate amongst us. Only two of us were remotely interested and so I told them I would think about it, that if I could find a white shirt, a suitable tie and a pair of dress pants I might take on the job.
They said they would return at 5.30 that evening to pick me up, even though I hadn’t committed.
I was lucky enough to rent all the clothing items and what was amazing, they actually fitted me. They belonged to an Australian man that was about my size who had been living in the little hotel where I had set up my Bangkok base. He had been in the country for several months on some independent business venture…..Rental cost for the night 5Baht!!
The men returned later that day, right on time, all dressed to the nines…in dark suits. They were just as unfriendly then, as they had been earlier in the day.
I squeezed into their car, a small Fiat and sat in the back, between a fourth man, who I gathered was a helper, and one of the dressed up men. Being much taller than all of them, I had no room at all to move my legs.
We drove for about an hour through the narrow streets of Bangkok, crossing all the canals over narrow bridges that abounded in the city at the time. Bangkok then was not un-like Venice, Italy.
We finally arrived at what appeared to be a country fair, at a sports stadium somewhere on the outskirts of the city. I had completely lost my sense of direction and didn’t have a clue where we were or where we had come from.
At the fair there were crowds of people milling around the the variety of attractions. Food stalls, performers doing tricks with live animals, magicians inserting swords down their throats .
Without much regard for the people, they drove through the crowd into the fair grounds to a tent that they must have set up near the main concourse earlier in the day. It was obvious that whatever they were going to sell, they were going to get maximum exposure.
It felt good to get out of the car after the long drive through the city. A relief after being cramped up in the back seat of the little Fiat, between two little Thai men……!!!
There were hundreds of woman and children in colorful Sarongs, amongst an array of other national garb that people wore in that part of the world.….. virtually no western dress.
Some of the men, as I remember wore shirtsleeve and tie and always dark trousers. Colorful dress amongst men in that era was not too common.
I was given no time to adjust to this strange environment before the tall main man directed me into the tent to show the merchandise. The product I was to sell ???. It was stacked in plain cardboard boxes, at least three dozen of them, all ready to be arranged outside, to expose to the crowds.
There was also a wooden platform next to the boxes and seeing this tied the whole scenario together.
I was to stand on that platform and publicly make a spectacle of myself selling whatever it was I was supposed to sell. I immediately broke out into a cold sweat!!!! Still at this point not having a clue what the product was.
He opened one of the bulk boxes and removed a long rectangular product box. It was soap !!!! bladdy soap!!!….Three tablets of it in each box.
On the box was printed — Deau Sandle Wood Soap, material from Paris, France. That was it !! This is what I was supposed to sell !!!!
What an anticlimax but what a smart move on their part, to have a western foreigner peddle their product. I was bound to attract hordes of people, if not to buy my soap, at least to gawk and listen to an unintelligible sound being emitted from the mouth of a strange looking foreigner standing on a wooden box.
The cold sweat began to subside as fear was replaced by utter confusion. What was I supposed to say standing on that box. My only instruction was………. you stand box – talk soap. We sell.
I stepped onto the wooden box, speechless in front of the gathering crowd. I had to say something, at the very least, to prove to myself that I had some credibility.
Slowly I began to make up short promotional phrases on Deau Sandle Wood Soap, Material from Paris, France, the most fantastic discovery in body deodorants, I said, used by all the famous stars in Europe, England and America, ……..then I drew a blank !!!!
The only stars I could think of where ones my parents talked about at the dinner table when I was a boy. It was my Mother, she must have jumped into my head sensing my predicament and was talking for me.
It was just as well the crowd were oblivious to what I was saying because the only stars I could think of were either dead or not far from there. Stars like Jane Mansfield, Margaret Hayward, Charlie Chaplin, the Three Stooges.
I declared this was the offer of a lifetime and all just for 20baht a box.
Deau Sandle Wood soap guaranteed to give you 24hour personnel freshness and so muchmore !!!!!
I survived the four hour ordeal in continual speech, my very first public appearance, making up the most ridiculous stories about soap.
The only time I toned down the rhetoric was at the sight of an occasional American GI accompanied by a Thai woman. During the rendition one of them came up close to me, listened to what I was saying, shook his head and walked off.
What an embarrassment!!
At the end of the night, all the soap sold, the crowd dispersed, I got down off the box actually feeling quite proud of myself but completely exhausted. My employers willingly paid me what they promised, including a massive bonus of three tablets of soap.
They drove me back, all the way through the city and dropped me off with a big grin of gratitude, back to the Thai Sung Greet.