***
Sometime in 1968 I arrived in Sattaheep, which is right on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand. There was an American camp here too; I think it was called Camp Vayama. I stayed for two months, playing at the Ponderosa restaurant-bar. The owner also owned the local bath house where I spent many a relaxing afternoon. I was joining another old pal, this time from Saint Joan of Arc, who played guitar in a group with two bad-tempered Chinese girls.
They looked comical onstage, standing side by side, because one was very fat and the other one was skinny. I didn’t get a chance to get to know them very well as they left the band abruptly after a fight with one of the guitarists. However, I made a lot of other friends over the two months. I learned how to bowl and play cards, in that order. It’s true what they say about gambling—when you win money, you want to play again to win more, and when you lose money, you want to play again to get it back. The money wasn’t that great, though I was living cheaply enough, and my accommodation was just a small room provided by the bar. My meals were free, but not very appetising. I was caught up quite happily in my own life, barely registering the world outside my life of gigs, girls and gambling, but there were constant reminders that the world was still turning. At night I could hear the B52 planes taking off and then hear them return in the early hours of the morning, their deadly mission completed.
My father came to see me at Sattaheep. It was a surprise visit so it was lucky that I decided to bus into the city centre. I saw him, from the window, with Oud my older brother and Seena, my half-sister, from one of my father’s previous marriages. They came to the Ponderosa to have dinner and watch me play. I hadn’t seen my siblings in quite a while and I was delighted to catch up with them, and show off my musical talent and my many new friends.
When our gig ended with the Ponderosa I went home to Bangkok where I hung out with old friends and practised my guitar a lot. Then, a DJ I knew, Surachai Thomdirat, rang to ask me if I would go to play in Ta Khli, in the province of Nakhon Sawan, which is north-west of Bangkok, a few hours past Lop Buri. It was quite a large, busy city, very modernized compared to most places I had been. I jumped at the opportunity. The following day I left Bangkok on the 1pm train and arrived in Ta Khli four hours later. There was a big American camp there, so there were plenty of farangs on the streets and everyone was well dressed with plenty of style. There was also lots of traffic, buses, trucks as well as the more humble tricycles. To my delight there were plenty of bars and bath houses that lined both sides of the streets, and there were no less than two movie theatres, Chalermwattana and Sripornsawan, though they sadly lacked air-conditioning. There was also a large fresh food market with plenty of variety; I couldn’t believe the many different types of food on offer. Up on the mountain in Ta Khli, the US Army Airforce Radar and Communication Site was clearly visible. This base was very strict compared to the others and the guards were really uptight about who could enter or leave the camp. I later found out that this was to do with the F111 which was supposed to be top secret, but obviously wasn’t. The F111 was meant to be the absolutely most up to date war plane with the highest of high-tech equipment, and it was stationed there. Despite all this hoo-hah, however, I do know that not all of those fantastic planes made it back to the base.
I played in three different bars there over a period of six months. I was in a group that included another school friend of mine, Odd. Quite possibly he was the reason I got the job. The first bar we played at was the American Bar, run by a large Thai woman. She hired us for two months, and as was usual, provided us with accommodation, letting us have an old house behind the bar. It’s a house that I will never forget. I moved my stuff into a room on the second floor while Odd bagged a room on the ground floor. After a couple of nights he began to complain that the house was haunted. I wasn’t sure if I believed him or not but when his complaints got louder I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and spend the night in his room—he wasn’t making it up. I awoke at some stage in the night when my bed started to shake violently for no reason, and then, to my horror, I saw the outline of a woman sitting silently on a chair against the wall. I couldn’t really see her face as she was staring down into her lap, but she had long dark hair. She never looked or spoke to me, which is a good thing because I had lost my tongue, and couldn’t even scream. After a couple of seconds she vanished, and so did I, never to spend another night in that room.
We did very well in Ta Khli and proved very popular. We included acrobats and silly stunts as part of our act, and a lot of our songs were heavily laden with a great drum beat. I was now able to play bass guitar, which improved my confidence as a musician. Thailand’s Elvis replaced us when we left for our next post, the Sorry About That Bar, where we played for three months. This was a big place that used to be a roller-skating rink, and was run by a kindly Chinese man, who was from my home town in Bangkok. The bar was in the centre of the hall so there was plenty of room for the popular floor shows. Odd left the band around this time and was replaced by Tui, a married man from Nonthaburi. We must have been decent enough because I remember someone recording us rehearsing one day. We also played at the Sripornsawan theatre, with other local bands, thanks to DJ Surachai, who had joined us by then, but the money wasn’t great.
When our three months were up we got a booking at the Black Jack bar, but this turned out to be a very quick visit. The owner wasn’t very prompt at paying us so our managers, Maitri and Tawil Mitranon, decided that we should move on to Udorn. We sneaked out in the dead of night, which is not something I’m necessarily proud of. So I was back in Udorn again the following afternoon. The bar that booked us, the Las Vegas, was still being renovated. It looked more like a nightclub, and had a big dance floor. We heard that a farang had been shot dead here, under a previous owner, which thrilled us a little.
Things started off well. We all shared a house which faced onto a pawn shop. There were quite of few of us now, three guitarists, one drummer, Thep the saxophonist, a Filipino called Philip on trumpet, two female singers, and Tui who also sang, and who was the eldest son of the manager. We played there for a couple of months but were gradually paid less and less. However I always enjoyed Udorn. For one thing I got plenty of opportunity to practice my bowling. The two movie theatres, Chalermwattanarama and Vistarama, both had really good bowling facilities on their second floors, with plenty of lanes.
I was lucky enough to be able to visit the American camp because the Shang Gri-la bar owner, where we next played, was the ‘wife’ of the sergeant who ran the officer’s club in the base. She put in a good word for us and we were invited to play at the base on Phupan Mountain. My father was visiting me at that time and was more than delighted to accompany us. Strippers were also organised for the show and we all bundled ourselves and our equipment into a large bus to make the treacherous journey on a dusty winding road that seemed mostly under repair. The three sides of the mountain were nearly vertical and I did not enjoy the drive. Neither did the strippers, and there was a lot of praying interjected with screams and hysterical giggling. However, my father absolutely loved it and kept trying to make me look out the window so that I could appreciate the heights we were climbing. When we reached the mountain top there was a helicopter parked outside the camp’s entrance, and there was plenty of barbed wire. A pilot I knew told me that there were three security barriers; barbed wire, and beyond that an electric fence, and lastly a fence that was alarmed to the hilt. I saw lots of machine guns almost covered in their bunkers by gunny bags. Because of the height of the mountain it was quite misty, but you could not fail to appreciate the size of this military base.
We had also played at the military base in Udorn when we played at the non-commissioned officer’s (NCO) bar. It was huge, with bomb shelters, bowling alleys and cinemas, and was completely staffed by Thai people, house-keepers, gardeners, cooks and waitresses. There was also a Laundromat staffed by Thai women. Oil was obviously somethi
ng that they had in abundance; I remember my surprise at seeing three gardeners using three lawn mowers to do one small field. There was even a row of slot machines in the clubhouse. I felt really at home in my Elvis-style get up.
The Americans on the mountain were mostly technicians and they ran the place like no other camp I knew. For one thing they had a pet, a young brown bear, and they seemed to live on a ridiculous amount of eggs. Also the men didn’t wear uniforms. This military base was not what it appeared and I learned much later about its tragic end. It was actually a secret Air Force radar facility sitting on one of the highest mountains around. There were links with bases in Laos, but as Laos was a neutral country, no foreign troops were meant to be based there. To avoid the detection of US soldiers crossing back and forth between the borders, it was decided that the site could only accommodate civilians or military personnel with civilian documentation. However the American Air Force didn’t want to supply its men with false documents as it would cause majors problems if the men were captured, and they would have no protection under the Geneva Convention as prisoners of war.
Therefore the men had to be ‘sheep dipped’. They left the Air Force and as civilians they were hired by a legitimate civilian company. Their employer sent them into Laos as ordinary employees. Afterwards they could rejoin the Air Force. The men were specially chosen for the mission.
It was believed that this location, high in the mountains, would protect the base from attack. The mountain was so steep that the Americans were confident their men would have plenty of time to be rescued by helicopter should their position be located by the Vietnamese. The secret radar was even wired up to explosives should the enemy attack. I don’t remember seeing it myself but even if I did I would not have known what I was looking at.
It happened in March in 1968, just before midnight. 33 North Vietnamese managed to climb the mountain while enemy planes overhead were attempting to bomb the radar system. The Vietnamese had been practising climbing difficult rock peaks for months. When they reached the site, between the radar buildings and a Thai guard post, they hid until 3am. Then they made a move but were spotted by a guard who threw a grenade at them. This prompted the Vietnamese to open fire with their submachine guns. They killed over half the Americans they found there, men I had probably chatted to and certainly played in front of.
***
As usual the show on Phupan went down really well and we got plenty of cheers and applause. After the gig we all headed back to town for dinner. We had learned to behave ourselves when we were out late at night in the city. Plenty of high-spirited evenings ended in alcohol-fuelled battles so it was wise to keep to your own group and not attract any unpleasant attention. I wasn’t happy. The Americans had paid quite a bit for us, but I only got a few hundred baht from the managers. I had also discovered that the Las Vegas bar had paid an advance of 2,000 baht before we even arrived in Udorn, none of which found its way into my pocket. That was the last straw and I quit the band.
I decided to head to Korat or Nakhon Ratchasima, north of Bangkok, with my girlfriend Tew. It was a busy enough town with plenty of shops and nightspots. I took a room at the Tokyo Hotel for 40 baht a night. An old friend from home and his girlfriend moved in with relatives of his who owned the Lucky Bar. I had thought that we might get to play in this bar but entertainment was provided by their compact and reliable jukebox. However, his girlfriend’s uncle owned a bar and I got to play there. After maybe three weeks I returned to Bangkok. The uncle couldn’t afford to pay us much and I had had to leave the hotel as I couldn’t make the rent.
Back in Bangkok I was unemployed again and I accepted any little gig I could get, from weddings to birthday parties. I played briefly for a band called Johnny Guitar. We travelled to Nakhon Phanom to play at a movie-theatre near the Thai-Laos Border. I got tired of waiting for other people to throw me a bone and decided to form my own band, once again. There were five of us; Kay, who was a great guitarist, and the singers, husband and wife Klelk and Toi, Tui the drummer and myself on guitar. I suppose I hoped to recapture the good old days with Mitra but it wasn’t meant to be. For our first gig in Ratchaburi, west of Bangkok, we got paid absolutely nothing, having been ripped off by the unscrupulous bar owner. I decided to try our luck at Ta Khli, and had got us a booking at the Blue Sky bar. This turned out to be a bar only frequented by African Americans. We didn’t see one farang cross its threshold, which I found a bit strange.
I was also dealing with insecurities over my guitar playing—the band’s and mine. As I say Kay was really good and Tui was a really talented drummer. They were all old friends of mine from Bangkok and it was galling to be made aware, by them, of the gap between their skill and mine. I no longer felt comfortable with them on stage. Furthermore, relations in the group were becoming a little strained. Tew, who was my girlfriend at the time, was now travelling with me to all our venues and she just didn’t get on with Toi. They eventually had a full-blown argument one night in Ta Khli, which didn’t help matters at all. Then there was the matter of our shaky finances. Toi had arranged for us to be supplied with most of our equipment in advance of making any money, and we weren’t anyway near paying for it yet. And just when I felt that things really couldn’t get any worse, my father arrived at the bar to tell me that the friend who lent me his cymbal now wanted it back. That was it, I threw in the towel. I am only human after all.
It turned out to be a wise move because shortly after my return to Bangkok I was asked to join The Crickets, a popular Thai tribute band to The Beatles. We played at the best of venues, like the Lido nightclub in Bangkok. This was a big nightclub, run by a Chinese guy, Sia-uan, who rented it from a police officer. It hosted a variety of shows, from magic to strippers, to dancing. There were lots of girls, mostly Thai or Japanese. I had a great time working there. A huge party was organised for New Year’s Day and all the entertainers received gifts. I think I got a horse-shoe ash-tray and a wallet which I gave to my father. I even appeared with The Crickets on TV, when we performed ‘Simple Simon Says’ for the well-known Seven Show.
But of course, all good things come to an end. I was no longer a teenager, free of responsibility. The wild hey-day, if you could call it that, of the Vietnam War was coming to an end, and with it went my career as a musician. I needed to find a new path.
Chapter 3
My life had changed considerably by 1969. I had met Tew the previous year. She was 18 and I was 20. We lived near each other in Udorn. I shared a rented house on the Mhakkaeng Road while she lived next door, across from the pawn shop, with her cousins. I used to frequent a Kaogaeng stall on my way to work. This is a bit like fast food Thai-style—you choose two or three dishes and the owner spoons them on to a plate of rice.
I saw her there one day, sitting by herself and reading Bangkok Magazine, a popular rag magazine at the time. She was wearing a light summer blouse, khaki pants and her hair was held in place by a brightly coloured bandana. I watched her read for a while and thought about my approach. An idea popped into my head and I sidled up to her and asked could I borrow her magazine. Not very original I suppose, but it was the best I could come up with. However, when she smiled warmly at me in reply I knew I ‘was in’. We developed a true friendship, with lots of conversation and exchanging of books and opinions. Our courtship consisted of dinners, movies and shopping. She was a typical northeast girl who was very attached to her family. And I liked that about her. She was, and still is, sincere and unpretentious. I always felt comfortable around her, plus she had a nice jaw-line—I don’t know why, but I really dislike women with big jaw bones.
Tew was attractive without any of that sophistication and seductive beauty that can cause a lot of trouble for a man. I remember discreetly looking at her face and then studying my own in the mirror before reckoning that our children would probably be handsome enough. I didn’t have to worry about her flirting with my friends behind my back
; she was a practical girl who had fortunately decided to settle for me. I also felt ready to settle down after my years of travelling around. Plus, and I know this will sound very unromantic and selfish, but I really wanted someone who would look after my father, who was now in his 70s. She returned to Bangkok with me and got on like a house on fire with him.
We were a bit ahead of our time in that we lived together first. My father warned me not to mess her around, as she would find it difficult to meet someone else after living with me. She ran away from her cousins in Udorn to join me. We had kept our relationship secret from her family for as long as we could but of course that wasn’t going to last forever. We only formally registered for marriage after the birth of our second son. Looking back now I just wish I had more money starting out. We probably rushed things unnecessarily. I don’t remember us ever sitting down properly to discuss our future, and we had no savings between us, or a house, but I suppose it all worked out fine in the end.
My music career ended after I was summoned to do my military service and ended up in the Air Force. Given the choice, I would have preferred to continue playing guitar, but there wasn’t really a choice. Two years was the legal requirement. I was glad that Tew was going to be at home minding my father. The aviation school, which was brand new, was in Nakhon Prathom, and again I did very well—I came first in the class. I lived on the base Monday to Friday and returned home to Bangkok every weekend. The dormitories were upstairs over the offices.
The Last Executioner Page 3