Morning, Not Smart

04.16.03 | 9:53 PM ET

Thai pop is an unsettling genre of music, much more grating on the nerves than hard-core gutter punk, elevator muzak, or even the latest brand of teen bubblegum pop. Singers string ridiculous sing-song words together into rhymes that make Mother Goose stories look like epic poetry. The high-pitched melodies seem composed for two-year olds and the voices, whether male or female, sound just a few years older.

Thai pop is also the music that was favored by the teenage employees of the 24-hour gas station and mini-mart next door to our house in Thailand.

A few years ago, my partner Gary and I quit our jobs, sold our belongings and boarded a plane for Bangkok. We were determined to make a life in the country we had fallen in love with while traveling. We politely declined the decrepit cookie-cutter townhouse offered by the college where we’d found positions teaching English, and opted for the housing allowance instead. In a matter of weeks we found a huge, solid teak house for rent. Eighty years old, perched on stilts and sprawled out on a private yard with fruit trees and flowering shrubs, the house was a dream.

We were well aware of the gas station when we signed the lease, but the house was so wonderfully far from the cracker-box sized apartment we had lived in back in San Francisco that we assumed we’d get used to the slamming car doors and the gasoline fumes. What we weren’t prepared for was the music that blared over the station’s loudspeaker, particularly early in the morning and late at night.

We first heard the music at 6:45 a.m. on a weekday. We were sitting at the table on our patio, eating breakfast.  We engaged in this ritual at the exact same time every morning, but this was the first time in the two months we had lived in the house that we heard the music. We froze in disbelief, cereal spoons caught in midair, the music pounding.  We waited for the music to stop as abruptly as it began, certain that someone had accidentally turned the volume dial the wrong way. Ten seconds, twenty, thirty. The volume went up half a decibel.

Without a word Gary got up from the table and walked across the patio and back into the house. A few seconds after that, through the fence slats, I could see him walking into the mini-mart. A few seconds later the music stopped and he walked back out and across the gas station floor towards the house.

“Well, I straightened that out.”

“What happened?”

“I just pointed to the stereo system, put my fingers in my ears and made a face like I was in pain.  They obviously got the picture.”

We settled back with our corn flakes, laughing at the charade, when the music burst forth again, startling me so much I knocked over my water glass.  Before I could grab a towel to wipe up the spill, Gary was heading back toward the mini-mart in long, determined strides.  This time he was inside for several minutes before the music finally stopped.  Walking back out the door, his stride was as purposeful as when he approached, as if he now had something even more troubling to take care of inside our own home.  When he walked out onto the patio his face was ashen.

“That didn’t go so well,” he said, sinking into his chair. “There were three of them behind the counter, staring at me with smug smiles when I walked in.  No one made a move to turn the music down so I started yelling.  But they just stood there staring at me.  So I reached across the counter and turned the music off myself. Then I turned around and walked out.”

Jai rawn.  Hot heart.  According to Thai people, every foreigner has one.  In Thailand it’s considered extremely rude to show any form of anger, even if it’s just mild irritation.  Displays of rage are simply unacceptable and cause both the source and the recipient of the anger to lose face, which in Thai culture is akin to relinquishing one’s core dignity.  One is expected to keep jai yen, cool heart, at all times.  In a holistic sense, this code of living would seem to keep the population’s blood pressure at a low level.  By maintaining a cool heart, people can take advantage of the recommended ten seconds before raising their voice or acting out, the theory being that after ten seconds of reflection, the outburst will no longer be necessary. In practice, however, this isn’t the case.  Thai people being a volatile combination of flesh and blood and raw emotion just like human beings the world over, the culturally imposed plugs on anger only serve to keep the population seething just below the surface.

In my years of traveling, I’ve never encountered a more passive-aggressive culture.  Any world traveler will tell you that crossing borders opens up just as much opportunity for cross-cultural intimacy as it does hostility. And my own travels have certainly proved this to be true. I’ve been pelted with rocks in a small village in Turkey for being a female traveling alone, I’ve been arrested and verbally harassed in Romania over a trumped up charge of blackmarket money exchange, and in eastern Malayasia I was hissed at by Muslim women for not wearing the traditional headcovering. Although all these experiences were disconcerting they were also reassuring in their transparency. No need to second guess the offended culture’s justifiable state of disdain or indignation.

Not so in Thailand, where the expression of displeasure, however justified, is communicated with enthusiastic nods and ear-to-ear grins. Not a shred of evidence to indicate that the other party is just as annoyed.  Instead, you walk away from the encounter convinced that the matter has been solved and then a few days later, you inexplicably find yourself signed up for “volunteer” activities after work hours, or maybe your desk gets moved from beside the window to the airless corner next to the men’s bathroom. Suddenly you receive poor service, shoddy treatment and incorrect directions with smiling apologies throughout. Which, of course, instigates a hot-hearted reaction on your part, which starts the cycle all over again.

Later that morning, as we pulled out of the driveway past the gas station, the music was again blaring as if nothing had happened. Already running late, we rode off on our motorbikes, hoping the cool morning air would keep our hearts at an acceptable temperature.

That afternoon I was able to have a mature and cool-hearted discussion with the gas station’s assistant manager, Num, who, through a combination of broken English and body language, assured me that the music would not be a problem again. He also gave me his personal cell phone number so that in his absence I could report to him directly if any of his employees acted out again.

We had a few minor morning and late night stereo incidents in the first month after this, but nothing that a single visit to the mini-mart or a call to Num couldn’t resolve fairly painlessly and without any loss of face. Then the station was blissfully silent for months.  I imagined that the Esso/Tiger Mart employee manual now had an entire section devoted to the rules and regulations of operating their speaker system.  This is why I was so surprised to come back from my jog one morning, more than a year later, and hear the familiar pounding rhythms blaring across the gas station floor and through our windows.

I was in a particularly fragile state of mind at the time.  We had just made the decision to come back to the United States and each day closer to our departure left me less tolerant and exponentially more judgmental than the day before.  I suppose it was a defense mechanism.  I needed to separate and disengage. Although getting aggravated wasn’t the healthiest way to do this, it made it easier for me to justify my leaving.

Gary was sick in bed on that particular morning, and he was home from work to recuperate.  With the music pumping straight through our walls it was doubtful he was still asleep.  I was furious.  How typical of Thailand, these stupid, rude, thoughtless people.  They think they can just step all over me because I’m the “other,” not of this country and so not worthy of basic respect.  But they don’t even give this respect to each other.  That’s the problem with this country, ignorance!  They can live with this level of noise pollution because that’s all they know!

The bullying diatribe in my head continued as I paced toward the mini-mart. I was too blinded by rage to even pick up the phone and dial Num’s number. I needed immediate retribution.  I threw open the glass doors and pounded my fists on the counter in front of two young Thais who looked at me with a mixture of familiarity and uncertain fear. 

“Don tree!”  I screamed, but then hit a mental brick wall. I knew the word for “music” but I couldn’t remember any words to communicate that I wanted it turned down or turned off.  Stereo and television vocabulary suddenly eluded me.  So I made a few wild gesticulations with my right hand, pantomiming clutching a volume knob and turning it counterclockwise. 

“Don tree, tawn nee!”  I repeated, coupling the word for “music” with the word for “right now,” my wrist still convulsing midair.

The two employees were fixated on my right hand and its volume dial gesture.  I pounded the counter again.  One of them pointed frantically outside the glass windows toward the gas pumps.  Yeah, sure, I thought.  You’re trying to tell me that you’re only playing the music inside the mart and not outside.  I pushed open the glass doors beyond which the music was playing even louder.  If I could have reached across the counter I would have shut off the stereo myself but, my arms not being long enough, it would have meant climbing up onto the counter itself.  The two teenagers, by now backed up against the far wall, continued to look at me helplessly, both of them pointing outside the window.  If I stayed any longer I was liable to do something desperate so I stormed out determined to call Num and have him deal with the situation.

It was still only 5:30 a.m. and except for the young boy who manned the fuel pump on the night shift and a man sleeping in the cab of his cargo truck parked beside the mini-mart door, there was no one else around.  The music echoed off the concrete and as I passed the huge truck, the sound grew inexplicably louder.  I stared at the driver slouched behind the wheel and froze, dumbfounded.  It was obvious from this vantage point that the music was blasting from the stereo inside the 18-wheeler’s cab.  This is what the two teenagers I had accosted moments before were pointing to.  My rage bubbled to the surface again, not because of the music but at my own blind willfulness.

All the Thai I had learned in the previous two years was again sucked from my brain so that when I pounded on the cab door and got the driver’s attention all I could manage to scream was “Tawn chow, mai keng!”  I wish I could say this translates as “How rude and inconsiderate of a man you are!” or “Don’t you care about anyone else besides yourself?” or even “Hey buddy, don’t you know there are people trying to get some sleep around here?”  But in my state of mortification, the only reprimand I could blurt out translates crudely as:  “Morning, not smart!”  I walked back across the gas station floor much slower than the way I had approached it.  Aware of each step in front of the other, back toward the house, up the stairs, through the wooden door.  Gary had miraculously slept through it all.

I made my way out onto the back patio toward my favorite chair.  The neighborhood roosters were in full chorus.  I sat quietly and listened, feeling the early morning light change in increments too small to see. Feeling my heart’s pounding settle into a more temperate rhythm.

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