in thailand, two topics are rarely analyzed or reported on critically: the king and religion. in fact as a foreigner, they often seem even more off limits. it’s normal for people to say thing like “ohh you don’t understand, you’re not thai”. the king just celebrated his 80th birthday and in honor of it there has been a week of celebrations, many of them telling people that to show the love for the king they should live their lives by his principles. one of his main messages is that we should live our lives modestly, only taking what we need, not giving in to excess, things like that. given that the king’s teachings are usually used in a very well-respected way, i was actually pretty surprised to see boot’s (a foreign pharmacy) use it to sell things like fine fairness cream. the image below is a boot’s advertising flyer, and was also used as an ad all over town. the thai text at the top literally translates as “economize for dad”. by saying “economize” they are referring to the king’s teachings of living modestly and also their special low prices on whitening cream. the king is often referred to as “dad” or “father”, something that shows his level of respect in the country but is also a function of the thai language (i am often called older brother by my younger students).

as a foreigner, i find the ad rather surprising and somewhat funny. i guess more surprising to me is that there hasn’t been any uproar over it … then again, there may have been and i just didn’t hear about it. things are often handled in a very private way in this country.