Continuing from previous story “What's on Chatuchak”.
There was one interesting happening when me and my husband walked away from Chatuchak. We crossed the street and reentered the park area which was not less crowded from the market. We walked through this park before when we wanted to go to Chatuchak.
In this tidy and clean park, a lot of people either walked or sat leisurely on the grass field or park benches. We took some pictures and sat a while there. After we were no longer tired, we stood up and wanted to continue our walk to MRT station.
When we continued our walk, a song was played suddenly in that park. We didn’t know where did it come from. The only thing that we know was that song could be heard by everyone in that park. This park probably had loudspeakers on many places so the sound was pretty clear.
When this song was played, everyone around us at the same time stood still like statues. I was surprised. What’s going on? It’s as if they were all bewitched or something, just like what I saw on some movies. Because we were confused with what happened around us, me and my husband stopped walking too and stood still too so we wouldn’t look out of place.
Even though I stood still, my eyes didn’t stop moving. I looked around. These people really stopped and unmoving. It’s not just the locals who were frozen, I saw the tourists doing the same thing. I wondered if it was Thailand’s national day? Was the song I heard the national anthem of Thailand? Was this some kind of Thailand ritual? Those things were on my mind when I stood still.
This stood still event didn’t happen for a long time, it’s just several minutes. After that song stopped, everybody returned to what they were doing before. It’s as if they were freed from magic. How about us? We were still frozen in place because we were shocked by what we experienced. Then me and my husband started discussing it. He had the same thoughts as me. I saw this happening for the first time and I was really amazed by it.
Because we were intrigued by what makes these people freeze, we started looking around on Google. What was the reason they freeze? Our guess was right. The song that we heard was Thailand’s national anthem (Phleng Chat Thai) which were played on public places every 08:00 and 18:00.
That’s right. When we left Chatuchak and walked through that park, it was 18:00. When this national anthem was played, Thai citizens had to be respectful and stand still. What an admirable tradition. I got precious experience in this vacation.
I learned a lot from Thai citizens who could stand still twice a day when their anthem was played. They respected their national anthem a lot. It’s a good and admirable habit.
Let’s develop and train ourselves to be good citizen wherever we are. We can start from simple things, such as keep our environment clean, obey the law and rules, and contribute to our country with our utmost ability. Let’s do it for our country’s advance.