In Thailand, they absolutely adore the king. King X has been the crowned King of Thailand for over sixty years – he just celebrated his eightieth birthday – and his popularity is as strong as ever. For someone from a country without a monarchy, it was absolutely baffling to see how much the Thais love their king. Though King Sihamoni and his father, King Norodom Sihanouk, are revered in Cambodia, the Thais take their reverence to a whole new level. His presence and image is absolutely everywhere. On entire faces of skyscrapers. In every shop and restaurant. In taxi cabs. In movie theaters (as described below). On t-shirts – every day we saw dozens of yellow t-shirts bearing the logo of the king. On the highways lined with billboards of the king and his wife.
At one point in our travels across Bangkok by taxi, traffic came to a complete standstill. Though it was rush hour and traffic was indeed bad, there seemed to be no reason for us to be fully stopped. The wide boulevard we were on had four lanes in each section and had dividers between every two lanes. The two middle sets of two lanes were both closed completely. Our taxi driver turned to us to say that we were very lucky, the king and his convoy was going to drive by. Sure enough, after a ten minute delay a convoy of BMW police cars and a cream-colored 1950s Rolls Royce whirred past. The cab driver was not at all mad at the delay; he bowed as the king passed and just kept saying how lucky we were to see the king on our first trip to Thailand.
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