By way of clarification, “Land of Smiles” (LOS) is a common expat term of endearment for Thailand, referencing the propensity of the natives to smile broadly for no reason at all, even while they’re up to shenanigans like extorting monks in honeypot schemes, as recently reportedly occurred.
Related: The State of Feminism in Southeast Asia
The cheery treacherousness is part of their charm.
Via CNN (emphasis added):
Police in Thailand arrested a woman Tuesday who allegedly enticed a string of Buddhist monks into sexual relationships and then pressured them into making large payments to cover up their intimacy.
The possible violation of the celibacy rule for monks has rocked Buddhist institutions and gripped public attention in Thailand in recent weeks. At least nine abbots and senior monks involved in the scandal have been disrobed and cast out of the monkhood, the Royal Thai Police Central Investigation Bureau said.
Wilawan Emsawat, in her mid-30s, was arrested at her home in Nonthaburi province north of the capital Bangkok on charges including extortion, money laundering and receiving stolen goods. Police said they traced money transferred to her by a senior monk from a bank account belonging to his temple in northern Thailand.
Wilawan has not made a statement since her arrest and it was unclear if she has legal representation. Speaking to local media before her arrest, she acknowledged one relationship and said she had given money to that monk.
One of the recurring themes of my gold-standard expat novel, Broken English Teacher: Notes From Exile, is that nothing is as it seems in the LOS.
Back in 2011, the first time I visited, I once saw a monk smoking a cigarette at a bus stop and scrolling through something on his orange iPhone that matched his robes.
The absurdity of modernity!
Another time, before I really got hip to the way things worked there, I was drinking with a German guy at a bar that also functioned as a brothel on the second story. The whores plied their marks with booze and giggled at their jokes on the first floor and then took them upstairs once they’d gotten their claws in deep.
(For the record, I never availed myself of their services; I was just drinking.)
Then, a cop entered in full uniform.
“Maybe we should leave?” I asked, knowing that prostitution is technically illegal in LOS even though it’s right in your face everywhere.
“Don’t mind him. He’s the owner,” was the German’s response.
C’est la vie.
We continued drinking undeterred.
Related: The Sun Never Sets on the British Empire
Continuing:
Wilawan deliberately targeted senior monks for financial gain, police said, noting they found several monks had transferred large amounts of money after Wilawan initiated romantic relationships with them.
Wilawan’s bank accounts received around 385 million baht ($11.9 million) in the past three years, but most of the funds were spent on online gambling websites*, police said.
*Although all peoples enjoy gambling from time to time, the Thais have a particular penchant for it, particularly betting on numbers. They are obsessed with “lucky” numbers and play the lottery voraciously. All across the land, almost as ubiquitous as taxis, vendors sell lottery tickets on the street.
