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SIAM
4/15/46
THAT'S MINE
"A terrible crime wave is
raging in Siam," cabled TIME's Bangkok
correspondent last week. "It is no wonder that King
Ananda is taking a special interest." The reason
for the young monarch's concern was evident:
someone had pinched his favorite green 1942 Nash,
parked out front.
There are only five 1942 Nashes in
Siam, so the search should have been easy. Yet a
hunt led by Siam's supreme police chief himself,
and a proffered reward of about $67, failed to turn
up a trace of the missing car or of the recently
discharged royal chauffeur who disappeared at the
same time. While the search went on, somebody crept
into the royal bedchamber and copped the King's
7.65-mm Mauser pistol.
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JAPAN
3/18/46
NEW CONSTITUTION
*
Emperor Hirohito and his
Shidehara Cabinet, with General Douglas MacArthur's
endorsement, offered the Japanese 16 closely typed
pages of a new constitution, which forswears armies
and war, guarantees civil rights, deprives the
peerage of its privileges and promises the people
an end to police tyranny. The constitution closely
paraphrased political literature from the U.S.
Declaration of Independence, Abraham Lincoln's
Gettysburg Address and the Atlantic Charter.
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THI-GYA-MIN DECREES THAT
SPRING IS THE TIME OF SHOWERS
BURMA
4/25/49
WE LAUGH, WE LAUGH
*
In Rangoon many years
ago, it is said, a newly arrived visitor
from Britain called upon a Burmese
dignitary. He was met by a bevy of girls
carrying bowls of water, who said a few
words in their native tongue. Anxious to
be agreeable, the Briton nodded, whereupon
the maidens deluged him, from topper to
spats, with cold water. The master of the
house laughed and laughed. The furious
Briton presently learned that the girls
had formally asked his permission to douse
him, and that this was part of a Burmese
spring custom, the Thingyan or Water
Festival, marked by the visit of the god
Thi-gya-min. This year he arrived in a
green dress, carrying a flower and a
flower pot and riding a buffalo. That
meant, of course, that cattle and crops
would be badly damaged. After three days,
the celestial visitor departed, leaving
the Burmese to hang up their clothes to
dry.
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