SIAM: Garden of Smiles

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In 1946, Phumiphon went home to Siam with his brother. Ananda, Siamese remember, was a strange young King. Full of Western ideas, he refused to talk to visitors who sat on the floor below _ him Siamese fashion, insisting that they sit on chairs level with himself. Since shyness is a Siamese characteristic, the visitors often found themselves unable to talk in such a presumptuous position; King and subject would sit in silence, both blushing. Siamese tell of Ananda's visits to little villages near Bangkok. He would summon up all his courage, walk up to an old woman and ask, "Grandmother, how go things with you?" The woman would probably burst.into tears at the thought that she had been addressed by a King, and Ananda would stand before her, eyes downcast and silent.

Ananda liked to drive a jeep around the palace grounds, and he liked to play with guns. One day he fell sick. His mother brought him some castor oil and left him alone to sleep. A few hours later, Ananda was found dead in his bed, a pistol beside him and a bullet through his head.

The event is said to have marked the birth of public opinion in Siam. Up to that point the people had not approved or disapproved of public events; almost everybody disapproved of the death of Ananda. Murder was whispered, then shouted. A cabinet fell. An inquiry commission decided that Ananda had been shot either by-himself or somebody else. A trial began more than a year ago and is expected to last ten years more.

Phumiphon was desolated. Wandering about the palace grounds, he saw a guard turn a group of peasants away from Ananda's funeral urn (in which his remains were folded into the traditional fetal position), because the peasants were not dressed in proper mourning. Brusquely Phumiphon ordered the gates opened to them. Two months after Ananda's death, Phumiphon left "to resume his studies" in Switzerland. Two million tearful Siamese lined his road to the airport, casting jasmine flowers under the wheels of his car. Ananda's funeral was postponed four years until Phumiphon got back.

In Lausanne, Phumiphon's studies consisted of a passionate interest in photography, music, and racy automobiles. He also sometimes read a law book. He liked to organize orchestras and jump about from the drums to the horns to the piano. He composed dance tunes, both Western and Siamese style. Many mammas of the Siamese nobility got the idea that the climate of Lausanne would be good for their daughters. Quite a "court" developed around Phumiphon. Winner of the tournament was the Princess Sirikit Kitiyakara, who also likes music.

"Too Much of the Stars." Late this month, after attending to the cremation of his brother, Phumiphon will marry Sirikit on a day set by astrologers. No one in Bangkok makes a move without consulting an astrologer. In a recent speech opening the Bangkok branch of the Bank of America, U.S. Ambassador Edwin L. Stanton found it diplomatic to mention that the astrologers had found the date propitious.