article by Sal Chankong

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The first black and white set in the village

My name is Sal. I’m from Thailand, and I lived in the countryside, in a village called Ban pet noi. In 1982 one of my neighbours bought a black and white TV set, and everyone in the village was allowed to watch it. But because there was no electric supply the tv had to be connected to a big commercial battery, unfortunately the owner had to drive for one hour to the nearest town to charge the battery, once charged the battery would last for three days.

The TV would switch on 2 hours a day 8pm to 10pm. The first programme would be the 8pm Thai national news which was the adult’s favourite programme. All the children would be sitting and waiting for the Popeye cartoon which started 8.55pm and finished at 9pm; although the Cartoon was only on for five minutes the kids enjoyed and loved every second of it. The 9pm programme was always Thai drama; during the drama all the children would fall asleep. At 10pm when the drama finished the TV would be switched off and the parents would wake up all the children and then would walk home with torches and candles to light the way.

One day the son of Mr Dang (TV owner) switched on the TV after school at 4pm and many children, including myself, went to see, as we knew there was a good children’s programme on. Starting from that day we went to Mr Dang’s house at 4pm and begged him to let us watch tv.

Mr Dang was very kind but he said, I haven’t finished my work yet. If you want to watch tv, can you help me pick the leaves to feed my pigs? ‘Yessssss!’ shouted the children and from that day on, when my friends wanted to watch TV after school, we had to pick lots of kra-ched leaves to feed his 10 pigs, which gave us 30 minutes of cartoon programme. We fed those pigs for two years!

In 1984 electricity came to the village, and many villagers were interested in buying TV sets, though not every household; so the group of children became smaller.

In 1985 Mrs Kham was the first person to buy a colour tv. All the children were very excited and preferred to watch their TV programmes in colour. On the evening that the colour TV was switched on for the first time, all the children arrived 30 minutes early because they where so eager to watch colour TV for the first time. While we were watching the TV we couldn’t stop talking about how different it was, and we had a great time.

But again!! We had to earn our programmes. Mrs Khan was a very religious Buddhist and she needed peace and quiet to prey every evening, so we would quietly wait outside until she had finished. She felt sorry for the children, she didn’t want to see us waiting and moaning, so she asked us to join her to prey. Again we did what she asked. While we were praying it made a very good sound, like a melodious choir, and all the adults in the village came out of their houses to find out what the noise was. Our parents were very grateful to see their kids learning about religion, and my mum told me everyday to go to Mrs Kham’s house to watch TV and pray.

One day Mrs Kham wasn’t well and stayed overnight in hospital. The children were waiting outside her house and talking about how we were going to miss our favourite programmes. One of Mrs Kham’s neighbours saw us waiting and asked us to go into house to watch TV and pray, like we had been doing in Mrs Khams house. But this was different he had recording equipment and he recorded us while we were praying. Afterwards he wasn’t happy; he said, ‘when I listened to you all praying in Mrs Kham’s house, it was fantastic, but today in my house it’s just load noise.

When Mrs Kham came home we went back to her house and did the same as before.

Im 1987 I finish school and went away to work as a housekeeper for a year, then came back to visit my mum. It was completely different; every household had its own colour TV.  Nowadays everyone stays in their house watching TV in peace and quiet, and they can watch 18 hours a day.

I have lots more experiences from the village to share with you soon.

Sal Chankong

November 2009 

Webmaster replies

I'm not sure whether you think that what has happened over the years is a good thing or a bad thing.

I think it is good that more people can afford a colour TV. 

Is that too good though?

What has happened to the village community?  Please let me know and I look forward to hearing more stories from you.  

Perhaps you would like to record them so people can hear you speaking?

Contact us and tell us what you think of Prathuang's story.