In Bangkok
IN MY capacity as President of the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand, I was privileged to be invited to witness the cremation of the late Princess Galayani Vadhana earlier this evening.
I arrived at around 3.15 pm, driving past thousands of Thais almost all dressed in black, lining the streets around Sanam Luang, some holding up pictures of the Princess, who died on January 2 at the age of 84. She was King Bhumibol Adulyadej's only - and older - sister. Many of them had been there all day.
I was seated in one of the pavilions set up around the crematorium, an elaborate traditional structure made mainly of plywood covered with richly painted fabric depicting symbols of Buddhist cosmology.
I was the only foreigner in our pavilion, surrounded by senior Thai civil servants. We had our backs to the Grand Palace. Two plasma TV screens beamed live close-in TV coverage of the proceedings inside the main pavilion, to where we sat. We were each given a delicately crafted flower made of sandalwood shavings, and served iced soft drinks by Navy ensigns.
Thai classical drummers in scarlet tunics waited in a row, along with classical musicians with their instruments including the elegant Ranad. Government and Palace officials wore their white dress uniforms, some with royal decorations and medals. All who wore white, also wore black arm bands.
The seven-tiered pagoda-like crematorium gleamed in the low afternoon sun. Pennants snapped in a brisk cool breeze. Pali chants from several monks wafted across the site, and while we waited military marching bands also entered the square and took up positions amid the deep thump of the bass drum, the clash of the big cymbal and the peal of trumpets.
At 4.50pm, the music and chanting stopped, and an expectant hush fell over the gathering, which included upwards of 2,000 invitees. It was the kind of silence in which you could hear the proverbial pin drop.
On the TV screens we saw the cream coloured Rolls Royces used by the royal family, pull up outside the square. At a shouted command, the military bands struck up the royal anthem and everyone rose.
The King and Queen stepped out of their car, the King walking haltingly but unaided. They were quickly flanked by the heir to the throne Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn - always easy to spot because he is usually a head taller than everyone else and walks with a quick, decisive, upright gait - and his sister Crown Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn. Other members of the immediate family walked behind.
The King, dressed in his ceremonial white uniform with a black arm band, lit candles in a Buddhist ritual. He and the Queen then took their seats. A senior Buddhist monk read out prayers in Thai followed by mass chanting in Pali. The Crown Prince as is customary, presented each monk with new robes.
As the light began to fade the King and his family made their way to the crematorium, using a special lift to raise him to the level of the plinth. TV cameras showed us what they were doing inside - presenting sandalwood bunches at the base of the big sandalwood urn containing the body of the late Princess, and later symbolically lighting the pyre. The actual cremation was to be a more private affair later, at 10pm local time.
Powerful spotlights placed at a distance lit up the crematorium, giving the elegant, pale gold structure a celestial glow against the darkening sky. At 6pm as the King symbolically set the flame to the pyre, a military trumpeter sounded the last post, which echoed back from the surrounding buildings; it is a sound which never fails to give me goosebumps.
Military gunners fired volleys which echoed back as well with deep multiple thuds. Then the Thai drummers started a slow, deep, poingnant drumbeat accompanied by traditional funereal songs, continuing for over half an hour as the King and his family made their way back and seated themselves on thrones facing the crematorium.
Monks followed by senior government officials and invitees and Ambassadors then filed solemnly into the crematorium to pay their respects, placing sandalwood bunches or flowers at the base of the urn.
Outside, the crowds were doing the same, placing the little sandalwood flowers on silver bowls which when filled up, were replaced by women officers of the armed forces. The flowers were to be burned in the crematorium.
The King and his family then left, and I did soon after, finding a lift with a diplomat friend and threading our way through huge surging throngs of Thais, many of whom will stay there until late tonight, waiting for the King to return, to support him in what may be a lonely hour of farewell to his sister.
Read Nirmal's story Thais pay tribute to late Princess.