After all, what can you say about a religion that makes a sin out of sex and a sacred act out of drinking alcohol?

The point is, I know that slavery and cruelty are wrong; murder, theft and lying too. I know what is acceptable behaviour because I behave towards others the way I want to be treated. Or at least I try, anyway. There are a great many of us who do not practise religion - but have strong spiritual leanings - and wish to have no religious influence on our lives. In Thailand, people don't just believe in miracles, they rely on them. Heavily. And expect Lord Buddha's agents to provide them.

Try as we might, last week it was hard to ignore the words "Buddhist", "activist" and "demand". Imagine being in the crowd and asking someone, "Do you believe in God?" and getting the reply:" I don't know, but someone's out to get me."

I think the late Bob Hope had it right when he said: "I do benefits for all religions. I'd hate to blow the hereafter on a technicality."

What's more, seeing a besuited senator on top of an elephant in downtown Bangkok during the "make Buddhism the state religion" parade was a most welcome distraction from the biblical heat. And the reaction to the "demand" appears to be more interesting than the demand itself. A religious corn has been trodden on. Ouch.

Maybe it would have been a good idea if the whole herd had kept heading for the deep South. Followed by a zillion monks. An invasion of saffron. Armed with Jatukam amulets. With a special deal for the insurgents. Buy one, get one free - if you just stop bombing the bejesus out of everyone.

 Now there's a miracle worth paying for.

***

Perhaps "abundance" should be made the state religion. For abundance in all things - material, emotional, intellectual, spiritual - is the goal of any first-rate soul. Even wealth has a spiritual element, because moolah may be our greatest teacher and more edifying than a stadium full of swamis.

The things we're willing to do to obtain it, to protect it, to express our guilt over having it (or not having it), are incomparably revealing. If a person wants to know how insecure they are, or how swollen and stiff their ego is, all they have to do is just examine their attitude towards ready cash and a Visa card - be they a monk or a layman.

In Thailand, millions pay attention to those things that might make them rich, and failing at fortune, to those things that make them forget. Pay day, after the most pressing loans have been paid back, is often manifested by extreme generosity to others, plus the purchase and intake of items that can both heighten and prolong personal inner peace, restore self esteem, and generate goodwill among others - all at the same time.

The morally righteous see this behaviour as "decadent", the purveyors call it "fuel", while the tabloids describe it as a "Young Man's Nightmare Descent into Booze and Pills".

My former neighbour, who treated his body like an amusement park, called it "Friday".

***

A colleague suggests that lie-detectors be installed in Parliament. What a corking idea. But then the ensuing power surge would black out the entire Kingdom. Imagine walking into a session and the House Speaker asking, "Why are you here?"

"I'm looking for corrupt criminals..."

"Get your own: it took me years to get this lot."

It was a marvellous week for justice. It moved with all the speed of a sloth on Mogadon. Ten defendants never bothered to turn up for the juicy Phang Nga land-grab case, and a rather senior gentleman, who was told to come in and answer some awkward questions over the bomb scanners at King Power Airport couldn't - claiming he had "vertigo".

***

RIP Boris "The Smirnoff" Yeltsin. The best quote on his presidency came from his prime minister, Viktor Chernomyrdin: "We hoped for the best, but things turned out as usual."

Don't know if this still happens or not, but, courting paranoia, the "winter-over" crews at the South Pole usually watched John Carpenter's "The Thing" immediately after the last plane of the year flew out.

***

An ANZAC moment.

Sergeant Bill Hay, Australian 5th Division, April 9, 1917, Battle of Arras, northern France:

"Above the din of the barrage you couldn't speak. It was Jimmy Adams who tapped me on the shoulder indicating 'GO!'. Well, I was first up the ladder, and once on top I turned about and put out my hand to assist him up; there was a loud 'clang!' and his steel helmet went spinning through the air. He was shot clean through the head and fell back in the trench. 'How bloody ridiculous!' I shouted, as if the Germans were listening. 'He was only a boy!'"

If you ever wander along the countless rows of neat headstones in the two beautifully manicured Allied cemeteries in Kanchanaburi, you may suddenly become conscious of a truly unnerving fact. Only 10 out of every 100 were over 30. A doctor here. A captain there. The average age was 23.

And there is still a question that bugs everyone: where is the monument to the fallen Thai, Malay, Tamil and Burmese workers who died in their thousands along the Death Railway?

It is a question asked every year. But nothing will be done.

***

In the heat of the moment.

Letter of the week from The Times of London:

Dear Sir, Some years ago, having moved to Italy, I became a fan of the Arezzo football club. Our fans are pretty bad, but I recently watched Arezzo play Verona, reputed to have the worst fans in the Italian league. Sitting next to me was a little old Italian lady. She wore a fur coat with a small dog on her lap and was eating delicate sandwiches and drinking a glass of wine. Towards the end of the game an Arezzo player was fouled. At that point, my sweet old lady leapt to her feet with her thumbs pointing down chanting "He must DIE!", and went on to scream a detailed sexual history of the perpetrator's mother. Once that was finished, she gathered up her dog, which had scarpered, and the remnants of her sandwiches, refilled her glass and continued to watch as if nothing had happened.

I dread to think what the Coliseum must have been like,

Yours etc,

Martin Samuel

 Compiled by Roger Beaumont