'A Day' in the life

Zcongklod "Kong" Bangyikhan

Anyone who reads the iconoclastic magazine A Day would expect its editor to be just as daringly dek naew as the young readers who it encourages to think outside the box.

It turns out that Zcongklod "Kong" Bangyikhan - his first name is a spelling variant of the Thai word for "halo" - is one easy-going 29-year-old, in casual shirt and jeans and canvas shoes.

 A Day's editor-in-chief of three years says he wants to keep growing with the magazine as it presents engaging stories that are told from unexpected angles and makes complicated stories easy to understand.

"I want A Day to encourage people to think, to bring something out of the reader."

Kong still hasn't told his mother exactly what it is that he does, but he compares it to being the manager of a football team. "I have to find good players and create a good strategy.

"I have to know whether the story I'm reading is enjoyable, which part is no fun and should be fixed."

Kong seems a little surprised at being the new-wave media man who everyone talks about. He puts it down to determination, and insists that anyone in his field who enjoys a measure of fame pays a high price for it in terms of hard work and long hours.

He entered university at just 16 and found himself immersed in adventure, aided along by his love for travelling.

He racked up degrees at Chulalongkorn in environmental and natural-resources economics, then did research and academic work in the field, as well as environmental activism. He was tracking global warming years ago for the World Wildlife Fund.

Then Kong got into tourism.

"At the time the notion of 'eco-tourism' was very popular," he says. "My friends and I wanted to put it into practice and we called it 'neo-eco-tourism'. I wrote an academic book about it as well.

"I wanted tourists to learn about the places they visit, but it was a difficult concept to sell. I had to find a way to communicate the idea to people, and that was the beginning of my really determined writing."

Kong wrote an article about a tour he'd organised for Krungthep Turakij's "Sao Sawasdee" section and it got the attention of former editor Athikom Kunawut.

"There was nothing delicate about the writing," Kong says. "I used wild words and put in a few hooks every two or three lines. I wrote, 'Please read this by candlelight, because I wrote it by starlight.' It's a style that a lot of readers appreciate, especially young readers, and I was offered the chance to work as a permanent columnist at the newspaper."

Wongtanong "Nong" Chainarong-sing, who was at the time the editor of A Day, approached him to join the magazine. The articles he wrote for it were ultimately compiled in two books, and he's just released a third, a mix of travel and fiction stories.

Despite all this, Kong doesn't think he's a writer. He only thinks of himself as a magazine producer, albeit one who loves telling stories through writing.

"Writing is personal. It's very private, different from the editor's work. Sometimes editors can't write what they think. The editor has to consider the magazine's concept."

Kong was a big reader as a child, choosing and buying his books by himself by the time he was in Grade 6. He read the Chinese Sam Kok tales of the Three Kingdoms twice in different translations.

His economics studies have benefited his writing, he says, since economics involves the logic of human behaviour in its decision-making. It helps him as an editor, as well, in terms of weighing pros and cons.

"Environmental economy, in particular, taught me to look into things we can't see, to estimate the untouchable," Kong adds. "It helps me see angles that other people wouldn't normally notice."

Kong is currently gathering information for another book, the ecology-minded "101 Ideas to Make the World a Better Place".

"I swore I would never work on weekends, but I've just finished eight consecutive days and slept at the office all weekend. It seems that holidays are a thing of the past, but the team and I still enjoy doing it."

Nattaporn Luangpipat

The Nation