The Slum Fireman

Klong Toey seaport is surrounded by a large squatter settlement - the Klong Toey Slum. It's the largest informal settlement in Bangkok and now is home to over 100,000 people. The settlement is well-known for drug lords, prostitution, and arson. Beneath this sleazy world of outlaws is a man named Damrong Boonyang. Dumrong is the community fireman. He works for the Duang Prateep Foundation in putting out fire in alleyways - labyrinths that are inaccessible to most municipal firemen.

"Once a city fire truck got lost in the alleyways," he laughs. "The alleyways here are the most intricate and confusing; most of them lead to a dead end or to someone's living room. Most city fire trucks can’t even get into the alleyway due to its size.” His fire truck is the size of a pickup truck; and that gives it a better access to alleyways.

Damrong got his fire equipments from the Dung Prateep Foundation which had worked with the residents of Klong Toey for many years. Each year there is an average of 5-6 slum fires; and yet there are no measures by the city government to encourage residents to help manage fire hazards. Even though most Klong Toey residents have access to this settlement and its alleyways, the city never did provide them with the necessary fire equipments or funding subsidies. The foundation and the slum residents must find their own networks of support within the community. They must find their own cash to make improvements.

But not all residents in Klong Toey are poor, however.

"Looks that that house," he says, "it probably worth millions. If you see a good house here, chances are, they belong to drug dealers," says Damrong. "Most people wouldn't be staying here if they could choose otherwise. They either stay here because they're earning millions from the drug business or they are new migrant laborers." He tells me that most people here use scrap wood to build their houses and it becomes a great fire hazard. Only the drug lords know how to build a good fire-rated house nowadays.

"In the old days, we only have 2 kinds of drugs - Heroin and Marijuana. Now we have over 100 types of drugs. If you do Meth, you're considered a low-grade lad. These days the "E-drug" is most popular," says Damrong.

Supap Sidang was a well-known drug lord here. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2003 during the height of a government crack down campaign. But in 2010, only 4 years after a military coup d'etat, the sentenced was reduced to 20 years.

Drug is a 1,000 million baht worth of business here in Klong Toey. "I used to go in Supap's house to put out the fire," says Damrong. "I had to enter the house through an adjacent house. It was full of Johnnie Walker crates. On the left-hand side of the room, the crates felt heavy - they were full of whiskey bottles. On the right-hand side, the crates felt lighter; and they contain bank notes - over 100 million baht in cash." He says the cash is being stored for its future use as "gifts" to high-ranking generals and police officers.

"Supap Sidang actually help supported many generals and police chiefs, you know. Even now while he's sitting in prison!" In November 2010 Supap's brother was also charged with money laundering. The police noticed that he got unusually wealthier by some 10 million baht.

Dumrong points to a dilapidated tin shack along the railroad track as we walk. "Nobody lives there now; it's now a python's den and a fire hazard. Last year we caught one big python and several baby ones. They looked like noodles."

Next to the python's shack is a house belonging to a noodle seller. He's an unusual man. Besides selling noodles, he's also a poet. He writes on walls; any kind of wall surface - highway columns, subway walls, and his houses is full of messages.

"Talk softy, my head rests here!" an arrow points to a spot on his shack; that spot is merely 1 meter away from the walkway - and the train track. He comes out to meet Damrong with a smile.

"So my house is on fire," he greets Damrong. "Yes if you keep blazing your words on its walls," jokes Damrong. The poet goes inside the house and scribbles something on a piece of paper. He reappears from his shack and hands a piece of paper to Damrong. It says:

"If you treat the earth well,

it too will treat you well."

We walk past a group of old men playing cards together in a house next to the railroad track. They greet Damrong with an invitation to play cards with them.

"These are the policemen here," Damrong makes a Sawasdee gesture. "This guy," he points to a thin balding man, "it was him who made the famous arrest of the drug lords years ago." The bald man smiles at his winning cards. "But these days I'm not so physically fit, I'm semi retired," he said.

"The current government is not so serious about drug dealers," the fat man interjects. "Back in the old days, we had made headlines arresting drug dealers,” says the bald man. "Right now the law is no longer enforceable and the drug lords are back," he slaps his one and only card on the floor mat and sit back to caress his bald head in a circular motion. "I have family

to support you know, so I have to be careful now. I can't be so idealistic like I was before."

The other card players - all policemen - tell me that sometimes college students and NGOs got carries away by their romantic vision that there's a real community here in the slum; they think that it’s like an extended family that supported each other. "That's not quite true here. It's just like any middle-class community actually; people here don't talk to each other unless it's about business matters. It's the culture of big city."

We see kids playing in the alleyways; they seem to have their own community that is independent of the adults. "Kids sometimes play with cooking and stove," says Dumrong. "Sometimes they started the fire." There's little adult supervision during the day because both parents need to work outside to make ends meet; the prevailing wage for labor-intensive jobs is $0.8 per hour.

Currently the city government is planning a new development in Klong Toey district. The slum will be eradicated and replaced by a 1,000 Rai stretch of parkland.

"It will be the largest park in the world," says the government spoke woman.

"It will be the lung of Bangkok where people can come and do aerobic exercise." This is the new environmental policy of the Democratic Party. You could now see row of trees along the street front; they are there to hide the slums from the public.

Dumrong looks sad when I ask him about the planned park. "There are 100,000 residents here. Where will they go?" he looks towards the seaport. "Even fire cannot wipe us out like that."