There was no inn at the room

Every year the Bangkok stake puts on a nativity production at the Asoke chapel called Journey to Bethlehem. Each room is decorated as a different scene from the Christmas story, with members acting as shepherds, wiseman, angels, etc. This year the event drew over three thousand people. It is the largest missionary activity in Thailand.

Some of you may remember my earlier announcement that the planning committee offered me the role of Joseph. Well...they called back a couple days later to say they decided to give the role to someone else. I won't pretend it didn't hurt. I was offered the role of the innkeeper instead. Trying desperately to cling to the spotlight, I asked if I could be Joseph's understudy. Then, if anything happened to him I could fill in. They said they'd think about it (but I don't think they did.) They didn't even give me a reason for the change, but they must have found out I punched a producer on the set of Joseph: Prophet of the Restoriation.

But, trooper that I am, I carried on in the role of the innkeeper. My 'inn' was the second last stop on the tour. As the travelers came in my daughter Naomi handed out breadsticks. Then I told my account (in English or Thai depending on the tour) of the night Jesus was born and Naomi and I sang the first verse of Away in a Manger. After the song I invited the travelers to go on to the stable behind the inn where Joseph and Mary were singing to the Christ-child.

My monologue was simple enough, but I found lots of way to keep the audience off balance. During one of the ten dress rehearsal performances both Naomi and I managed to forget the words to Away in the Manger. I was supposed to take my glasses off to ensure believability, but sometimes I forgot and left them on. During the two nights of performances there were probably 30-40 tours per night. After a while everything started to blur together. I forgot lines and made up others instead. The shepherds who guided the tours from room to room were supposed to tell me if it was an English our Thai group, but they often didn't. In a darkened room without my glasses on I couldn't always guess correctly, and so several times I started in Thai when the group was English, or vice-versa. Once I correctly started in English, but then after the song forgot what language I had been speaking and resumed the dialogue in Thai.

It was also a little unsettling to share the nativity story in front of people who had little appreciation for its sacredness. The members all came during the dress rehearsal, and for the most part behaved like they were in a church. But during actual performances the audiences behaved quite differently. Each stop on their journey provided them with some form of treat, and so by the time they arrived at the inn the children were conditioned like Pavlovian dogs to rush forward and grab as many breadsticks as possible. Then they sat and crunched those breadsticks as I talked. It sounded like someone was mixing gravel. A few times people took cel phones calls, or talked to their neighbors about the days shopping, or asked questions. Since the church building is close to a university, there were many college kids in large groups exhibiting standard frat boy behavior. My prop was a broom, and so a couple of times as the group was leaving these geniuses would throw the stub of their breadsticks on the floor and gesture for me to sweep it up. It was offensive (even for someone as callous as myself).

It was the experience of being a religious and cultural minority. After it was over I reflected on how this dramatization must have appeared to Thais who have almost no knowledge of Christianity. Christmas was introduced to Thailand largely by Japanese department store conglomerates who emphasized Santa Claus, Christmas trees, and of course - buying things. As a result, most Thais think Christmas is like their Songkhran, a festival celebrating the advent of a new calendar year. So when Thais are then guided through a series of rooms that contain a raving lunatic king, three traveling merchants, white-robed minstrels, sheep-herders, a hotel-owner, and finally a couple in a cave-like setting singing to a plastic baby that is supposed to represent the son of God...one can only wonder at their impressions. In comparison the story of Vishnu's creation of Buddha's enlightenment under the Tamarind tree seem surprisingly plausible. Only the Holy Ghost could overcome such barriers.