The birth of Nightmarch

Karma played a major part in the birth of the original 'Nightmarch' column which first appeared in the Pattaya Mail in June 2000.

The story begins, in a way, as far back as 1995. I was involved in running a go-go bar, which is how I came to meet Dan Dorothy, the American editor of the Pattaya Mail. Back then he was the sporting editor and general photographer and I spoke with him on a few occasions. He even took a photo of a birthday party held in the bar and published it in the Mail. Over the next few years I only saw him a couple of times, on each occasion we just passed a few pleasantries and not much more.

In October 1999 I was offered a position as a writer and sub-editor on a new bi-lingual newspaper (English and Thai) due to be launched in December the same year.

Without going into boring detail, I soon found the operation to be run more like an anarchist's picnic than a professional outfit and stayed for only four issues, all of which were late in hitting the streets.

Prior to the third issue I suggested to the owner and editor a nightlife-cum-bits-and-pieces column could add a bit of spice to the paper. There was general agreement and I set about putting a column together. I called it 'Phar Lap's Knights'. The first part of the name, Phar Lap, was an easy one to come up with, and perfectly appropriate for me.

For many years I have been involved in both the greyhound and horse racing industry in Australia. My first published book was The Ultimate Accolade, the New South Wales Greyhound of the Year Title 1965-1985. Phar Lap means 'lightning' in Thai and was also the name given to one of the greatest racehorses ever to set foot on a racetrack in Australia. Phar Lap won 37 of his 51 races between 1929 and 1932. So, I had a name capturing both the essence of Thailand and which suited my racing background.

I have no idea why I added the 'Knights' part or even decided to spell it in such a fashion. I can only surmise my medication was running low and I wasn't maintaining the correct dosage. At any rate, the newspaper and I parted company in late March 2000.

During this time I also wrote a set of four stories every week for an Australian greyhound racing website. As I was unable to access the Internet from my humble hovel, I used to prepare the stories beforehand, pack up my laptop computer and toddle off down to the Computer Link shop in North Pattaya, run by an Englishman who employed two computer experts. One of them was a man named Alex, a Ukrainian who, in many ways, was the unwitting catalyst in the birth of the 'Nightmarch' column.

Using their facilities and my computer I was able to send the stories I had written back to Australia. This process worked well until mid-May when a glitch left me unable to post my stories to the website. By this time Alex had left Computer Link and opened his own place off Pattaya Central Road. Frustrated, I contacted Alex. He fixed the problem straight away and I was also able to access the Internet from his shop. What was even better, Alex was cheaper and closer to my place than Computer Link.

As I was working away, a vehicle pulled up outside Alex's shop and a few moments later in came Dan, carrying a computer. We recognised each other and he asked what I'd been doing. I told him and he said the Pattaya Mail was always interested in freelance material, suggesting I drop some samples into the office. It was here karma intervened yet again. I put a copy of a story about Cambodia into an envelope and then, at the last minute, decided to throw in what had been going to be the next edition of 'Phar Lap's Knights', merely to give an idea of what I could do.

I saw Dan a little later and he told me, "Peter [Malhotra, the owner of the newspaper] and I liked the 'Phar Lap's Knights' piece and would like you to do a similar column for the Mail." A meeting was arranged and in June 2000, I met Peter Malhotra, and with Dan in attendance, they asked me to do a weekly nightlife column of around 800 words.

Peter surprised and impressed me when he asked, "Phar Lap, that's the name of a famous Australian racehorse isn't it?" I gave him some background on the horse and the reason I had picked the name.

"You'll have to think of another name for the column. Unfortunately, we can't use Phar Lap because of the association with that other paper," he said.

"I've already thought about that. What about Nightmarch? Believe it or not, that's the name of a great New Zealand racehorse which also competed in Australia and who just happened to be Phar Lap's half-brother and beat him in the 1929 Melbourne Cup. Mind you, Phar Lap kicked his brains in every time they met in a race after that. At least it keeps the Australian racing theme and I think Nightmarch sounds OK for a night-style column."

"Alright, 'Nightmarch' it is then," Peter replied.

I have told this story in some detail because there are a couple of people in Pattaya who seem to delight in spreading falsehoods regarding the origins of the column and its name and I want to set the record straight. The name, clearly, is not a derivative of the now-defunct but famous 'Nite Owl' column formerly penned, for 35 years, by Bernard Trink in the Bangkok Post as a few people have either suggested or intimated. Whilst I certainly read the Trink column each week, my style of reporting was completely different.

29-Jan-10

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