Fleecing Ichitan: Thai marching band wins Dutch gold medal by competing with themselves

After camping out in Thonglor and guilting Ichitan’s CEO into paying millions of baht to compete on two continents, the little performers of a school band managed to win a gold medal after all. By competing with themselves.

After Satriwitthaya 2 School’s marching band “Max Percussion Theater” talked businessman, juice magnate and cosplayer Tan Passakornatee into handing over THB3.1 million so they could travel to compete in the Netherlands and United States, the social network has been hard at work digging up the dirt on the band.

The band claimed to have been invited to the competitions but unable to apply for government funding due to the political crisis – not exactly the truth.

As it turned out, the Max Percussion Theater was the only band to compete in the “Marching World Class” category, meaning they could have whistled their way to the gold, as it was guaranteed. How convenient.

In the end, the band scored 84.6 points while the gold and silver medalists in other categories earned higher scores in those categories.

Photo: Drama-Addict

Netizens also found the official website of the organizer, which stated the band contacted them some months ago and asked to compete. But soon after the issue gained attention and Tweets, observers say it was edited and changed to say the band was indeed invited.

Not that we’re going to cry a river for the Tanman, as we suspect he’ll be just fine, but there are probably more worthy causes out there which could have used it.

Photo: Drama-Addict

The list of unclear issues go on and have been discussed online such as the band’s decision to fly to Frankfurt instead of heading directly to Amsterdam where air fares are less expensive.

The social network is waiting for the band to come back to Thailand tomorrow and answer all of the questions raised up in the public forum such as “are you even high school students?” or “How could your budget have been approved when you haven’t won a national award?”.

Meanwhile, check out their gold-metal performance.

Related:

‘Tanman’ saves school band’s dream with his superpower: lots of cash