Siripong Khwanthong sidles up to a lottery seller along a crowded street near Bangkok's Patpong pleasure district, studies the selection and settles on a ticket ending in 37.
"The number just came to me," he says. "Maybe I'll be lucky tomorrow."
If the government has its way, Siripong soon will be buying lottery tickets from machines. And that's fine with him: not only would it be more convenient, but it also could save money by cutting out the surcharge that street vendors command selling "lucky" numbers, which can add as much as 50 per cent to the US$2.70 ticket price.
But Nipon Sasananand, a 67-year-old with a sprained wrist selling Siripong the ticket from a portable wooden case, strongly opposes the idea. "The machines would be cheaper for customers, so they might not buy from us and we could lose our jobs," he says. "I'm afraid."
The state argues that the machines would reduce overcharging by street vendors and increase state revenue by expanding the market for lower-priced tickets and reducing illegal gambling. Critics counter that it will weaken family values and undermine the social order.
Still others wonder what the fuss is all about. "Why is everyone so upset?" says Usnisa Sukhsvasti, an editor with the Bangkok Post. "It's all a bit hypocritical. Thai people love to gamble, the more the merrier, and they're happy to have another way."
The government first proposed lottery machines in 2007, then scrapped the idea in 2010 in the face of political opposition before reviving it this year. The twice-monthly lottery offers a top prize of about US$67,000.