You can be Dad

A young man I met by the banks of the Chao Phraya river in Bangkok decided straight away that I was too old for him, and should be his 'Dad' instead.

Nong is 18, though his impressive height, 182cm, makes him look older. I met him close to Mum's shop in Thon Buri.

He worked at a hotel nearby, and had dropped in to the area for the first time that night.

Nong came from Esan, and has lived here three years, but found few friends in that time. In fact, Nong knew no one outside work. He had little money to get home, just change for the bus, so I took him back to his place in a taxi.

I walked with him to his room, a tiny box of a place on top of a run-down four-level rowhouse, which shook when buses roared past on the highway below. The room contained a mattress, tiny dressing table, scruffy couch, and little else.

The room had no curtains to keep out the morning light, and no air-conditioning to ward off the heat. He had just the whir of a small fan to keep him company at night.

That was it – his life in Bangkok after three years. He makes just B3000 a month, less than the minimum wage. Somehow he makes it stretch, though he takes overtime when he gets it, or borrows money from his work friends.

The next time I saw him, two nights later, I took a large pile of clothes which I no longer wear, and which I hoped would fit him. None of my Thai friends can wear them, as they are not tall enough; my friend, alas, was tall enough, but not wide enough across the shoulders.

Some he kept, and the rest he sent back with his sister to his mother's place, so she could sell them.

I gave him some money the first night I saw him, as he had almost none left, and wasn't sure if he could borrow from friends. I was upset to learn later that he sent part of the money I gave back with his sister as well.

Nong was a great talker, and wore a sunny smile. He liked to sing to himself, like a child lost in a dream. He walked like a giraffe, but would take my arm as I navigated broken footpaths.

'You have a boyfriend. I would like one, too,' he said. 'How do I find one?'

Once, I took him to an internet café, so he could look for a boyfriend on line. As his 'father' rather than a prospective boyfriend, I could watch him do things which he would normally keep from my gaze.

'I don't like the look of him,' he would say, after inspecting the profile of someone in the chatroom.

Plenty of boys asked to talk to him, but Nong did not seem interested. They were too dark, too thin, or Nong just couldn't be bothered.

Our father-son relationship was short-lived. One day, Nong told me he had bought himself a cell phone. However, he did not call me much, and I did not call him.

Months later, we bumped into each close to Mum's shop. I was annoyed to see he was wearing clothes in the same style which he wore the night I met him. If he was wearing anything which I gave him, I didn't see it.