Drowning worries at the rat tent

‘At the moment, she has no money...not even to eat. She doesn’t want to show her face at a time of such suffering.’

That cheery message popped up on my phone after I texted a woman friend, Pong, asking if she would like a drink.

We meet at a small rat-infested, mosquito-bitten shop close to my work.

The shop has a truck yard on one side, and a decrepit railway line on the other. Let's just say it has atmosphere.

That curious text message about suffering, written in the third person, arrived on my phone moments later.

Was Pong, a plumpish woman aged 35, trying to tell me she has no money, and needs my help?

Pong has a young daughter, and also looks after her mother. She lives in the slums, works at an oil depot, and finds it hard to make ends meet.

I recall our first conversation: ‘I look after my mother and a six-year-old daughter. The father is no longer with us, as I threw him out. He liked alcohol too much,’ she said.

We met two weeks ago when a farang friend and I dropped in to the rat tent, as we call it, for a quick beer after work.

She must like farang, or their money...I am not sure which. She applied mosquito repellent to our arms and legs almost without asking, fetched us our drinks, and asked if she could join us.

My farang friend is married, and apart from that has no Thai, so the task of communicating fell to me.

Pong and I met at the same place two or three times last week.

Boyfriend Maiyuu noticed changes in my behaviour, as I started turning up home later than normal.

‘You’re stuck on a man or a woman...I am not sure which,’ he said.

I told him about Pong. Maiyuu listened patiently, and asked me why I don’t mix more with farang friends, or at least well-off Thais.

‘Most Thais will want something from a farang they meet. There are hardly any who would mix with you for the sheer pleasure of your company,’ he said.

I started avoiding Pong.

For the next two nights, when I walked past our usual haunt on my way home, the place was empty.

At work last night, when my phone started ringing, I knew it would be her.

All girls like an entrance. How could she not follow up an SMS as angst-ridden and dramatic as the one she sent me a few hours before?

I did not take her calls, as I was busy. However, I was not surprised to find her sitting at the shop when I walked past an hour later.

‘Why don’t you take my calls? Even a simple message saying you are busy would be enough,’ she said.

‘I don’t like phones,’ I said.

For most Thais, my explanation about disliking phones is rarely enough, as they believe answering the phone should take priority over everything else, even work.

We drank a couple of beers as Pong told me about her financial problems.

‘I have a couple of close friends who help me whenever I have run out of money for food,’ she said.

‘My mother is ill, with heart problems, blood pressure, bad knees. She is a big woman and visits the doctor three or four times a week, but because of her size, she has to take taxis. That’s expensive,’ said Pong.

Pong wants to snag a mate who can help her alleviate the burden. She knows about Maiyuu, but doesn’t seem to care.

Three empty bottles were sitting on the table. ‘Who do they belong to?’ I asked, hoping she would not ask me to pay for them.

‘When I am stressed, I like to relax with friends. I was sitting with a couple of friends before you arrived,’ she said.

That was her way of saying, ‘Mine’. Not bad for a woman who has no money to eat, I thought.

‘I have a tab at this shop worth B1,000. Actually, it’s closer to B2,000,’ she said.

When I went to pay the bill, the woman running the shop turned to Pong, as she always does, to ask her what I should pay.

The intention is not to ask Pong whether she wants to help me pay for what we have just consumed.

It’s to ask her whether she wants me to pay for imbibing she has already done that night, even before I turned up.

‘Two bottles,’ she said.

Fair enough, as that’s what we drank. The other ones, she can add to her blasted tab.