Bike arrives, but without receipt

Boyfriend Maiyuu has bought his bike. It is a large, smart beast - a gleaming silver-and-blue mountain bike, with seven gears.

Maiyuu bought a quality bike. 'I don't want an ultra-cheap bike which mae ban (housekeepers, cleaners) use...they look as if they might fall apart,' he said.

Unbelievably, the thing appears to have come without an instruction manual.

As I write, Maiyuu has taken the thing for a ride to the supermarket, to buy ingredients for his new takoyaki (Japanese dumpling) maker.

He turned up with one of those yesterday, too, along with a handful of new bed sets, which cost about B200 each.

We get two each. I opened one pack last night. It contains a fitted sheet, two pillow cases, and two cases for bolster pillows - the sausage-shaped pillows for which I had no name, until readers kindly supplied it to me a few weeks ago.

But back to the bike. I had hoped to look up the make on the internet, and bring you a picture of thing if I was able to find it.

However, in the few short hours since Maiyuu brought the bike home yesterday, he has stripped all the stickers off the bike, and thrown away the receipt.

He also claims that he bought it without an instruction manual. When he walked in the door with the bike late yesterday, I did not see one, so perhaps he is right.

Maiyuu says the bike cost a bit over B10,000. But without a receipt, I have no other way of telling.

He bought it from a shopping mall close to our old home in Thon Buri. If I cared enough, I could trek back to the mall and ask them.

I write this post mindful of what regular reader the Shrink has been telling me about my life.

'Love yourself more - then all your boyfriend problems will sort out themselves!'

Before Maiyuu bought the bike, I asked him to bring home a receipt. I did that in the name of self-love, self-preservation, or whatever you want to call it. No one likes to be cheated of his money.

If I truly loved myself, I would still demand evidence of how much it cost, right? Yes, yes, dear reader. Been there, done that.

In Maiyuu's absence, I have flicked through the desk drawer where he keeps the household bills and his stash of condoms.

That's a strange mix of things to keep in one place, I know. I found plenty of condoms, but no receipt for the bike. I did find what looks like a partial consumer guarantee for the bike, but it tells me neither the price, nor the make.

Boyfriend Maiyuu has reverted to his nasty, feral ways...secretive, and possibly dishonest. All this, over a mere B10,000? But then he comes from the provinces, has no job, and no income of his own.

He must be aware of the precariousness of his lot. No farang boyfriend = tough times!

If the bike actually costs less than he told me, and he spent the difference on his dumpling maker and bed sets, I do not really mind. But why not just say so? Maybe I make too big a deal out of financial accountability...demanding he show me this receipt and that.

I am not tracking every last baht...I can't be bothered. But one day, I might have to tell my boy that, as much as I love him, this childishness has to end.

The bike is too big to fit in the lift, and for security reasons Maiyuu does not want to leave it on the ground floor, or chain it up outside.

He has decided to keep it inside the condo instead.

Go for it, lad! We are on the seventh floor. When Maiyuu wants to use it, he has to cart it down an exhausting seven flights of stairs.

Noisy diners, long walks, desert/dessert

I took boyfriend Maiyuu out for lunch yesterday. He chose the place, and ordered the dishes. It was our first time out for a meal since we moved to central Bangkok.

We took lunch at an eatery in Soi Sri Bumpen. Decorated in green, the Krapao Krob eatery serves excellent Thai food, offers an extensive Thai menu, and even makes home deliveries.

A farang was sitting to the left of the entrance as we walked in. A Thai girl served him. 'Krub! Krub! Krub! he said in a loud voice.

This was a man who wanted to be noticed. I am flattered that when I walk into eateries in the tourist district, many farang want to 'reach out' to me, by showing me how important they are.

Some put on a showy display of their Thai language skills. Others stride into the middle of a highly visible public place, such as a street, to pull out the cellphone and make one of those Deal Clincher telephone calls.

Well, that's the impression they give. Maybe they are just calling their Thai headmaster-boss to see when they are due at tomorrow's lowly staff meeting.

Twenty minutes later, as were tucking into our meal, the farang paid his bill.

He let loose another impressive burst of Thai - short witticisms, uttered loudly, to impress upon this farang diner the fact that he was Well Known to the people who run the restaurant, was Local, and Very Funny as well.
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Sri Bumpen Road

After lunch, Maiyuu took me on an hour-long walk back home. Our journey took in the green eatery on Sribumpen Road at one end, and the Ibis Hotel at the other.

At the end of the street, we took a left at the 7-11, then walked down the next soi on the right towards Sathorn, passing a few places I remember from my early days in Bangkok.

Here, a building where a Thai woman - one of my first friends in Bangkok - asked me to invest in an internet shop she wanted to open. That would make me a shareholder, right? Don't be silly. She just wanted my money.

There, a place where I visited a high-price dentist. 'He was too expensive,' said Maiyuu, as we walked past the spot yesterday.

'You have a good memory,' I replied.

On North Sathorn Rd, we emerged at the towering LH Bank (Land and Houses Retail Bank), which wasn't even built when I arrived in this city nine years ago.

'Back then, it was a vacant lot,' Maiyuu reminded me.

We walked through the shopping arcade on the ground floor, looking for any shops selling traditional Thai desserts. We found none, though we did see Thais in university uniform sitting in smart cafe-style eateries.

'I miss foi thong from the market,' said Maiyuu, referring to a Thai dessert we used to buy regularly at our old home in Thon Buri.

That all seems so long ago.

Just before we reached the rear of our condo, Maiyuu took my hand. We walked together, hand-in-hand, for about 20m.

He also took my hand earlier, just outside the mighty LH Bank. What came over him? Normally he is too shy to show affection outdoors...or am I just imagining it?

I looked at him. He was smiling, and looked happy.

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I can't spell the word 'dessert', as in after-dinner sweet things, I have just discovered.

I tend to use the word 'desert', as in dry sandy things, even when I mean the sweet edibles.

I looked up the word on my blog, as part of my 'research' for the last story. I made the mistake about half a dozen times. I have now corrected it.

Thai blogging life: Hit me with your comments stick (reply to the Shrink)

Boyfriend Maiyuu is hopeless. Or maybe the problem really lies with me...

Newcomers to this blog are probably wondering which is true (and why they should care).
In recent months, regular reader the Shrink has volunteered much advice about what I should do with my relationship.

Sometimes, I get annoyed and say so. Once or twice, I have even deleted his comments, as I thought they went too far (well, I assume they were his - he posts under the 'anonymous' label after all).

Yet am I justified in complaining?

Someone who writes for an audience should expect that sometimes readers might not agree with him, or offer views on his life which he doesn't want to hear.

I accept that some of what regular reader the Shrink says is hard to take, and that occasionally friends and even members of my family have said much the same thing - boyfriend Maiyuu is a waste of time, manipulative, and so on.

However, I stand by my assertion that no one is in a position to know as much about what is really happening as the actors involved - me, him, and people who know us or who have met us.

I will stay in the relationship for as long as I think it is going somewhere. Should we meet problems, then we will have to sort them out ourselves. Ending the relationship is a drastic solution to something which could still be repaired.

Why we bother trying to fix things if they break? Usually because they still have some value to us. When they cease to have that value, we trade them in or discard them for a new good.

I would like to thank the Shrink for adding colour to this blog. A while ago, I declared that reader responses were the best part about any blog, and for the last few months have encouraged more of them.

Someone left a message yesterday saying he could understand why some readers liked to bitch about Maiyuu and me - because I wrote in such a way that almost demanded a response, or was angling for comments.

True! I want comments, and the more the better. I won't like them all, of course, but I don't care.

When I started writing this blog, readers rarely commented, and nor did I welcome them. I thought I could do it on my own. Blogging was a way to vent, or prove to myself that I could still write. Boring!

Now, I feel differently. A blogger is just one voice. If readers take part as well, then many voices are represented on our little stage.

If readers are interacting with 'content', then that content takes on a new life.

When I realised how much I valued reader comments, I changed the way I write, to draw them out more often.

Yesterday I invited the Shrink to become a regular contributor to this blog. Judging by his latest response, the Shrink doubts my motives.

Actually, I am keen on inviting someone else to write for this blog, and thought the Shrink might make a good choice, as he appears to have a good command of English.

The arch, bitchy, moody queen in him comes across clearly. By which I mean, he has a good writer's voice.

I did not extend the invitation merely to 'marginalise' his opinions, though if he was to write in this space then he should expect readers might well subject his stories to as much scrutiny as they do mine.

We are all interested in each other's lives. The question is, are we willing to 'share', to use the ghastly modern parlance?

Apparently, I made some outrageous 'projections' about Shrink's conduct with boyfriends. Sorry about that.

Now that I have said sorry, I hope we can move on.

Message to the Shrink: If you're worried that I would attempt to undermine stories about your life, by making other 'projections' about what it might all mean, then I think you should rest easy.

If you are even half as good a writer as I hope, then your stories will cry out for reader reaction. Regular visitors to this blog will pile in to leave their views: how they feel about decisions you have made your life, especially where Thais are concerned.

Like me, you might find some of the responses hard to take. But those who dish it out are usually just as good at taking it back in return. Right (cough, cough)?

However, in any event it seems 'personal circumstances' might conspire against you taking part. 'Personal circumstances?' Almost everything about blogging is personal.

If you lack the courage to tell us about your life, then just say so. No need to be a bashful queer!

The last word should go to The Shrink:

'You have characterised me in other critical posts as someone who probably "has a different young English-speaking boy in his bed every night".'

That was intended as a criticism? How remiss of me...I must have succumbed to an envy attack. In most circumstances, my response would be: 'Good luck to you, dear!'

Now, how about telling us those stories!

Thai blogging life: Invitation to the Shrink

Here's an invitation to the Shrink, a regular critic of this blog's author.

I like the way the Shrink writes - he has a fluent, convincing and easy-to-read style which would not look out of place on this blog.

Are you interested in leaving accounts of your life in the Land of Smiles?

Maybe we can compare.

Ennui is a friend of mine

No reaction from The Shrink to yesterday's post. Has he worn himself out with all that couch talk?

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The boyfriend went out last night. He is cunning, so that when he wants to go out, he is always out the door before I get home from work.

That way, I can't stop him. He sends an SMS telling me he's going out. He also makes sure he cooks a meal for me before he leaves. Last night, he left for me chicken pasta, wrapped inside a crepe envelope.

Only a curmudgeon would object. I sent Maiyuu a thank you message as I usually do, and wished him a happy night out.

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The money for the pushbike and sofa which Maiyuu wants - okay, which we both want - is likely to arrive tomorrow. After rising from his slumber, Maiyuu's first words the other day were:

'When will I be able to buy a bike?'

No 'Good morning', or 'How did you sleep?' Such polite fussiness belongs in the West.

Lately, Maiyuu has looked bored and unhappy. Now that we have settled in to our new condo, there's nothing to do.

Maybe people are only happy as long as they are striving for something. When it finally arrives (a nice place to live, in this case), the novelty quickly fades. We start looking for something else to worry about.

We want to buy a bike, so he can scoot off to the supermarket to buy groceries when he needs them. Martha Stewart's cooking show gives him ideas for cooking, which he usually likes to act on straight away, while the inspiration is still with him.

We want a sofa so we have somewhere to sit while watching TV. At the moment, we lie on awful fold-out soft mattresses, which in the old place served as Maiyuu's bed.

We sleep together on those mattresses occasionally, as the afternoon ebbs into evening, and we feel in need of rest.

Once we have those things, Maiyuu assures me, the condo will be finished.

We won't have to spend anything more on doing it up, or equipping it for our needs.

Yet I do not kid myself that a smart pushbike will make Maiyuu happier.

It will give us perhaps a week's worth of excitement - the novelty of riding on a bike, which I have not done for years, and Maiyuu, perhaps not at all.

After that, we will go back to feeling the way we do now - bored, flat, as if life is just drifting along. No challenges, no excitement. It's almost as if we need something to go wrong to recover some passion in our lives.