Booted out of the BF's kitchen

Maiyuu made khao tom with squid for lunch yesterday, even as preparations are underway for tonight's birthday dinner.

As the birthday boy, I am guest of honour. Maiyuu has also invited three Thai friends, and Jumbo, a pet Chihuahua.

‘I want to take pictures for my blog,’ I announced.

I will ask our guests' permission when they arrive.

Last night, as part of initial preparations for the birthday meal, he made a chocolate mousse.  This morning, he went to the market to buy more supplies.

As I write, a dish of meat is sitting on the bench waiting to be cooked.

He has also cut up pineapple, and made walnut toffee. 

-
‘Are you up to making one meal by yourself?’ asked Maiyuu caustically.

I happened to mention I was hungry.

For me, hunger is a permanent physical state, or so it must seem to the Master of the Kitchen, who complains that no sooner has he finished making me one meal that I am mooching around with a hungry look, wanting him to make another.

Maiyuu makes breakfast for us every morning. I fool around on the computer, go for a swim and a run. When I come back after lunch, he makes another meal. Sometimes it is sitting on the table waiting when I walk in the door.

At lunch yesterday I decided to give him a break, and bought food from the slum area across the way.

The surroundings may be slummy, but the food is fine. Maiyuu took advantage of his free-time 'window' to buy me a birthday present. He cycled into town and back. Two hours later he turne up with a pair of work trousers.

‘They are B700,’ he said. Birthday gifts for this farang do not come cheap.

I tried them on, but they were too small. In early evening, patient Maiyuu went back to town and changed them for another pair, which look big enough to fit an elephant.

Late yesterday he also managed to rustle up a beef and vegetable soup. How does he do it? We made smart work of that, so that at the time of writing, the pot is now empty. We are both hungry again.

Well, I am...but as I say, my stomach is always crying out for food.

‘You just think you are hungry...but really, it’s all in your mind,’ said Maiyuu, as he sent me to bed last night, food bowl empty. I had complained yet again of being hungry.

This morning, as he headed into the market to buy food for my dinner, Maiyuu asked if I could possibly look after my own needs for a few hours.

‘I will be busy in the kitchen today, making the birthday meal. Can you possibly heat up something for yourself?’

In the fridge, I found the left-overs of a beef curry which Maiyuu had made a couple of days before.

‘Can I have this?’

‘That’s all there is,’ he said. ‘Dish it out on rice, and put it in the microwave,’ he said, like a mother talking to her child.

Am I really so hopeless?

Kong, Phiwit: Hottest gay couple on TV

Kong and Phiwit, from the television drama Tomorrow, I'll Still Love You (พรุ่งนี้ก็รักเธอ), are falling in love!

Played by Fluke Pachara Thammon (ฟลุค พชร ธรรมมล) and Oh Anuchyd Sapanphong, (pictured above in a TV interview), Kong and Phiwit take secondary roles in the Channel 5 soapie, but in the eyes of many viewers, they are the show.

At the Pantip webboard, fans have left dozens of posts enthusing about the pair. One fan calls them ‘scene stealers’.

Readers are also polled on whether they would like to see more of them in the show. More than 460 readers voted yes, against 140 who said they were getting enough scenes, or too many.

Oh is Phiwit, who starts the series with a sore leg. Fluke is Kong, a therapist, given the unenviable task of caring for him.

Phiwit takes every chance he can to pursue the younger Kong, who is not amused. In the latest episodes, Phiwit grabs Kong’s hand, and holds it...and holds it...

They gaze into each other's eyes, and know they are meant to be an item.

Later, Kong comes home to find Phiwit is there, getting friendly with his mother. Phiwit and Kong have shared family history.

Kong reckons dark deeds committed by Phiwit's elder brother against Kong's sister are reason enough why the two should not see each other.

Phiwit says that's all in the past, and he doesn’t care.

Watch the hand-holding scene here. The scene where Kong comes home to find Phiwit has befriended his mother is here. See Lyn’s Lakorns blog for plot details here.

Obdurate patient, Fluke embarks on gay role

A mercy errand for the sick patient might be in order. Maiyuu is still coughing and looking miserable, but won’t do anything to help himself.

Take medicine? Don’t be silly. He eats as much as ever, which is good, but won’t take anything to relieve the symptoms of his cold.

I will buy him some aspirin to relieve joint pain, and perhaps some fruit and chocolate to cheer his spirits.

I barely slept myself last night. ‘You are not getting a good sleep,’ I kept telling myself in my mind...so I didn’t.

In my last fitful dreams before dawn, a silver-haired librarian was chatting me up. She was about 60. Even worse, in the closing scenes of my dream I was chasing her through the library trying to get her attention.
-

Oh, left, and Fluke

Scene at the hospital

Actor Fluke Pachara Thammon takes a co-starring role as a young gay in his first soap opera role.

In Tomorrow, I’ll Still Love You (พรุ่งนี้ก็รักเธอ), Fluke is paired with actor Oh Anuchyd Sapanphong. 

In the opening episodes, which we saw this week, Oh is Phiwit, a patient with a sore leg, while Fluke (ฟลุค พชร ธรรมมล) is Kong, a therapist, given the unenviable task of caring for him.

Their relationship starts on a bad note, when young Kong accuses Phiwit of pinching his Mum’s purse.

Mum notices her purse is missing, and Kong, who has just seen Phiwit hobbling past with a walking aid, chases after him. He is sure he is the thief.

This being a soap opera, Kong does not merely catch up with Phiwit, but manages to knock him over. Bowled over by love, you might say.

Mum finds her purse in the toilets. She left it there herself. The drama is over, but Phiwit won't let Kong forget it. Phiwit likes to tease and torment Fluke, especially after the theft allegation, but both seem aware that they have sparked.

Boyfriend Maiyuu, who watched the show with me, is sure Phiwit and Kong know they are attracted to each other. The gay word never passes their lips, but the knowledge is there.

In real life, both actors are dogged by persistent rumours that they are gay. But never mind that.

In the soap opera, which I saw over two nights this week, they click as a couple. Oh is always enjoyable to watch no matter what role he takes on. Fluke – third place-getter in this year’s The Star talent quest - performs naturally, as if the cameras aren’t there.

It’s a great watch, and I’m sorry I can get to see it on television only on my nights off.

I might have to buy one of those TV magazine write-ups of the show to find out what happens.

In Bangkok, we can buy pulp fiction-like versions of lakorns (soap operas) on TV. They are like lengthier versions of the script, illustrated by pictures of the stars.

They are fiendishly complicated, with as many twists and turns as the soaps themselves, which puts me off. On the plus side, as befits trash fiction (the kind you find in cheap women’s magazines, for example), they are cheap.

Watch the first episode here.

Strawberry desires

Maiyuu is unwell with a cold. He has been coughing since early yesterday, when he declared the kitchen would be closed for the next 24 hours. ‘I need a break from cooking...I am tired, and feel ill,’ he said.

‘You get sick, but you refuse to take any medicine to relieve the symptoms,’ I told him.

I feel sorry for him.

Maiyuu likes to eat fruit when he is sick, especially strawberries. Yesterday I visited a Tesco Lotus supermarket on Rama 4 in search of them. Nothing.

Today I will visit a Tops supermarket closer to home to see if they stock them. It is larger and more modern, so I should have more luck.

I will walk there, as I don't fancy my chances getting to the supermarket on his bike...too many potholes, cracks and crevices lie in wait on that route, ready to trip up unsuspecting farang.

Maiyuu is sure to appreciate the gesture, even if I end up picking strawberries which taste terrible.

For such is my lot: when I stray into the shopping or cooking realm, which normally belongs to Maiyuu, I never do as good a job, at least according to him.

But that’s okay. When he is sick, I don’t mind wearing criticism for presuming to care for my boyfriend, who is so fiercely independent that he believes colds should just cure themselves, without any help from him or anyone else.

Au Hareutai (อุ๊ หฤทัย): Missing You

Au and Amp

Yes, I’m a romantic, I admit it. It can cloud my judgement, and annoy readers.

Lately I haven’t let my girly side out much, as I have been busy going through old posts, tidying some of the appalling English I found.

Now that I am getting over the shock, and am managing to beat the blog back into some kind of shape, I am almost ready to indulge my emotional side again.

No surprise, then, if I should succumb to tears easily when I heard Grammy artist Au Hareutai Puangboonsri‘s new song Missing You.

Au, who has branched out from singing to become a local body councillor and boxing-ring manager as well, peels it all away, at least for this fan.

Missing You is from Feminine Night, her new joint album with Grammy singer Amp Saowaluck Leelabutr. The pair held a concert to promote the album in late September. Au is the one on the right.

The lyrics (quick translation below) are right on the button of what we feel when we are no longer with someone who used to make our lives complete.

Lyrics this knowing can only have come from the heart of a woman – long-term Grammy song-writer Nim Si Fa.

I found the song on the internet, and recited the lyrics for Maiyuu as he made us breakfast this morning.

Like me, he is a fan of Au and Amp. He promised to buy the album.

‘I haven’t gone anywhere,’ he said, referring to the lyrics, and talking about us. ‘I’m still here, caring for you.’

Read Au’s story here.

Missing You

I have gone back to the place where we first met.

The trees, the flowers, the stream look the same.

Everything looks familiar

Nothing has changed...it's only missing you.

The sun shines through the window, and the past floods back.

On the outside, my life looks the same

At home, nothing has changed.

But really, my life is not complete.

Since you left, it’s not the same.

How can it be the same without you?

Where are you? I miss you...

Whenever I close my eyes, I think of you...

We’ve been apart many years

Life appears to go on

But it’s never been the same

How can it be, without you?

ขาดเธอ – อุ๊ หฤทัย

กลับมายืนอยู่ตรงที่เดิม ที่เราเจอกัน
มองต้นไม้ ดอกไม้ สายธาร มันยังสวยงามอยู่เหมือนเดิม
ได้แต่มองอย่างคนคุ้นเคย ที่ตรงนี้เหมือนเดิมทุกอย่าง
ไม่เปลี่ยนแปลง ขาดแต่เธอเท่านั้น
ดวงอาทิตย์ยังส่องแสงมา ที่ตรงหน้าต่าง
ภาพความหลังกระจ่างขึ้นมา ได้แต่ยิ้มทั้งมีน้ำตา
รูปเธอวางอยู่ตรงที่เดิม บ้านหลังนี้เหมือนเดิมทุกอย่าง
ไม่เปลี่ยนแปลง ขาดแต่เธอเท่านั้น
* อยู่ไหน คิดถึงเธอ
หลับตา ฝันถึงเธอ ทุกที
จากกัน นานหลายปี
ดูชีวิตเหมือนจะเดินไปด้วยดี
แต่มันไม่เคยสมบูรณ์เลย
ไม่เคยจะดีเหมือนเดิมเลย
จะดีอย่างไรเมื่อไม่มีเธอ
ซ้ำ *

The song is here.