Ball's new duds, carer R's new worries

I succumbed to temptation, and bought young Mr Ball some more clothes.

I was at the Carrefour megastore the other day with my friend, farang C. He helped me look for T-shirts and shorts for Mr Ball, whom he has met previously at carer R’s ya dong stand.

I bought him half a dozen T-shirts, and one pair of soft cotton shorts. I didn’t like the shorts much, so next time I shall buy better ones.

The main objective was to buy T-shirts, and I bought them in different styles, and colours: pink, white with a blue diamond top at the neck, orange...

Mr Ball was a little peeved at first that I had bought them, as he is feeling increasingly obliged to me as I give him more things. When I handed over his clothes, he said: ‘There’s no way I can repay the generosity of such a gift.’

He gave me a deep wai.

The clothes cost just B300, but Ball’s family does not have that much cash lying around, at least for the purpose of buying clothes for a single member of the household.

Ball has three brothers and sisters, but the household itself has many more mouths to feed: his elder sister’s boyfriend, their child, Ball’s girlfriend, his mother’s adopted infant daughter...

The first day after I presented him with the clothes, he wore pink. The second day, he wore the white shirt with the blue diamond at the neck.

'Do I look handsome?' he asked proudly.

'You look great,'I said.

They are also a hit with his mother. ‘Mum loves the clothes, especially the colours,’ he said.

‘Next time, please let me buy you some new colours,’ I said. ‘We want the full range.’

I dropped in to see my young friend yesterday. It was 4pm, but he had not yet showered for the day. I watched him prepare two bottles of baby milk for the two youngsters of the family. Then he put on a sarong and headed into the shower, where he was to spend almost an hour.

‘Ball can spend two hours a day showering,’ said his mother.

After the shower, he headed up the narrow staircase to his bedroom, where he spent another 30min, ironing clothes and dressing.

By the time he came downstairs, I had almost run out of time and had to go home. We walked to carer R’s stand and sat for 15mins.

Ball took his baby sister, Fresh. I noticed that as we left Ball’s place, he took large paces ahead of me, as if he didn’t want neighbours to see me in his company.

‘Are you afraid to be seen with me?’ I asked when we arrived at carer R’s stand.

‘No – I just wanted to get away from home,’ he said.

-
Carer R was stressed, and puffing one cigarette after another.

‘What would you do if a friend suddenly let you down...if he said he’d do something but then failed to keep his word?’ he asked me.

We were sitting at his ya dong stand last night. I dropped in briefly after work.

Mr Ball, who had indulged in too much ya dong, was floppy and giggly. He asked suspiciously if carer R was referring to him.

‘It has nothing to do with you, Mr Ball,’ said R patiently.

‘I’d ask him why he broke his word,’ I said simply.

This cheered carer R, who was thinking of doing just that.

Out of earshot of Mr Ball, he asked me if he could borrow B500, so he could buy raw ingredients for his ya dong.

He was short of the amount he needed to buy an order.

I gather this was connected to his complaint about friends backing down on their word. One of R’s suppliers, previously willing to extend him credit, has now changed his mind, though the reason has nothing to do with R’s credit-worthiness.

A rival ya dong stand is nearby. It is run by an extended member of R’s family. She may have persuaded the supplier to withhold credit.

I agreed to lend him the money. Carer R took me to the local 7-11 by motorbike, so I could withdraw the money from an ATM.

He will repay me today, once he has bought his supplies.

Without them, he cannot carry on his business, as he needs them to make his daily brew.

Breaking the slum mould

I called Ball from work, as I had not seen him during the day.

'What did you do today? How are you feeling?' I asked.

I had promised to call, after he complained about a lack of friends ('I don't know where my school and work friends have gone. My phone is silent all day,' he had told me).

‘I am fine, but rose late,' Ball said. 'Mum had found casual work for me with a lifting gang, but I couldn't go,' he added.

Ball said he was willing to go, but stayed up late the night before he was due to start, so missed his first day on the job.

‘They give everyone in the lifting gang B400, but I couldn’t get up in time,’ he said.

The gang started work at 9am. Someone had offered to pick him up, but he slept through instead.

Ball is young, and deserves his independence. Still, Mum is probably wondering when her son will get over his headstrong streak, and knuckle down to do some work.

Mum's partner, idle taxi driver Lort, sets a poor example. His vehicle rarely hits the road.

Lort claims he is also an underground money-lender to Thais in the slums who like to gamble in the hope of getting ahead in life.

'I know everyone around here, as they all need my money,' he told me. The other night, he dropped in for a quick nip at carer R's ya dong stand.

‘I like to have many business endeavours going,’ he said smugly.

Great, mate. Just leave Ball out of your shady money-making ventures, if you don’t mind; I don't want him turning into another one of you.

Dipping a toe in Thai life

A small update on Mr Ball.

Judging by some of the reader responses I have been getting, some of you have some odd ideas about Thais.

One unpleasant character left a message today saying I was having serious ‘boundary’ issues, and that my relationship with Ball was exploitative, built on self-delusion, and so on. He’s poor, and half my age, so I must be up to no good.

Others say we are using each other: I want to feel young again, and like to have someone to paw over. He likes my money.

The truth is more complicated; real life always is. These are stories not just of Ball himself, but also my relationship with his friends and family, and the other characters at carer R’s ya dong stand.

They are about our conflicting expectations, values, and backgrounds, and how we reconcile them. It’s about how people who are so different can still find enough things in common to be friends.

I can’t expect readers will understand or sympathise with all of what happens, especially if it beyond the realm of their own experience.

For the record, Ball is now drinking much less than when I met him. He stays up late, but no longer keeps the ridiculous hours he observed before. He does not have a job, but is making half-hearted attempts to find one.

Now that he knows I live with a gay man, he no longer shows me the affection he once did, as he doesn’t want me to get ideas. He is also worried that people in the neighbourhood will think he is selling himself to this middle-aged farang.

When we say goodbye at night, we shake hands.

All relationships evolve. Ball seems happier now that he is on better terms with carer R. I like to think that he is happy to have me in his life too.

We can both listen as he unloads about his family and girlfriend. He also knows that we can love him for what he is.

The other night, carer R found some bug on the ground, and without giving any warning, dropped it on Ball's lap.

Ball happens to hate this particular type of bug. As it fell in his lap, he was taken by surprise. He jumped back in his seat, and clenched his fist, as if he was about to hit someone.

I felt a wave of sorrow for my young man. He has so little life experience to protect himself against the unexpected. I worry about his welfare, especially in a rough place like the slum.

Sensibly, when he is not at carer R’s place or at work, he spends most of his time at home, rather than mixing with the element in the neighbourhood. He may be wayward, but his Mum has taught him a few lessons in how to look after himself.

At this difficult time in his life, what Ball needs most is friends. Few, if any of his friends from school or work call. ‘My phone is silent all day,’ he says.

In carer R and me, he has found two friends who can help him make sense of the demands which his family and girlfriend place on him.

Naysayers among my readers can think what they like. Over time, I’ll show you just how ordinary – and yet at the same time, how special – my relationships with Ball and my other Thai friends can be.

Clothes going cheap

Clothes in Bangkok are astonishingly cheap...trousers for B350 or less, T-shirts for B100 or less.

Normally I leave the clothes shopping to boyfriend Maiyuu, who has a good eye. If I need something, he buys it for me. Otherwise, I don't bother to ask.

In the last month, however, I have been clothes shopping several times - for a young friend rather than Maiyuu or myself.

I have bought a pair of jeans, and half a dozen T-shirts, or soft cotton shirts with a collar. I spent no more than B700 in all.

Now that I now how cheap these things are, I might have to start shopping for myself - or perhaps even buying clothes for the boyfriend, who complains that I seldom buy him anything.

I want it, but I don't

‘I want you to stop buying me things. We meet over drinks. That’s enough,’ Ball told me.

I had just bought pizza for Ball, myself, and carer R.

After I ordered the thing, I handed over the phone to carer R, as I am hopeless with directions.

‘Come to the end of the soi. We’re at the ya dong shop,’ he said.

‘I have never seen anyone eat pizza with ya dong before,’ said Ball.

A shot glass of ya dong goes for 10 baht. Most customers are taxi drivers, and other simple types. It is a country drink, though its popularity is now seeping into Bangkok as well.

Ball reprimanded me for spending so much (480 baht, for a large pizza, chicken, and garlic bread).

‘R and I are embarrassed. There’s no need to be so generous,’ he said.

As soon as the pizza arrived, Ball took out a slice and gave it to one of the kids who lives with carer R’s mother-in-law.

Carer R asked if he could take out a few more slices, just in case his mother-in-law was to get hungry later in the evening. Another child aged about 10 lives with her. He declined an offer of pizza, but took a piece of chicken and garlic bread instead.

It was exciting watching this activity. I liked the way carer R and Ball helped others before they ate anything themselves.

The night before, Ball told me he rarely eats fast food, as his family doesn’t have the money. He didn’t put it quite like that, but I knew what he meant.

‘I eat it if it should come along,’ he said.

‘So, would you like pizza if I order it?’ I asked.

He smiled, nodded, and said nothing.

That’s a Yes, as far as most Thais are concerned. Ball and R feel a keen sense of kreng jai (obligation), if I do anything out of the ordinary. As an honorary Thai, I try to keep my head down and do as everyone else does.

I might buy a full bottle of ya dong for everyone, rather than a half bottle as the Thais do, but if no one makes a fuss, no one needs to feel any different.

Occasionally, however, I want to do a little more, if only because the act of giving is so enjoyable.

Carer R and Ball don’t know it, but for me the highlight of ordering a pizza was seeing how they gave to others around them before they agreed to partake themselves.

Even then, they were reluctant. I had to find a plate for Ball and put a slice of pizza on it myself before he would agree to eat. Carer R ate nothing, claiming he was sick of pizza, as his last employer used to shout his staff to pizza meals so regularly that the novelty had now worn off.

How does the foreigner know what is an acceptable display of generosity - and what will make people feel awkward, rather than happy to be the recipient of someone else’s largesse?

For Thais, it is probably easier, as no one has much money.

I have more than the average Thai, though not a huge amount more. In any event, boyfriend Maiyuu holds on to my ATM card, an arrangement which suits me – or I might be inclined to show even more generosity (and discomfit my Thai hosts in the process) than I do now.

‘I wonder if you can separate the two. I know you have never asked me for anything, but perhaps I just like giving. Can you understand that?’ I asked Ball.

In truth, I have not given much. I have bought him a belt, and a pair of jeans, because someone in his family told me that he had none.

I have bought food for his mother twice, and now the pizza. Yes, I’m bad. I am making people feel awkward, but hopefully not too much. In any event, can’t they find it in their hearts to forgive?

‘We don’t have to be like father and son. We can just be drinking friends, as you’ve given enough,’ said Ball.

‘You're getting old. Why don’t you try to find a girl, and have a family? Thais like to deceive farang. I worry you have ended up with someone no good,’ he added.

‘I have only ever had two girlfriends – Jay, my present one, and one other girl, who left me,’ he said.

Ball's girlfriend paid us a brief visit, though he shoo-ed her away.

‘Go home...we’re talking,’ he told her.

‘Can’t I sit for a while?’ asked Jay, who had just finished her job at the supermarket. Ball’s younger brother Beer picked her up on his motorbike, as he usually does.

‘Are you looking for trouble?’ he asked.

She left.

I gave carer R and Ball a brief reading and listening test. Both left school early, though carer R’s English is better.

Ball, I was dismayed to find, can barely read or understand a word.

'I used to skip English classes,’ he said.

Ball asked me about foreign girls. A sample of his questions:

‘Do you think foreign girls would find me attractive, or would they look down on me?’

‘If I flirted with them, would they get upset?’

I replied that foreign girls would jump at the chance to get to know him, as he was so handsome.

‘First, though, you might have to learn a little more English,’ I said.

Ball isn’t interested; not yet, anyway. My friend farang C, who has met carer R and Ball, sent a text message.

‘It is so obvious that you have nothing in common with those people,’ he wrote.

Yet when I am with these two, I am relaxed.

Carer R is like a safety net, waiting to collect my mistakes.

If I say something wrongly in Thai, or behave ineptly (buying expensive pizzas, for example), I know he will come to my rescue.

If a passer-by asks who bought the pizza, R will come up with an explanation which helps me save face.

‘The farang forgot himself, and was thinking of home so much that he just had to order Western food,’ he will say.

I massaged Ball for a couple of hours: I rubbed his shoulders, legs, waist.

He put his legs on my knees.

‘Keep massaging in a straight line,’ R joked, as he watched me plunge my hands right up to Ball's groin.

I went up his shorts leg, but stuck strictly to the leg, just as R advised.

Whenever a motorcycle came our way, I would have to take my hands off him, as he worries about what people in the neighbourhood will think if they see him with a farang.

‘I really enjoyed the night you took me to my bedroom,’ he said, referring to a visit I made to his place a few weeks ago, where we were able to sit in privacy for once.

I can’t recall doing anything special that night, other than inviting him to sleep in my arms.

About 2.30am, I excused myself to go home. Ball, for the first time, declined to escort me across the vacant lot between carer R’s stand and my condo.

Only the night before, he told me how much he enjoys our walks across the vacant lot. Last night, however, he stayed seated.

As the night wore on, young Ball started to look ragged. My young man rose late in the day, but was already in need of bed. His T-shirt was stained in front, and rumpled under the arms.

As carer R chatted away absent-mindedly, I took Ball’s hand, and kissed it.

‘Good night,’ I said.