Robbing me deaf and blind

I ran into Mr Dependency in the slum, which was jumping to the sound of a dance routine.

‘I have nothing to drink,’ he said.

I couldn’t hear, so in old-man fashion, craned my body forward and bent my ear towards his mouth.

‘What?’

Every evening, women in the slum gather in a wired-fence area next to the main road for exercise.

A trim looking thing gets up on a box and shows off her aerobics moves. The women facing her, who tend to be much larger, follow her movements.

Thais can’t do anything without noise accompaniment, and so it is with this routine. A hip-hop song blares from a sound box next to the aerobics coach.

I was heading to work, but dropped in on my favourite slum shop to buy a laab moo (spicy pork salad) dish.

I was hoping to avoid Mr Ball, whose mother had called moments before I left home.

‘Ball wants to talk,’ she said almost guiltily, and passed over the phone.

‘Farang Mali, aren’t you dropping in today?’ he asked.

‘I have to go to work. I am in a hurry...but I will see you tomorrow,’ I said.

Ball wanted me to buy him alcohol. It was evening, the time when any self-respecting hard man from the slum will start contemplating how to fill his belly with the brown stuff for the evening.

I avoided Ball’s place all day, which wasn’t hard, as I was busy most of it. But on point of principle, I am against giving away money to people who do not work.

As part of a new hard line stance against wasting money in the slums, I have decided to visit only on days off or special occasions such as public holidays. Well, that’s the noble goal, anyway.

As luck would have it, however, I was to run into my young man in the slums just 20 minutes after our phone call, as I was waiting for my laab moo.

‘I have nothing to drink!’ he repeated for my deaf-man benefit.

Boom! Boom! (noise from aerobics workout next to us).

‘Why don’t you ask your Mum for money?’ I asked. ‘Can you wait until tomorrow? I haven’t been to the cash machine,’ I lied.

‘I don’t want to ask Mum,’ he said, but accepted my suggestion that he should wait rather than press the point.

I left happily, thinking that I had made an easy escape.

An hour later, his mother called me at work, sounding desperate.

‘Can you buy him a bottle of whisky on tick? He wants to drink.

‘Last night I bought moo krata (Korean-style home-made bar-b-que) for everyone...I went through B700 in one day,’ she said.

I contemplated her request. I had visited their place the night before, and took part in that delicious moo krata meal.

Feeling sorry for Ball’s mother, I agreed.

A bill of B100 awaits for me when I visit his place tonight.

Bottom dweller

Half a dozen ruffians were whooping it up large outside Ball’s place.

They gathered at what passes for a karaoke bar in a narrow slum alleyway opposite his family home.

Thais rarely know when anyone is approaching from behind (even the gay ones).

I put my hand on the shoulder of one beefy guy blocking the alleyway, to let him know I wanted to get past.

He turned and smiled. This guy has seen me before, but rarely bothers to talk.

He rubbed my shoulders as I passed, and as a bonus gesture, stroked my bottom.

You...you have a nice bottom!’ he said, in a mix of English and Thai. He said it in an affected, feminine way, just to rub in the message.

‘Thanks!’ I said.

I am now in their good books, because I bothered to respond to their silly banter.

-
I dropped in to see Ball and family, after three days away.

Almost everyone was there. It was a happy family occasion. Even the kids were well behaved.

Mum had stuck tinsel and fairy lights to the ceiling, as she prepares to celebrate her birthday.

‘Mum’s party starts on Dec 31, but will carry on for days,’ said Ball, who looked happy to see me, if a little reserved.

When I stay away, Ball wonders if he has done something wrong to upset me.

Once, he was so scared of me at such moments, he didn’t dare approach.

He would stick to his mother on the opposite side of the room, so nervous was he about the prospect that I would criticise him.

Ball is now used to my strange shifts in mood.

He knows I go through phases when I stay away, though he doesn’t always understand why.

I did not say much. I had spent the day wondering what to do about our relationship.

Boyfriend Maiyuu wants me to show him true love.

I spent most of the day with him, but by mid-evening wanted to get away.

We are getting along well enough - our home is now full of chatter, where once it was virtually silent - but there’s no spark.

Ball smiled and looked in my eyes, to gauge how I was feeling. He asked me a couple of polite questions, but did not press matters.

His mother filled me in on his news, as she knows I like to keep up with what he is doing.

'He is drinking two bottles of beer a day. Tonight he went out to play football with friends,' she said.

‘You have been falling down on your duties as a dad...we haven’t seen you for days!’ she said, while serving me a dish of her home-made green curry.

Mum was in an ebullient mood.

Meanwhile, I felt wretched, and fought back tears.

Boyfriend revives, dad has second thoughts

Maiyuu has perked up, now that he realises I am devoting more time to him, and less energy to my friends in the slums.

He starts chattering from the moment he gets up, and rarely lets up until night.

That makes a change from recently, when getting anything out of him but for the most rudimentary speech was a struggle. He would make a meal, utter a few words, and retire to the couch in front of the TV, usually to sleep.

Maybe it is true: I really have been a bastard.

Of course, everything could fall apart. He could enter one of his paranoid, neurotic phases (‘People are watching me!), and I could be left wondering why I bothered.

But regardless of how our relationship ends up, I believe that I owe it to myself to change.
-

I am tired of taking on the mantle of dad in the slum.

When Ball’s mother asked me the other day if I would care to help her pay for a family motorbike, I realised something was wrong.

‘How about you buy Ball just a bottle of beer a day...and put the rest in a piggy bank, to help me pay for a motorbike?’ she asked.

‘Ball and his girlfriend can use it to get to work every day.’

Mum wants my help paying for the bike because she doesn’t have enough cash to make the repayments herself.

This is despite the fact that she has B100,000 tied up in an informal lending scheme, from which she draws interest.

On top of that, she spent B150,000 buying a pick-up truck months ago, which is still in the care of the ‘authorities’, after her son and a ne’er do well from the slums were caught using it to sell stolen petrol.

Once the truck comes back, why not sell it, and recoup the investment?

As for the motorbike, Mum wants to buy it on tick: no deposit, but monthly repayments of B3,000 a month for two years.

Her eldest son Boy would chip in as well.

When I spoke to her about it last, Mum had just spent the day looking at motorbikes with Mr B.

They were keen on a Yamaha Fino bike, which would complement the other two run by the family to do errands, and get its members to work.

Yet why should I bother?

Mum invites me to take part because she knows I care about Mr Ball’s welfare.

Ball’s response?

‘These are our financial problems, not his,’ said Ball, referring to me. 'Don't bother farang Mali with them.'

Ball is worried that if my money is diverted to helping Mum pay for a motorbike, he will have less to drink.

That’s an understandable reaction. But he also speaks the truth when he urges his mother to sort out these problems herself.

Maiyuu's message of hope, divided loyalties

‘I hope to have a good birthday this year, as my last one was sad. And next year, I hope to find true love.’

That’s a message from boyfriend Maiyuu, which he sent me this morning.

It wasn’t an ordinary SMS, sent in ‘real time’, but one he wrote in advance, and programmed his phone to pass on to me.

It arrived the first time a few days ago, on his birthday last Wednesday.

This morning, for some reason, it turned up on my phone again. Is he trying to tell me something?

A gentle ring-tone alerted me to its arrival. I was in the land of half-wake, half-nod when my phone, which I had tucked in the folds of a blanket close to my bed, started humming.

It was not my usual ring-tone, but a special one, with earnest, soft tones.

Perhaps it is reserved for sad love messages from my boyfriend; maybe my phone just knows.

I opened it, and bleary-eyed, read its contents.

Those parting words linger in my mind: 'And next year, I hope to find true love.'

Last year, Maiyuu invited a couple of his women friends to dinner, which he cooked himself. One of the dishes failed to work out, and we teased him about it.

Maiyuu has never forgotten the moment, as for him it felt as if we were making fun of him.

I told him we were just playing around, but my assurances failed to work.

We did nothing special for his birthday which passed on Wednesday, though I hope he can start to forgive me.

At least it wasn’t as trying an experience for him as last year’s celebrations. It was Maiyu and me, sitting at home. We did not invite his women friends, or anyone else, to take part.
-

Maiyuu and I, as readers might have gathered from the short piece above, are back in each other’s good books.

As he heads out the door on his green push bike every morning to buy groceries, I fuss over him. As I stagger around the place looking for food (I am hungry every five minutes), he makes gentle jokes to cheer my spirits about my growing middle-aged tummy.

I hope it’s not just a sentimental post-Christmas thing, as I want these good times to last.

-

‘I hope you haven’t forgotten my birthday on the last day of the year,’ said Mum chirpily.

Mum’s birthday falls on New Year’s Eve.

She asks family and friends to her place to celebrate what is usually a big affair. Everyone in the slum hears about it, though not everyone is invited.

At Ball’s request, Mum called me at work.

Ball rarely calls me himself, as he believes it is more appropriate for his mother to make contact. She usually asks when I am coming around again, to help feed her son’s drinking habits.

Oops! Did I say that?

‘We haven’t seen you for a while,’ she said.

True, I have been busy with work and haven’t dropped in for two days.

If I spend even a day away from them, the emotional ties which bind us together start to unwind, perhaps because the experience is not quite 'real', or not what I want.

I doubt I will drop again today either.

Part of me wants to go, to reassure myself that I will still enjoy their company, am still close to Mr Ball, and that they fill an empty part of my life.

Another part of me wants to carry on investing time in Mr Maiyuu, in the hope we can make something more of our lives together.

Slum visits give me doubts about the life I lead with Maiyuu.

Too much time spent with Maiyuu gives me doubts about the slum.

It is an emotional juggling act I perform constantly, and at my age, one I can do without.

A merry little pork ribs Christmas

Pork ribs, cauliflower, pumpkin and a dark sauce. No, it's not traditional Christmas fare, but it was our version of Christmas dinner in Bangkok. Chef Maiyuu made it for us last night.

I praised him for the dish (not pictured here...sorry, I was too hungry).

'That tasted just like a Christmas meal in the West!' I said.

'It was supposed to...it was Xmas Eve, so we had to eat that way,' he said matter-of-factly.

I realise we are supposed to have turkey with such things, but never mind.

At my work function celebrating Christmas, we tucked into Chinese noodles, meatballs on a stick, and roast duck, among other things. No turkey there either, but who is complaining?

-
My bosses have decided I deserve a little extra money this year, and have awarded me a performance-related bonus, the first time my company has come up bonuses tagged to achievement at work.

Previously, staff were awarded a bonus across the board, or we weren't, depending on how the company's balance sheet is looking. The only exception was the lowest-paid staff, who get them regardless. Two weeks pay, anyone?

I don't know how much it is worth yet - that will have to wait until pay day next week.

I suggested to boyfriend Maiyuu that he might like to let me keep it. However, he proposed that we put it towards a trip he wants to take to his home town in Chon Buri.

'My sister has called half a dozen times, asking me to pay a visit. But I can never go, as we don't have enough money,' he said.

I changed my mind. I have now told him he can keep the money, as I want him to take a break from the burden of looking after me.

'Please regard it as your Christmas present,' I said.

-
Merry Christmas to readers, and thank you for supporting this blog over the last year.