Kor Beur Noi (Can I have your number)?

‘The farang over there...he wants your number,’ Miss F told a handsome Thai, gesturing at me.

We were sitting in a city eatery. The young man was the best looking male dancer in the joint.

My friend Miss F knew I liked the young man, so took it upon herself to ask if he was available.

I am sure Miss F meant well, but I would really rather she had not asked the lad for his number, as he must get such tacky requests from patrons all the time.

Perhaps Miss F wants me to find a new boyfriend.

I pretended that I didn’t hear, and when the young man turned in my direction, I looked away.

Miss F, her boyfriend farang C, and I were dining at a food barn in Rama 3.

They call them suan raan ahan, which is 'garden eatery', if you like, but they are really just ugly barns with an outdoors section.

They serve mediocre food, beer on tap, and have a stage inside where bands play tinny Esan music.

Miss F used to work at one of these places, and took us there for a meal.

She is still friendly with the girls who serve there. I listened in to one conversation.

‘Is he available?’ the woman asked Miss F about me.

‘He likes men,’ she replied simply.

We visited two places. At the first, we had a meal; the second was for watching a band.

The second place, nearby on Rama 3, was almost empty, so we didn't stay long.

Half a dozen guys who normally serve tables were idle, and sat next to us to watch the band.

Miss F, seized by a moment of silliness, or perhaps acting under farang C's instructions, approached one guy and asked for his phone number on my behalf.

I had mentioned casually which one I liked among them...she chose the wrong one, but it didn't matter, as I could tell all of them were straight.

I shrank into my chair.

The guy didn't look upset that she asked, but I heard him say he didn't like the look of me...or perhaps just didn't like guys, it was hard to tell.

I had already examined his features and body shape carefully...handsome, but too short, hard looking in the face, and most importantly, a woman lover.

I felt dirty and silly after that little episode, and made haste to leave. I didn't ask her to go begging for his number, and even if he had given it, what then?

I am not interested in hiking across town to see some kid I don't even know.

One guy danced for us on stage as part of a half-hearted chorus line.

He was the best looking guy in the whole place, and knew it - tall, lanky, pale-skinned.

The lad wore low-rise jeans, white underwear poking over the top, tight white T-shirt...same old, same old.

His dress was predictable, his dance steps clumsy, but I felt hot just watching him.

I told farang C that I liked him the best.

'I knew it!' he replied.

Farang C teased me for ogling only the best looking guy in the joint, but I replied: ‘Why not?’

It's not as if I stand a chance of bagging someone so young and handsome, unless I was prepared to 'off'' him, and he was prepared to go with me.

Farang C appeared to be saying that I should set my sights lower, but why?

I am not in a position to get to know anyone as a potential boyfriend replacement, or even kik (love interest on the side). 

I don't have the time, money, or energy, even if the status quo - life at home with Maiyuu - leaves me feeling flat at times.

Farang C wants me to change boyfriends, as he believes I am unhappy.

My best chance of snagging a boyfriend, he believes, is to go for one of the less stunning ones.

If I was in the market for boyfriends, I would probably set my sights lower, just as he advises.

However, I don't want to dump Mr Maiyuu, so could see young men only for a night's fun at some awful short-stay hotel.

That won't happen either, as I lack the courage. Nor do I want to expose any Thais I meet to such horrors.

So I end up ogling the best looking guy in the place - why not? - as I know it won't lead anywhere.

Fantasising is free. And in 20 years, he'll be as ugly as I am.

Bonding moments over the undies washer

Let's take a closer look at Maiyuu's avocado green washing machine, which does indeed have a spinning device to toss about his underwear when in washing mode.

Alert readers asked how the thing can wash if it has no spin cycle, as I claimed incorrectly in a blog post yesterday (I have now amended the wording).

Maiyuu bought his mini-washing machine for the eccentrically gay purpose of washing his underwear only.

It has a spin cycle when in washing mode, but lacks a spin dry cycle...the bit at the end, after the clothes are washed, when normal washing machines spin the water out of the garments so they are ready to hang on the line.

This explains why, after washing another mega-load of his underwear yesterday, I found Maiyuu crouched over the machine, wringing the water out of his clothes.

I asked Maiyuu if it was a new entrant to the market.

'They have been around for ages...but previously, they were B2000, which I thought was too much.

'Then, a week ago, I saw the price reduced to B1200 as a New Year's special, so decided it was cheap enough to afford.'

Since Maiyuu bought the machine, he has turned into an ardent clothes washer. In fact, he can't get through underwear fast enough...if he had a choice, I suspect he'd give that washing machine of his a spin every day.

Maybe I should add mine to the load as well, to give us something more to talk about. It's fun sharing bonding moments over our avocado green Hatari washing machine.

Thai chef turns gardener

Chef Maiyuu has expanded into gardening. He now tends half a dozen pot plants on the narrow balcony of our place.

Now, where once we sat there facing Silom with nothing better to do than spy on the neighbours, we can admire the greenery of our plants instead.

Maiyuu waters them faithfully twice a day, and has even fed fertiliser to one or two which look a little sickly.

These ones look good but have no smell. Next, we think we might buy fragrant potted plants. They will give us something more to talk about.

-

Maiyuu has been working so hard around home lately, tending to its needs, and those of its large farang occupant, that I felt he was due a little reward.

'Can I buy you a gift?'I asked innocently, thinking he might be happy with a treat from the 7-11, and preparing an accordingly modest sum of B100 or so.

'Yes, please - a washing machine!' he announced.

This is no ordinary washing machine, folks. It is avocado green, rises only as high as a portable fan, and handles underwear only, with no spin cycle (amended: no spin dry cycle]. How eccentrically gay is that?

'I have walked past it many times now, but don't want to pay for it with my own money,' said Maiyuu.

'It will save me having to wash my underwear by hand, as I have been doing.'

The machine cost me B1200.

My boyfriend lives like hermit, at least in his bedroom, which he locks whenever he leaves home. If he is in residence, the door is usually closed.

He keeps bags of dry rubbish in his room, just in case he wants to dig out a receipt from some purchase six months ago. He could sift out the important stuff, and toss out the rest from his small waste paper bin like everyone else, but prefers to be cautious, so keeps it with him instead.

Rather than washing regularly, he keeps his unwashed clothes in there with him as well, until he has run out and must start a lengthy hand wash.

Now, at least for the underwear, no more! He bought a clear plastic water pipe, and cut it to fit, so now he can run the machine in the living room, or even on the balcony if he fancies...his small underwear washer, pictured here in poor lighting, is light enough to move around. A long plastic hose trails after it wherever it goes.
-

From Maiyuu's kitchen...a rice pork dish created in a boat made of egg. That's a bit of fish on the side of the plate.

He made a strawberry cake the other day, and offered it as a gift to a doctor friend of mine who lives in this condo complex.
 
I teach the doctor English, and Maiyuu thought he might like something sweet while he is listening to me drone on.
 
He packed his cake in a cardboard box, and sent it over with me.
 
The next day, my doctor friend gave us a bottle of red wine in return as a New Year's gift.
 
Last week I decided I would like to drink it, but Maiyuu stopped me.
 
'That red is for me...in return for the cake I made,' he announced.
 
Maiyuu does not drink red wine. But it looks good on the shelf, I suppose, so it can stay there a while until the temptation to have it overpowers me.

Bright-eyed and fancy free

I am now in the market for new adventures, after the appeal of handing over money for no return at Ball’s place started to wane.

I have stopped giving an allowance to Mr Ball, who, despite my urging, has yet to find a job.

I have also stopped dropping in regularly, though Ball seems oblivious to the fact that anything much has changed.

Only his mother, who has remarked that I am being less generous with money these days, has noticed that I appear to be going off them.

‘A good father would drop in and see his son more often,’ she remarked when I paid a fleeting visit the other day.

I had expected to see Mum there alone, only to find Ball rattling about the place looking idle and empty-handed as usual.

‘I applied for a job at an ice-cream store, but they have yet to call offering me a job,’ he said.

‘Next week, I will look for a job somewhere else.’

‘Why not try looking today?’ I thought to myself.

These idle slum people really are too much.

A couple of days before, when I paid a fleeting visit to their slum doorway, Mum told me she had withdrawn B700 to buy Ball a pair of football shoes.

‘Why hurry to buy him a treat when he has yet to find a job?’ I asked myself.

Mum told me about the shoe purchase in hushed tones, as if she was about to ask me to help her pay for them, but didn’t want to let anyone else know. I made my excuses, and promptly left.

Slowly she is getting the message. Now, she seldom calls, and I like it that way.

The other night, my friend farang C took me to racy soi Sri Bumpen for a meal, and a chance to ogle at Thai guys rubbing shoulders with farang tourists.

Farang C is straight, but has often urged me to look beyond the benighted slum for adventures. He knows that as the appeal of mixing with Ball and his family wanes, I will need to broaden my horizons.

He’s right. I want to find some handsome male I can play with, for I am now loose and fancy-free.

Slum lurgy, gruesome patient files

The blog has been silent a couple of days. I am battling a wave of strange head colds and fevers, which creep up on me, then leave again.

Who knows where these bugs are coming from. I like cuddling the toddlers at Ball's place, and they are always sickly. In fact, almost everyone there has a bug at present.

I recall a conversation with a Thai doctor, Mr B, who lives in this condo complex. I teach him English several times a week.

Our genteel, middle-class condo sits cheek by jowl with a slum area.

Mr B has dropped in to the same slum area in which Mr Ball and family live perhaps just three times.

'I wear plenty of clothes, and clean my hands as soon as I leave,' he said.

Most middle-class Thais such as Mr B wouldn't be caught dead in a Thai slum. He enters that area only in an emergency, such as when he needs to to reach the local 7-11 through the slum, which serves as a short-cut.

'You should be careful when you enter that area,' he told me.

To practise his English, Mr B pretends he is presenting medical case studies to an audience of farang doctors.

One of Mr B's patients, a police officer in Bangkok, managed to contract tuberculosis in his knee. Mr B showed me a video he took of the operation which the patient underwent to remove the TB. It was not pretty to watch.

'Perhaps 20% of the people in that slum have a chronic disease,' he said.

Mr B knows about my relationship with Ball and his family.

'On the plus side, TB does not like healthy people like you,' he said. 'Keep eating, and you should be fine.'

-

'I know that as soon as I see my child, I will want to work,' said Ball.

I spent a few hours with Ball's family the other night, when I took the opportunity to ask my young man when he intends finding a job.

He has been out of work since early November, when he lost his job as a messenger for a city bank.

Ball's girlfriend Jay, who is five months' pregnant, said nothing. She must have heard this story before, I thought, and no longer lets Mr Ball's complacency upset her.

'I want you to find a job now, not in four months,' I said. 'You have to put some money away for the big day.'

Ball's childhood slum friend, Y, knows someone who might be able to find them a job at an air conditioning firm.

Y has been promising to take Ball to the company for days, so they can apply for a job.

I am getting tired of waiting. If there is no progress soon, I shall withdraw his allowance as punishment.