Slum micro-financing venture goes sour

‘I will pay you back...one day.’

That was Wan, the slum grandmother to whom I loaned thousands of baht so she could kick-start her noodle business.

Her first repayment date had come and gone, and she was as skint as the first day I met her, when I peered into her slum home from the alleyway and despaired of the plight of its inhabitants.

Wan raises three children, two of them under 10. They are the offspring, one each, of her three adult children, all of whom have new partners. They decided they no longer wanted the children they bore from previous relationships, so dumped the kids with Wan.

Wan has raised them all since they were babies, and with the exception of the middle child, hardly ever sees their parents.

When I met Wan a couple of months ago, the eldest child, Jean, was expecting a child by her jobless boyfriend, who spends most of his days rattling around Wan’s slum home.

’I have no money to help her raise the child,’ Wan complained miserably.

‘Her boyfriend’s parents give me some money, but it’s not enough.’

I asked how she made a living, if no one at her place was working.

'I sell cordial drinks from my home, which fronts into the alleyway and serves as a small shop. I used to sell noodles, which did well, but lack the capital I need to start it up again.’

If she was able to start selling noodles again, I thought, she could bring in a regular income, and everyone in her shabby household would benefit.

Wan’s neighbours – a rough lot who spend their days gambling and gossiping – noticed I liked talking to Wan, and decided I was interested in her romantically.

‘Here comes your boyfriend,’ they would call as they saw me approach her place.

Wan probably thought the same thing, which might explain why she took such a casual attitude to repaying my loan.

I decided to lend Wan some money to get her noodle venture up and running again. We agreed terms: she would repay me B1,000 a month, starting this month, until the debt was discharged.

Before handing over the money, I sounded out the neighbours, including a Thai woman who lives with a farang nearby. She knew Wan, though not well.

I also asked a friend in her 30s, just down the alleyway, who has a small family of her own.

Pin, who is married to a husband who works, supplements the household income by selling fried chicken and sausages to passing slum traffic.

She was reluctant to say too much, but suggested I would be better helping them with small amounts of money first.

‘I feel sorriest for the kids,’ she said.

Pin lives just 50m down the same slum alleyway, but unlike the malingerers at the top end of the slum where Wan lives, is prepared to work to make a living.

When I told her several days later that I had lent Wan money, she was shocked.

‘I don’t fancy your chances of getting it back,’ she said bluntly.

A month later, I realise she was right.

I passed Wan’s place almost daily for weeks, but rarely saw her selling noodles.

One day, I saw her gambling with friends, and pulled her out of the gambling ring to demand an explanation.

‘I didn’t lend you that money so you could gamble it away!’ I said.

She walked away angrily. ‘Are you mad? I have put every baht aside for my family,’ she said.

A week later, in another bad sign, she admitted she had spent B2,000 of the money not on capital for her noodle venture, but on paying outstanding rent.

Three weeks ago, I walked past her place one morning to find two men from the water company outside. They were unscrewing her water mains, to cut off supply to the house.

Wan was not at home, but a tatty-haired friend in her 50s pleaded with them not to cut off her water.

‘I will vouch for her...you can’t leave them without water, a baby is inside!’ she exclaimed.

The water company workers carried on with their task as if they didn’t hear her. When I spoke to Wan a few hours later, she still had no water supply, and was trying to raise from friends the B2,000 she needed to get her mains reconnected.

‘Why didn’t you pay them for me?’ she asked.

‘You’ve blown your chance. You owe me money, but by the looks of it I won’t get any of it back,’ I said miserably.

For days, I cursed myself for having been so stupid as to lend money to someone I didn’t know. She was not willing to help herself, even when given the chance to make a new start. Day after day, I would walk past her place to find her smoking or gossiping with her slum friends.

On good days, I might find her helping Jean care of her baby, who was born about three weeks ago.

Jean and the boys greet me as if I am a family friend. That helps me feel better, but lingering over everything was an unpleasant suspicion that I had been deceived.

Last week, I pulled Wan away from her slum friends to ask her why she didn’t put more effort into restarting her business.

‘I go jogging across the way every day, and can see your place from where I run,' I told her.

'I saw you open your place to sell noodles half a dozen times at the most. Most days, you are closed, and rarely open before midday.

'If you are serious about selling noodles to make a living, you have to get up early, not sit around all day. What are you thinking?’ I asked her bluntly.

Wan looked unperturbed.

‘’Every time I sell noodles, I lose money. Since developers bought the land next to the slum, and put up a wall around it, foot traffic has died.

‘No one enters the slum anymore, so the only customers I can rely on are the people who live here,’ she said.

’But I will pay you back,’ she said hopefully.

A week has passed since her first repayment day. I no longer hold out hope of getting back my money. Wan and her family are thinking of moving to a cheaper place outside the slum, along the main main road where I am unlikely to see much of them.

Trucks roar past all day, which will make their living conditions unpleasant, but I can't help thinking that she is getting what she deserves.

I have not told boyfriend Maiyuu about my forlorn venture into slum micro-financing, as I do not want to be scolded for free.

My friend Pim, to whom I have drawn closer thanks to this loan saga, is helping me come to terms with my financial loss.

‘Regard it as making merit. You performed a good deed, because you wanted to help people in need. That’s enough.

‘Next time, however, you might want to think more carefully about which causes you choose to support,’ she said tactfully.

First taste of fatherhood

Ball is now the father of a beautiful daughter, weighing 3.3kg.

His little girl was born early on May 27 at a small private hospital just outside Silom.

Girlfriend Jay woke Ball about 2am to say she had started bleeding. Ball took her to hospital on his motorbike.

He called his mother a few hours later to say that the doctor had admitted Jay and that she was expected to give birth within hours.

By 11am, it was over. Labour took a little more than two hours. Jay spent the next two days in hospital recovering.

Ball’s mother had prepared virtually nothing. I gave her some money and she went to the market to buy baby clothes and supplies. A couple of days later, her elder sister turned up with more clothes, baskets, basins and towels.

The baby was kept in a small room along with half a dozen other newborns. At first, only the mother and the nurses were allowed to hold her, to protect the child from germs.

Ball saw the child on the day of her birth. On the second day, Ball, Mum and I visited Jay in hospital. We crowded around the glass pane in the door for a glimpse at his little girl.

When I saw the tiny bundle for the first time, I held Ball around the chest and kissed his head. 'You are so clever!' I said.

The first day after the birth, visitors were not allowed to touch the child.

On the second day, the doctor cleared Jay to go home. When we picked up the baby from the dispensary, Ball was able to hold his daughter in his arms for the first time.

He was a happy, beaming Dad. I felt excited for him.

On the way down in the lift, a nurse noticed Ball handling his baby awkwardly, and gave him some advice on how to hold a newborn.

But where Ball might lack experience, his mother, and her elder sister - who held the child for hours on her first visit - showed no such hesitation.

At home, Ball's Mum dressed the child quickly, and with ease. A day later, she washed her, and changed her clothes.

The baby, who has yet to be named, sleeps by day and wakes at night.

‘She likes to be indulged. Whenever she is hungry, or has soiled or wet herself, she will cry immediately,’ said Ball.

The baby’s odd sleeping patterns are playing havoc with her parents’ routines. I can pay a visit in early afternoon, only to find that Ball and Jay are still out to the world, catching up on the sleep they missed the night before.

I spend many hours gazing at the child, who looks much more like Jay than she does Ball, but has a small library of facial expressions, and appears to smile even when she sleeps.

At first I had to fight back tears. ‘I cry because she’s beautiful, and for lost opportunities,’ I told Ball. ‘I never had children, but when I see your beautiful daughter, I wish I had.’

A few days after Jay's return home, Ball, Mum and I visited the local hypermarket. I bought the parents a portable air con machine for their bedroom upstairs, which can serve as their private retreat when they want to escape the bedlam of their large family below.

Ball is understandably proud of his daughter, and gives her many cheek kisses. By now he was no longer hesitant when he picks her up, but holds her like a seasoned hand.

If she cries, he quickly attends to her needs. He doesn’t leave Jay to do all the dirty work, but pitches in himself.

‘Few of my friends have visited to see her, which is upsetting. But I can tell that my mother and aunt love my daughter very much,’ he said, consoling himself.

Time to say goodbye

Google has decided to end advertising on this blog, by disabling my Adsense account. It says my account posed a risk of generating invalid activity, meaning readers click on ads when they want to support the blog rather than because they are interested in the advertising.

Some of that invalid clicking activity might have been encouraged by this message, which I left in the blog sidebar:

Some readers visit day after day, but never seem to notice the Google Adsense advertising on this blog.

The ads help keep this blog in business. In fact, if I don't make enough from it, I don't blog.

However, for Google's sake I must ask readers: Please click the ads only if you find something of interest.

I earn a share of click revenue from the ads.

Funnily enough, I took down the message a few days ago, as I found that few readers were clicking on the ads, even with the message in place.

However, I am sure it contributed to boosting my Adsense revenue in the past, which is why Google has decided to disable my account.

It believes a share of my most recent earnings is artificially inflated, and intends returning my account balance to its advertisers rather than paying it out to me.

In one sense, Google's decision is welcome, as it frees me from the obligation of having to blog. While I blog mainly because I enjoy writing and sharing my experiences, the money I earned from Adsense also helped.

While I could carry on blogging for the sheer pleasure of it, a larger point of principle is involved: I don't see why I should have to write for free.

The days when readers can expect free access to unique internet content are limited, and if I could charge readers for access to this site, I would.

I have taken a quick look at alternatives to Adsense contextual advertising; none of them looks appealing.

I would like to thank readers for their support. I shall take down this site in the next few days.

Postscript, May 14: After reading your supportive comments, I have changed my mind.

Offering a helping hand

The scene outside Wan's home, in green on the left 

Another worthy cause, or just a waste of money?

I have met a woman in her 50s, grandmother to two boys under 10, and one young woman aged in her late teens.

The girl, Jean, is pregnant and due next month. Her boyfriend, 18 and jobless, also lives with them.

Wan, a small, wiry woman with a tough exterior but a great sense of humour, is head of the household.

She has converted the front of their slum home into a small shop, selling bar-b-que kebabs, Thai deserts, and a Chinese fruit drink. Jean, her pregnant grand-daughter, helps her run shop.

No one else in the household brings in an income, though the boyfriend’s mother gives her a little money to look after her son.

‘The rent is B2500, the electricity and water another B1500. I have to find this myself every month,’ Wan told me within moments of our meeting.

The two-storey house from which Wan runs her shop – she opens the front of her place, which points into the slum alleyway - has a bare wooden floor and contains little else of value. A faded picture hangs on a wall. I have spotted one couch.

A kitchen and run-down toilet at the rear adjoins the main room where the family spends most of its time.

Upstairs is a joint bedroom with no walls. That’s it.

I am getting to know Wan slowly, after I met her through one of the boys.

As I walked into the slum one evening last week, a couple of kids stopped me to show me a lizard climbing up a wall. A man selling sausages on a cart arrived at the same time.

When the kids saw the sausage man, a group of kids crowded around, asking me for money – 5 baht apiece.

‘Order what you like, and I will pay. One sausage stick each,’ I said.

Fifteen minutes of frenetic activity later, I owed the sausage man 55 baht.

I gave another two children B20 each to split up among their friends, though one promptly ran off to a video games shop. That was a poor investment, I thought. In future, I shall have to watch more carefully where the money goes.

I hope none asks where he found the money; the adults in his life may not be amused if he is spending a stranger's money on a computer games habit.

While many of the kids know my name – I pass through the slum daily on my way to the local 7-11, and cash machine - I knew the name of only one of theirs.

I asked one lad to take me back to his place, and that's where I met doughty Wan.

‘Flork says you want to see me. Has he done something wrong?’ Wan asked, referring to the lad who guided me back.

‘Not at all,’ I said.

Wan and I started to talk about her life in the slum, as Flork drifted off to see his mates.

The boys and the girl are the offspring of Wan's three adult children: two daughters, and a son. Each has dumped one child with her. None helps with the cost of their upkeep.

‘My adult children have found new partners, and no longer want the kids,’ she said. ‘They do not send me any financial support.’

‘They obviously love their mum,’ I said facetiously.

Wan laughed.

Wan’s own partner died some years ago, and she has not been able to find anyone else.

The youngest child, Ing, aged seven, does not go to school.

His father took off with another woman along with the boy's birth certificate proving his place of birth. Without that, Ing cannot go to school.  Wan said she lacks an education and feels unable to grapple with officialdom to pursue the paperwork herself.

‘Do you want him?’ Wan was asking me whether I would like to take over responsibility for raising the lad.

Unable to start school without the necessary paperwork, Ing spends his days at home while the older lad goes to the nearby school.  ‘I don’t want him,’ I said honestly.

It is not uncommon for Thais in this area to invite me to take over their child-raising burdens. Sometimes they look as if they mean it.

The other lad, Flork, is aged nine, and loves to study. His mother has also found someone else, and is no longer interested in the offspring of her previous relationship.

‘He goes to a temple school because it’s free,’ Wan said.

‘Sometimes the temple donates his schoolbooks, pens and so on,’ she replied. ‘Otherwise, he goes without.’

The school term is about to begin, and with it come expenses.

She asked me if I wanted to help – Wan is nothing if not forward – and I replied I was willing, as long as he is a hard-working student.

I pondered how to do it. Should I accompany her to the local shops, to buy his uniform and anything else he needs? Or should I just hand over cash?

If I hand over regular payments, untagged to particular expenditure, she will come to expect it. On the other hand, helping this family will give me someone new to worry about, other than my friend Ball and his family who live nearby.

The shop which Wan runs from her place might do better than it looks. But her home is as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, and she could do with the help.

I know a woman down the way with a good head on her shoulders. Ping raises a family of her own, but has better means.

'May I have your phone number? I would like your advice on a matter,’ I asked the other day as I dropped by for a chat.

I will ask my friend Ping what to do. If she thinks they are a cause worth supporting, I shall go ahead.

Ping sells fried sausages and chicken. A couple of doors down from her, another slum household has opened for business.

Its occupants sell food to order, including a flaming Korean bar-b-que, which they deliver to homes in the slum.

The entire alleyway, in fact, is a hive of commercial activity. Here, an internet shop; there, a small games arcade.

Almost every household sells something, which helps keep money circulating, and families in business.

Mobile traders also move through the alleyway pushing carts which offer local produce, including fish, vegetables, and flowers.

Wan also wants some start-up capital to sell noodles from her shop. She used to sell it, but ran out of money to keep the venture going. With the girl’s pregnancy coming to term, household expenses will rise.

Even if I don't help the boy, I might lend her some money so she can rebuild her business. Hopefully, it will provide her with income sufficient to look after her family's needs.

Turning down the workers

A drunken takraw Ball picked me up from the office on his motorbike.

He had called me a couple of hours before to say he was knocking back beers with friends, and would I like to join them.

Ball had joined his gay takraw friend Sorn, and two men in their 50s at a seedy karaoke shop nearby.

Ball arrived on his motorbike to take me to the shop. I had just left work and was waiting for him 50m down the road.

Though I knew the way there, it was good of him to pick me up. I did not fancy walking through that industrial part of town – past shipping containers, trucks, and dusty roads with no sidewalks – at that grim hour of the night.

When he greeted me, he was wearing a cheeky smile which said: 'I know you fancy me. Why else would you want to drink with us?'

I ignored it, and climbed on the back of his bike.

No sooner had I parked my bottom than Ball lost his balance. The bike tipped to one side, and I fell off the back.

I scraped my bottom and my hands. If I had hit my head on the road, I may not be here to tell you this story.

This is my first time in Thailand that I have fallen off a bloody motorbike. What was he thinking?

Ball was apologetic and embarrassed. The bike had just run through a puddle on the road, so he was able to save face.  ‘The road was slippery,’ he said repeatedly, as if trying to convince himself.

'Are you hurt?’

‘Not hurt,’ I said, gathering my composure.

Half a dozen Thais were standing nearby. They watched me fall off the bike, which must have been amusing. But no one laughed, which made my discomfort easier to bear.

Ball asked if I was working tomorrow.

'I am rostered on as usual,' I replied.

'They shouldn't do that to you...it's Labour Day weekend,' he said, changing the subject.

We arrived at the karaoke shop, an airless box of a place with darkened windows.

A dozen men were sitting inside. Why do these places so seldom have any women?

Ball’s friend Sorn was dancing for the crowd. ‘You...sing song?’ he asked in English.

‘No,’ I said.

The boys were sitting with two middle-aged men. Ball introduced them as his 'uncles'.

'Hello,' I said, shaking their hands briskly.

I didn't get a chance to ask, but I suspect they were actually his bosses at work.

The pair looked embarrassed, as if they had never met a foreigner before, which might be true.

I took a quick look about, and decided it was not for me.

The tables have space for four. As those seats were occupied, the boys put me at the end of the table next to the drinks trolley, jutting into the shop like an unwanted wisdom tooth.

No, thanks.

The music was so loud that I couldn’t make myself heard, or understand what anyone else was saying either.

Thais are nothing if not good hosts. One of the older men poured me a drink, and asked me if I wanted to sing.

I emptied my glass quickly, and told the lads I was going. 'It too noisy, and it's late,' I said. They did not seem to mind.

I said a quick goodbye, and left on foot.

The humid night air hung over me like a thick blanket. I worked up a good sweat as I walked past the shipping containers and trucks which I had earlier hoped to avoid.  But at least I made a clean escape.

When I arrived home half an hour later, I told Maiyuu the motorbike and karaoke shop saga.

He was waiting in front of the condo with Jao Khao, our adopted dog, whom he had just fed for the second time that day.

‘You are lucky you did not knock your head...I would be left in difficulty,’ Maiyuu said.

'I decided not to stay. It looked horrible.'

'You escaped lightly,' the boyfriend pronounced. ‘On May Day weekend, working Thais get so drunk they don’t know what they are doing.’