Put that boy in his own bedroom, thanks

Young Dream once occupied a shared bedroom in his parents’ two-storey slum home, but no more.

When his elder cousin Dear took in a girlfriend, Dream, with whom he once shared the bedroom, found himself unceremoniously booted downstairs. He now sleeps on the floor close to the front door.

‘’Dear is a mere guest in the home, but behaves as if he owns it,’’ Dream’s Mum complained last night.

‘I stood up to him one night when he was complaining about something," Orng said, referring to Dear.

"His mother was present, and I told him in front of her that if he didn’t like it, he could leave.’

So far, so good. So why not boot him out of the upstairs bedroom, and have him sleep downstairs instead?

Mum charges Dear 500 baht a month for his upkeep, which is hardly a princely sum.

The conversation deteriorated at this point into petty sniping about whether he buys his own washing powder. I suppose these things matter when money is short, but I suspect Orng just likes to complain.

So why not raise a few words of complaint on behalf of her son?

The men of the household last night retired to what I shall call the ‘sitting room’ – the spartan bottom-floor space of the house where Dream sleeps  - to play cards.

It has a sofa, which I can see from the soi when I walk past their house. 

It also has a TV, fridge and toilet, and a small cupboard for the cutlery and plates…the sort where Thais, oddly, also keep their opened food.

Being a slum home, there is no table or chairs, at least on the ground floor. The family tends to sit at a rickety wooden table for meals in front of their place.

This part of the slum alleyway is slightly wider than the rest, as they live at the head of it.

They keep a small coal fire out there, and wash their dishes outside in plastic tubs.

Inside, the men were smoking up large, oblivious to the fact that in a few hours, Dream would have to breathe their polluted air as he prepares to sleep.

When he closes the door to the world and douses the lights, does his place look any more comforting?

A thin duvet and pillow were folded up in one corner; these no doubt belong to Dream. If he wants to undress in privacy, he has to do it upstairs, and come down again.

I can barely fit in the toilet, which also doubles as a shower.

A laundry basket containing underwear and a few other bits and pieces sits by the stairs. Wouldn’t you want that stuff kept in a private place?

I admire the ability of Thais to live in such appalling conditions and still carry on day by day.

But I can also understand why Dream – my new foster son, under arrangement with his family – is hardly ever at home.

I waited an hour for Dream to turn up. Aunty Lek and his mother were attentive hosts, as ever, though Lek argued with a woman friend. I witnessed another argument at the table the night before, in which two men came to blows.

These rough scenes are not pleasant to witness, and make me doubt whether I really want to spend my time with these people.

Dream and his friends had gone out to play football. 

Aunty Lek called their return as they approached the house in a noisy procession of at least half a dozen motorbikes.

The boys rode two to a bike. Everyone wore football gear, though none in the same colours.

‘Here they come!’ she said excitedly.

Dream jumped off the back of his bike athletically, and gave me a wai.

After a shower, he joined his father’s card game, as the women folk carried on gossiping outside.

Half an hour later, he had evidently tired of home life, and told us he was heading out to play computer games with a friend.

Dream, who had yet to eat, is fussy about his food.

‘He doesn’t eat vegetables, and rarely bothers with fruit,’ his mother said.

'The other night when you bought him khao pad krapao moo, he picked the peanuts out of it.'

As Dream prepared to take off with his friend, his mother announced: ‘You will have to arrange your own meal tonight.’ 

Dream held my hand as he said goodbye, and said he’d be back in an hour or so. He looked worried, as if I wasn’t enjoying myself.

He’s right – I wasn’t. I don’t like the way Dear relegates him to second-class status in his own home. Nor do I like the forlorn way he lives, sleeping on the dusty floor by the front door.

If I am to care for this young man, I reserve the right to ask for better.

His mother and I are set for interesting times ahead.

Dreams are made of this

Happy New Year to readers.

I spent mine in a slum close to my office, where I have befriended a new family.

They invited me to join them for the New Year’s countdown.

My family lives at the head of a row of slum houses which I pass on my way to work.

By the time I finish, they are often drinking out the front.

Anyone who takes a detour through the alleyway to the main road outside must pass their place. The passage is narrow, but the flow of traffic is constant.

Almost everyone knows each other; passersby are greeted with a lively cheer or a drink.

A few nights ago as I was walking home when a youngster offered me a whisky.

Dream is 18, and works for his aunt’s shipping company. I had spoken to him half a dozen times in passing as I cut through the alleyway where he lives out to the main road where I work.

The alleyway lies between my condo, on the opposite side of a railway line close to Pra Ram III,  and the office. It is behind a fresh market leading into Klong Toey and a popular shortcut for motorcycles in particular.

Dream wears a steel rod in his right arm after a recent accident on his motorcycle. We have talked about his injury, and the operation, which he says terrified him.

We usually chat a few minutes, and I head on my way.

However, after he thrust a glass in my hand the other night, I suggested I join his family for a quick drink.

He welcomed me to the table, where I recognised a boisterous uncle who had stopped me on my journeys down the alleyway before.

‘Happy, happy. New Year. Thailand. Fun!’ he said, shaking my hand vigorously.

The mainstay of the grouping is Aunty Lek, who introduced me to Dream’s mother, Orng.

‘She says little, but has a kind heart,’ she told me.

Her partner P' Noi was absent, as he was sleeping off a drinking session.

 ‘We’re all family here, and as you know Dream, you are now part of our family too,’ Lek told me proudly.

I also met Dream’s elder cousin, the delightfully named Dear, who occupies the bedroom next to his in their two-storey house.

Both young men are attractive, well mannered types. Getting to know them will be fun.

We have drunk together for the past three nights. As the only farang to have joined their group, I am the star attraction.

The first night was for introductions; the second, family bonding.

On family bonding night, I had only just joined the table when Aunty Lek asked me if I wanted to be Dream’s foster dad.

Being hospitable Thais, they are anxious that I keep myself stress-free and happy.

‘Yes,’ I said.

A few seconds later, Lek, who appears to enjoy stitching together the emotional fabric of this family, asked Dream to join us.

Dream, head bowed, quietly took a seat next to me.

‘Farang Mali says he wants to adopt you as his foster son. Do you want farang Mali as your foster dad?’ she asked, getting straight to the point.

Dream, who can be as boisterous as any teen when it suits, gave an emphatic ‘Yes!’

I was surprised, as I thought they were just having fun.

Since then, the family has introduced me as Dream’s foster dad.

No one has explained how this is supposed to work, though for the moment I am happy just to go with the flow.

Dream, an only child, is attentive. He makes sure I am rarely sitting with people I do not know. He jumps in to answer questions on my behalf at introductions.

He holds my hand, puts his arm around my shoulders. He pulls up a seat next to me when I am alone.

I have met cousins, elder sister-types, Dream’s friends, local eccentrics…it is a lively setting in which teens mix with family elders one moment, small children passing by with balloons and dolls in arm the next.

I am making tentative steps as foster dad… I bought Dream a baking treat one night, a hooded sweatshirt to keep him warm the next.

'He likes KFC, and dislikes sauce,' his mum told me.

'Okay,' I thought, making a mental note.

If I move from the main table to a chair sitting against a block wall framing the alleyway –it is wide enough for a motorcycle and couple of people to pass by, but little more – someone follows me with my drink and food.

Mum keeps a small coal fire going on which she cooks up tom yum and lab moo.

The young ones look after the music, choosing songs on their smartphone, which is plugged into a large amp.

The music sounds like techno pop. Once or twice, they treated us with ballads, or Thai ‘music for life’ songs, which I enjoy.

I waltzed with a guy in his 50s when one of the slower songs came on, as it was the only music I could understand.

When the techno stuff resumed, Dream's teen friends invited me to dance with them, but I declined. Their moves look too self-absorbed, as if they would really rather be looking at their own reflection in the mirror than sharing the moment with anyone else.

With midnight approaching, Dear helped Ong's partner P' Noi, who had risen from sleep, into a jacket, tie, and pair of fancy shoes.

He emerged playfully to shake everyone’s hand, imitating a robot with jerky hand movements. We took group photographs.

Meanwhile, Dear found a televised broadcast of the city’s main countdown party on a smartphone app.

We watched as the presenters on stage outside CentralWorld department store in Ratchaprasong counted down to midnight.

‘Three…two…one…’

The skies lit up with fireworks, at least where the crowds were in town.

I looked above me in lour Klong Toey slum setting for signs of life in the skies, but saw only a huge overhead advertising billboard, blocking the view.

The billboard, an enormous steel structure, looks sturdy enough. When the lights on the billboard go out every night – which they must do by city council order, Lek tells me earnestly – we rely on fairy lights, strung above our heads with the party balloons, to see anything.

Other folk were celebrating New Year down the alley. Some let off firecrackers, others turned up the music.

At our place, young ones jumped in the air to puncture the balloons with lit cigarettes.

‘Bang!’

‘Bang!’

After another 90min, I was spent.

I offered a wai to my new ‘family’.

Dream, wearing the oversized windbreaker I gave him and a pair of shades, led me away.

‘Are you sure you do not want to stay? I will keep dancing.’ he said.

A family elder gives me a lift home every night on a motorcycle, as they don’t want me walking the streets at that hour. Dream stays behind.

As I clambered on the back of the bike, I thanked my ‘foster son’ for a great time.

Really, I felt awkward for most of it, but I am still learning how to fit in.

‘Don’t stress! Don’t be serious! Just relax!’ the family urges me, thrusting a drink into my hand.

Perhaps I am just rusty.

Surrounded by so much family warmth – and with my new duties as foster dad to discharge – I am sure I’ll cast off my baggage in time.

Going off the slum

''Are you really that busy?'’ asked Ball, who has noticed I am growing meaner with money but is anxious that I return to my old giving self.

‘'I am working too hard to come and see you,'’ I said, hoping it sounded convincing. While I am tightening the purse strings, I still feel guilty when I refuse to give.

I dropped in to see my needy friend from the slum the other night, after he sent a message saying he would fancy a drink.

I seldom make contact these days, as I am sick of having to part with money whenever I visit.

Ball has quit his stable job as a messenger for a city bank, which paid just B7,000 a month, in favour of a delivery job which pays a much more attractive B13,000. 

He found a flier advertising the job in a public transport van.

He now buzzes around town on a motorbike delivering perishable goods while his boss, a farang, keeps an eye on staff movements via a GPS tracker device which sends messages to his cellphone, or somesuch.

I must admit I wasn’t paying much attention. Ball and I appear to have lost our spark. I was more interested in playing with the kids and the dog, who are always happy to see me, regardless of how much I spend.

Ball and his girlfriend Jay have gone halves in a motorbike, their first joint purchase of a substantial asset. They are paying it off at a rate of B3,000 a month.

‘'It’s more convenient when we have to get to work or go shopping,'’ he said. Previously they relied on public transport or had to wait until his brothers’ motorcycles were free.

Jay told me enthusiastically about the motorcycle purchase plan a month or so ago, no doubt hoping I would help pay for it.

I haven’t, and in fact have avoided shelling out for their everyday expenses now for weeks.

I have known the couple for three years.  I have given them financial help regularly, which keeps them happy for a few days until they ask for more. Nothing appears to get any better, so one day recently I decided to stop.

What’s wrong with breaking old patterns of behaviour occasionally? 

In the time we have known each other, Ball and Jay have had their first child, Nong Min, now two-and-a-half.

When I met him, Ball was an angry drunken teen. He is now a mellow, responsible dad to a beautiful, happy little girl.

I am proud of how much he has grown up, but now think it’s time he takes the next step, and learns to look after himself.

A month or so ago, Ball graduated as a military conscript, which means he finally has his Sor Dor 8 military certificate telling would-be employers he has served his obligations to the state.

Without one, he’d find it tough getting a job, as employers tend to ask for it.

That’s fine as far as the paperwork goes. In fact, Ball spent most of his service at home, thanks to the sergeants at his base who took pity on his plight as a young slum dad whose mother has been carted off to jail (Ball's Mum was caught with a bag full of drugs stashed at her place which she intended to sell)​.

Ball fled the military base twice, so unhappy was he about being stuck there with a bunch of conscripts he barely knows. Two years ago when he started his service, Ball was that much angrier, and in need of a drink.

On one of his escapes from camp, he jumped over the wall and into a muddy canal, losing his cellphone in the filthy water. ''I could hear the sergeant sounding his whistle to let everyone know I had escaped,'' he said.

When he emerged a tuk tuk driver, who looked as if he had seen it all before, gave him a free lift. He also made it into the subway, and found a taxi willing to take him the rest of the way.

Ball's superiors weren’t happy he fled, but knew that as a young dad – one of the few conscripts in his intake with a child at home – he would be missing his daughter. 

They let him stay at home, but for one or two occasions when they asked him to report in person, or send pictures of himself with a military-style haircut, presumably to show as proof of service should anyone ask.

 ''They told me to keep out of trouble, and avoid attracting attention to myself,'' he said.

The sergeants told him to avoid looking for work, as ''authorities'' might discover that with the military’s blessing, he was dodging conscription. 

The head of his unit kept the salary he earned as a conscript, which was only fair, but meant money at home was short.

The military offered conscripts who had left school early the chance to better themselves. Military instructors taught basic subjects including English which the young men could put belatedly towards a school leaving certificate.

Because Ball spent his service at home, he did not get the chance to finish his studies while serving in the military. He could have earned the 6^th form  leaving certificate equivalent which eluded him at school, but no.

Ball left school with a 3^rd form certificate, the lowest you can get. As far as the marketplace is concerned, he is unskilled.

On the plus side, I liked having Ball so close to home. I accompanied him to his base in Bang Khen a couple of times so he could report to his superiors. 

A friend of his brother's took us on the back of his truck, loaded with fishing gear. Ball was dressed in his soldier's uniform, and looked miserable.

We rattled about, battling exhaust fumes and traffic jams on the way.

Our last visit was months ago, back when I enjoyed his company and didn’t mind parting with money for his upkeep. 

Now, I am happier to spend time with Maiyuu. Call me selfish, I don’t care. As I get older, I am learning to self-indulge. 

The other day Ball sent me a message saying he was desperate for cash. I ignored it.

He called half a dozen times. I ignored them too.

The other night when I saw him I was forced to explain my absence, as I usually am whenever I fail to come through as his friendly farang provider.

‘'Bloody Suthep’s protests kept me away,'’ I said, which was partly true. My work is much busier because of them.

‘'Can I make contact with you tomorrow? I will need money,’' he said timorously. ‘'I leave in the morning.'’

Ball spoke in an embarrassed whisper, even though there were no other adults around.

His girlfriend, brothers and sister, who are rarely home these days, were still at work. 

They leave him alone to look after the three kids of the household. Ball himself works 10 hours a day, he tells me, and seldom has the energy, still less the money, to devote to the little ones when he makes his last delivery of the day.

‘'I get up early and start work on the computer straight away,'’ I snapped.

Ball evidently expects me to drop everything and venture into the slum whenever he needs help.

No, thanks. Perhaps I was too nice in the past. Or maybe I am just too nasty now.

I didn’t hear from him the next day, and he hasn’t called since.

I am not sure how much we can last if I am no longer paying out. But to be frank, given the truckload of problems over there, I am not sure I care.

Topping up with Mr Esso

‘I am not imprisoning him in his room. Do you have a problem with that?’

Well, that was rather abrupt…bloody rude, in fact.

I was talking to the girlfriend of an attractive young man I have met.

Esso (Sor) is the eldest child by a previous marriage of Mum, a woman who runs a massage shop down the road from me.

Mum, as everyone calls her, is having problems with her marriage. Her new husband, father to their second child, Oo-ee, an 8 year-old girl, is seldom home.

‘Home’ is the massage shop where I met Mum, her son Sor, and Oo-ee several weeks ago.

Oo-ee dotes on her dad, and makes her preference for her father’s affections plain in her unpleasant exchanges with Mum.

Mum in turn stresses about the hostile way her daughter treats her.

‘By contrast, I never worry about Sor…even though he has no work, he causes me no bother,’ she tells me.

Sor, 28, lives with Mum and his younger sister at the shop.

They share the space with a couple of mor nuat (massage therapists), and any number of strays and waifs who appear to bail up at all hours wanting company.

Sor, who has a lovely smooth shape, has no regular work. 

Mum sent him to work with relatives in farms in the provinces, to no avail. He left school early, and reckons he lacks the intellectual rigour to go back to school.

He is painfully shy, and spends much of his day with his head bent over his smartphone, playing computer games.

Pow! Bang! Slam!

Isn’t that what they do?

However, I like him, and understand that he’s not the simple, idle young man that he might appear on the surface.

Sor, who wears only black T-shirts, wears his hair down the sides of his face, Korean-style. So much of his pretty, angular face is obscured by his trendy hair, in fact, that the first time I saw him I mistook him for a teen.

He’s so shy, I had to tell his mother that I wanted to talk to him before I could get him to utter a word.

‘Sor…farang Mali is interested in you,’ she said plainly.

That was two weeks ago.

The first time I visited, I went for a massage, but was taken by the friendliness of its owner.

I decided I liked the feel of the place so much that I called the shop a few hours later and asked if I could pay social visits. Mum agreed.

I went back that night. About half a dozen guests had gathered, ostensibly to celebrate Sor’s birthday, though I saw precious little of him. 

They were friends of his mother. She and her pals gambled and drank the night away, as they do most nights...the fact it was her son's birthday, it seems, was just a coincidence.

Sor came down the stairs of their three-storey place occasionally to visit the toilet. 

However, he would disappear just as furtively up the stairs again, without saying a word to me or anybody else.

Occasionally a manly looking woman appeared on the stairs too. 

‘That’s his girlfriend, Muay,’ said Mum.

She came and went without a word.

'What a modern family,' I thought. 'Mum doesn't mind if her young son spends the night with his girlfriend, as long as they do it in the privacy of his bedroom.'

That was back when I thought he was a mere teen.

In fact, Sor’s mother told me later that night it was Sor’s 32rd birthday.

He's older than he looks, though it's hard to tell from under all that hair.

A few days later, I asked Sor himself how old he was, and he told me he was actually 28.

It’s nothing unusual for a Thai mother not to know the age of her own child; I come across it often. Perhaps both are mistaken.

I was to go back another three or four times in the next week. Boyfriend Maiyuu was away, so why not?

Sor, who helps his mother run the shop, arrived in Bangkok five months ago from his home in Esan. ‘I grew up with my grandmother,’ he said.

Sor is having trouble fitting into Bangkok. The two massage therapists who work at the shop tell me he is ‘mean’ with money. 

I suspect it’s simply a case of Sor not wanting to commit himself to Bangkok, which is too big and busy for his liking. He's a country boy, after all.

‘I go out occasionally, but mostly I like to stay with Mum,’ he told me. ‘I rise early to take Oo-ee to school. Then I clean the floor of the shop. 

'I might still be awake at 2am or 3am the next day, depending on whether I have to take the mor nuat to see customers outside the shop,’ he said.

Sor takes the mor nuat – who, like him and almost everyone else I have met there, comes from the poor Northeast – to local hotels on his motorbike. Their customers can call the mor nuat at all hours and expect service.

I enjoy Sor’s company. He’s a so-called red shirt, who enjoys bantering about politics with his mother, a yellow shirt. 

The mor nuat, who fancied me as a potential catch until I told them I live with a man, now understand that I prefer Sor’s company, though they are not happy about it.

The shop attracts mainly Thai custom. Mum, who holds qualifications in massage therapy, has owned one or two other places in town.

When she moved to this one a few months ago she did it up at her own expense.

‘Sor was like you when he was young…he liked men,’ Mum confided in me one night.

That might explain why Sor likes white make-up, girly-style, and wears his hair in the style of effeminate Korean boyband singers.

It might also explain why his girlfriend looks like a ladyboy, though my mor nuat friends insist she’s real.

Anyway, Muay, as she is known, does not appreciate the competition for his affections which I represent.

Someone must have told her I was taking an interest in Sor.

Really, we are just friends. I enjoy teasing him about his quiet life. He appears to enjoy our exchanges, perhaps because he rarely meets anyone outside the shop.

Sor has big plans, despite his lack of experience in the workforce. ‘I would like to fix computers, though I would prefer to own my own shop than work for someone else,’ he said.

‘You will need capital for that,’ I reminded him.

When I was there most recently, about a week ago, I found Sor downstairs when I entered. He had dyed his hair red.

‘What do you think, Mali?’ he asked.

‘I am not sure what to say,’ I replied.

Sor laughed.

‘I obviously have too much time on my hands,’ he joked.

I had bought him and his mother a simple dish of oysters fried in egg batter.

‘I have never eaten fried oysters before,’ Sor said, declining to join us.

His mother and I decided to eat it instead.

Moments later, Sor slipped quietly upstairs.

I could hear noises coming from upstairs, but thought nothing of it. Apparently, his girlfriend was in residence, though no one told me. 

I asked the mor nuat, who like many Thais are expert liars, where he had gone.

‘You want to see him, don’t you,’ one asked.

Well, yes. You know how it is, dear.

‘Oh, he’s just up there with a friend,’ one said.

‘Oh, he told his mum to entertain you as he has a headache and wants to go to bed,’ said the other.

Bullshit.

I called Sor, and asked him what he was doing upstairs when he could be sitting at the table enjoying our adult conversation.

‘Why are you keeping yourself shut away up there?’ I asked him, jokingly.

The manly voice of girlfriend Muay came on the line. 

She must have wondered who had called, and snatched the phone from her hapless boyfriend’s grasp.

‘‘I am not imprisoning him in his room. Do you have a problem with that?’ she asked me.

I could barely believe what I heard. Muay must be half my age, and has never introduced herself to me, but spoke to me as if I was a mere dust mote. 

At the very least, she should be aware that I am a guest of Sor’s mother.

I ended the call without saying a word, so shocked was I at the abrupt way she spoke.

I asked the mor nuat for background on my new rival.

Manly Muay studies accountancy at a university in Kanchanaburi. She and Sor have been going out an impressive six years, though meet only once every fortnight or so.

I knew all that; Mum and Sor had told me as much themselves. Oh, well.

I complained to Mum about the harsh way she spoke to me. I am not sure she understood.

‘When he was 11 or 12, he used to wear makeup and do his hair like a girl,’ she added matter-of-factly, as if that was supposed to make him more appealing in my eyes.

Half an hour later, the happy couple appeared on the stairs, ready to go out for the night.

Both wore so much white makeup they looked like ghosts. Sor was carrying a handbag, which I assume belonged to his manly girlfriend, though who can be sure.

Several friends had turned up on motorbikes to meet them. 

Sor and Muay walked out the door without a word of goodbye to Mum, me or anyone else, which once again is nothing unusual for Thais.

I haven’t been back to the shop since, because I don’t appreciate Muay’s hostile manner – or the gutless way Sor let his girlfriend talk down to me.

‘She saw you as competition, so hit back at you,’ a farang friend told me, after I told him my frustrating massage shop story.

True. But will it keep me away from my new shy, red-haired, white-faced friend?

...What do you think?

Game on, dear!