Daughter of Isaan - Chapter 1 – by Antoine Hudon

By : Bangkok Book House
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A frown of disappointment settles on her face. He smiles and asks her name again, urges her, says that he simply forgot. But she quickly changes the subject and goes back to recounting the sad details of her sad life. Only after another hour of confiding and a new appeal from him that she tell him her name does she give him another chance.

“I tell you my name if you say you forget. You say sorry first.”

“I am sorry. It’s true. I forgot.”

But he is sure she is just teasing. He’s been thinking of her constantly for over a week, since that first fateful glance, since the first words they exchanged at the travel agency where she works. How could he have forgotten her name? At last, she agrees, but

grudgingly, still reproaching him.

“I tell you my name Chu. I say Chu like choo-choo the train. You don’t remember?” With her fingers, she mimics a little train running up the hair of Gerald’s arm, like she did at the restaurant at lunch.

“Oh, yes! That’s true. I’m sorry. I won’t forget anymore. Chu… Choo-choo…”

“You see! You not listen what I say.”

She is right! How could he have forgotten?

“Oh no, darling, I listen. I remember now. You said ‘In Thailand, we have small names, just for friends.’ Your real name is Chuleepohn. It means Morning Sun.”

Her accusing look softens. Gerald smiles apologetically and doesn’t dare add anything further. He loves her endless flow of words, so often frivolous, yet at times so choked with tears that it breaks his heart.

The day with her has been serene and uneventful. But earlier, after making love, he noticed her scar from a cesarean section and asked her about it. That’s when she started telling him about the recent events of her life, and was soon in tears, her chest tight with an urgent need to talk. She obviously trusted him deeply, telling her life story as if he could help in some way.

When he tries to console her, she answers that she likes him very much. When he assures her that he likes her too, she asks him innocently, with childlike hope in her voice, “It’s true?” At times, feeling sorry for talking about herself so much, she sets her own stories aside for a moment and asks “How you feel?” And she seems delighted to hear he feels good.

To him, of course, they are only words. He finds her a little forward, but he tells himself she just has a burning need to pour her heart out. He listens and tries to understand, but loses her in places. “I say it to the judge. I say ‘I tell you true. All true. If you don’t believe me, it’s all in my diary. Everything in my diary!’”

What’s she on about now? he thinks. Ah, yes! Her divorce. This is the third time she has told him the story of this great drama of her life. Each time, she adds details, tears, cries of rage… She tells of the baby she had to give away in America, her in-laws who turned against her, people who understood nothing she said, and, at last, the good judge who believed her, who was like a father figure to her.

“I say it to the judge. He good judge, old man, he listen to me. He say ‘Maybe I tell them give you money.’ I say ‘I don’t want money. I want go back Thailand. I know rich, I know poor. I want to work and send money for my baby. I just want come back Merica see my baby.’”

Sometimes, as if to wrap up her story so she can go to sleep, she draws lessons from her hardships with a serenity that astonishes him. In these moments, she shows no resentment and is happy at least for the experience she has gained.

“In Thailand, some people good, some people bad. Same same Merica. I look at my life now, I think not all good. But maybe I made a mistake. Now I go school, I know. Next time I do better. Life, you know, is like movie. When we old, we look and we know—good or bad. Now, I young and sometimes I make a mistake. Sometimes I stupid too. Now, I write everything in my diary and after I look and I see. Life is like a movie. You know everything only when it finished.”

***

What memories! So sweet, so perfect. The vacation of his dreams. And now Gerald was back in Thailand, but this time to live. After a four-hour bus trip from Bangkok over flooded roads full of detours and almost-nonstop traffic, they were arriving at the Pattaya bus station. Gerald could see the excitement in Chu’s eyes.

The day three months earlier he had met this curious woman could well have been a turning point in his life.

When he came back last week, their Bangkok hotel room had been specially decorated for newlyweds. Chu had said, “It’s just for weekend, for honeymoon you and me.”

She would slip this last point in often on the phone before his return. And before he had even realized it, it was understood they would be on their honeymoon when he returned. Not that he minded—he was excited to think of the months ahead. It would be just like the week they had spent together, but a sort of never-ending honeymoon. And after that? Time would tell. He was a free man, after all.

But Gerald hadn’t been back to live with her for a week yet and already he could tell that Chu longed to do something new. Not only had she decided to leave university, but she had also left her job at the travel agency. Through the muddle of her explanations he detected a dream of independence, a desire to have her own business and make money. She was counting on her boss Günther to find her a contact or put her on the right track. And of course she was counting on Gerald, too, for the money.

The previous Sunday over a beer with her old boss, Chu had finally let go with her crazy ideas. She had talked about businesses and restaurants, perhaps in Bangkok or maybe in Kanchanaburi. Günther had been non-committal, often laughing off her plans—he was afraid she would ask him for money. He finally tepidly suggested that a friend had a restaurant to sell in the suburbs. Chu jumped at the idea and wanted to go see him the very next day. Günther, a mustachioed hulk of a man in his forties, was cautious.

“Yeah, I don’t know if the man is still here. I can check.”

Pressured by Chu and weakened by her flattery, Günther continued suggesting people and places he knew. Occasionally, he dropped a small seed that would glow like magic for Chu. Gerald smiled and said little. It seemed to him that Chu had embraced each of these dreams so many times before. He hadn’t come here to get into business. These were still just crazy ideas. He had time, he could wait and see.

Hardly another day had passed before Chu decided that going to Pattaya was probably best after all. She talked briefly to Gerald about it, saying they’d first have to go see Günther’s friend and decide for themselves. He was a big businessman in town and apparently had a good opportunity to suggest.

For superstitious Chu, getting a lead like that—from friends and when she had someone to support her—could only be good karma.

She mulled the idea over in her head until it seemed inevitable. Hadn’t she already had a restaurant? Wouldn’t it be like sweet revenge, the chance to prove she could succeed?

When the taxi stopped in front of Cosy Palace, Chu excitedly pointed it out to her boyfriend. “Look! This Mr. Klaus hotel. I know lady cashier, also lady at restaurant. Everybody here very nice.”

In the dim street lighting, Gerald noticed the name of the hotel in large gold letters. The hotel restaurant, Club Benz, was awash in light.

“When my boss come on weekend, he always stay here. We go to Mr. Klaus restaurant with manager. We look all the papers here. You see, he good guy too. Not here often. Always busy, always away.”

***

That morning, Klaus arrived early at Cosy Palace and left his Mercedes roadster in the small lot next to the entrance gate. He waved to his friendly gatekeeper, who would watch over the precious vehicle while keeping an eye out on the area and making sure traffic flowed smoothly in the narrow lane in front of the hotel.

Günther had told him about this farang, an engineer it would seem, who wanted to settle in Thailand for a while—and with that strange girl who had been working for him until recently. Klaus, who could smell a business opportunity a mile away, put two and two together from what Günther had told him since the time the girl had announced she was leaving the travel agency.

Pondering him now, he could only guess at how much the guy was worth. But those who settled in the area were always quite well off, and sometimes even filthy rich. As for the girl, he had her number. She was not the type to settle for peanuts. In any event, the guy surely had money to invest. The important thing was to win his trust and suggest something that he’d take a shine to. In Pattaya, Klaus and his partner Khun Sathien had something for everyone.

Klaus liked to strike while the iron was hot, so he’d planned to meet his potential clients for breakfast and then show them around. He would spend the whole day with this farang and the girl if need be—he knew you had to dazzle newcomers right from the start. He called Günther to find out what had happened at his meeting with them the previous Sunday and to see what his friend told them about him and his business dealings.

Klaus went into his manager’s office, an ice box whose tinted glass door was always closed to keep in the air-conditioned chill that Holger needed to maintain his sanity. Holger handled day-today management for the property. The safe where Klaus often kept stashes of money was in his office, and its reassuring presence did much for his status within the hotel.

In Pattaya, Klaus spent more time at the hotel than he did at home, and Holger saw him every day. Klaus was only 35, but the ten years he had spent in Thailand had taken him far. Holger preferred not to know too much. The hotel was enough for him, and Klaus gave him free rein. Of course, it would have helped if his boss were there when he needed him. But Klaus was not a man of routine, and since he didn’t overly concern himself with the running of his hotel, he would show up when he felt like it and always without warning.

“Hey! Holger! Howya doin’? I have a couple who arrived last night. That girl Günther had in his Pattaya office, Chu. You know her, I think…”

“Chu… Hum… Is it that girl we sometimes see with Noutcheree, the night receptionist? Frizzy hair, crazy like hell?”

“Yeah yeah, that’s her! She’s found a new guy, an American I think, and she’s looking to buy something in Pattaya.”

“A rich guy?”

“Don’t know. Günther didn’t pry much. The girl seems to light up whenever the talk turns to business. When she first started working for Günther, she’d hardly been there a week before she was asking him to take her on as a partner. And of course, she doesn’t have a baht to her name.”

“Yeah, he told me. But he was quite thrilled anyway. The girl has a knack with customers, he said.”

“Yeah yeah… You know Günther. She was playing him for all he was worth. He likes playing daddy too much, and as for her— give her an inch and she’ll take a mile… But when her guy decided to come back and settle in the area, she was so excited she got all independent-like. If she’d stayed any longer, she would have had the new manager thrown right out the door. Anyway, I’m going to see them later at the Club.”

***

On their way to breakfast, Chu pointed out the odd décor and its luxury car theme. Grilles of famous luxury car models decorated the walls and around the bar—Daimler, Mercedes, Rolls Royce, BMW, Alfa Romeo. Chu filled Gerald in on certain details and told him what she knew about relations between Günther and this guy she had met several times.

“Günther, my boss, he come here every weekend, you know? Klaus, he very rich, rich millions, very very well known in Thailand. He have plenty business everywhere, do the houses, do the cars too. Oh! Come. I show you.”

She took him to see a motley assembly of pictures, trophies, and plaques against the back wall.

“You see, this is the business for cars. He have the shop in Chonburi for this. He make the cars very special cannot see anywhere. Buy the BM, Mercedes, and things in Japan and everywhere and make the cars for the president, the general, and all. He car, na? Mercedes! Not one like that in the world! Make it himself. And here, we see

him with the big shots in Thailand. Look!”

One big display showed Klaus with such-and-such a politician, or such-and-such a general, standing in front of very expensive cars, or with a business partner in front of a building they had built, or with other Germans drinking and carrying on at a Bavarian party.

“He drink beer too much, too. He like Singha beer, same same Ierman guy. You know, in Thailand, can drink in the car, na? This, you cannot do in Merica. My boss Günther, he always do. He have the beer case on the seat near him. Here, no problem. Just cannot have accident.”

Chu lowered her voice to tell a story. Just recently, a young German on vacation had killed two Thais while driving drunk and had been thrown in jail. It had been the start of a long weekend and the police headquarters had been closed.

“Oh! Prison in Thailand not same Merica! Three day, you can die very easy. Friends of poor little guy call everywhere but nobody can help. After, Klaus hear that and he telephone to big boss of police, general police in Bangkok, the prachak, and the little guy he get out right away. Klaus he pay money for him. That one general, na? His son do business with Klaus. You see this photo, there on the wall. Come see. This one! Ooouch! He very important!”

Prominently between two bronze plaques was a big framed picture showing a medal-bedecked military man shaking the hand of a young blond man at some sort of official party in front of a group of smiling businessmen.

“Oh! Here comes restaurant manager. Very nice lady.”

Chu flashed a smile, greeted the woman with a cheery Hello!, and clasped her hands in a gracious wai that the manager returned. She introduced Gerald as her husband.

“He my husband. He name Gerry, Gerald! He come Merica… Mon…”

“Montreal,” Gerald noted helpfully.

“Now, Gerry and me, not married yet, but next spring, we do. So, I say my husband anyway.”

They exchanged a few words in English about the changes in Chu’s life and plans. The woman, in her thirties, was tall and slender. Her sparkling eyes and friendly smile showed a natural interest in people. Chu continued.

“We want have business in Thailand. We look here, but just a bit, because now we have honeymoon. Maybe we have business in Pattaya. Günther say Pattaya very good now.”

The manager smiled her approval, looking amused to Gerald, and even tenderly indulgent. Chu’s exuberance often provoked this type of reaction.

“So, I hope you have a good stay in Pattaya. It’s the beginning of the high season, you know. From October to February, we have plenty of tourists…”

The manager glanced toward the bar, as if to signal to Chu she didn’t have as much time as she would have liked to chat. But she was happy to treat Chu and Gerald on her boss’s behalf.

Toward the end of breakfast, the manager, who had finally seen her way free to come and chat a bit, spied Klaus in the door leading in from the lobby. “Oh, Mr. Klaus is here!” she interjected, causing Chu to break into a broad smile and greet him in turn:

“Mr. Klaus!”

Klaus glided over, nodding at Chu and offering Gerald a firm handshake. A broad smile publicly announced his good mood. He was a small, nervous individual with Teutonic blond hair, and his round face, short, tousled hair, and slender moustache gave him the look of a rumpled sportsman, along with the casual confidence of a millionaire. His sports shirt was open at the neck, revealing a thicket of blond hair that cradled a heavy gold chain.

“Hello! You are Gerald, no? Günther told me -- ha ha”

“Yes. Good morning, Mr. Klaus. He told me about you too.”

“Mr. Klaus! I already speak Gerry your business in Thailand. I say you richest man in Pattaya. True?”

“Whoa! Careful! My employees could hear,” said Klaus, glancing around in feigned nervousness. “I am not rich. You know why? It’s because I married a Thai woman. Ha ha!”

“You have gold everywhere!” said Chu, pointing at his chain and the big bracelet on his wrist.

“This is nothing, just for show! You know, gold is very cheap in Thailand. I beg your pardon—I’ll be right back.”

He went to the counter, ordered his breakfast, and came back to sit at their table. Gerald was surprised by his seeming insouciance. This was obviously a man who had made it. His voice in particular added to his debonair manner, the warm, inflective voice of someone who knew how to persuade.

Looking to flatter, Chu pointed to the wall of pictures and trophies.

“The photos, there, I show Gerry. You know many rich men, many important men. I show the general police, that one I see here one time, true? You make car business with his son, na?”

“Yeah, that guy has all the money. I only have the ideas and I like cars.”

Klaus drew their attention to several trophies he said he was particularly proud of. He explained where they came from, then asked his manager to put his luxury car promotional video on one of the TV screens hanging from the ceiling.

Providing running commentary as it played, he added details here, named a partner there, told about the outrageous alterations he made to such-and-such a Mercedes or Rolls Royce, the Japanese sedan pictured on screen, all the while sprinkling his conversation with the biggest names from the political, military, and civilian elite.

“Ah! This is not a business, it’s only a hobby. It costs me more than I make with it. It pays only in contacts, not in money. Ha ha! A hobby for the rich.”

The video ended, and he began discussing his real estate projects, less passionately but in greater earnest. The only real place to make money in Thailand was in real estate, he claimed. Pattaya, he added, was like a frontierland that international investors were only just now discovering, there was fabulous potential waiting to be tapped just outside Bangkok. And on he went, recounting how he and his partners made their fortunes, regaling them with examples of smalltime speculators who had hit it big.

His meal finished, and with Chu once again in fulsome praise mode, he concluded, “Yeah, yeah, but all that’s just money! Very easy to make around here!” And then asked if they were available: “Do you have any free time? I would love to show you things I’ve built around town. I could do it on my way home.”

***

The glittering gold Mercedes threaded its way slowly through the clutter of the backstreet, stopping while stools, parasols, and motorbikes were pushed aside to make room. In mock annoyance, Klaus commented on the chaos: “In Thailand, it’s always like this. Ha! Look at that! People set up everywhere—on the sidewalks, in the street—and in three days, there’s no room to drive. But all these people will go, because they don’t have licenses. The City will throw them out. The landlords have complained, so they will have to leave. If I said something, they would go, you know. But I like it better if the City throws them out.”

Gerald was all ears. He loved real estate. Like its name said, it was real, you could touch it. Klaus was animated and cheerful during the drive. He talked of Pattaya like it was the center of the universe for leisure industry investors. First he took his guests to his worksite office, where he left them to view models of his buildings and projects. Then he took them on a tour of his Tropical City residential development, an island of upscale properties and greenery in Pattaya’s fast-growing northern fringe. At the end of a short street paved in cement and lined with pretty white homes, a wrought-iron gate opened with a broad sweep to reveal a vast property and a luxurious dwelling at least twice the size of the others on the street. Klaus was home.

He served cold beer on the patio, which extended out to a magnificent pool surrounded by a deck of white marble.

“It’s so easy to make money in Thailand when you know the right people,” he said, dismissing the opulence of it all. “And especially for me, to spend money! This house is nothing—it’s for my wife. I’m always away.”

Gerald found him modest for such a successful businessman. He was barely older than himself, and already he’d been in Southeast Asia for ten years, starting businesses all over the place.

“My wife has everything she wants. She has her daughter and her mother. And the dog! Have you seen her collie? Hey Lassie! Lassie! Ach, she must be inside.”

But like a favorite record he played again and again, he returned to the subject at hand.

“All around here will be new development, everywhere. All the land up to Naklua is already in the hands of big developers, Hong Kong, Japan, Germany. Plenty of big condominiums are being built on the waterfront. Lots of new businesses are also on the main road. Did you see them? This whole area is on the road to Chonburi, that’s why; Chonburi, the Ban Laem Chabang deep sea port, in fact, hold on--”

He went inside and came back out with the Bangkok Post, pulling the Pattaya real estate section out.

“You see? It shows all that’s being done around here. Pattaya, Si Racha, Sattahip, Rayong. This is where things are happening the most. It’s crazy, the development going on here.”

Klaus gestured to the north, the east, the south. His infectious enthusiasm gave rise to subdivisions and great walls of wealth towering over the miserable hovels of the local residents.

“Only rich people will live here. In Tropical City, we sold everything in one year and are doubling the size. Everything is ready to start construction. Khun Sathien, my partner, is a big Chinese developer. He is also a very respected man, not the type to go into some crazy business.”

On leaving Tropical City, Klaus nodded toward a little hotel for sale, brand new and naively stylish with its white and pastel pink stucco walls.

“You see, values here have gone up at least 25% a year in the last ten years. That hotel, there, it will be a big success right away, you see? There are all sorts of rich people all around, and they have no quiet place to go. If you invest in something like this today, it’s worth double in three years. I don’t know if it’s the kind of thing that interests you, or if you have enough money, but Sathien is asking for eighteen million. And maybe I can get it for you for sixteen.”

“Sixteen million,” sighed Gerald.

He glanced at Chu. She was sizing up the hotel, but without expression, offering an unenthusiastic “Oh! Very pretty!” She, the lover of action and people and excitement, seemed to find it too quiet. Gerald was worried how complicated it would be, but Klaus was ready with an answer.

“A hotel is the easiest thing to operate, you know? I know, I have one. They’re not like bars. First of all, your employees are stable and they are cheap. Income is great during high season, and you close the rest of the year and go on vacation. I tell you, with a hotel, your only problem is counting all your money and hauling it to the bank! Ha ha!”

Klaus threw a glance at Gerald.

“Anyway, sleep on it. It’s a very good business. It’s the only hotel they can have around here. Now’s the best time to buy, you know? Soon everybody will want to come to Pattaya. Three years from now, forget it! It will be too expensive!”

Gerald could never go for anything that expensive without getting a hand from his friends back in Montreal, which could take time. Having a local girl to please was a powerful motivator—as Klaus no doubt figured—but it wasn’t powerful enough for Gerald to want a complicated business like that. Klaus would surely have other opportunities to present to him. Something boring in real estate, perhaps? If Chu wanted to run a business, she would have to wait for him to be sick of doing nothing.

***

After a nap, Gerald sat at the room window calmly watching night fall. Chu, however, itched with excitement, no longer in her quiet dream world of earlier that day. Klaus had had something for them when they got back to his hotel Cosy Palace, a small bar that had instantly caught her eye. A friend of his had drawn up plans for it, but had had to return to Germany. Aside from two small dance stages, everything needed work. The architect, Jürgen, had been there and said he would leave them the plans for free.

After touring it and following Klaus into the yard where he bought them a drink at the little bar by the pool, she had been further enthralled by the enthusiasm of Axel, the bartender. He talked about how great a business a bar in Pattaya could be.

“For me, it’s only a small business here, but I make enough to earn a living. I have two bar girls, I run good movies after six o’clock, there’s beer, and it’s O.K… I do it for six months, then go back to Germany for the rest of the year.”

Even Gerald had been intrigued.

Tonight, she’d made up her mind. A restaurant in Bangkok or Kanchanaburi, that was before; before she had understood her inspiration. Now it was going to be a gogo bar in Pattaya. Why not? And since her fiancé called her darling, like an English gentleman would, the bar would be called the Darling à gogo. Everything seemed to be working out so well, she felt like her future of wealth and success was finally within her reach.

All day she had had the intoxicating feeling she owned the world. She could tell people were looking at her differently. She was no longer just anybody—she was a businesswoman. It was all coming together. Her dream life had returned. Success was hers for the taking. Imagine—a business lady again! Chu could hardly contain her excitement. She’d have money, beautiful dresses and jewels. Oh! She’d almost forgotten! She still hadn’t gone to the pawn shop to reclaim her jewelry. She’d have to explain that to Gerald right away. He’d understand.

***

After an early evening stop at a jewelry store on South Pattaya Road to get back several charms she had pawned, Chu took Gerald to see her sister Toy, who worked at the No-Kini Gogo.

“At No-Kini? As a dancer? You didn’t tell me that.”

“Oh yes, I tell you. She rotten baby. She want the money, so she dance. Me, I don’t care. She do what she want. She big girl now. Almost twenty.”

There was a note of frustration in her voice, as if her sister’s newfound independence were a source of pain. Gerald remembered the apartment they had shared the previous summer above a restaurant on a cramped little street. Toy he remembered as almost too eager to please, smiling, naïve. And Chu seemed to like playing the protective big sister.

“She same father as me, not same mother. She only nineteen, little baby!” She had affectionately patted her sister’s cheek, and Gerald had noticed how small Chu was next to this solid, athletic girl.

At the No-Kini, one of the big gogo bars on Soi Diamond, Toy was delighted to see them, her enthusiasm helped along by a drink or two. As a sign of friendship, Gerald gave her a little gold chain that Chu had urged him to buy. Toy, in thrall, gripped his hand as Chu recounted all their latest doings. Her words gave the impression she wanted to savor her victory, show off her good fortune to Toy and the other girls. Her boyfriend was different, not like her American husband. He was quiet, educated.

“He no smoke no drink whisky! He like to stay home and read book.”

Chu, suddenly, was gone, turning her attention to the girls she knew, rushing off in all directions to meet them. Her natural radiance engulfed Gerald. He felt like Chu was everywhere. Her hands were a blur, her short-cut dress a streak of white. She kept taking her big moviestar sunglasses off and putting them on again. With her jewelry back, her confidence had returned. She could now project her true self with her full arsenal of glitz and glitter. Three fine chains of gold glistened on her low neckline, highlighting the soft brown of her skin. A heavy gold bracelet—her most prized possession—sparkled on her right wrist. Rings, also gold, adorned her fingers. But tonight her smile outshone them all in its pure beaming joy. Gerald was elated.

At the pawn shop, a smile was all it had taken. He had paid to retrieve her jewelry, barely letting the disapproval show on his face.

But she reassured him playfully, her eyes big and caressing.

“Oh, honey! You know women, na? Women like gold. Me, I like you, like love, but I like gold, like friend!”

Now she was back with another friend, a girl whose name she at least knew and whom she introduced to Gerald. She was still going on about her bar. All of a sudden she reached into Gerald’s shirt and tugged on the big gold chain around his neck with a Buddha medallion on it.

“Look. This one good Buddha. Very very old. My father give me. Maybe ten hundred thousand year old. Very expensive too. Maybe one hundred thousand baht more. Only two like this one in the world.”

As soon as she had got her jewelry back from the pawn shop, she gave it to Gerald as a sign of her love and asked him to buy a big chain made out of Thai gold and wear it around his neck. She thought her boyfriend looked too poor with just a ring on his finger. Now, he looked complete. And again she proffered her advice about the Buddha.

“This one for good luck. You must wear all the time, even when you sleep. If you take out, you must put high, not low like on table. Maybe put on the lamp near the bed.”

Gerald nodded obediently. He knew how important appearances were in Thailand. You had to flaunt your wealth by wearing lots of gold, preferably Thai gold, which was very pure and shiny.

Toy returned from dancing, sat down near Gerald, and stared at him like a child besotted with admiration for a fairytale hero. After he had left in July, Chu couldn’t but talk of him as her new savior, saying he would come back soon and everything would change.

Gerald guessed that Toy too was dreaming of change, dreams as exhilarating and vague as Chu’s were calculated and doable. He already knew about Chu’s. They seemed reasonable enough. She wanted to be rich, but not out of greed. It was so she could get her daughter back. But if she had her way, Gerald suspected, she would also wrap her arms around her friends, her mother, her brothers and sisters, everyone she loved and who loved her back, all her girlfriends today and tomorrow, all the abandoned children she would adopt as her own. Her home would be so big, her garden so overflowing with wonderful things.

These fabulous dreams were inscribed on the left-hand page of her mysterious diary.

***

On the last day of his vacation as they arrive in Kanchanaburi, Chu leans over the scrap of paper he is taking notes on.

“What you write? This your diary?”

“No. I just note the things I do. Just to remember.”

“Oh! Me too I have diary. I told you already. I write everything in my diary, things we do together, things I think.”

“You have done that for a long time?”

“Yes. I was just little girl, eleven. I remember first thing I put in my diary. It was one night with my sister, I go run in the street with the bat to kill the frogs. In my village, after rain, frogs run in the street and me and my sister we go catch them. My sister and me, we go run everywhere, in the fields, on the dikes, we climb in the tree to watch the movie in my village.”

“I’ve never seen you write.”

“Oh, I do when I have time! But I keep hide. It’s just for me. In the page at right, you see, I write what I do, and in the page at left I write what I think, what I like it happen, my dreams. Often I write much more in this page than other page. That’s because I want many, many things and I say what I want in my diary.”

“What will you do with it?”

“When I old, maybe someone take my diary and make the movie. Why not? Because life, you see, it’s like a movie. When you live, you live. When you die, you die. No problem! You do what you have to do.”

This is obviously a secret she has shared with very few people. But when he asks her if she has written much, she seems confused.

“I have… uh! Have… Maybe ten, twenty things… books. I think… twenty-six. Before I write in my school books, and I continue like this.”

She tries to describe her school books—how big, how many. As always, she gets muddled in the details. Numbers confuse her most. Ten, twenty, thirty, for her, they are just numbers. She’d rather say “little,” “many,” or “many many.” Then she remembers something.

“Oh! You know Good Morning, Vietnam? I play in this movie. Sure! They make here in Thailand, because very cheap in Thailand. They wanted girls for play in that movie. So, if you look this movie, you see me. So that’s why I like movie. My life is like cinema. One day I hope they make a movie with my life. You no believe me? Why not?”

Seeing Gerald’s firmly skeptical expression, she shrugs and turns away with an embarrassed yet teasing laugh.

“Sure! One day, you see!”

ISBN: 978-974-10-35250
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If you enjoyed this first chapter of Antoine Hudon's 'Daughter of Isaan' you can easily purchase the book online here at Bangkok Books.com: http://www.bangkokbooks.com/php/product/product.php?product_id=000091&sub_cate_name=&sub_cate_id=

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All rights for this book preview are reserved by the author. Reprint permission came from the publishing house Bangkok Book House (www.bangkokbooks.com).