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I used to do business with a man in Patong, and by 'doing business' I mean that I would go to his bar every day at about 5:00 pm and wait for him to show up, which could happen at any time from then till closing. So I spent a lot of time sitting on the front-most stool in the bar, just sipping beer and watching the traffic. That's where I met Ying.

Ying was a Patong Flower Child. You see them everywhere; they range in age from about four to fourteen, roaming in loose gangs from bar to bar, selling flower garlands or cigarettes and candies from trays. Ying was the oldest in her group, and only sold the flower garlands, a genius at convincing sailors on leave that these were the perfect gift to win the heart of a Patong bar girl.

Ying was 13 when I first met her, a gawky tomboy and stern shepherdess to her flock of younger charges, most of them her siblings. One year later, without my having noticed, Ying had blossomed into adolescence. This fact was pointed out to me by a Cockney tourist who was watching Ying make her way down the row of barstools, hawking her flowers in five languages. "A few more months an' it won't be flowers she'll be sellin'." was how he gave me the news. 

I looked more closely at Ying and was shocked to see that indeed there were little hints of her growing femininity: the outline of a training bra under her Singha Beer T-shirt, a slight swelling of the hips and buttocks. She could still play Peter Pan if she had to, but she was well on the way to the ingénue stage.

Phuket is a very conservative community.   In fact, compared to Patpong or Pattaya or even Chiang Mai, Patong on a Saturday night is like Lutheran Day Camp, and none of the girls in the choir ever looks underage. But even with the squeaky-clean, shrink-wrapped, produced for foreign consumption quality of 'nitery entertainment' on The Rock, and even though I knew that Ying had a huge support network of family and friends around her, I also knew that she had never seen the inside of a school and had few skills outside of the retail marketing field. 

Ying had grown up in a ringside seat at the Circus of Love, and the temptation to grab for the 'easy money' is strong when a young girl lives upcountry; how much stronger must it be when you call a hundred prostitutes Elder Sister? It saddened me because I knew that Ying had a good mind and a good heart, and I knew what price is paid by the women who make a career out of flattering men.

So that's what was on my mind one day, early in the high season as we reckon time on The Rock, while I sat on my creaky bar stool waiting for this guy to show up, watching Ying and her troop of Flower Children make their way up Soi Bangla. Just as they got opposite me they met another gang working the same side of the street. After a little teasing and gossiping Ying grabbed each of her young flock by a loose fold of clothing and conducted them all across the street. She then sent them off in pairs before coming over to give me a hard time. 

"Hey you!" she addressed me. "Why you no sit wit' lady?"

"Because I'm married." This was my standard reply, and much less complex than the truth.

"What bar you gir'fen work?" Ying knew perfectly well that my wife never worked in any bar. "I sink you chow choo! I sink you buttah-fry too mutss!" She dealt me a surprisingly strong punch in the arm.

We bandied back and forth for a while, she in her version of English, I in mine.   I refused to buy a flower garland on the grounds that my wife is allergic to jasmine, then because it was against my religion, and finally I fell back on the excuse of abject poverty. Ying tried to search my pockets to prove me a liar, but I remembered the Cockney's observation, and the fact that I once possessed the entire Traci Lords Home Video Library. I was uncomfortable with the physical contact and pushed Ying away. 

Taking the shove in stride and giving up on selling me any posies, she dug into her kangaroo bag and came up with a glossy business card. "Hey, you!" she said. "You know dis place, yeah?"

I took the card and saw that it was for a small handicrafts outlet on the airport road, one that sold umbrellas and rattan and pearls and suchlike. "Yeah, I know it. So what?"

"Papa me buy today!"

I looked at her closely, to see if this was a joke, or more likely, a scam.   She saw the doubt in my eyes and huffed "Jing-jing!" Papa me buy with China man. Whole famb'ly gonna work there."

I checked the card again and remembered that last time I'd made the long run up to the airport the joint had been closed down for the low season. "Really?" I asked her. "Your daddy bought this place?"

"Yeah! Why you no believe Ying? We gonna make it reep roi, all good, and open up wan-ti yeeb haa tanwakhom" She suddenly grabbed the card back and bounced off in pursuit of a group of midshipmen; nothing spells easier money in Patong than 19-year-old boys in crew cuts. I watched her leave thinking "There's one saved, anyway." 

Then my never very nimble mind slowly, slowly, did the translation: wan-ti yeeb haa tanwakhom... December 25th. They were opening their new store on Christmas Day. Not because a rabbi-to-be was born on that day in a faraway land in a faraway time, but because some local monk-cum-fortune-teller had seen that date in the lines on her father's hand. No matter the reason, I had a better feeling about Christmas on Phuket that year than I ever had before.

God bless the children.

 

© Steve Rosse. All rights reserved by the author.

The author can be contacted at: shavethemonkeys@gmail.com

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