Twelve Little Stories

1. Into Her Mind

I am standing in front of a huge mother elephant. This is only a good idea if she thinks it is a good idea. She could kill me in an instant. Everyone else has gotten up on their elephants by using a ladder for tourists. But I have been chosen out of the crowd to somehow climb up over the elephant's face. I get this a lot: being chosen for goofy things.

I imagine it is because I am so capable and because I am so athletic looking. It's probably because I look stupid. Anyway, the deal is that I put my foot somewhere on her trunk and then I climb up over her face. I love elephants. If the mahouts and touts would meet me at the airport I would sign up right away. But I've also learned a few things. First, elephants look slow and ponderous; but they can spin on a dime. Second, they have big big smart brains. Whatever you are thinking, they are probably ahead of you. Third, when they strike it is your last surprise. Mahouts are killed with regularity.

My mahout senses my caution and says: "No problem". I look at the elephant. She looks at me. I imagine scraping my foot across her mouth, or sticking my knee in her eye, or slipping at the top and grabbing for her ear. But I'm on the fence. I might do this. Then I look at her left eye. And all of a sudden I feel as if I can travel right through her eye, up the nerve bundle to the brain, and into her mind. And I can hear what she is saying to herself. And this is what I hear:

"Go ahead you little stupid fxxxing tourist puke; try and climb up my face. Go ahead, foreign devil; I dare you!"

I walk around to the tourist ladder and climb up with the fat ladies.

2. We Drift

I'm in a long tail boat going across a huge lake. We have to cross the lake in the early, misty morning and then go up a narrow river to a village. People are expecting us. The boats engine coughs, wheezes, and dies. It has run out of fuel. There isn't any extra fuel. We are in the middle of a watery nowhere. The Thai driver curls up and goes to sleep. We drift. Forty minutes later, another boat appears. Fuel is exchanged. No one at the village has left without us. Thais have a different sense of time.

3. Charred Earth

I'm in the jungle on an elephant tour. We are in extremely remote jungle near the Burma border, but the path is used regularly. I notice that the path has been burned off on either side. All the underbrush is gone. Just charred earth. I've seen this before in remote areas next to village trails. Always a mystery. This isn't agriculture. It seems senseless and time intensive. I can't get anyone to tell the tourist why this has been done. Their eyes tell you they know the answer to the question but they are not talking.

Months later I find out. Snakes. It is done so that everyone, elephants and people, can spot snakes. At least that is what I was told. Maybe. Who knows: maybe that is a lie too. Ok, enough for me. On future trips down village paths I will keep my eyes peeled and hopefully be way up high in an elephant basket.

4. Too Fast

I go into a transvestite bar just to see what it is about. I am green. New to Thailand and new to the tranny scene. Instantly, three gorgeous trannies grab me, throw me on a couch, and assault me. Two pull down their tops and are rubbing their breasts in my face. The third has her hand in my pants. I start to get a excited. Now they want 1500 baht to have sex with me. It's all too much, too fast. I leave.

5. 17 Degrees

Elephants again. I once read an article in Boston that circus elephants can not go up an incline of more than 17 degrees. So the circus people have to make sure that in every city that they go to the ramps into the arenas are not more than 17 degrees. Ok, I read this in a newspaper so it must be true. Well, I'm on an elephant tour in western Thailand not far from the Burma border and we come to a river. The river bank drops straight down. Down go the elephants. Up in the basket I have my feet planted on the front rail and my back arched over the back rail. I am almost vertical. On the other side the bank was not as steep but it was no 17 degrees either. The elephants climbed up fine. I think these circus elephants have fooled circus management and they are probably having a big elephant laugh over it.

6. Thai Width

I go into the Royal Gardens Mall on Beach St. in South Pattaya. They have a nice shoe store on the first floor. They have nice crocodile shoes. They are not custom crocodile shoe quality like you can order at the Riverside Shopping Mall on the Chao Praya river; but considering that it is a shoe store in a mall, the shoes are nice. Good price and I can not get them in the States.

A stunning Thai girl asks if she can help me. I ask for my shoe size in a wide width. The Earth stops spinning. Incomprehension. Now I am pantomiming. She is getting that frightened look. Another piece of sex candy arrives to help. Still no progress. The manager comes over. A light dawns. The shoes aren't made in widths. One width, Thai width, only. I leave. Too bad. I'd have bought a lot of shoes.

7. Give Me A Break

In front of the Nana Entertainment Plaza in Bangkok, one of the most well known Red Light districts in the world, is a woman who sells magazines and newspapers on the sidewalk. She's got a big business and she has been there for years. Probably at least 50% of her customers are in the sex business; selling, buying, or vendor providing. You go into the bars behind her; and you buy your Viagra, and antibiotics, and condoms across the street.

I ask her if she has any Thai porno magazines. She acts surprised and slightly shocked. I get the impression that I am supposed to feel that I thought, or that I did, or that I said something inappropriate. Pleezzze. Give me a break!

8. Buy An Umbrella

When you go to the Royal Palace you should buy a paper (mulberry bark) umbrella. They sell them across the street. Inside the walls of the palace is always suffering hot. Blow torch hot. Spirit crushing hot. No breeze gets over the walls. And the glare off the buildings can be blinding. So everyone wears sunglasses. And by wearing sunglasses they deprive themselves of what they came to see.

Part of the architectural and decorative and Siamese wonder of the Royal Palace buildings are the tiles, and paints, and colored bits, and glass, and gems (?) on the walls. With the reflection from the sun, the decorated walls are fabulous. But if you mute the effect with sunglasses you miss everything. Buy a paper umbrella and don't wear sunglasses.

You'll see more and appreciate more than the tourists in brand new safari clothing and expensive cameras, you won't wilt in the sun, and you'll feel clever. The umbrellas are a lot of fun with their hand drilled holes, bamboo struts, hand painted and varnished mulberry bark covers, and hand operated toggle that puts enormous tension in the whole apparatus. Afterwards you can either keep the umbrella or go back across the street and try and resell it to the guy you bought it from. I have done both.

Buy an umbrella.

9. Seatback Table

I take Noi on a trip to Chiang Mai. I look into the all night train from BKK to Chiang Mai. It is a 14 hours trip. I'll get a first class cabin. But wait a minute. If Noi and I spend 7 hours sleeping, there is still another 7 hours to account for. My enthusiasm for another Thai experience starts to droop. Too boring. Too long. Noi and I go through mutual torture trying to make conversation for 7 minutes: the notion of 7 hours is just a deal breaker.

So instead I book us on a plane trip. It's only an hour. Noi has never been on a plane. Never taken off, never landed, never looked out the window and seen the Earth below. Never been exposed to all this wonderful miracle technology. I give her the window seat.

Do you know what she liked the most? Do you know what made the biggest impression on her? Do you know what she found captivating? The table attached to the seat in front of her that folded down for meals. She must have lowered and raised the table at least 15 times. And we think of marrying these children! Are we nuts?

10. Drug Addict

I'm somewhere west of Kanchanaburi at a monastery. Ok, maybe it is not a monastery. Maybe it is a wat, or a stupa, or a . . . no idea really but there is a cave with a Buddha statue inside. Buddha seems to have gotten all the best real estate when it comes to mountain views and caves. Anyway, you can go in. Maybe talk to Buddha. Sitting in the cave off to the right is an elderly monk. I guess he is the watchman.

He is smoking cigarettes. One after the other. Hour after hour. Year after Year. He isn't friendly, or accommodating, or smiling, or informational, or bright eyed, or useful in any way. He isn't even connected. He probably does an 8 hour shift and he probably disconnected or zoned out about twenty years ago. And when he isn't smoking cigarettes, he is chewing betel nut. His rotten, black colored teeth are stumps. Betel nut is a narcotic. Cigarettes are addictive. This guy is a double drug addict masquerading as a philosopher in orange. I decide I'm OK. I'll just stick to being me. I'll be a good, quiet, generous, open minded tourist. But I'll be a careful believer.

11. He Slaps Me

Lek and I are in a tuk tuk. Normally, I would never do this alone because tuk tuk drivers are a criminal underclass that is tolerated by Thai society for cultural reasons. The Thais know how to use the service but no one else should. But Lek is doing the talking so I assume I am somehow protected and it will be ok. It is negotiated as a 20 baht ride.

When we get to our destination, I give the driver a 50 baht note. Now the game starts. He can't find the change. But he has picked on the wrong guy. I have already lost interest in Lek so face is not an issue. And I am on vacation, so time is not an issue. I just sit back and wait. I can sit there until the sun goes down. I don't give a fxxx. Eventually, this elderly guy finds the change.

As I am climbing down he slaps me in the face. Hard. These old men are muscle and bone and they aren't restricted by notions of civility or dignity. I don't retaliate. He knows I can't. Farangs have no rights. Not even the right to defend ourselves. Would he have done this to a Thai? Of course not, he might have ended up dead.

The experience reminded me of a recurring dream based on a novel called Andersonville by Bruce Caton. It chronicles a prisoner of war camp in the southern United States during the 1860's. The camp became a Darwinian theatre where the strong preyed on the weak. As soon as you entered the camp, the predators and the bullies would strip you of your clothes and possessions. Every day after that was a fight for life.

One day on a given signal: all the weak, and the wounded, and the disenfranchised, and the dispossessed, and the sick rose up and beat the crap out of the bullies. It was a planned mass uprising that completely changed the social dynamic. My recurring dream is that someday all the farangs rise up on a given signal, and beat the crap out of the Thai nearest them.

12. Spilling Out The Top

I go to my first 2nd floor Patpong fish bowl emporium. I'm a newbie. The place is horrible and slightly scary, the girls are not too appealing. One girl is sitting in the bleachers crying. I'm short and there is nothing for me. I have to leave the Kingdom the next morning. I won't get a second chance. Before this, I spent 8 days on a politically correct trekking tour where I couldn't even look at a woman or the feminist guide from Melbourne would call the police. I'm about to leave.

Then I hear a door shut and I turn around. Out steps an Essan stunner in a high waist floor length dress with push up bra and her breasts spilling out the top. Brown skin, high cheek bones, and long black hair. And, oh God: I can hardly breath. Did I say it? Her breasts were heaving and pushing to be free. Spilling out the top. She's about 4'8'' tall.

My vacation is saved.

© Dana. All rights reserved by the author.