Friday, February 9, 2007

All Monkeys!

We get some real characters in the bar sometimes, so from time to time I'll write a little about them.
There was quite a memorable German fellow we had in recently. It was quiet and it was just me and the girls when he walked in and slumped himself at the end of the bar. Pim took his order - Sangsom and coke - and Joy gave him a little massage on the shoulders.
"Ah quit it!" he snarled at her.
Joy is relatively new and speaks only a little English, but she knew by his tone to leave him well alone. When Pim set down his drink he necked it one. "Same again."
"Tough day?" I enquired.
He shrugged. "Tough week... Zis country, I dunno, I think I'll go to Cambodia next."
"Yeh? What's in Cambodia?" I asked. "Except Angkor Wat, cheap girls and landmines, of course."
"I am an English teacher, you see, and now it seems wiz all these new visa rules I will have to take my qualifications elsewhere."
Joy and Daeng (who is particularly good looking) sat down beside him, chins in palms, faking enthralment by his words.
He paid them no attention and went on: "My friends have fled there already. Thailand does not want us farangs here any longer. I have a little over a month left on my visa, zen I think I go also."
"How long you been in Thailand?" I asked.
He snorted. "Fifteen years! I came here wiz very good intentions. I believed bringing the English language to a third world nation would be very fulfilling."
"And it's not?"
"How can it be?" he laughed. "Thais, they don't want to learn. They are essentially all monkeys."
I raised my eyebrows.
"True," he went on. "Maybe two, three generations ago they were still in trees."
Joy and Daeng laughed, not because they understood, but because he laughed, and they have been to taught to be polite and laugh along with the customers. Mamasan Pu, whose heard a lot worse, gave me an ironic smile. She had once explained that some Thais view us farangs as monkeys, because of our hairy bodies and long arms.
"Thai children," the German went on, "it is impossible to teach them. They are only interested in trashy magazines and computer games."
"Aren't most kids around the world today, though," I argued.
"Yes, but they have the advantage that they have something in zeir minds already. With Thais," he said, tapping his forehead. "Their is nothing. I tell you - they are essentially all monkeys."
He was now on his third sangsom and coke. Soon the regulars would be in - all of whom had Thai wives or girlfriends - and I was beginning to worry that if he carried on with this "monkey" business it might get ugly. "A lot of the guys who drink here have Thai wives," I told him, "and i don't think they'd agree with you on that."
"I am lucky," he said. "I married a smart one. Her descendents came down from the trees a long time ago." He then took a look at his watch. "She will be here soon. She has gone shopping and will pick me up."
He ordered another drink, and we waited for his wife to appear. I was expecting a smartly dressed graduate type, conservative clothes and spectacles, maybe pulling up in a BMW. When a chunky woman in her forties with cut-off jeans and unsightly DIY tattoos pulled up on a motorcycle and approached the bar I thought it was somebody who was in search of a job maybe.
"Ah, here she is," the German cooed. "Love of my life."
She planted her large frame down next to him, crossed her arms and scowled at his drink. "You get drinking again?"
"Just one or two," he slurred.
"Fucking asshole," she said, with an American twang. "always get drinking!"
He looked at me a little sheepishly. "Isn't she beautiful?"
"Don't call me beautiful. You tell me come here, now I look stupid. Everybody think I have asshole farang husband."
He smirked at me. "She gets angry because I'm thinking of leaving for Cambodia."
"Nobody stop you," she told him.
"But she doesn't want to leave the troop behind."
With that, his good lady got up and stomped back to the motorbike.
"Wait, sweetheart, don't be hot heart. I'm coming now." He pulled out some crumpled notes, threw them on the bar and rushed after her. He just made it onto the back of the motorbike in time.
Mamasan Pu then came over to me. "Boss, I'm just going out. I'll be back soon."
"Sure, where are you going?" I asked.
She scratched under her armpit. "To go and buy some bananas."

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