domprz

Actually, this is more related to the question of viability of e-books.

I have only one reservation about them. Overall the idea is great! It makes me look like an idiot after collecting thousands of hard cover quality books over about 50 years, not speaking of keeping them, moving, dusting, etc... And the costs wasted (?) over those years!

My reservation is based only on lack of information from the electronically available (downloadable) books libraries.

They all point out cheerfully the millions of titles available. What if someone's specific needs are not from their mainstream?

Just to illustrate my doubts: if I am interested in W. Shakespear, W. Blake, W.S. Maugham, G. Byron, E.M. Remarque, L. Feichtwanger, A. Dumas, A. Chehov, M. Bulgakov, J. London, Stendahl, O. Balzac, G. Maupassant, R. Kipling, G. Orwell, etc. etc. etc.... while the libraries in question offer millions of titles from Mills&Boon collection, - the good idea sucks!?

In short, can I check what is on offer in a package: e-book AND the list of books available for download? Please point this info here.:jap:

The Gutenberg project http://www.gutenberg.org has 33 000 free books in epub, kindle, html and simple text formats. Part of the pleasure of an ebook reader is that there are none of the adverts or distractions that one gets when using a multi-purpose piece of equipment like an ipad etc.

Has anyone got an EBook ? Are they worth buying ?

Most of my ebooks are the free ones. The only one I bought is 'From Beggar to Butterfly' by Peter Jaggs. A collection of related short stories from Thailand and Pattya - very enjoyable.

I have a Kindle. It only needs to be charged once per month. The screen looks like high quality paper - very easy on the eyes. It has a built in dictionary and I can keep notes related to the content of all the books. I prefer to buy an ebook than a paper book now.

Google analytics tells me that despite 90 odd views only 3 people actually went to the blog to read the rest - so at the risk of being annoying here is the rest:

The short story got a good reception and I had given her a copy on my way to the old city. I was proud of it. I was sure she would be flattered, Thai women seem to be suckers for flattery, and then, when returning on the evening of the same day, like an over-familiar besotted old fool I had knocked her down.

I stayed away a few days more than usual, hoping the time would fade her memory and, with the realization of how I perceived her, that she would forgive me. And so it happened that the cashier intercepted me. Mook would be finished in fifteen minutes if I cared to wait.

She emerged with minimal greeting. "I have to eat," she said and bought herself a noodle soup from a pavement vendor. "What kind of massage do you want?" she asked upon her return.

"I'd quite like an oil massage," I said timidly, "but you decide. Whatever you feel like doing."

"Up to you."

"No. This time it's up to you," I insisted.

"Okay, foot massage."

I was wearing long trousers. I did mention that it may be a little uncomfortable. She didn't think so, and that's how I ended up with tightly rolled jeans choking much of the blood supply to my feet.

"Did you like my story?"

She looked at me apparently puzzled.

"The one I gave you," I said with what may have been a note of dismay.

"I've been too busy to read," she snapped, "We've been cleaning as well." They had been expanding their shop, breaking down walls into the adjoining one. I closed my eyes to concentrate on the movements of her fingers on the soles of my feet. They opened again to the sight of an elderly American with a jovial face and the body of a balloon. He was escorted to a sofa by three beaming masseuses and presented with his after-massage tea. The girls crowded around him as he sprayed 100 baht tips in all directions, including to the cashier. "What about mine?" Mook pleaded, my feet all but forgotten.

"You weren't in the massage," the fat old American said dismissively. "How much for a joob-joob?"

"100 000 baht," she laughed.

He stayed for a long time it seemed. Mook joined the conversation between him and her work-mates, continuing my massage mostly by reflex. I slipped into a semi-conciousness occasionally opening my eyes to imbibe Mook's features in profile, yet again surveying the disquieting aspect of her beauty as it flickered across her cheek. It was at night when her image seemed most veiled by the sheen of external beauty. I was searching beyond the borders of occular vision but, not too far. I ignored a slanted sidelong glance and the words "I have a plastic heart." I was more comfortable outside of the conversation. It was banal and dominated by the fat old american. I pretended to keep my eyes closed.

A meek young man emerged from a massage with Fon, a new masseuse. Her features; her nose and eyebrows were straighter than Mook's, less oriental. I had remembered thinking she was as pretty as Mook when first I saw her. She had less self-confidence and consequently more sensitivity. I wondered what it would be like to get a massage from her. She stood at a sofa next to her customer while he drank his tea but, her eyes kept on meeting mine with a hint of concern. I was grateful. It would have been a lonely experience without her. I gave Mook a 100 baht tip, and regretted it immediately. She hadn't deserved it. I had done it merely to 'compete' with the fat old American.

It got me to thinking how life seems to come at me in waves, each arising from interest or excitement, many falling into confusion and pain. Nothing ends happily ever after. It just ends with nothing much more than backwash. Perhaps the ideal is to remain suspended at the crest of illusion for as long as possible and then, somehow, to exit decisively before descending into the gloomy trough of reality, the dwelling of most comfort to the cynic. I prefer to inhabit the brighter amplitudes when I can.

I recalled the sight of the bar-girls; the innocence in their eyes as they gazed up at those chanting monks, a clue as to how they endured. Innocence has been described as the filling of an empty glass, a sense of heightened reception. To regain it is to empty the glass. Was that what those monks had been doing for them? It reminded me of a moment (recounted in 'Drifting away') when I feared that to drop the weight of all my emotional baggage would mean the loss of my identity or even of my sanity. But could it, at least in part, be an enlightenment? The Zen Buddhist perspective views enlightenment and innocence as similar, maybe even the same. Though it was a late afternoon, my thoughts inspired me to ride up Doi Sutep and to visit the temple of Wat Phrathat.

It's about the height of 20 storeys from the base of a straight flight of stairs, lined all the way by the huge glittering bodies of two seven-headed snakes. The Naga (snakes) are revered as protectors of the Buddha. I walked up against an exodus of camera-wielding sight-seers, relieved we were heading in opposite directions. I was taken by the beauty of the place, and the variety and individuality of 'worship'. I witnessed a candle-lighting ceremony where seven monks actively participated. On completion, one of them turned to look at me with a twinkle in his eye, and an implied invitation to follow him to the bot. (It's the most sacred area of the temple reserved exclusively for monks. I didn't know that at the time though.)

I knew little of Buddhism so was cautious. I remained outside and noticed Thai lay-men did the same. It was clearly a ceremony meant exclusively for monks. Many small groups of falangs however, mostly over-weight and sweaty (despite having come up via the funicular), felt no qualms and continuously entered the bot to flash their cameras at the monks and themselves, heaving around in various grinning poses, oblivious to their own arrogance. I was one of them. They were of my own race. I was too embarrassed to remain.

I went to the old city, to a roof-top bar where the food is good and cheap. The festival of Yi Peng was imminent. I watched as some early sky-lanterns rose from the streets. It's said that when they float off into the air; they take your bad luck with them. I noticed a young good-looking Canadian, a regular customer. I felt a little envious. If only I had come to Thailand when I was his age. I shook myself, I had no excuse for envy. There was so much to learn, so much to enjoy.

Mook intercepted me on my way home, as friendly and charming as she had been before I'd knocked her down. She quizzed me about the first three times she'd tricked me. I remembered the names of her substitutes, and the circumstances, and she accepted my recollection. She made no further comment. I couldn't guess what she was thinking. She prided herself in never showing her true emotions. She asked me to take her to Burger King. I had vowed never to go to a falang-style fast-food outlet, over-priced and bland, but the Thais love them, it's crazy. Again, one of her friends was chaperone. Thais don't have a tradition of chaperones but I didn't mind. If I were to go alone with her it would have the appearance of her being a hooker. Why else would a girl as young and beautiful as her be accompanying someone like me? I walked a few paces behind the two of them to further lessen the appearance. It let me observe how other men perceived her. To me she seemed timeless in traditional clothes and the silver earings and her long black hair knotted around a silver hair-pin. Perhaps it was the silver which suggested an aura of ancient moonlight. The falangs gave her lingering looks but the Thai stall-holders surprised me. They were mesmerised, staring at her with an awed desire tinged with a semblance, it seemed, of fear. It's one of those things one notices but doesn't contemplate until some time has passed. She showed me the scab on her knee, still almost an inch across after more than a week.

She had once told me that she prayed to Buddha for two hours per day in the years before she started working. Thais follow the Theravada ('doctrine of the elders') Buddhism. It was established in the first century after the Buddha's death and is the only one of the original forms to survive. It seems to be based on paradox - whatever we believe to be reality is not real but merely a personal conception of it ("up to you") and, that opposites are alike ("same same"). There are the 'Three Treasures' of:

1. Buddha: The ideal or highest spiritual potential.
2. Dharma: The teachings of the Buddha.
3. Sangha: The community of those who have attained enlightenment.

There are various precepts (rules of behaviour) depending on how ambitiously one follows the teachings. These are from the 'grave precepts':

1. Affirm life
2. Be giving
3. Honour the body
4. Manifest truth
5. Proceed clearly
6. See the perfection
7. Realize self and other as one
8. Actualize harmony
9. Experience the intimacy of things

To become a Buddha is possible. Apparently, all one need do is fully realise the grave precepts and another 48 secondary precepts. I'm not that ambitious but, I did return to Wat Phrathat after sunset on a Saturday evening, hoping for some kind of subliminal revelation - an awakening of an inner faculty - a way to alter or to escape from the downside of cycles and the gravitation of orbits... Something like that. The restaurants at the summit had closed. I sat at one of their tables on the outer edge of the northern side of the temple perimeter. The sound of monks chanting filtered clearly through the walls. I could hear many more voices than on my previous visit, some special occasion. I tried to get a feel for the rhythm. The words were evenly paced, monosylabic, the chant continuous, no discernable pause for breath. the timbre was medium with rhythmic dips to a deeper tone sometimes once, sometimes twice or three times every eight or so words. It sounded almost like the beat of drums. I didn't understand the words and I had been digging around on the Internet, so my mind wandered.

My thoughts drifted around those little shrines on the pavements of Loi Kroh Road and into the ancient pre-Buddhist realm of mythology and spirit worship. The spirits are called phi. Every family has a guardian phi which brings bad luck if neglected. So I guess the shops in Loi Kroh Road must have a similar, though less familial phi. Oddly enough, there was no shrine where Mook worked. I had dug a little deeper and came across a phi song nang, spawned by the death of a woman before marriage. It appears as a very beautiful woman, and at night it hunts for handsome men to prey upon. It lures the man to a secluded place with hints of sexual favors. Once alone, it attacks him, draining him of his blood. Thai men have been known to wear nail polish and nighties to bed, hoping to trick phi song nangs into believing them to be women. Back in the 1980s in Thailand, a phi song nang was blamed for the spread of a mystery disease which killed some 230 migrant workers. It was called Sudden Unexplained Nocturnal Death Syndrome. Those who claimed to be survivors described a sudden fear come over them as they slept and, upon waking, feeling a strange presence and an increasing pressure on their chest. They were unable to move or scream.

I had looked in a mirror with relief. My body is firm for my age. I move as easily as I did in my twenties. I do stretch exercises every morning and almost always walk up the nine floors to my room. My eyes have pigments of grey, green and blue with one or the other dominating in different lights, but I've lost most of my hair, except in those places where I shouldn't have any. There's a looseness to my cheeks and I have the beginnings of a turkey neck. Whenever I introduce myself to Thai women as a 'falang ling ghe' (old foreign monkey) it usually sets them off on fits of giggles, probably because I'm saying what they are thinking. If phi song nangs only go for handsome men then I was reasonably safe.

Chimes from a line of lucky bells brought me back to my surroundings. I ambled to the eastern edge where a crimson bougainvillea framed a view of the city below. Various pagodas housed priceless collections of drums, bells, statues, and intricately carved wooden frescoes. It could have been a museum but it was no sterile collection of artefacts, no protective glass panels, no signs, no warnings, no prohibitions.... I took off my sandals to enter a pavillion walled by enormous dish-shaped bells all facing inwards. When some were struck the frequency was so low as to resonate in my skeleton but to be virtually inaudible. The bells responded differently to each person, amplifying their touch, leaving a clear impression of their age and character without my knowing what they looked like, or whether they were man or woman. I left the one set of reverberations for another. They drew me up a broad flight of stairs to the inner temple. The chants were getting louder to my ears as I approached and then entered with bare feet through the southern edge of the western wall.

The temple is of white marble, a square with the perimeter roofed over statues of the Buddha and the walls painted with scenes from his life. At the centre is the gold-leaf stupa; luminous with the effect of concealed floodlights. It towers into the sky, easily visible from the far side of the city beyond the Ping river and thousands of feet below. Against the southern wall; a mixed congregation of about 50 lay-people, monks and nuns faced an equal number of chanting monks. In fact they were beating drums, but so subtly it seemed the drums were chanting too. I circled north and then east passing a young couple elegantly dressed in traditional clothing and kneeling in front of a jade Buddha. Behind them a few superstitious women rattled a box of sticks wrapped in paper. When one falls out the number written on the paper is the key to a page in a chest which tells them their fortune. In an alcove, set in the eastern wall a monk was giving councel to a lay-man. I was then within a few metres of the chanting monks, the sound at its loudest, and I relaxed into the Tai Chi posture for standing meditation, emptying my mind to let the rhythm flow freely past any preconceptions of my consciousness, but it wasn't doing anything for me that hadn't already been done. I headed back to the western wall to leave an offering at the Buddha statue for the day of my birth. The Friday Buddha stands in contemplation with his hands crossed over his chest; the right above the left. The hand posture symbolises his first sermon. Having left some cash in the bowl I stepped back to view the stupa with a strange sense of inversion, as though I was looking down from the temple to the sky. The moon seemed tethered to the golden stupa like a giant disk of raw white silk, as if it was a ghostly vessel floating on a deep blue sea. An electrical current coursed through me. An intense emotional desire tightened across my chest. It had nothing to do with Buddha. I was in the wrong place.

As I left I was looked at with yet another knowing twinkle of an eye; a blue eye, a narrow face, a wisp of blonde hair, her white robes revealing a slender figure; a Buddhist nun.

My rented scooter was the only one remaining at the base of the temple steps. It was raining. The road was 15 kilometres of slippery mountain pass winding steeply down through the night shadows of a jungle. I had broken a rib in two places just six months earlier on a scooter at a bend on a wet road. I had to concentrate. Once I reached the outer city limits the sensation which triggered my departure was all but forgotten and, I was to discover at my own inconvenience that most of the roads into the centre had been cordoned off. Of course, the full moon, I had forgotten all about Loi Krathong; the annual sacrifice to the river spirits, the three-days of festivities and carnival. It was only by luck that I found a way through to my condo.

Showered and shaved, I headed up Loi Kroh Road to the old city. I saw Mook through the window. She was massaging the feet of the fat old American. She made frenzied gesticulations at me to return. Her eyes flashed with an unusual gleam of hunger. The cashier came out. "Mook only start now. Come back one hour."

"Okay," I looked up at the wall clock, "I'll come back at nine," and gave Mook a confirming wave with a surge of the current which had moved me from the temple. Those of her work-mates who weren't busy were making loi krathongs using bread-sized slices from the trunk of a banana tree as a base which they wrapped with banana leaves into the shape of lotus flowers. They were selling them with the candles, incense and flowers which, together with a few coins, makes the traditional offering to the river spirits. I intended to buy one or two, if Mook would join me, on my return. I was ravenous by the time I got to my favourite roof-top bar.

I ordered Pad Thai Moo noodles with pork and a beer, lit a cigarette and wondered about what seemed to have become an amplified sensitivity; both sensual and emotional. I've had similar episodes, but never really thought about them at the time. Usually they had accompanied an obsession; a falling in love or, an inspiration which had seemed to offer unlimited opportunity. Was it one of those or was it neither? This time there wasn't the same rosy haze of euphoria. This time there was an unusual clarity. This time I had little fear, if any, of delusion and despite my preoccupation with the phi, no concern for the fragility of fantasy.

My food arrived as two plump english-women sat down at the bar counter next to me, the only two chairs available. They effortlessly ignored me. Falang women are unable to detect men over the age of forty. Fortunately I smoke, so my appetite wasn't much diminished by the invisible cloud of perfume which ruthlessly condensed on all nostrils within a two-metre radius. I had almost finished my meal when, to my surprise, one of them addressed me.

"No offence," she said; "after all I am 35, but do you know where the young men are?"

"None taken," I laughed. "There is a Canadian. You would like him but, he doesn't seem to be here tonight. Your best bet is to head to the north-east of the old city. That's where all the hostels are. Any other time I could have taken you there but, I have to meet a young woman in less than ten minutes from now."

Back on Loi Kroh Road I bought two big khom lois (sky lanterns), about 1.5 metres high and half a metre in diameter. They're made from the same kind of paper that chinese paper lamp-shades are made from. The base is a circle of wire with four spokes. I tucked them under my arm and headed down for my appointment with Mook. I would pay for a massage but instead of having one I would take her down to the river. We could launch the khom lois, wave farewell to bad luck, float loi krathongs and please the river spirits. I was almost skipping with excitement when I arrived. She had finished her massage of the fat old American and was sitting next to him.

"Look," I crowed, "I've got us a pair of big khom lois. Let's go down to the river." She seemed more than a little hesitant. "Don't worry. You won't lose any money. I'll pay for a massage, even if it takes us more than an hour."

"I can't," she said.

"Why not?"

"I have a customer waiting," she gestured behind her at the doors to the oil-massage rooms.

I don't recollect exactly what went through my mind. I don't remember saying anything. She may have read my eyes.

"No, not later either. I'm booked up for the whole night."

I felt someone's hand on my arm.

"Come," it was Fon, "I can do it with you, if you like."

She wouldn't come down to the river with me though; apparently Mook would consider it too personal.

"She isn't my girlfriend," I needed to remind myself, "She won't mind."

"I know, but you don't understand. These girls can be funny about some things."

"Is it okay for you to give me an oil massage then?"

"Yes, that's okay. It's her fault. She was supposed to give you one."

Using thin wire, we each tied a ring of wax, about the same size as a ring doughnut, to the base of the sky lanterns where the spokes intersect. Then we set fire to the wax, waiting until the heat inflated the lanterns before releasing them. Mine lifted smoothly but Fon let hers go too soon and I had to sprint across the street to catch it before it got entangled in electrical cables. I owed her. It would not have been fair if her bad luck remained. I needed a smoke. I asked Fon if she minded waiting. I knew she was heavily in demand but she was fine about it. My defences were up. Was she being a little too kind? I stubbed it after a few drags and followed her. The room had four raised massage beds, when in use a curtain is drawn for privacy. No curtains were drawn. We were the only ones there.

"Where is Mook?" I asked as nonchalantly as I could, "Has she gone to her customer's house?"

"No she's in the other room. Have you never been there?"

"No. What's the difference?"

"In that one the beds are on the floor. I can take you next time."

Her massage was a good one, perhaps a little more sensual and intimate than Mook's had been, but my mind was elsewhere. It was responding to a challenge, one I had anticipated and prepared for, a sub-conscious effort of discipline; a release and a letting go, the first real test.

When I emerged for my cup of tea I recognised another of the customers; the young Canadian. He was leaving. Mook was talking to the cashier, frequently glancing back at me with a guilty grin. The Canadian was waiting out on the pavement. Mook disappeared into one of the back rooms. I sipped at my tea and remembered Fon saying that she had to leave me; another customer was waiting. I was waiting but what was the point? I knew what I would see.

I left and walked up the road, thirty paces, then turned and retraced a few. What for? I turned again. No. She at least should know that I knew. I headed slowly back and, with ten paces to go, she came out the door smiling brightly at the Canadian, her handbag slung over her shoulder. She saw me and I smiled at her as I walked past then crossed the road beyond. I turned and watched her follow him, a few yards behind, she may have hesitated. I haven't seen him since, but that would be called circumstantial evidence, even if his corpse were to be found. It would be a coincidence only in the context of this story.

I was smiling because I was smiling. I could feel life stirring and flowing past me like the wind through my hair (if I had any). I could sense a clearing of the passage of perception from my senses to my mind. I was seeing more shape in the shadows. It brought a tingle to my fingers and a shiver to my spine. I was exposed to an intense sensitivity of colour, flavour and scent and, perhaps also to the the progeny of fear and hope. I had passed the first test. I had taken a small step into innocence, into the source of creative power.

"I think, therefore I am." A painter transforms figments to a canvas. From a fresh perspective of space and time, a writer makes history anew. A city exists only as a vision before the houses, streets and alleys become a material reality. In their shadows and behind their doors is much which is unknown, whether it be covered by indifference or disguised by design. The spirits of Loi Kroh road may only roam within the innocent confines of our minds, but what cannot exist in the mind cannot exist anywhere in any way which has a meaning to us.

I had crafted the extra dimension of Mook's beauty as an external and transient spiritual essence which could release her once I had passed the summit of illusion. The beauty which cloaked Mook is the spirit of Loi Kroh Road. The spirit of Loi Kroh Road is my heart.

I saw the shock on Mook's face as I hit her, as her knees buckled I was swinging my arms around her, trying to prevent her slamming into the pavement, succeeding I thought, then lifting her back to her feet, sensing alarm from bystanders, feeling her dismay.

"I'm sorry," I was saying, "I'm so sorry. You walk fast. I was running to catch you. I must've tripped," I swivelled to look for what had tripped me, a parody, I hadn't tripped at all. She had heard the rapidly pounding footsteps and moved quickly aside, directly into my path. It hadn't been her fault. Stupid adolescent old man. I tried to skip the situation, "Are you going for a pizza?"

She pointed to a pharmacy. "No. I'm going there," no expression neither in her face nor her eyes. I had no choice but to dismiss myself, to wai in submissive apology, to turn around and to walk away in a blizzard of embarrassment. If I had looked back I may have seen the blood on her knees. I struggled for equilibrium, trying to discern my emotional position and direction. I had spiralled into an orbit with her at its centre. The writing of 'Secrets Of Loi Kroh Road' had got me to think of her more than I otherwise would have. It directed a discovery of details; a love of singing, a delicious half-giggle half-chuckle, a creative instinct - she too wrote. She showed me a notebook and let me glance over a few pages; charmingly naïve prose, all written in English. I queried the absent content - the balance. Where was the anguish and despondency? "I only write sweet thoughts," was the answer. I had taken her (together with a workmate) out for pizzas. I saw it as a step beyond a mere commercial relationship. At work she was triumphant, when twisting my back, if she could get it to click.

"Have you ever broken your customers' backs?"

"No," she had laughed, "only their hearts."

She claimed not to have a boyfriend but that was implausible to my heart and rigorously irrelevant to my reason. If I was much younger I would not have had immediate cause to twist my motive to a purpose different than the conquest of her heart...

You helped me with comments and encouragement after I posted 'Secrets of Loi Kroh Road'. This is the result, and I'm asking the same favour again. Any comment or criticism is valuable. This story is longer than the last (about 5000 words) so I haven't posted the whole thing here. It's on my blog (domprz001.blogspot.com)

Up to you once again

I've done a little editing and added the story to my blog.

It can be downloaded as a free Kindle e-book from http://goo.gl/8h3lc

I got myself an Amazon Kindle in October. It's fantastic - thousands of free books and perfect for a traveller.

If you don't have one try "Amazon Kindle for PC". It can be downloaded from http://www.amazon.com/gp/kindle/pc

I used to be caned every Wednesday morning at school (with a fibreglass one which drew blood) for not going to cricket on Tuesday afternoon. I preferred five minutes of pain to 2 hours of boredom.

Mr. Guesthouse who I read all the time but hardly ever agree with suggested some follow up to posts by the OP.

He wanted to know how things turn out after all of the initial discussion.

I can see that.

So what happened to my English less, Thai only speaking GF.

She went out to play cards with some friends at noon. She came home at 9 the next morning.

I gave her some money and sent her home.

I don't know if she actually went out playing cards or had a boyfriend or turned a trick.

I think it is a good rule of thumb if a women who is your significant other stays out all night that she be banished to the hinterland, in this case Phetchabun.

It is not like I threw her to the wolves as she has a recently remodeled home there and a small farm and family.

Will there be a replacement? I don't know. My fate is cast to the winds.

I went out last night to drown my sorrows in a can of coke zero. I had a good night.

Breaking up in Thailand I have discovered is not as emotionally draining as breaking up in Falangland.

Nailed by irony, just when your relationship seemed to have moved up a level.

Commiserations.

To zzdocxx, gotlost, bifftastic and GarryP:

Thank you, particularly to bifftastic and GarryP for your kind words and [constructive] encouragement.

You made Loi Kroh Road seem a lot more interesting and exotic than it actually is. You must have some talent.

It depends on whose eyes are looking at it. When I first came to Thailand, everything was exotic. We are just old and jaded now, Ulysses. We've all experienced those things at some point in the game. I took the brother of a good friend of mine to the bars on Loi Kroh for a simple experience so he could understand the atmosphere. Nothing much happened other than getting a few hugs from some pretty ladies, but he's still talking about it a few years later. He came from a VERY reserved family in the USA and the only two women he had ever been with was a highschool sweetheart and his present wife.

I believe I noticed one error, or at least something confusing. It's in this sentence near the start of the story...

" It's a disappointment to many, as the masseuses are the prettiest on the street. I tend to glance at the sandals in the doorway."

I believe the writer meant to say... "It's a disappointment to many, as the masseuses are NOT the prettiest on the street. I tend to glance at the sandals in the doorway." ... unless he was saying the masseuses sitting outside are pretty and the ones inside are homely. In my experience I've NEVER seen a pretty masseuse sitting along Loi Kroh road, in the 10 years I've been here.

"no erotic extras offered or provided. It's a disappointment to many"

I'm wondering what kind of mistake I made, that you didn't associate it with the prior sentence.

Thanks

Bokhoma, Ulysses G. and gotlost:

Thanks for your comments compliments. If I have a talent I'm not at all sure of its nature, but it has got me thinking, particularly about the difference in my perception of Loi Kroh Road, and those of Ulysses and gotlost.

It's a fact (from basic 1st-year psychology textbooks) that 15% of what we see - comes through our eyes. The remaining 85% is manufactured by our brain through a series of mental filters; primarily utilitarian i.e. Is there a threat? Is there an opportunity? etc. The drug LSD disables most of those filters (also in the text-books), in fact it doesn't produce hallucinations, quite the opposite. It allows us to see useless things like beauty without ignoring it (read 'The Doors Of Perception' by Aldous Huxley). No, I wasn't stoned on Loi Kroh Road.

Many Thais are perceptive and spiritual people, If they see that one is receptive to beauty they respond. If I have a talent, perhaps it's based on a malfunction of my perceptive filters.

Secrets of Loi Kroh Road

I ignored a warning from a man who knew Loi Kroh Road better than I do. He wrote a book about it. His name is Alan Solomon and the book is called "The Mango Tree Café, Loi Kroh Road". The next two paragraphs are (more or less) a part of what he wrote, the rest is a part of what happened to me.

'Loi Kroh' means 'wash your bad luck away'. For many this has been the case, but most who have entered Loi Kroh Road found this interpretation to hold the reverse effect, particularly for the spiritually naïve. The story goes that when King Mengrai the Great founded the city of Chiang Mai in the year 1296, the superstitions of the East entered the city and lay in wait in the shadows of Loi Kroh Road where today, it is told, they still wait patiently.

If you do not know the street yet, but wish to feel its magic touch, take the walk but be warned: do so at your own peril. For if you feel the strong allure to enter it, be aware. It is a temptress that offers a stretch of broken tarmac, street dogs, cooked squid, street kids and girlie bars which possess strange mystic powers, and if you can conjure just a little of the ability to see the Sight or hear messages from beyond, you will never be the same again. This street named Loi Kroh Road leads men to rejoice and give thanks, or to destruction and confusion. Whatever may happen, visitors to Loi Kroh Road will never escape the fate it has in store for them. Take the risk and walk the street, or stay as far away as possible.

I stayed away. I stayed away for more than a month, and then, one afternoon, I took the walk. It was a disappointment, particularly after such a dramatic warning. I ditched my fear, and walked again. Was there something I was missing?

That's how it started. Now I'm addicted. I walk Loi Kroh almost every day, often twice a day. If I don't feel like making my own breakfast I walk it in the morning. It sleeps until late. Only the bars serving breakfast are open. The pavements are bare, the vendors, artists and craftsmen who furnish them are doing whatever they do when not on the street. The bars and massage parlours are being cleaned. The occasional call of "Massaaage" at that time of the morning is more a reflex of habit than an invitation. On the bridge over the canal a seemingly frail, toothless and ancient bicycle rickshaw driver always greets me with a delight which leaves a grin on my face. Somewhere along the street, I'm not telling you where, is a massage parlour, a respectable one; no erotic extras offered or provided. It's a disappointment to many, as the masseuses are the prettiest on the street. I tend to glance at the sandals in the doorway. Is there a bright red floral pair? The clue of their absence is seldom needed as at least one of the girls will rush out and say "Mook sleeping.", or "Mook busy." or "Mook not here yet." She usually is there in the early morning though, busy cleaning, then we wave at each other as I walk by or, if near the door, she comes out to greet me.

Loi Kroh Road is the red light district of Chiang Mai yet it's unlike any other I've been in. It's ruled by women. There is no pressure other than the sing-song calls of "Massaaage" and happy shouts of "Welcome" from the bar-girls. There are no bouncers, no pimps, no drugs and no theft. Motor-cyclists leave their helmets on the handlebars returning hours later, or even the next morning, without loss. There is no sense of sleaze, not to me anyway.

It's in the mornings when the Thai women garland their shrines. The women, not the men, often kneel and pray beneath them at random times of the day. They hold smouldering joss-sticks between their hands and seem oblivious of passers-by. I remember seeing a group of monks walking down Loi Kroh Road. Pay-for-play bar-girls and masseuses rushed out onto the pavement to kneel before them, the palms of their hands pressed in prayer. The monks chanted their blessings while the women gazed up at them with eyes of an innocence I've previously only associated with children.

I don't have the background to understand much of what I have witnessed on this street. The fabled superstitions and spirits of the East came with the women of the ancient Lanna Kingdom. It's the women who sustain them, and that's why they are still here, still waiting in the shadows, still as powerful and mysterious as they have always been, and it's only the women who know them. It is their secret. That's the way I see it.

A small bar/restaurant at the top of the street used to serve a superb English breakfast. Perhaps they still do. Unfortunately the lovely waitress/chef left when it was sold to the new owner. I haven't returned for another breakfast since. It's my form of protest. If the eye-candy leaves, so too will I. One evening I entered; thinking it was her I saw behind the counter. It wasn't but that's how I met Bayo; a friendly waitress with an unusually good command of English. So a few nights later I visited again, hoping to learn a little more of what goes on inside those pretty Thai heads.

Each of the three round wicker tables next to the pavement was occupied. Only one man was sitting at the largest. I asked and received his permission to sit at it. I asked Bayo for a Chang (local beer) and offered her a drink. She poured herself an orange juice and charged me for a cocktail, pocketing the difference. It obliged her to join me socially for as long as it took me to finish my drink. That's how it works in Chiang Mai. The company of a good waitress here is often better than that of a good date anywhere else.

Bayo sat on a chair between me and the other man. He was from Luxembourg; casually and fashionably dressed, perhaps a few years older than me, but fit and good-looking and with all his hair - Henry I think his name was. He was fuming, though initially he hid it well. His anger became more apparent after a couple of terse phone-calls from his girlfriend, his ex-girlfriend he insisted. He unburdened himself. She told him too many lies, is what he said. That intrigued me. Thai women are consummate liars according to the expat discussion forums. I watched Bayo's expressions from the corner of my eye while Henry told us of money that he had given to help with medical expenses for her mother. Then his girlfriend had sent him photographs of herself. She'd used the funds for cosmetic surgery.

She, the villain, meanwhile, was trying to find him, occasionally annoying him with another phone-call. He told us of a few more examples. Bayo offered sympathy but she didn't appear to see anything wrong with the girlfriend's actions. She often glanced at me with an expression which is as close to winking as one can get without actually doing it. Thais don't wink as far as I know. Perhaps she felt that Henry benefited more from his girl's improved looks than he would have from her mother's good health. She kept her own counsel though. It's a Buddhist thing; "Up to you," is the response you're likely to get when asking a Thai for advice, or "same same" when asking their opinion. When the infamous girlfriend appeared I did have to suppress a wolf-whistle. "Give me keys," she demanded grimly. Henry tossed them to her and she absconded with his motorbike, her young son riding pillion while he, all the more furious, was left behind to walk home.

Bayo is pretty with a neat figure and long slender legs. She wears very short mini-skirts. I tell you this because it is relevant to what happened next. She was dolled up with make-up and false eyelashes. She called it her cabaret look and claimed to wear modest outfits when not at work. She did ask me if it looked stupid. Of course I said no. Her job is to lure customers into the restaurant and to make them feel welcome. She does it vivaciously and well. That's why I was there, and the two men at the next table. One was Norwegian and had arrived in Thailand that same afternoon. It was only after Henry left that I noticed them though I registered little more than their presence.

"I think he is big man in his country," said Bayo about the Norwegian after serving them. I sent her off to get us another drink while I observed him. He noticed and briefly came over to introduce himself, friendly enough but there was an edge to his voice which hinted at antagonism. It didn't bother me and I remember little of what he said. I wasn't really interested, not until I realised that he was 'competing' with me for Bayo's attention. All he needed to do was to buy her a drink but he didn't know that.

He called Bayo over and told her that should she Google his name next time she was on the Internet; she would discover that he was famous and celebrated, even in New York. She stood at their table for a few minutes and then excused herself to come back and sit with me. A few minutes later he called her over again, this time showing her photographs of his chalet in Switzerland, and again she returned to me. Perhaps he noticed my amusement, perhaps my eyes betrayed me. I had consciously kept a straight face. Perhaps he considered me to be the obstacle to his conquest. He stalked over to my table.

"I'm a dangerous man," he said.

I leaned back and relaxed as I've been trained to do when confronting danger (it helps to deflect the energy of the first blow) and looked into his eyes. I've learned how to find the inner-rage in a man's eyes. This Norwegian had no more in him than a puffed up poodle.

"Are you threatening me?" I smiled.

"I am in the CIA. I can have you eliminated in 50 minutes," he snarled.

I picked up my almost empty glass and looked at it. "Well, I had planned to leave after this drink, but I don't want to rush you so I'll stay for another hour." I looked at my wrist. I'd left my watch at home. "Bayo, can you go inside and check what the time is, and while you're there please get us another drink."

A flower seller with a large bag of flowers diverted my attention and I patiently refused her persistent offers while the Norwegian returned to his table. I was thinking of how vulnerable I had been when I first walked Loi Kroh Road. It had seemed an insult to decline the sensual offerings from some of the loveliest women in the world. Whenever I accepted; in a setting conducive to intimacy I would learn intimate details of her life. I would know her name and she mine and it would be so much harder to reject her offer the next time I walked by. Then I would meet another. I was being sucked into a whirling cycle and it was spinning me dry. That's when I first saw Mook.

"No no it's too much!" Bayo's protest interrupted my reverie. The Norwegian had bought the delighted flower-seller's entire stock and was presenting it to Bayo. He persisted and she had little option but to carry them inside.

Mook's face defies my description. I've examined it many times with a determination to describe her features, yet each time I try, something mysteriously blanks my memory. Her father was Chinese. Her mother is Lanna. She has the almond eyes of the Lanna and the Chinese genes extend the slanting shadows further at the corners of her eyes. When working she wears big silver earrings of a simple design. Her hair is usually knotted around a large elaborately wrought silver hair-pin. When she loosens it, it flows fine, heavy and liquid like mercury. It reflects the illuminated paintings of Buddha and tigers which line the pavement. It flashes gold and red; synchronised to the lights of passing cars. Her beauty has a weird aura, as though it has been transported through the curtain of time, as though it has a separate independent existence, as though she is immortal. She wears it lightly, almost as a garment. She acknowledges and enjoys it but it doesn't define her. Once that beautiful hair reaches her buttocks (it may take another two months); she will cut it off, braid it and offer it as a gift to Buddha, as she has always done in the past.

Bayo was back at my table and the Norwegian, having realised that I had no romantic interest in her, was making frequent forays to kiss her hand and to whisper in her ear. It seemed to me that he was not doing himself any favours, while I slipped further into reverie.

With that surreal beauty; an offer of a massage from Mook is never refused and, having accepted her offer, the trapped customer is presented with a lesser (though still pretty and no less capable) substitute. It happened to me three times in a row. Eventually I told her that I would accept none other than her, neither at her shop nor at any other. She was delighted and that's how I was saved from my downward spiral. Somehow it seemed that the whole street knew, almost instantly, and most offers became simple greetings.

"I'm sorry," Bayo was speaking to me after another Norwegian hand-kissing ear whisper; "I can't stay here any longer."

A minute later a different waitress placed a bill on the Norwegian's table.

"What!" he shouted. "I don't want the bill. I want another drink... Okay I'm going to buy the bar! Where's the owner? I'll give him five million baht right now!" He marched inside, "and if I own the bar I own you," that must have been aimed at Bayo, "and you will have to do what I ask!" He stormed back out in less than a minute, once more to sit at his table, his brawny companion doing nothing other than to look apologetic.

I don't normally interfere in a foreign country but this was clearly an exception. I saw the surprise when I faced him eyeball to eyeball. After ten years of Tai Chi, I can move swiftly and smoothly without that initial lurch which alerts the opponent. "Thais are very polite and courteous people," I said quietly "but you need to tone it down right now." He didn't argue. By the time I got back to my seat he was lurching across the road, a glass still in his hand. On reaching the pavement he gave me a final malevolent look and disappeared into the shadows. A short cry of protest swivelled my head like a spectator at a tennis match. The flowers had been dumped on the table. A lynch-party of enraged Thais was being hastily pacified by the Norwegian's companion as he held up a couple of 100 baht notes with outstretched arms; recompense for the departed glass. The sense of aggression quickly abated into a round of excited Thai chatter and a few yells at the departed falangs. I couldn't follow any of it.

"We thought you were going to get into a fight," explained Bayo brightly, a pretty Thai smile back on her face.

"No. No, that was never going to happen," I didn't want the reputation of a brawler. I never have been. Calm returned and then I remembered I had a date - sort of; from a brief encounter with Mook on my way to visit Bayo.

She had emerged from a side-door wearing jeans and a T-shirt, not the traditional Thai baggy trousers and cotton top. She wasn't wearing make-up. I like her that way; then she seems merely human. "Bai nai? Where you going?" she had asked. It's a standard Thai greeting, almost a rhetorical question but I answered anyway, taking the opportunity to study her face, while the unearthly veil of beauty seemed to have temporarily lifted. Her face is not perfect. Her teeth protrude slightly but I like that. It gives a subtly pouting character to her mouth. Her face is not round yet it is a collection of curves; her eyebrows, her nose, her eyelids, her lips, her chin... Her skin is silky and flawless, neither a blemish nor a wrinkle. "Come back later," she said and I smiled and nodded at an invitation I could not refuse. "I'll wait for you," she called as I walked away, struck by the way her eyes had wandered over my face; same as mine had done. "Same same," a sing-song voice echoed through my mind.

I headed across the street into the same shadows as the Norwegian and his henchman had last been seen. I wasn't concerned. The odds of my being 'eliminated' were remote; anyway longevity is no longer on my list of priorities. I have lived long enough if needs be. He had no leverage on me. There was no way he could harm me. I dismissed him from my mind as I headed for my rendezvous with Mook. Yes, I had better things to ponder; things like what kind of massage I would ask her for... I liked the idea of a Thai massage, and the thought of her wrestling my body till the joints clicked, and all tension was gone.

I saw the commotion from a distance. Mook's workmates were clustered around her. She still wasn't in her working clothes. She was still wearing jeans. Her hair was loose and mussed up like a wild black cloud swirling around her face and shoulders. There was blood on her T-shirt. I was only a few yards away when I saw the jagged gash which stretched from her nose to her ear. A heart-shaped bruise smudged her other cheek. She saw me coming and flashed a ravishing smile.

"We all going to Halloween party," she embraced her work-mates with a gesture. She stopped smiling and looked at me closely; "You scare me." The adrenalin had not yet drained from my veins. "Tonight I only give foot massage." The smile returned to her face "Follow me."

We entered the room with the reclining chairs. There were about six of them; all but one occupied. I could see by the way the occupants gazed at Mook, that she had tricked them in the same way that she had first tricked me. She filled a basin with warm water and squeezed lime and dropped herbs into it. She knelt before me and bathed my feet. The rest of us stared at her as if in a trance, even her work-mates, and I began to understand.

It was those ancient spirits of the East who swirled around to cloak her in that indescribable beauty, and I understood why she was so unaffected by it. It didn't define her. She knew that. It defined them. That beauty which defied my memory wasn't hers, it was theirs.

I had learned one of the secrets of Loi Kroh Road.

Mook looked up into my eyes and chuckled.

Introduction:

I'm hoping to become a writer. I've never been on any course. I'm not a member of a writers group. I'm doing it on my own. That's the way I am. This is my first short-story, my first attempt at self-publishing.

The events in the story are true. The interpretation/perspective is subjective. The places are disguised. The incident with the Norwegian was in the old city - not in Loi Kroh Road. Mook is not her real name. She doesn't wear red sandals.

Off-hand I can think of two members with outstanding writing skills: mca and mark45y. There are many others here whose posts are excellent and, in my circumstance - intimidating. I'm asking for constructive criticism.

Up to you...

A real man is concerned with what he's doing, what he wants to achieve, how he's going to get there. If the lady likes that, then she'll want to come along for the ride, may even want to support him in his efforts, then that's the one he should choose. If she doesn't like his ponytail she can cut it off.

Tell me Ladyboy butterfly. What are you coming to Thailand for? What kind of ride will you offer?

Where have all the real men gone? The narcissism and vanity I see here is appalling.

There are three kinds of people: Those who can count, and those who can't.

If this isn't about the top five passions of the falang in Thailand, then I suspect spiritualism, superstition and/or Buddhism may be near the top.

There's something that moves me when I see a Thai woman (yes I'm a falang) garlanding and kneeling at a shrine and praying with joss sticks between her palms. What did bring a tear to my eye was the sight of bar-girls and masseuses rushing out to kneel before a group of monks on Loi Kroh Road, Chiangmai. They looked up at the monks with an innocence in their eyes which I have previously only associated with children (before they are 12, before they are corrupted by cynicism). It was so incongruous that, though I was privileged to witness it, I didn't have the background to understand what I saw.

I'd love to know what their true passions are. I'm sure I don't have a clue.

Honesty being my first priority there has been a new development on the language home front.

... [Much content edited in the interests of brevity]...

So I told GF she was going to teach me to write in Thai. I still have the AUA text with the writing lessons and she can use that for structure.

When informed of her new role as teacher she surprised me and told me she would only do it if I taught her how to write in English. (She wants to know what I write on the computer.) So we are off today to buy two new kitty pink notebooks that we will use to write our new language skills in each day. Me in Thai and her in English.

... [more editing]...

Assuming the first sentence to be true; this is a breakthrough and, and it took less than 400 posts.

Could the Thai elite change too?

Well done Mark. It seems you're still young enough to be flexible.

One change leads to another of course.

Marks observations about the way some posters try to assert an element of control are correct, none more evident than in the political posting arena you regularly visit JD. I guess for some open discussion of topics is not acceptable due to their limited debating skill,. hence the calls for threads they cannot contribute to intelligently, to be closed. Opinions are always welcome, however it is always advisable to have the ability to support your opinions with reasoned argument, should your ultimate aim be to have others on the forum support your opinion.

I rarely see people asking for political threads to be closed. I do, however, often see red shirt supporters resorting to flaming or using non-factual arguments to try and score points. (I see this in anti-reds as well ... but the anti's usually have factual arguments to use.)

mark on the other hand talks down to and about people on a constant basis, it seems. All the while, misrepresenting what is said and doing exactly what he accuses others of. Take for example .... his "Never" threads, or his "Why I don't", thread, simply not very well veiled sneers at other people

(note: when I sneer ... you know it

Thanks. The straw man concept makes sense. It does make mark45y's topics entertaining and instructive though - not so much by his tilting at windmills, but the responses they inspire.

There must be something wrong with me then as I read it all the way through and really enjoyed it.

Thank you for your efforts and keep writing.

There must be something wrong with me too for writing it. Thanks for your comment.

Apologies. A reminder that I should never assume the circumstance/perspective of another to be similar to mine.

There is also Pira Sudham, the 'Master of Isaan'. Maybe you know him but this guy was born in Napo, a village on the northern tip of Buriram province. Through scholarships was able to study in Bangkok and then overseas. Now he's in his sixties and divides his time between Napo and the UK - he's become something of an Anglophile and although he used to be a Buddist monk for a time he is paticularly interested in fine wines and champagnes. His novels and short stories are still found in bookships. He writes in English and for my money can be placed up with Checkov and all the greats as a short story writer. He is quite exceptionally brilliant. His novel Monsoon Country and it's sequel are a unique eye-opener into how Thai politics work and how it feels to be one of the 'buffalos' of Isaan.

Thanks. Pity it isn't available as an e-book. I'll trawl through the bookshops to try get a copy.

[8>< SNIP NESTED QUOTES DELETED ><8

Me? No. Company CO didn't like the dog. He told the men to get rid of the dog. Someone threw a grenade into his quarters.

That's a wicked thing to do to a dog, even if they were just following orders. No wonder the dog had the CO fragged

SC

Nooo! The sargeant-type had the CO fragged. The dog had done him the favour and Mark45y had paid him to do it (re previous brief post). I had hoped he would be as eloquent, and even more specific, about his personal experiences as he has been about the generic ones. Jazzbo may give us a few more clues...

I'm beginning to sense a Vietnam conflict version of the William Holden 'Sefton' character in Billy Wilder's Stalag 17 (though doesn't have to be set in a POW camp) -- Holden won Oscar for Best Actor in 1954 ... you can pivot on the decision to maneuver your CO elsewhere instead of just paying someone to just frag him ... arrange girls for the top brass ... cold Coors ... sounds like fun ... 3rd act you hustle the wrong guy and almost lose it yourself ... if I keep going I may have to write it myself ...

Top brass flew to the beach weekends with nurses. I scheduled the flights. I had two Co's. One in a company area where I lived and another at the office where I worked. The CO in the company area did get fragged. He was going to kill the company dog. I didn't do it. I didn't like the dog either. I would post a picture of the guy who got my office CO transferred except I owe him my life. I was two weeks away from death. I realized then that there is always someone more important than you. Always someone stronger or richer or better connected. I had forgotten all about it but I did a person a favor. And some people don't forget. Officers think they run the Army but they don't. Generals think they run the Army but they don't. Sergeants run the Army and Command Sergeant Majors run the sergeants. I don't know if it the same in the Thai army.

It was the same in the Korean army. ROK's. The ROK's were tough soldiers. They had little problems with the VC. ROK's moved into an area and the VC moved out.

They had it figured out. See, the American army taught Vietnamese liaison officers how to speak English. And these liaison offices interviewed prisoners and carried on all communications between the American army and our allies the South Vietnamese Army.

The ROK's knew all the Vietnamese liaison officers were spies and untrustworthy. So, the Korean army learned how to speak rudimentary Vietnamese and shot the liaison officers.

If I may be so bold, your (not you Jazzbo) Thai girlfriend wants to learn English and you not to learn Thai for the same reason the Vietnamese liaison officers wanted to learn English and the American officers not to learn Vietnamese.

Thanks for the elaboration. It's not quite clear who got the CO 'fragged', but it appears that it was instigated either by you or the dog - you were in the same company (or boat) after all and it is clear that both of you had the same motive. You lost me after the first half-paragraph. Perhaps you were responding to some earlier post which I missed.

I forgot about smelly. In Farangland we only wash our hands after going to the toilet. What more could they possibly need for a ready-made image of a villain. We are perfect.

I'm beginning to sense a Vietnam conflict version of the William Holden 'Sefton' character in Billy Wilder's Stalag 17 (though doesn't have to be set in a POW camp) -- Holden won Oscar for Best Actor in 1954 ... you can pivot on the decision to maneuver your CO elsewhere instead of just paying someone to just frag him ... arrange girls for the top brass ... cold Coors ... sounds like fun ... 3rd act you hustle the wrong guy and almost lose it yourself ... if I keep going I may have to write it myself ...

I'm sure OP's memory is as vivid as your wit. Perhaps he needs to protect innocent people involved.

Oh! I would be a villain on Western TV too. I smoke.