Stickman Readers' Submissions January 26th, 2004

Falling Stars And Dropping Temperatures



I'll never doubt my lass again. It is quite nippy up here in Surin in November. Especially in the late evenings and early mornings. Why, a Surin witch could actually freeze her little tits off here if she didn't dress properly! And tit-less witches must be a frightening sight to see indeed. I know I would find it disturbing. Personally I prefer tits on just about anything, except men that is.

I had seen off two of my friends visiting from Bangkok earlier in the day. We spent hours chatting over breakfast and coffee after a late morning awakening.

He Clinic Bangkok

Too much whiskey from the night, and very early morning, before had been consumed. We were recuperating and relaxing. It was a fun, if not the excessively exciting night out that can be had in Bangkok or Pattaya. This is Surin after all. No Nanaplaza or Soi Cowboy up here. The company of friends I enjoy is still more enjoyable than a night out with strangers, having sexual parts shaken about in front of my face by women I neither know nor love. (Although it does have it's redeeming qualities at times!) It would have been nice if the lasses dancing in the lone Surin gogo bar I know of, that we attended, had at least taken some fucking clothing off though.

The lady who has rented me the red shitbox pick-up for quite some time now screwed me up bigtime this trip. Toward the end of my voyage up and down the sois leading to Surin from Bangkok, in a mini-van with seats decorated, seemingly, by a gay Puerto Rican with a bent for faux leather of a brilliant blood red color, she called and asked us when we would like her to drop off said red shitbox pick-up truck for my use. We agreed she could leave us the truck the next day, sometime after noontime was the decision agreed upon.

We needed the wheels to take our butts to the Surin Elephant Roundup on Saturday morn.

CBD bangkok

This was on Thursday, the 15th November. Friday we settled in. We took a loooooooong walk in the Surin Winter Wonderland that morning. The lass, my fairly new wife, was a bitchin' and a moanin'. For chrissakes woman shaddup! Yer nearly half my age, and I have a bad back too on top of it. Ya don't hear me whining do ya? Sheesh. Walking with a Thai lass IS like walking a cat on a leash. You have to practically drag them by the neck down the soi.

We saw shitloads of elephants, elephant food, baby elephant antics, and dodged much elephant poop while walking around. The air was electric, the excitement palpable, the stench pervasive, and the falangs too numerous to count. This was Surin's big weekend. The once a year time to suck as much baht from the tourists as was possible, until next year.

As usual my lass was less than thrilled at the length of time she needed to use her bi-pedal abilities. She whined and moaned, and dragged her ass about as though this thing called "walking" was some truly horrendous torture, the likes of which would
cause even the Marquis de Sade to shudder in horror in contemplating.

The time for the arrival of the red shitbox came and went. Nothing was heard from it's owner. A friend of my lady's. I napped awhile in the early evening. Well, it was a long walk we had taken. I am slightly older than my lass, and the effects of jetlag were still kicking my biological rhythms about. So around 8 p.m. my lady woke me and informed me that her "friend she" with the pick-up could not perform as promised the arranged rental agreement. Not that she'd be late, not that the truck was broken, but that……………she had sold the truck that very afternoon!! HUH? "She sold it?!" I asked in amazement. Well, it looked that way I was informed. Dubious I was to say the least. But..my pen rai….I guess. This is Thailand after all. I've learned it pays little to let these blips in your plans here affect your inner calm and tranquility. It's senseless really. Take the hit, brush it off, smile, and forge ahead into your life's adventure in the Land of Smiles.

wonderland clinic

So I shrugged this off, and we pondered our alternatives in procurring some sort of locomotion other than what God created for us. Something man-made, four wheeled, and petro-chemically fuelled was what we desired. Mobile phones were opened and family and friends were called and enlisted in the search for the perfect cheap conveyance in a shitbox form. Something would work out eventually. Meanwhile I would enjoy myself, and fret only occasionally. As one good friend would say………."Fuck it!!!"

We managed okay with our motocyke, and the occasional tuk-tuk. The weekend progressed. Our friends arrived and visited, and seemed to enjoy themselves and our company. The elephant show was seen and enjoyed by all.

As I said, my friends left in the afternoon on Sunday. Once they were gone I relaxed some more, listening to some jazz and reading the Nation and the Bangkok Post. It's what Sundays were meant to do really. Relax and recuperate from Friday and Saturday night's excesses. All else seems blasphemous to a lapsed old Catholic boy like me. Again the urge to nod hit me in the early evening. Albeit an hour later than the last time. Saturday night doesn't factor in to the jet lag stuff, as we didn't come home until 5:30 in the morning. A few more days and the biological clock would finish resetting itself. Hopefully.

A call came later. Sister #3 and her husband were bringing their pick-up truck for us to use for a few days. I would need to drive them back to their home outside Burirum after they visited for a couple of hours. An hour or so's drive from the house in Surin. Shit. I was tired already.

I finally got to meet my brother-in-law. He wasn't at the wedding. Marital discord had erupted a few months before. He was spending too much time, and money, it seems on his current mia noi. So I was told anyway. This being the wife's family's version. Knowing Thai guys it seemed fairly believable to me. Sister #3 vocalized her objections to this treatment from her long time husband once too often, and openly, for his liking I guess, and while he was drunk. He beat the crap out of her. Himself being a cop, and a Thai, he suffered no legal consequences for this.

This being Thailand the consequences were more of a familial nature. Condemnation and ostracization from the immediate family. A scolding from a monk. No longer welcome in the wife's home, nor the big bed, he took up with the mia noi for a few months. He realized his mistake after a while. Seems that though mia noi is great in the sack, she was a bubble headed pain in the ass to live with, and a baht sucking black hole of infinite depth. He moved in with his father and began a course of soul searching, and has been working hard at reconcilling with Sister. She's taking it slow. He's on probation with her. She's searching for signs of his rehabilitation before agreeing to take him
back.

I met him last night for the first time. He was personable and funny. Made everyone laugh a lot, and seemed like a nice guy. I'm not fond of wife/women-beaters. But everyone can make a mistake in life. God knows most of us do at times. It's just that I've found that most men who resort to hitting a woman when angry will eventually do it again. (This wasn't a self defense slapping he gave her, but a severe drunken physical beating, with fists.) Time will tell I suppose. Alcohol is usually the fuel that ignites the flame of marital violence. He seems to like his whiskey and beer. Without his abstinence from booze I
predict a recurrence some day of his violent response to Sis' complaints. While I was with him I noticed he has a well trained roving eye. Young pretty ladies attract his gaze like metal filings to a magnet. He was very obvious about it. At least to me. You'd have to be blind not to notice really. Looking ain't cheating in my book, but I try to avoid doing so in
the presence of my lady, or at least try to be covert and discreet about it. He is neither. Leering openly at other women in the presence of one's wife is neither gentlemanly nor advisable in my eyes.

I doubt the sincerity of his current contriteness, and can foresee more mia noi's and marital problems in his future. Poor Sis. Leopards will be born with octogonal spots before this cat changes his ways I'm afraid.

We dropped Sis and hubby off at her place around 11 p.m. At one point during the hour's ride up the little shit had the nerve to ask me if his driving scared me. ("The little muthafuggah!" I thought to myself. His crazy driving was some sort of Thai macho test for the falang's benefit!) "No." I replied, "I drive the same way myself." This brought some loud laughter from him. I guess it was the right answer, and I passed the test. He did drive like a bat out of hell with a scud missle stuck up it's ass. Fucking Thai men can be a real pain in the ass with macho shit sometimes.

I had read earlier in the papers that morning about this night's coming meteor shower show. Since it was already after twelve midnight when we got home in Surin I decided to stay up for a while and see what all the hoo hah was about. I've always been interested
in the stars. I parked the new vehicle in the driveway, grabbed a couple of pillows and blankets for comfort, and to ward off the effects of the now pretty damned chilly night air, (Actually it was fucking cold, but don't tell my lady I said so.) and prepared an astronomical viewing platform in the bed of the pick-up.

Look sow (daughter) and I snuggled under the blankets, heads resting on pillows, and made ourselves comfortable for the impending celestial show God and nature had planned to commence at 1 a.m., or so the scientists and newspaper reporters had said would be so. They weren't wrong. Precisely at 1 o'clock particles of rock, ice, and iron started bombarding the upper atmosphere above us. Streaks of white, red, bluish yellow, and green flashed across the starry Isaan night sky, and elicited oohs and aahhs from us, and others in

the neighborhood too. My lady and her sister came outside bundled up against the cold night air to sit on the tailgate of the truck at our feet and see what all the ruckus was about. They soon joined us in our ooh-ing and aahh-ing as the night sky turned into a laser light show. Within minutes we lost count of the falling stars. The dropping temperatures, and our drooping eyelids had us back inside by 2:30.

As I lay next to my new wife I thanked the lucky falling stars now obscured by the roof above us for our being together. Life is grand.

Bangkok is a nice place to visit, but I'll take the star studded night skies of Isaan any time. I fell asleep seeing flashes of falling stars still imprinted on the inside of my eyelids, happy to be home once again in my beloved Surin.

Stickman says:

More magic from Cent.


nana plaza