Stickman Readers' Submissions December 21st, 2005

Thai Girls Abandoned In New Zealand Part 3

Thai Girl Abandoned In New Zealand Part 4: The Making of Tawhiri

In part 1, I wrote about how I was driven to insanity by my Thai girlfriend in New Zealand and forced to abandon her there. In part 2, I wrote about what I thought probably happened after I abandoned her. In part 3, I wrote about what did happen. Now, in part 4, I am going to reveal how she was made.

He Clinic Bangkok


This thoroughly horrible creature (nothing about her merits a ‘human’ label) is still in New Zealand now. She regularly writes to me with the incredible expectation that I might send her money. I still can’t decide whether she’s extremely stupid or extremely evil. If it’s extreme stupidity, then it’s difficult not to feel some sort of compassion for her, because she’ll never be able to create anything like a stable life for herself and, in the not too distant future, when her beauty takes its leave and she’ll be no longer be able to find men willing to support her, she will inevitably be reduced to a shocked, impoverished, desperate existence on the streets.


Here are some extracts from a book I wrote, which explain how she was formed. In addition to her New Zealand fiancée (see part 2), there was an Italian!


A Migrant’s Tale Page 86 – internet café in Patong, Phuket

CBD bangkok


Three weeks later, during one unforgettable morning in an internet café, Bird showed another area of her character.


“You help me write e-mail?” she asked innocently. This was unusual since the privacy of her e-mail account had, up until then, been a matter of enormous importance to her. Jerzy supposed that she felt that they had become suitably close for him to share this once secret section of her life.


“Is this good English?” she asked.


Jerzy initially assumed that what he was reading was some sort of practical joke she was playing and treated it as such. He read:

wonderland clinic


“Dear Mama Mia, Like to be today? I am fine now stay alone in my aunt house. She go Europe so I lonely now here. Thank you for send my money last time. Next time I need more money because I loan friend money and need give back soon. Yes I like marry with you go Italy when you come Thailand in two month. Miss you. Bird.”


Jerzy thought that he would play along with this little joke for a while. Fancy Bird believing that he would fall for that!


“Yes the English is understandable but why don’t you tell him that the police will execute you if you don’t pay the loan back next week?” he joked


“Thank, yes I say that,” she replied before duly inserting Jerzy’s suggestion. She then sent the e-mail.


“Well, you think you’re very funny, don’t you?” laughed Jerzy.


“What you say? Him my fiancée. Him send my money every time,” she responded without the slightest notion that this information may have come as a shock to Jerzy.


It then dawned on Jerzy in a moment of unprecedented wonder that she had not been playing a practical joke and that her lifestyle really was being subsidised by a lovesick Italian. It would certainly explain why she always seemed to have money. Jerzy felt an overwhelming sense of guilt.


“How long have you known him?” he asked in a casual tone put on to disguise a feeling of total incredulity which, if shown, would most certainly have influenced the truthfulness of her answer.


“Five years, but not worry Jerzy. I not love him and I never marry him. Him not even speak much English. We need speak with dictionary. I love you. Him only for money. Him love me,” she proudly announced. “Him always send me my money.”


In Thailand, it is a strange fact that, for many people, no importance is attached to the means by which money is acquired; the issue which they concern themselves with is whether or not the money has been acquired. It was perhaps for this reason that Bird could not see that it was wrong to encourage a man to send her money on the false promise that she would one day marry him. It is difficult to understand that a person may never have learned the difference between right and wrong; it is even more difficult to think that a different people may have a different comprehension of what is right and wrong. Jerzy tried to explain to Bird that this was probably the most cruel thing that a human being could do to another human being, but it was pointless. From Bird’s point of view, she needed the money from this rich farang so of course she should accept it.


It is human nature that the sense of obligation in doing a favour is much greater than the sense of obligation in receiving one. This, however, was taking that to the extreme!


“So when are you going to let him know that you won’t marry him?”


“I’m not marry him. I want stay with you. You good man for me. We love and I not love him and I know if man and lady stay together but not love, they very not happy,” she said, obviously from experience.


“How often do you see him?”


“Him come every year for two weeks. I take him go islands. But I not like him. Sometimes if he not buy what I want, I run very quickly and every time him run after me very quickly and always him say sorry and buy what I want,” she revealed with a triumphant expression.


“And how often and how much money does he send?”


“Him send every two week for five year. Him send what I ask for. Sometimes big money. One time, him send me 40,000 baht (US$1000) and I very happy. I have money like this,” and she held her hands far apart representing a large wedge of notes.” He send me money for buy air ticket go Italy. But I not buy ticket. I buy very nice clothes for my life. When him come and him see what I do, him go…” She screwed up her face and groaned noisily before laughing; clearly the memory of his groan still tickled her to this day. “I call him ‘Mama Mia’ because it what him say when him angry.”


Jerzy found it difficult not to laugh because she was a very funny girl. However, there seemed to be some sort of link in her brain that was missing. Jerzy struggled over a definition for her condition for a few minutes before finally falling upon it: she was thoroughly selfish. With his ethnocentric Western logic, this seemed the only plausible explanation for her behaviour.


In fact, her relationship with Mama Mia had been arranged by her aunt who thought it good for her to have a European boyfriend. Bird hadn’t liked him from the start but her aunt had insisted that she at least pretend to like him. He had also known she didn’t like him but, being a rich farang, he thought it perfectly acceptable that he should buy her. Rather like the Hong Kongers who purchase South East Asian maids and sexually abuse them. ‘After all, what do women need other than security?’ he reasoned. He sent her money on a regular basis and as far as he was concerned, he had bought her. He considered himself to be the best thing that had ever happened to her. She, on the other hand, could hardly turn down all this money which would take her months to earn in Thailand. It would take a very special breed of human indeed who, having absolutely nothing, would turn down a fortune from a fool. Bird had, in effect, been enticed into this uncomfortable situation and it had the effect of corrupting all her morals. After she had accepted money from him, she could be capable of accepting money from other men and at sometimes she had several men sending her money simultaneously. It would be easy to dismiss Bird as being a depraved, little minx but it is difficult to imagine any human being behaving differently in Bird’s circumstances. She was acting according to her nature – human nature. And besides, if the whole truth were ever known about any of us, we would inevitably be revealed as being the most sinful scoundrels.


There was now, however, a serious complication for Jerzy in that, even if Bird was not planning to marry Mama Mia, he could hardly stay with her while she was receiving money from a man who intended to marry her in two months time. Jerzy had a difficult dilemma. Bird reassured him that the next money she received would be the last and that she would very soon tell him the awful truth. Jerzy realised that this was a lie. For the time being, however, he told himself that her relationship with this man was not really his business, and it would be wrong to interfere, especially when, at this time, he saw no long term future for himself and Bird. And besides, if she was not with Jerzy, she would most definitely be with another man.


A Migrant’s Tale Page 111- a month or so later, leaving Singapore


The next day, they took a bus to the ferry terminal where they would take a ferry to the Batam Centre in Indonesia. In the ferry terminal, as they were about to check-in, Bird said: “Wait, I need check internet.”


“Internet?”


“Yes, Maybe Mama Mia want send my money in Singapore and I need write him I leave Singapore.”


Jerzy was startled. Not only had she not finished with this man but she was still accepting money from him.


“You told me that you would finish with him.”


“Yes, I know but now I need my money so I take my money one last time and then say, ‘Goodbye Mama Mia.’”


“It’s not your money, for God’s sake. Can you really not see that it’s not your money?”


“Not talk about my friend. Him always send my money. My money nothing to do with you. I need love my life. It very important. We go or not?”


Jerzy pondered over the situation for a while. Was it really possible that she didn’t know what she was doing was wrong? At first, Jerzy couldn’t bring himself to believe it but he began to think that this girl had had a rather unfortunate background and everyone she had ever met had advised her to love her life. To her, the highest virtue to which a person could aspire was to compassionately love their own life. In addition, she had been subjected to the Thai custom of attaching no importance to the means by which money is acquired. She really didn’t realise that what she was doing was wrong! It was insane. Bird’s absolute confidence in herself had a strange effect on Jerzy; he began to, himself, question whether it was wrong. He considered that life was meaningless and that in a hundred years they would all be dead and forgotten. Surely, it was silly to go out of one’s way to be moral in such a situation. ‘Be moral?’ thought Jerzy. ‘For my vanity, is it? To make me feel better? So I can say how unselfish I am? For don’t you know that it’s a fool who plays it cool by making his world a little colder. The human race had probably evolved a conscience so that societies could work. But I’m not part of a society – I’m a migrant and need special permission to go anywhere – so why should I need a conscience? Why should I care if the societies where I’m not allowed to live, work or not?’


They went to an internet booth and she wrote a long and rambling e-mail about nothing very much. It worried Jerzy a little that his partner’s head was filled with such nonsense.


“Wait,” Jerzy started just as she was finishing it. “You can’t send this e-mail. It’s wrong. You are going to tell him everything now!”


“OK, I say bye bye Mama Mia,” she reneged, irritated at Jerzy’s interference. “But I not want him sad so I need thinking what say first. Tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow, I say goodbye Mama Mia.”


“No, now. This has gotta stop now! I have enough money for both of us so you don’t need his money anyway. I would never leave you without money. You have to say it to him now.”


Jerzy watched her write and send the e-mail. It probably wasn’t very nice to do it over the internet, but she didn’t have his phone number and they couldn’t communicate verbally anyway. When the e-mail was sent, Jerzy felt enormously happy because he felt he had done the right thing by making Bird do the right thing. His vanity was boosted because he had resurrected his conscience and it had made him feel righteous and praiseworthy.


A Migrant’s Tale Page 156 – several months later, leaving job in Korea


Before leaving Pyongtaek, Bird insisted that they went to an internet café.


“Why on earth do you need the internet now?” asked Jerzy.


“Mama Mia send my money today and I need check Western Union number.”


“What?” he cried aghast. “You haven’t finished with him yet? Does he still think you’re going to marry him? But I saw you send an e-mail finishing with him.”


“He not believe me in that e-mail. He go Thailand for marry me next week. I say him I in Korea and I lie I need one last money for air ticket go back Bangkok. I think he send big money this time,” she boasted.


“Bird, you need to tell him that you will not be in Thailand next week. How do you think he’s going to feel? You don’t care at all?”


“OK, I say him I not marry but I need one last money then say, ‘Goodbye Mama Mia’.”


“No, we can go to an internet café now and say it. Unbelievable! Only you could be capable of this!”


They went to the nearest internet café and opened Bird’s email account. There was indeed an e-mail from Mama Mia. It read: “Surprise my sweet little Bird. I am in Korea to meet you. Next week we be marry in Seoul and then we go Italy together. I love you more and more and soon we be together forever. I waiting five years for this! I so so so so happy! Love you dearest.”


“What are we going to do now?” asked an exasperated Jerzy. He had been with Bird long enough to know that she was capable of the unspeakable but this exceeded every boundary. They checked into a hotel in a nearby town to decide upon a course of action.


“Jerzy, really I sorry about this. I not know he come here.” She flushed as women always do when they have received a declaration of love. This little display of self-indulgence annoyed Jerzy infinitely.


“How can you possibly have got yourself into this situation?”


“I know. Before five year ago I very good girl. I never lie, never bad girl. I like my sister – she very, very good girl. I see Mama Mia in Bangkok five year ago. Him friend my aunt. I try go Italy with him, but Italy Embassy not give visa. We try again after three months but again not give visa. Him go holiday Thailand every year and every year we try Embassy but every time they say, ‘No.’ Mama Mia, him love me and him send me my money for five year. I not have to work and I have happy life. Party every night. This time he say he want marry me so they give me visa for sure. But I not love him and I not want go Italy. Yes, five year before I want go Italy with him but then I have son and I not want go. Him only for money and if him want send my money, I think it good for me. First, my Thai boyfriend very happy that we have money and then him jealous and him leave me.”


All of a sudden, Jerzy realised what he had experienced by living with Bird. He had been witnessing how the existence of visas and barriers to migration had completely mutilated the character and soul of this beautiful, young girl. It is said that the reason there are so many hysterical women in the world is that nasty, unnatural hardships have befallen them. These include especially women killing or living apart from their babies. Bird had experienced both of these and more. Her culture and the life inflicted upon her by immigration rules had destroyed her. She should have been allowed to travel to Italy five years ago with Mama Mia, before she had had her son, before she had been corrupted. Instead, she had been confronted with a set of insane procedures which had left her almost subhuman. She had been tempted, left in unendurable suspense, confused, ruined, exploited, abandoned, destroyed. It was a tragedy.


A Migrant’s Tale Page 159 – the next day at a travel agency in Seoul


The next day they went to a travel agency in Seoul to buy their plane tickets to Bangkok. As they walked into the busy office in Jonggak which seemed to contain literally hundreds of desks, Bird exclaimed: “It him. It Mama Mia.”


“Where?” cried Jerzy, desperately searching the room with racing eyes.


Before she had time to answer, the Italian had noticed them and was walking towards them. He was a slim, bald man with bulging eyes. He looked older than his forty-four years and was dressed in an expensive-looking suit.


“My love, like to be today?” he screamed.


The two engaged in a passionate embrace with Jerzy looking on nervously. He had no idea what to do. Feeling that Bird, with her history of lies and deception, was most likely better qualified to handle such a situation, he left it up to her, hoping that she would come up with something


“Who is your friend?” asked Mama Mia, after the embrace was over.


“Him my boyfriend.”


Without speaking, MamaMia stared at Jerzy, his bulging eyes bulging even more, his face reddening. Jerzy was also speechless. Bird stood between them. In the heat of the moment, neither man noticed a sardonic smile creep across her face, perhaps in anticipation of the excitement which this sanuk, new situation would bring.


“What-a-you mean-a?” Mama Mia asked eventually.


“I’m sorry but it’s true. Believe me, I’m very, very sorry. It’s not how it looks. I thought that she had told you this a long time ago. Please forgive.”


“Bastard!” he yelled, unable to understand any of what Jerzy had said except the true bit. “You-a-steal-a-my lover! Liar! I you kill-a!” he shouted in his thick Italian accent, as he wrestled Jerzy to the floor.


This was one injustice too many for Jerzy. The blood rose to his head and a bloody fight broke out between them. The Korean staff in the travel agency looked on in amazement as the two foreigners fought. It is not in their nature to interfere, especially in something so incredible as two foreigners fighting.


“Stupid, that’s what you are!” screamed Jerzy as he held the Italian in a head-lock.


“Mama Mia!” he returned, escaping from the hold and pulling Jerzy to the floor.


“You have destroyed this girl,” spluttered Jerzy has he struggled to release his opponent’s hands which were now strangling him.


“I have-a-sent her money for five-a-years. I-a-love her.”


“And what do you think a beautiful, young girl is going to do in Thailand with all that money. Did you ever ask what she was doing?”


“She-a-working, you bastard. She-a-tell me.”


“No, she didn’t need to work. She just played. She played and played and played. Why wouldn’t she? Alcohol, drugs, men. Constant parties. She was the only girl in Thailand who would actually pay foreign men for sex! You’ve created a monster. She’s unemployable. She doesn’t understand anything of life. She’s a spoilt brat, accustomed to living beyond her means, dependant on your money. How will she survive alone? She’ll be like a pet hamster released into the wild.”


“She-a-go with me-a, she-a not alone-a.”


“You stupid, stupid man. You’re twenty years older than her. You don’t even speak the same language. You don’t know anything about her. She doesn’t even like you.”


“Then why she-a-take-a my money?”


“Because it’s free money! She’s not so naïve to turn down free money.”


“Liar,” he bellowed, “She-a-love me, you-a-try steal-a my love-a.”


Jerzy removed the hands from over his throat and manoeuvred himself on top of the Italian. He managed to contain him by putting his knees over his arms and his hands over his mouth. It was the same position in which he had attempted to contain Bird a few weeks earlier. Before Jerzy could gather his thoughts, Bird arrived with a heavy, metal dustbin. She dropped it on Mama Mia’s head and he was knocked unconscious.


“Stand by, go, go, go!” she shouted.

Stickman's thoughts:

I thought this series had ended long ago…


nana plaza