Waiting for Godknows

I started to pen this submission for no other reason than I am currently bored. Not just a little bored but spectacularly bored which is unusual for me. If there was an Olympic event for being bored I would be up amongst the medals. I am even bored with the use of my left handed mouse on the internet and anxious I may eventually sprain my wrist. I currently have all my used handkerchiefs at heat treatment waiting to be annealed.

My sense of ennui is made more acute that I had to forgo the habitual visit to Thailand I usually take in June. It is not so much the actual mongering I missed, although I regret not augmenting my photo collection of Thai girls in West Bromwich Albion shirts (small youth size). But I have certainly missed the company of my pals Phil and Union Hill and our expeditions around the salacious sois of Sukhumvit, and meeting fellow Stickmanites.

The new British Ambassador to Thailand, Quinton Quayle, is also a keen Baggies fan. I wonder if he shares my penchant for Thai girls in West Bromwich Albion shirts (small youth size). Well maybe not.

In the initial weeks upon returning from my last Siamese sojourn my main priority was to pen my final Brokenman is finally repaired submissions, which suggests that maybe I am a sad case who really should get out more often.

I must admit I have not gone out much in the past few months for fear of threats from the paramilitary wing of the Morris dancers Guild for my derogatory comments made in a previous submission. Not to be left out I believe the rival Morris dancer’s Conference have also issued a fatwa on me.

Maybe I have too vivid an imagination.

I acknowledge that no able bodied man should ever be truly bored. I accept that to a chap bought up with a strong protestant work ethic, being bored is tantamount to a sin. I also owe a few replies to emails I have received from fellow Stickmanites for which I feel terribly guilty about. So I must explain that it is following a few months of frenzied activity I am currently in that uncomfortable interval between projects as I await the arrival of my Siamese spouse. With my eldest son on the island of Rhodes on a drinking expedition with his mates and my youngest son getting wet at the Glastonbury festival I was also short of my usual weekend companions.

Hardly a beer has touched my lips for four weeks (that’s a reduction of 20 pints a week); I have eaten frugally and been more physically active at work than usual. What is perplexing is I have not lost a single ounce of weight.

As my regular reader is aware, at Easter I did rather a daft deed and got myself married to my old friend Nat who was my first Thai girlfriend back in 2003. Our romance has not been easy with me trying to fit some serious mongering in between our meetings, but over the four years our relationship developed from an infatuation into a friendship and matured into an enduring and genuine devotion. She is not a classic Thai beauty but is a mature intelligent girl with a developed sense of humour. We connect and I could not envisage spending my life with any one else.

My motivation for matrimony was to have her live in the UK with me to brighten my lonely existence and share life’s rich tapestry together. Our plan is to live together in England until we accrue the resources to eventually retire or semi-retire to the Kingdom. She has a pleasant property in Siracha and I can envisage spending my twilight days there although she fears I will return to my mongering ways if I lived in Thailand. It is also close enough to visit pals in Bangkok and Pattaya when the need arises.

Much as I love her to distraction I must admit there has hardly been a day when I have thought, what on earth have I done? This is perhaps understandable in anticipating the myriad problems of integrating a Thai lady into British society. But conversely the more I witness the decline of Britain I wonder what I have done in subjecting a sweet Thai lady to the turmoil that is today’s UK.

Eight days a week.

(Work is the scourge of the drinking man)

On my return I was busy with a few things that included sorting out an apartment for me and my mear jah to live, bailing out my youngest son in his latest fiscal disaster and preparing the business I work for to face an impending UK recession of biblical proportions.

My father passed away in January and I am still trying to sort out the Probate on his estate. Although his estate was quite modest, the task was made more difficult as my mother has a friend named Edna from whom she takes her advice. All old ladies never feel the need to Google on the net or consult an encyclopaedia as they all seem to have a friend called Edna or Enid who is the font of all knowledge. It did not matter how many competent lawyers and qualified accountants I consulted, to my mother Edna always knew better.

And of course there was never a set of circumstances so dire that the advice of Edna could not make infinitely worse or make extra work for me.

But the principle task that has engaged me is collecting information for the spouse visa for my beloved to enter the UK. The amount of information required boggles the mind. There had been a delay in processing the application which revolved around a previous misconceived visa submission she made.

I now realise there is no situation so bad it can not be made worse by the actions of a Thai girl.

The team at MyThai-visa who are assisting me with the visa application, work on the premise that “positive preparation prevents a poor presentation”. By a careful attention to detail they have hopefully circumnavigated the problem.

I wait in eager anticipation for the visa application to be approved.

(I want to be a) paperback writer.

(Shove that bloody keyboard up your ass)

I promised my care worker when I completed my Brokenmanrepaired series I would cease subjecting the poor Stickman reader to my unstructured rambling submissions. Despite wise counsel by members of the Schoocher fraternity suggesting that the novelty of my idiosyncratic style has now run its course and I should desist, the urge to compose my meaningless meanderings full of overly colourful metaphors is just too strong. Like Christopher Moore’s depiction of the addiction for the naughty nightlife as the sickness, the compulsion to pen my tongue in cheek tales is equally as obsessive.

Armed with a grant from the Ronnie Corbett foundation for the perpetuation of shaggy dog stories, I embarked upon this latest semi literate saunter which I will no doubt liberally shower with detours and digressions, unashamed embellishments, hoary old jokes and pretentious allusions.

Dithering is another of my vices, I have won awards for prevaricating and procrastination and I have shelves full of trophies for indecision and dissembling, or would have had but I couldn’t decide whether to go and collect them.

On the subject of trophies I occasionally drink with a chap who was the world hairdressing champion for over 10 years, a feat of which he is rightly proud. His salon is patronised by local celebrities and footballers and its walls are festooned with trophies. I do not frequent his establishment because he is too expensive for my frugal inclinations but I went in the other week for a short back and ears lowered. Seeing his trophies and cups adorning the shop I asked if he had won them for fishing! For some reason he refused to cut my hair and ejected me from the premises.

Maybe I should keep my strange sense of humour in check.

When I’m sixty four.

(Is the smell of embrocation an aphrodisiac?)

Reading Lookpapa’s recent account of the unpleasant British woman he met in Fiji reminded me of an unusual incident I had which I had forgotten about. Just before I embarked on my Easter Siamese sojourn I was watching a football match in my local with my pal Darren who owns a popular breakfast café in the town centre (next door to the hairdressing salon). His wife Mandy was with him and she approached me with an unusual request. She had a lady working for her at the café who was driving her mad; apparently she had not had sex for 3 years. She was getting quite desperate for a portion of Hampton and in Mandy’s opinion the sexual frustration was sending her neurotic.

For some reason Mandy felt I could help.

Feeling some sympathy for her plight and knowing that a ladies mudgeon is too far off the ground to feed itself, I promised to pop into the café the following week incognito and give her the once over.

The next week I went in the café and ordered a full English breakfast. The aforesaid lady had been described by Mandy as a little younger than me and quite attractive but there was no one matching that description. The only lady working that day was an older woman quite short of stature who looked to be in her 60s and best described in our PC environment as being of ample proportions and aesthetically challenged.

I had visions of a moth eaten old orifice like a badly packed kebab. I doubted if I could have completed the commission without significant assistance from the pharmaceutical industry or two elastic bands and a lollipop stick.

The following week I left for my Thailand vacation and gave the matter no further thought.

I bumped into Darren and Mandy in town last week and in the course of conversation she said her sexually frustrated colleague had seen me when I visited the café. She stated I was a good looking bloke (well she didn’t actually but I have added it for my own dignity) however she declared I was far too short for her!

At 5’7 I am not going to be recruited for any basketball teams but am not quite qualified as a companion for Snow White either. What was bizarre was if the intention was merely for me to blow the cobwebs away and to be used as a living breathing dildo to relieve this woman’s desperate sexual frustrations, why did how tall I was have any significance?

The perversity of menopausal English womanhood beggars belief.

Here there and everywhere.

Whilst there is no escaping some English women are weird, I have certainly stopped making sweeping generalisations about Western women, I acknowledge there are numerous factors that influence the behaviour and attitudes of western women. I have found that location can have a significant bearing on the quality of women one encounters. This was illustrated the other week when I visited a couple of town centre pubs in two quite diverse towns.

The Clifton is a lively Wetherspoons establishment in Sedgley which is a predominantly middle class town on the edge of the Blackcountry conurbation. The place was full of young slim well dressed tottie starting out the evening's entertainment before moving on to clubs in Wolverhampton. Even the older women there had made an effort to dress nice and look attractive.

I was even engaged in conversation by a couple of rather interesting and pleasant middle aged women. The exchange was relaxed and entertaining. They were as honest as they were astute and their accounts of their Friday night social adventures were most enlightening. They explained that most of their female colleagues at work complained of a dearth of decent men in the area. But they had established that despite this claim and feminist propaganda, everywhere they went they found there are significantly more good men available than decent women. They professed they faced minimal competition from other women in most places and were never short of male company anywhere they went, all they ever needed to do was smile.

I later went to a similar sized establishment in Wednesbury, a down at heel ex steelworks town in the centre of the rustbelt. Here we are definitely in the realm of Sharon and Tracey. There was a disco on so the place was buzzing but in complete contrast to my previous location the young girls here dressed with less taste and decorum than a Patpong hooker. The language of profanity prevailed and all the women were fat units with no discernable waistlines anywhere to be seen. The best looking girl there (everything is relative) had ripples of fat bulging through her tight black mini dress. Her heavy porky legs were only slightly enhanced by her 6” high heels. She was prancing around like she was Kylie Minogue or Shakira and had 3 tattooed Shrek look-alikes dancing attendance on her every whim.

In the land of the truly hideous the merely repulsive is king.

All things must pass

It is certainly not my intention to disparage western women or make one of my customary rants about the vagaries of English womanhood in this missive.

Since returning from my last Siamese sojourn my experiences of women have been surprisingly positive.

In the casino I use as my local there are a number of beautiful girls of many nationalities but there are four in particular who work in the bar and restaurant area that would ignite the interest of even the most jaded of mongers.

“P” is a black girl with the face of an angel and the most incredible arse you will see outside the pages of National Geographic or Ethnic arses weekly.

“A” is Polish girl with such feline grace she prompts an erection just observing her glide around the bar area. She features frequently in my masturbatory fantasies.

“M” is a 6’ 4” Jerry Hall look-alike who was once a fashion model in her native Slovakia. A more magnificent specimen of womanhood you rarely see outside the covers of top shelf magazines.

“S” is an Indian girl in her 30s with the poise and elegance of a $2000 call girl. I have fantasised over her for 5 years and can visualise her as the madame of a high class brothel or house of correction.

Previously they have always treated me with what is best described as polite indifference, but since they have learnt I have married a girl almost 20 years my junior the treatment of me has dramatically changed. When I go in now I get huge welcoming smiles and attentive inquisitiveness. They overtly flirt with me and I get little intimate touches when ever they walk past me. My sons have remarked on it and my brother is quite jealous at the level of attention I now receive.

The ugly pills have clearly stopped working.

Michelle my belle

I have experienced a few pleasant encounters of late but I must relate one of the more interesting ones.

I have become friendly with the landlord of my new apartment. Pete is about my age, a huge powerful chap with those rugged intense good looks that only Irishmen seem to posses. He texted me last Friday that he was playing in a jam session at the Comedy pub that evening with Ecka who is a renowned bass guitarist and my friend since childhood.

The Comedy pub in Tipton is owned by a wonderful Australian guy who is valiantly and almost single handed trying to keep live music and comedy alive in the area. Like most Antipodeans in England he is a popular chap (a sort of handsome Foster Foskin) and most of the local musicians will try and support him if they don’t have engagements with their own bands. Last Friday was such an evening so I made my way there. Pete is an accomplished guitarist with such an immense stage presence I have seen middle aged women almost wet themselves with desire when they see him on stage. If he saw him Eric Clapton would throw his guitar in the garbage skip and immediately retire.

As I entered the bar my pals were already performing on stage but they acknowledged me with a nod. Sitting alone near the stage was a very attractive girl who on seeing that I was a friend of Pete and Ecka beckoned me to join her. I bought us both a drink and took the seat beside her. Her overall appearance was most pleasing to the eye with vivid green eyes and a slender elegance. With a soft Irish lilt she introduced herself as Michaela a fan of Pete’s (other) band and a friend of his girlfriend. I was mesmerised by her long dark red hair that framed a skin like porcelain. Her smile was so enchanting if Leonardo Da Vinci had seen it would have prompted the Mona Lisa being discarded and his return to the drawing board.

She informed me she had been divorced for 5 years and had just celebrated her 42nd birthday although I believe she could genuinely have passed for 30. She was delightful, the very epitome of the Irish colleen and the personification of Maureen O’Hara if slightly less voluptuous. We chatted as if we had been friends for years such was her natural charm. I could not recall the last time I had such a comfortable and flirty conversation with such a beautiful (western) woman.

Just as I thought it could get no better than this, two young couples enter and take the vacant seats on our table. The guys were personable young men in their late 20s but their girlfriends in their early 20s were definitely worthy of note. They introduced themselves as sisters and the first thing I noticed was their wonderful almond eyes and delicate Eurasian features (they later confirmed their grandmother was Malaysian). As well as the most exquisite faces they both possessed bodies as slim and exotic as anything you will see wrapped around a pole in any gogo bar in the Kingdom. The eldest sister had the most magnificent natural breasts whilst her sister had astonishingly shapely legs that seemed to stretch to infinity, the effect enhanced by a diaphanous loose cotton dress. The boyfriends claimed to have an appointment elsewhere (probably a game of snooker) and asked if their girls could sit with us for an hour or so. On the departure of their boyfriends the two sisters joined our conversation with a youthful enthusiasm. They were as sweet natured as they were dazzling. I entertained with a few of my more respectable tales and even had them laughing at my jokes. I wish I had bought my camera (and a brace of West Bromwich Albion shirts).

I spent a wonderful couple of hours in the company of three delightful and beautiful young ladies. Without doubt the best evening I have had with my trousers still on for some time. They even paid for my beer.

This being Blighty and not Bangkok the story doesn’t have the “happy ending” my Siamese tales would have. The two lads collected their delightful girlfriends and Pete took Michaela home. My comely colleen has however texted me a few times since, telling me how much she enjoyed my company and has phoned me a couple of times just for a friendly chat.

I may have made a friend.

I should have known better

(So that’s what they were telling me!)

These positive encounters with western ladies are in stark contrast to the negative response I received in the past five years.

I do not believe I have become more handsome, slimmer, taller, richer or any more charming overnight. So this new found attention and interest I am receiving from women is a new experience for me and one I can not fully comprehend.

Whilst many of the unnecessarily callous rejections I previously experienced can certainly be attributed to a meanness of spirit on the part of English womanhood, I will admit to having had self esteem issues as the result of my wife leaving me and my subsequent invisibility to women.

Union Hill once explained to me that an emotionally scarred man is not attractive to women anywhere in the world.

BKKSW enlightened me that women can smell desperation in a man and it is a big turn off to them. He also emphasised the importance of self confidence in dealings with women.

Because I have committed to my Nat I am relaxed and contented, I am clearly no longer sending subliminal messages of desperation and women are no longer picking up signals of negativity.

I finally understand their well intentioned advice. The Brokenman is now truly repaired.

Of course this is all purely academic as I am now a married man and off the market.

She’s leaving home

If all goes well with the visa application my wife could be joining me in matter of weeks. What can I expect when she finally joins me?

I have fears that she does not fully realise what she is letting herself into, forsaking the paradise of Thailand for the dubious pleasures of the cold industrial heartland of Britain. I also suspect despite four years of explanation she still does not comprehend the reality of how expensive living in the UK actually is.

I have a great hope that she will settle quickly. I will take a few weeks off work when she gets here to show her around the England I love.

Whilst I hate the morally corrupt Gordon Brown and the Stalinist New Labour of social experimentation and political correctness with a passion, I love my country and all it (used to) stand for with equal fervour. I will be first to man the barricades come the inevitable revolution and dream of one day marching on London at the head of the mob to string up a few MPs, city financiers and Guardian readers from lampposts as was done to Mussolini in Italy.

But until that glorious day when the guilty are called to account I will busy myself to the task of assimilating my sweet Nat into English society and showing her the best this country can offer.

As well as the delights of the West Midlands I will show her the London of tourist attractions, theatres and its ubiquitous shopping. Over time I will take her to see a few English seaside resorts, Shakespeare’s Stratford, the glory of the English countryside and the wild beauty of Yorkshire and the Lake District.

Her first experience of snow should be an interesting experience.

I am certain she will be accepted by my friends and family without hesitation. I trust she will enjoy the western lifestyle and appreciate there is more to it than fast food, mobiles and electronic gadgets. I pray she will value the best things of British culture, our history, democratic traditions, shared values, inherent morality and sense of fair play and of course the legendary British sense of humour.

I hope she will come to enjoy literature and the arts. I will introduce her to the musical theatre and opera (but not the ballet or Morris dancing). In the fullness of time I hope she will find a job she finds rewarding and fulfilling. I hope she will stretch her mind and broaden her horizons. I would love her to fulfil her potential and become the person I know she can become.

I want her to join in my social circle and involve herself in the activities I am involved in and maybe introduce me to some new ones that take her fancy (but please God not the ballet or Morris dancing). I look forward to her hearing me sing in my Male Voice Choir, to watching my son play football on Sundays and come to the occasional Albion game (although her West Bromwich Albion shirt is now larger than a small youth size). I am excited about taking her to her first formal black tie affair such as the annual banquet of my institute and helping her to choose a ball gown or little black number for the occasion. I want to introduce her to many new people and make new friends together.

I am eager to enjoy the simple things like cooking together, supermarket shopping and the other domestic intimacies I have missed for so long. I hope I can instil financial prudence into the relationship and the importance of budgeting. I trust we can accrue the money to make regular visits to Thailand and accumulate the resources to eventually retire there.

The pessimist (pragmatist?) in me can also envisage an alternate scenario if I am not vigilant. There are potential problems inherent with Thai ladies irrespective of background or education I am sure my reader will appreciate. If men are from Mars and Women are from Venus, Thai females are from Alpha Centuri.

No matter how well you think you know your Thai lady and consider she is “different” there will always remain a soupcon of doubt. She could be become perpetually homesick and yearn for her som tam and road kill curry. The cold weather could prompt discomfort and continual complaining. She could miss those inane Thai TV soap operas and brainless comic books they seem addicted to.

The additional hazard is that every local lothario will think I purchased her and she is therefore fair game. The attention could turn her head and she could seek a better offer. I am wary of the advice other Thai brides could give her as I have heard some horror stories to this effect.

Persistent pressure from her family to send money home could put strains on finances and prompt friction. I have already seen pressure from her family for her (not insubstantial) assets to stay squirreled away in Thailand and I fully expect her to turn up at Heathrow with just the shirt on her back.

But other than this I await her arrival with eager anticipation.

I’ll get by with a little help from my friends

Successful men generally obtain their advice from other successful men and thus continue to prosper. Poor men listen to other poor men and remain poor.

You are where you get your advice.

I seek the advice of others who have passed this way before. I also accept I need to find a local Thai community for Nat to make contact with but up to yet I have not found one. My hometown is a multicultural society which has over the years absorbed every nationality in the world but there is no discernable Thai community I can find. The majority of Thais are brides who have been brought into the country and are an invisible community. I do not know any men living in the West Midlands with a Thai bride yet there must be thousands.

I know I can rely upon my old pal Cassanudra for advice but unfortunately he is currently spending most of his time outside the UK on covert business activities. There is a fellow Stickmanite named Peter who is a wonderful chap I can also rely on for advice but he lives in Devon which is quite a distance away.

So I take this opportunity to request advice on how to make contact with the Thai community in the West Midlands (or anywhere in the UK).

In the past few years I received wonderful support and advice from the Stickman community that helped to repair the Brokenman. I sincerely hope I will get similar advice to assist me in integrating my Thai lady into life in the UK.

Watch this space for progress reports.

Stickman's thoughts:

Don't listen to anyone who says your should cast your writing pen aside. There are few submission writers I enjoy reading more than you.

I really liked the points you made about what you are looking forward to with your wife and what you want to achieve, both together and individually. It's food for thought for anyone thinking of taking their Thai bride to the West.