Conversation with Momma Nong – And The Outcome

This will probably be my final submission about my dealings with a Thai girl/woman or at least with that particular girl. I confess that I am afflicted by SE Asian women and this is not like AA where you swear never to give in to temptation
again, is it?

I already realised, thanks in part to advice from people here, that things were going nowhere. I had not seen P for a year, her requests for money continued but the flow of communication had diminished, to say the least, and the most recent
request for 20,000 baht so she could go to Udon Thani to visit her family for New Year (Songkran?) was the last straw.

Our situation was unusual in that I met her here, not in TL, and that I see and talk to her mum most days. Mum has been here 20 years working hard and sending most of her money back to TL to support P and her brother and to provide for her
own retirement. (Momma is coming up to 50).

I told P that I couldn’t help her and told her I would talk about her problems with Momma Nong next time I saw her. I didn’t anticipate seeing Nong in a situation where we could talk any time soon, but I thought it would be
an interesting point to make. P’s reaction was that I should forget her and she would be OK. To be honest, I couldn’t see much if any future with P. She wants to live in TL and from what I see of recent news I don’t, certainly
with a woman who is short on communication.

(Just an irreverent thought here – is the helicopter service also available to those standing on building roofs and contemplating joining the PFC?)

Purely by coincidence I met Momma Nong a few days ago. I had gone (unusually) to a bar where my friends were performing a music act and she saw me as she walked home from work, about midnight. It was the first time I had seen her after her
work for many months. She called me and asked if she could meet me there a half-hour later.

So we met, I bought her a drink. She had just done a seven-hour shift in the restaurant kitchen (after a three-hour shift earlier in the day). She wanted to go home, shower, etc. before she met me. The ‘face’ thing I suppose.
She brought with her some spicy dry-fried beef which was exactly the right thing to eat with cold beer at that time of night. And we talked, and talked.

I have apologised before for making submissions when I have so little knowledge of the ‘scene’ in TL. But I have met, and come to know, a Thai girl, her mum, and her background, and perhaps I can comment on this one individual
person. And I want to make this point, that everyone is an individual no matter where they come from or what they do to make money and they should be treated as such and with (as others have pointed out) due respect.

Momma Nong told me a lot about her life. I report this as she told me. Her husband, the father of P and her elder brother, left her before P was born. Nong kept going as long as she could. She is actually Lao (and looks it) but found work
in various places in TL, then here (they think she is Thai), so she could send money for her children. The father has been a monk since he left her.

Son went a bit wild but has now settled down and Momma has started to buy a house for him. The house she bought for P has about €1,500 left on the bank loan.

About three years ago P met her father for the first time. Momma Nong took her to the wat. The father asked ‘Who is this girl?’ Shortly after this, P entered a wat herself for several months (P told me this
herself).

P had a son when she was 18/19. He now lives with his paternal grand-parents in Udon Thani. His father was married (she told me she found out too late). She sends money to support him (and so have I). He is doing very well in school.

I explained all my doubts about P – all the things so common here about a relationship with an attractive Thai woman – and she told me about her fears for P too. This is one reason which prompts me to submit this. Maybe some
farang involved with Thai women don’t have the benefit of talking with their mothers.

Momma Nong started crying but I kept pushing. P is a profligate spender, no doubt about that. And she likes to be ‘Queen Bee’. But all her friends are middle-aged family women. Momma Nong told me that that P has nobody else
in her life, that she has decided she is better to live alone (as has Momma, she said) unless she and I can work something out.

I took a deep breath and asked the crucial question – and I was ready to believe the answer because of the point we had reached in the conversation and because of the state Momma was in by now. ‘Is P a good girl, or is she a
working girl?’ She knew what I meant. ‘Yes’ she said, and I believe she meant it. ‘You and P, you must just take your time’.

We talked about P’s present circumstances – she has found a good job and has bought a new car. ‘Ah yes’ I said ‘The white Toyota’. ‘Yes’ said Momma ‘There was a better deal on
a new one’.

Anyway, we parted, and she told me she hoped to speak to P soon.

She obviously did, because in the last 24 hours I received a flurry of SMS text messages from P, clearly unhappy that I had spoken to Momma.

The first told me that if I really cared for her, I would send her the 20,000 baht she asked for because her family were coming from Udon Thani to visit her for New Year. (When she first asked for the money she was going to Udon Thani to
visit them).

The second said that she knew I had spoken with her Mum and she was not happy about that.

The third asked how I knew about her new car – and which of her friends am I in contact with?

The fourth said ‘Don’t contact me again’.

All in all, a sad story. I suppose I feel most sorry for Momma Nong. She lives here in a foreign country working in a crap job sending all her money home for a son and a daughter she doesn’t really know.

As for P – you’ve had a shit life so far. You are getting a little old at 28 to find what you really need, which is a rich and naive farang to give you what you really want and need. But I wish you well. Things could have been
very different. I hope you will be happy.

And in the spirit of the mongers on the Stick site – I happened to bump into a Greek Cypriot friend a couple of days ago. He has many friends among the Thai community here – but is now making friends with Filipinas.

He reports that short time with Filipinas is €20, long time €30 plus. (Momma Nong confirmed these figures obscurely during our conversation when she was pointing out that P is a good girl). This doesn’t really do it for
me but after recent experiences I am tempted…