Fear and Loathing in Bangkok
My close encounter with death took place in Thailand. I was with my Thai girlfriend of the time celebrating my recent re-arrival in the country in an obscure Thai-owned dance and dine joint in Pratunam on the outskirts of Bangkok.
After a few drinks and dancing happily out on the floor, I did notice from my periphery some ‘Jack Palance-faced’ Thai guys scoping me out with mean scowls and then muttering to their drinking buddies. They were obviously grossly unimpressed with my groovy dance-steps. ‘
I decided to leave the venue before my girlfriend wanted to, due to the ‘slightly” ominous vibes. She eventually agreed and we ventured outside to catch a taxi home to Samut Prakarn.
The taxi-driver quoted about U.S.$2:50 more than the price I was accustomed to paying and after some futile bargaining I decided to catch a ‘sawng-tayo’ instead. It was about 10.30 pm and already dark as my girlfriend and I boarded the multi-passenger vehicle.
I peered inside the vehicle before boarding to see the two long, opposing bench seats were occupied by mostly older Thai women with baskets of fresh market produce resting either on their laps or else at their feet.
There were also a couple of middle-aged men inside who looked somewhat weary.
My insecurity seemed placated and so we hopped aboard.
After the third bus stop, four Thai men perhaps in their mid twenties boarded the vehicle. They appeared to be affected by drugs, methamphetamine probably, and had also been drinking.
Their bodies and faces were chiseled down to the muscle and their eyes were intense, shining and black as coals.
The boldest of the four sat next to my girlfriend and began to speak halting English to her, saying things like, ‘You bad girl..you no good.’ ‘You do bad for our culture.’ ‘Why you go with Falung?…..You mus’ respec’ ower culture.’
My girlfriend was drunk and argued with him, again in English, and it was beginning to frustrate and unsettle me.
In a lame effort to restore harmony, I leaned over and said to them both in Thai, ‘Joke amusing isn’t it?’ You are both person Thai but you both persons are arguing in English and I am person Farung talking to you in Thai.’ Then I laughed foolishly thinking that the guy might see the lighter side of that irony. But instead he glared at me with pure hate streaming out from his Siamese peepers and he moved to rejoin his three friends.
Somehow, ‘the boss’ of the four had lost face and he suddenly stood up in a rage and announced to everyone on the ‘bus’ that he was going to kill me. (Khaa dtua dtai!) He went mental spouting all kinds of crazy talk and then he appeared to calm down. Then he walked over to where I was sitting and smiled at me and held my chin momentarily between his thumb and forefinger. ‘Kuun loop-law’ he said, (very handsome.) As I moved my chin out of his grip, he suddenly gave me a lightening punch in the face.
He wore a chunky ring on his right hand which hit my eyebrow and for some reason my blood squirted out like a fountain. Mr. ‘Poo Chai’ braced himself against the moving vehicle and stepped back waiting for a counter-attack. I looked back at him and saw his three pals behind him sitting forward like compressed coil-springs. I felt faint. I looked at the old Thai women clutching their rattan baskets. They looked ashamed and sad. I looked out of the back of the moving sawng-taew contemplating a run for it. It was dark out there with few street lights and no roadside shops or houses. Pratunam is an industrial area, and I knew in my guts that the gang was waiting for me to do a runner and that I wouldn’t get far before I was caught and stabbed by ‘the gang of four.’
I had around my neck a necklace with a picture of my Ahjahn or guru in a locket and I brought it out of my shirt. Looking around, I announced, ‘this is my Buddha.’ I repeated it in Thai risking another attack from the villain of the piece. I gave the Thai prayer gesture to each of the elderly passengers, the pouring blood obscuring my vision. Then the vehicle stopped again.
It was then that I thought that my prayers had been answered. Wouldn?t you know it but four French sailors in uniform boarded the sawngtaew on their way back to their ship. (Pratunam is also a navy port) I thought, ?well, that’s five of ‘us’ and only four of ‘them.’ What fateful intervention!
The four Frenchies looked at me, with the blood pouring down my face and on my shirt and I looked back at them darting my eyes back and forth to the front of the bus at the gang; an imperative international semaphore. They stared out of the window with nervous fake interest, refusing to make eye-contact. ‘Help Me!’ I mouthed.
The sailors muttered to each other in French and got off at the next stop, ignoring me. Was this my big chance? If I grabbed my girlfriend and jumped out with the Frenchmen would I be afforded their protection if the gang jumped out after me? I declined. I will never know.
The Thai word, ‘Farang’ is a shortened form of the word, ‘Farangsayt,’ which originally meant ‘Frenchman.’
After the sailors were gone, the gangsta started repeating how he was going to kill me no matter what. ‘I’ve always wanted to kill a Falung and now I fuckin? will!’ he raged.
‘Then you’ll go to prison!’ warned the driver.
‘I don’t care.’ Shrugged the gangsta, ‘py py, ma ma.’ (I’m in and out all the time, so what)
‘O.k,’ I’m driving straight to the police outpost this minute!’ Threatened the driver.
‘Before you get there, he’ll be dead,’ boasted the bully boy.
Another stop. This time my girlfriend tearfully pleaded with the guy to forget his perceived insult and leave peaceably. He refused, repeating his threats. She stood on the back step of the bus with her hands on his hips. His three friends were beginning to look uncomfortable. Then the bus lurched off again on its final run to the police station. All of a sudden, the gang boss swung off the back of the bus from its vertical railing, landed on the road and with another leap grabbed a hold of the railing of a sawng-taew passing by traveling in the opposite direction and was gone. His three pals also immediately got off without looking at me.
The driver asked me whether I wanted to go to the Police Station. I told him no. ‘But why not?’ It must be reported,’ he pleaded.
Soon, my girlfriend and I were in the precincts of the local Wat and I felt a warmth and happiness but my girlfriend suddenly sobbed out loud.
‘Why are you crying silly?’ I asked. ‘It’s over.’
‘No..no..you don’t understand?’ she replied between sobs, ‘When I was begging him to stop, I had my hands on his pockets..and I felt the gun!’
I took a tuk tuk to the nearest clinic and woke up the doctor who then stitched my eyebrow.
Holy hell. But that can happen in sketchy neighborhoods in many countries, including many cities here in the USA.