Encounters with the Thai

He's the guy I met in the back of a songtau rather late at night, the guy who was very happy to meet someone who could help him with English.

He's also the guy who came banging on my door after I had already sacked out.

Enthusiasm: that's a good sign, given that the stories I've heard about private English students generally entail either, "I had to keep reminding myself to keep my hands off" or, "But they all just sort of peter off anyway, so don't get too invested."

He called 15 minutes late to say he'd be there in 15 more minutes.

He said he wanted help with medical terms, so I had a scripted plan that began with my payment.

He showed up with a friend, the one driving the motorbike, and the first question he asked, once introductions were made and a scratch pad was found, was if I could give his buddy a C-note for gas to get home.

"No, I won't give your friend gas money. You can, but I won't."

Slurring through stutters: "But I don't have money. I bought two beers--one for him and one for you, see?" He holds up a can of the cheapest beer available in Thailand. "Here, you drink."

"I don't drink when I teach."

The friend leaves.

"So, how do you pan on paying me?"

"Please write, I don't understand. "

"You need to give me money."

"But I have you beer."

"Right, but pay? Money? Baht? For me?"

"You write."

PAY ME

"I have you beer, see?"

"I do not drink. I am teacher, and you pay teacher. Later, I not teach, I drink. I have beer with you, but no drink."

Owl eyes.

He hands me a manual of prescription drugs.

"You translate, see?"

Much flipping through pages.

Anxiolytics.

"You translate. Write Thai, okay?"

"For free?"

"I give you beer."

*The Look.*

He opens the beer and downs it in two slurps.

"I cannot write Thai, and I will not work for free."

"No, see? I bring you beer, see?" He sticks a new straw in the can, shakes the can. "See? I bring you beer."

An hour later, after someone came upstairs and woke him up so he could resume pleading at my door, I tried to escape by barging straight through.

Too bad my legs no longer have an escape-worthy spring.

In the end, he suckered into sympathy and I rewrote the medical terms into, "heart," "lungs," "anti-pregnant" type terms.

"No, no,no, you translate for me, see? Con, concertives!"

"I did, see? Contraceptive. You can look it up, okay?"

"Okay. Now we're done. I do not work for free."

And I walked off. He was staggering bad enough that he couldn't keep up.

I was after dinner, so I went to the sans-steam steam-tray cart.

"You are teacher, no?"

It was a gaunt older than dirt guy without many teeth.

"You are teacher, no? Srithammarat, right? Spirit, AMC!"

I manage to keep my face mainly blank while I nod.

"Me too! You come, have drink with wife and me. One drink, you have tea, is okay!"

30 minutes into the conversation, the erstwhile student staggered past and spotted me, then staggered up.

Somehow, the couple who'd been retired for fifteen and twenty-five years (her and him) lost most of that age. He went into a tirade. She snapped something. I was cringing and scared, and I was far below the line of fire.

The student left near to tears.

Glory be to longtime teachers.

"Yes, I am."