Bangkok Stories

Bangkok Stories

The photos and words in this story all belong to me

Bob was a minor Canadian Broadcasting Corporation radio personality in the city I grew up in. Then he divorced his wife and retired to Thailand. We stumbled into him, or rather he stumbled into us, at one of those "Meet Up" groups that were so popular with ex-pats over a decade ago. I recognized his voice right away. In Bangkok, you have the sense that you can disappear or be reborn. My observation is that this is rarely the case. You need to move upcountry to truly get lost.

There was a specific style for these aging lotharios back in the day: tight jeans, pointy slip-on shoes, a dress shirt slightly open at the neck and rolled up at the sleeves, and maybe a linen blazer kicking around, left over from the business end of the day. But mostly it was the black hair dye that is so unique to SEA. Too black to be real, and as it retreats it often leaves behind an afterglow of neon orange that is only seen on an orangutan in real life.

Occasionally Bob would call us up and we would meet down in Yan Nawa, down by the river, in some seedy little bar. Often he wanted to introduce us to his current lady friend. Bob was always popular with the ladies. Tonight, we came to meet Khun Cookie.

Cookie was a bit past her shelf life, but still digestible. Bob drunkenly leaned on the bar and said, "Minh, I have Yellow Fever." Naive me... my first concern was that he get inoculated. He laughed at me. At this very moment Cookie, who was sitting on the other side of me appraising the value of the jewelry I was wearing, took my head in both her hands and licked the entire side of my face. I immediately understood that there was no cure for Bob’s affliction.

Around noon the next day we received a frantic phone call from Bob. He had woken up in a suite at the old Dusit Thani Bangkok with no wallet, no money, no credit card, no passport, and the front desk was calling about his huge room service bill.

Apparently that is how the Cookie crumbled.