Bangkok Filth Read online

  Eerie Similarities

  It was a few days before it struck me. After working with a collection of well-adjusted Americans who were as far from the stereotypes as possible, I had witnessed two remarkably similar walking clichés straight out of central casting within a three-week period.

  Clayton; a fat, loud, balding, bespectacled slob completely lacking in self-awareness; a clod who would barge into rooms talking at the top of his lungs and walk towards people at an abnormal clip that created the sense he was about to lay a good-natured beating on them.

  Yank number two, Gilbert, ...well, it was eerily uncanny how in appearance and manner he was nearly a clone of Clayton. The only difference was that Gilbert had a full head of hair. Give it time, I thought, as he was about twenty years younger than Clayton. A surreal apparition of Clayton in his early years.

  Another strange similarity: in the first few days of chatting to Gilbert, he informed me that, like Clayton, he too had counselled troubled individuals as a 1-800 operator before becoming a teacher.

  Amongst the other foreign teachers at the Department of Logic, Gilbert quickly established himself as careless and unprofessional. He handed in scrawled, nearly indecipherable and crumpled up papers when typed and accurate documents were the standard. Worse, despite his apparent lack of self-awareness, it all seemed like an affectation. As if he were playing the clichéd role of an intellectual so distracted by other weightier matters that he couldn’t be bothered to do a decent job.

  The university environment is a good one, where you work unsupervised and have plenty of time for preparation and research. For some teachers not used to such a situation, it provides a relaxed atmosphere and the sense that you are trusted to get on with the task at hand. For others, like Gilbert, it sends them spiraling off on an irresponsible downward slide.

  A few weeks after Gilbert started, his wife showed up on campus. She had supposedly been working at a school in Malaysia and was now ready to reunite with the creature she called her husband. She was surprisingly attractive and well adjusted and probably ten years younger than Gilbert.

  She was slim and unassuming; the veritable opposite of Gilbert. Although attractive, she had a fairly mannish appearance with close cropped hair and little attention to dress or make-up. What she saw in Gilbert I’ll never know.

  Desperately Seeking Attention

  Together with his slobbish dress and work habits, the other trait that came blazing through in everything Gilbert did was a desperate need for recognition. Like many Americans, he made an early play to make himself known to everyone. The contrived “let’s be friends” approach is one that simply does not resonate with most non-Americans. Get to know people over time, arrange the odd get-together and after a few years look up and realize you have gotten to know someone you now value as a real friend? Of course. But the instant familiarity demanded by Gilbert and others of his ilk make a lot of people uneasy.

  After his wife had been around for a week or so, Gilbert decided it was time for everyone to share in the joy of their existence. Out of nowhere, he slapped up a scrawled note in the teacher’s room advising everyone that they were welcome to come to his room for a party the coming Friday. One sentence stood out: “If you want anything to drink, bring it along.”

  The cringe-worthy embarrassment for everyone was palpable. For everyone, that is, except those who had put up the invitation. If non-American Caucasians are unlikely to respond to such clumsy attempts at making connections so early after first introductions, then Thais are doubly so. The weirdness was really hard to fathom. “Come on over to my grungy room in the low-rent dive of a building near the campus. We can’t spring for a couple of 50 cent bottles of Coke so you’ll have to swing by the 7-eleven before you arrive. We’re a pair of groovy hipsters...you will leave stunned by our conversational abilities!”

  My informal straw poll confirmed that exactly no one was overwhelmed with enough enthusiasm to attend the event. Gilbert seemed relatively subdued for the following week or two.

  A few weeks later I saw him in the computer room and he started bellowing on about himself. He informed me that he was a “writer” and had “published” a book. I later did a quick online search and confirmed that he had indeed written a book though it was only available through the internet equivalent of a vanity publisher. Fair play to him for putting in the effort and churning out the words necessary.

  But it all had the feel of someone playing at being a writer. He registered with a litany of websites devoted to novelist wannabes, informing all of his supposed prolific output. In short, he devoted as much time to putting pen to paper as he did to attending to the visuals and activities associated with bringing him the due recognition he felt he deserved.

  And the recognition certainly wasn’t going to come from what he had actually written.

  Sample passages from his books revealed not only a person who hadn’t a clue about such things as narrative or character development but someone who was also lacking a solid grasp of the English language. Amateurish malapropisms, such as using “affect” when it should have been “effect,” littered the horrid dross he had produced.

  Inferiority Complex

  His slipshod approach to teaching and the related paper work continued. He was designated the mid-term exam coordinator for one course we were working on together. He ignored the details about the mid-term that had been circulated to pupils at the beginning of the semester. One of the most common ways to guarantee complaints from students is to stray from the syllabus.

  I saw Gilbert on the walkway outside the building one day, taking up the space of three normal people due to his size and way of moving. I stopped him to enquire about the mid-term exam problems. Literally within seconds he became defensive and started yelling at the top of his lungs.

  “I’ve been teaching for 15 year and will not be dictated to!” An especially odd claim considering his age and mention of previous jobs. And it was just plain off the wall because of the over-reaction.

  “Why are you yelling at me? I’m trying to help you. This is the kind of thing that will result in complaints from students which will cause problems for all of us. Believe me, you’re getting a reputation for being sloppy,” I said.

  He claimed he had a naturally loud voice and offered up some more abuse. I called him a wacko and walked away to the sound of him yelling at me and threatening to “elevate this to your superiors.”

  Raised in a Barn

  During the time that Gilbert had been at the university, another revolting revelation came to light about his personal habits. One morning soon after he had arrived on the scene, I walked into the washroom on the 15th floor. As I turned into one of the toilet cubicles I nearly vomited as I was greeted with a toilet-bowl full of shit. I cursed at whichever careless fuck had left his excrement on display and found another stall to use. I chalked it up to some daydreaming slob and a momentary lapse in attention.

  However, the next day the same sick individual had left his rancid calling card. And again the next day. I instantly assumed it was Gilbert. It matched his general way of doing things. I walked past him leaving the toilets on another day and sure enough, the deviant piece of filth had once again struck. This had never occurred before he had been hired, didn’t take place on days when he was absent and now I had come as close as possible to *gag* catching the turd in the act. For a person who craved recognition but couldn’t earn it through any form of talent or accomplishment, he sought it the way a three-year old does before toilet training.

  I considered confronting him about his nasty little ritual but the likely farcical and futile outcome of such an attempt dissuaded me. Similarly, it’s almost impossible to confirm with others that something like this is occurring though I did have a word with one of the poor cleaners who had the task of cleaning up after this sicko. She verified that he was indeed the culprit. Many may even question why I include this vile information here. It’s only done to more accurately paint a picture o
f repugnance distilled into its purest essence. That was how I viewed Gilbert. True loathsome disgust as I had never known before.

  In line with the bizarro world reality that existed at the university, it looked as though he had a long career ahead of him.

  Mr. Overcompensation

  I first met Mr. Overcompensation at a car show at a big convention hall in Chiang Mai. He was the friend of one of the other teachers I worked with. I didn’t know him as Mr. Overcompensation then. That came later. For the first part of this tale, I’ll use his real name: Lem Danzig. My first impression of Lem, which many others shared, was that he looked remarkably young for his age. He had an extremely smooth complexion and it appeared as though he rarely, if ever, had to shave. This is not uncommon amongst Asian men.

  Despite possessing the usual whippet thinness of most Thais, he lacked the hard facial angles that many of the men have: a tautness of skin that results from such a lean appearance and gives an attractive sharpness to the features. It seemed that he was aware of this and it was an appearance that he was proud of, even mentioning to people that he took collagen injections to offset the effects of aging. I thought this mildly unusual but having resigned myself to never fully understanding Thais, I thought nothing more of it.

  Lem was affable and it was easy to chat with him. I immediately noticed that he constantly steered any discussion towards talk of females. It was particularly evident that he wanted to demonstrate to others his prowess with women. He talked at length about the fact that he had two girlfriends on the go. Both of them were aware of the other, and to hear Lem describe it, they both considered him pretty hot stuff.

  When I meet new people, I am as agreeable as possible in an effort to get a feel for the person’s worldview and some insight into their character. Short of slapping Lem on the back, I stroked his ego with kudos for being such an accomplished stud. Aside from praise for performance in battle or in competition, the sweetest kind of recognition from another man is recognition of sexual conquests.

  Lem seemed spurred on by such a positive response and made certain to add that women such as the calibre he was capable of scoring were virtually off limits to foreigners such as myself. He said it in a good-natured way, almost an invitation to skip the early cumbersome stages of a developing friendship and advance to the harsh ribbing and competitive camaraderie that many male-to-male relationships are known for. It was impossible to take offense.

  After that I saw Lem on occasion. Usually it was together with someone I call “the good-natured oaf,” the teacher who had introduced us. There was a bar at the end of the street from the school where we worked. On Saturdays after we had finished teaching we would convene there for a few drinks and some games of pool. Together with the alcohol and the presence of women, Lem always started in with the macho references. He liked to call women “bitches” which seemed puerile to me but elicited a positive if hollow response from many others.

  The good-natured oaf, a chubby South African with limp blonde hair and a desperate need to be liked by others, always validated the talk and responded in kind. The two were “close” as I was informed by the good-natured oaf, something he took great pride in telling others.

  Lem always seemed flummoxed when doing something physical such as shooting pool. His awkward, inept shots were truly horrible. Once, when he was driving us to a party at a restaurant, simple directions seemed to throw him for a loop. The oaf arranged for a weekly Parcheesi tournament at his flat and the prospect of doing some simple deductions and using logic as part of the game left Lem looking clueless. He made up for it with his smoking, drinking and sly innuendo about women. He guffawed heartily when any mention was made about whores, bitches etc.

  One Saturday evening as the week came to a close, we gulped some beer at the pub down the road. The oaf, Baxter and I were sitting there at the outdoor patio and bantering as we drank. Baxter was a sinewy, older expat from Ireland who was a father figure to the oaf. The oaf was recounting some antics from the night before when they had been at the same location playing pool. As he was retelling some humorous episode from the previous night, a resident lady-boy sauntered by and entered the indoor restaurant and pub area. The oaf turned his attention to the repulsive looking transsexual and mentioned that Lem had been having a heart-to-heart chat with her the night before and had given her a hug. Now that he mentioned it, I had seen Lem giving her friendly hugs on a few other occasions. Somehow it didn’t jibe with all the “bitches” talk.

  “That must have been like an optical illusion,” Baxter said with a hearty laugh.

  My guts dropped.

  I had to play at being incredulous. It seemed like the only thing to do.

  “You’re having a laugh?”

  There was no response from them other than raised eyebrows and upturned hands though the oaf seemed a bit perturbed that I had cottoned on so quickly. Just then, some of the others ambled up and so my questions were cut short.

  Though there should have been be no good reason for it, the uneasy feeling persisted. Lem was a woman…or at least was born as a woman. Did he still have a cunt? Or some kind of prosthetic cock? Why should my thoughts instantly go to the clinical, mechanical aspects of his/her genitals or how he fucks? It’s intriguing, that’s why.

  Years ago I stopped trying to assess the appropriateness of various thoughts and instead started following them to a place that generates more internal discussion and perhaps even enters that realm of finding truths.

  Lem was set to arrive later that night and though I appeared as blasé as usual, I couldn’t wait to look at him through the fresh lens that Baxter had given me. Since that day I’ve wondered about Baxter’s supposedly innocuous comment. He was a taciturn sort that you knew had seen some things and come to his own honour code and way of looking at the world. He wanted me to know about Lem and to let it seem like a harmless slip. Somehow it seemed fair to him that I know.

  I started thinking about the vast number of lesbians I had seen since my arrival in Thailand. It seemed to stretch belief that there were so many. Or perhaps it’s just a comment on how much fear exists in the west and how many people are forced to conceal their true sexual identity. Seeing butch dykes with their beautiful Thai girlfriends had become common since I had arrived a few years earlier. Some of the “toms” as the bull dykes are called here, are truly nasty looking individuals. Not only physically ugly women, but sneering, unpleasant individuals with confrontational dispositions.

  In a society where roles are so defined, I wondered how many of these women exaggerate their behaviour and “look” because, well that’s what they are so they’ve got to play the part. The part is at times sad, amusing or just plain pathetic. Desperate attempts at overcompensation in public result in a laughable caricature that has an effect opposite to what they likely intend.

  Thais in general are fairly restrained in public. Though the current generation is more open about showing their emotions, it is still not common for couples to kiss or show affection in public. The bull dykes however, are all over whatever tart they are accompanying in public; groping, kissing and dry humping them in buses, on the skytrain and on the streets. They shoot aggressive glares at anyone who dares to glance their way. It’s a massive exercise in overcompensation and frustrated rage at not being able to be a real man.

  Observing this sameness in behaviour and dress had been a curious part of living in Thailand. It has also confirmed a belief I have long held. On the nurture/nature argument I had always thought that sexual preference was something ingrained at birth. The similar facial appearance of many of the Thai toms had confirmed that belief. Yes, aside from hairstyle and dress, there is a facial appearance, a similarity that is hard to articulate accurately. Their overall facial construction somehow looks the same when you encounter these pint-sized angry dykes.

  Baxter’s revelation left me with no doubt regarding the truth. Those little niggling peculiarities all made sense now. Still, I was eager to see Lem now
that I knew his secret. As he strolled in I didn’t see the amiable, kind individual I had come to know. Sadly, I was focused on dissecting the different parts of his appearance that would bring home such a prurient, shocking bit of reality. The ostensible nonchalance of the oaf on the subject was betrayed by his eagerness to fill me in on the details. It really was the type of information that created a compulsion to share.

  The shape of Lem’s skull, the daintiness of his hands and his undeveloped flanks all brought the realization home even harder.

  “It’s true isn’t it?” I said to the oaf.

  “It absolutely is,” the oaf conceded, though he assured me that he simply thought of Lem as a “he.” “Ask him about it if you want,” the oaf said, “it’s no secret.”

  Somehow I doubted I would ever broach the subject. I envisioned potential opening lines to such discussions:

  “So…ya still got a cunt?”

  or

  “The oaf says yer a woman.”

  Despite the fact that my social interactions with Lem were sporadic, I came to regret knowing his secret. It started occupying too much of my mind when I saw him. His glee at not being part of the half of humanity, that in his mind routinely deserved the scorn of the other half in the form of crude references, started to annoy me. My humouring him became another part of the whole surreal affair.

  I noticed his (likely) drug affected voice for the first time. As lady-boys have a sickly nasal sounding voice from whatever drug cocktails they imbibe, so Lem’s artificially gruff voice had a peculiar timbre about it.

  On a few occasions he exhibited an obvious need to show everyone that he could be a tough character if he had to be. Once, in a depressing spectacle, the oaf and Lem were fall-down drunk and engaged in some aggressive words with a bruiser who would have easily pounded them into the concrete. Luckily for them the bruiser walked away. Was Lem jacked up on testosterone?