Tuesday

25 March
Today I got up early and went to teach at my student at Thong Lor. My class was at 10am and I arrived at 9.45. The weather was very hot so I got myself a cold drink and then sat and relaxed in the cool air conditioned classroom.

10 o’clock came but still no student. There was no lesson to prepare as it was an English conversation class and there was already a book in front of me. This kind of work is probably the easiest in the world. I got out my mobile phone and tried out a new racing game that I had downloaded free off the internet.

10.15. Still no student. I went to reception to see if there was any news. There was nobody at the desk. I returned to my air conditioned classroom and continued with my game. I won two races and unlocked the next level which meant that I could now upgrade my Ford Mustang to a Lamborghini.

10.30. I returned to reception. Nong Sar was there. She smiled placidly at me as I approached.

“Any news of my student?” I asked.

“No, Mr Ben. I will ring her and find out where she is.”

She picked up the phone and dialed a number.

“Hello, Khun Sawataporn? This is Thong Lor Language School na. Are you coming to school today? No? Are you coming tomorrow? Ok, bye then.”

She put down the phone and smiled at me.

“She says that she got up late. She will be here tomorrow. Strange that she didn’t bother to let us know that she wasn’t coming. Thai people are lazy, no? Nevermind, Mr Ben. You will be paid for the full two hours anyway…”

I left the school smiling to myself. I had been paid 700 baht for spending 30 minutes playing a game on my mobile phone. Thailand can be a wonderfully relaxing place to work.

In the evening, Mina started talking about the good old days when we would argue all the time about everything.

“It’s all your fault!” she told me. “Before, you were jowchew…there was lots to argue about. I remember how when I went back to Pattani and you were with that girl…”

As the memories came flooding back, she became more and more angry. She started to shout, accuse me of all sorts of things. Finally, she threw her mobile phone across the room in a rage, punched the wardrobe door a few times (I have no idea what it had done to annoy her, being pretty sure that it had never gone off with another girl!) and then settled down.

“I’m tired now,” she said. “I’m going to take a shower and then I want to sleep. I'm going to get up at five tomorrow.”

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