Yellow Teeth 2
After paying 30,000 baht bail in the Sathon cyber-police station I drank beer with Khim at his place on Soi 33. Leo beer. Five bottles. He told me not to worry. The police said the same thing. My crime of selling counterfeit shirts over the internet was nothing and Khim shrugged off the charges. “It’s not like you shot someone or were dealing drugs.”
“No, it isn’t.” I admitted without saying that all I could see was my going to jail in Thailand like a remake of MIDNIGHT EXPRESS. I drank most of the beer and crashed in his upstairs bedroom. A dream of losing my teeth replayed throughout the night and I woke, expecting to choke on shards of enamel, except my smile was intact. Yellow as old piano keys, but every one in place. I checked with my finger to make sure. All there.
“What does losing your teeth in a dream mean to Thais?” I asked Khim after my shower.
“Mean you lose money.” Khim was getting ready to pick up his client for a drive to Pattaya.
“That’s for sure.” My source of income for the last four years had been shut down by the cyber-police. Bail had wiped out my savings. I was down to 3000 baht and the court date was over two months away, if I was lucky.
“Why don’t you start new website and sell again?” Khim outlined the SOP for internet sales. His friends were selling on EBAY.
“If I get caught again, I’m fucked.” To err once is human. Thais could accept that. Twice and you were a persona non grata. “I’m quits.”
“And what are you going to do for money?”
My wife had demanded the same thing the night before. My answer stuck in my mouth, since no one wants to hear. “I don’t know.”
“I’m heading back to Pattaya.” It was my home for the past 5 years. 3000 baht was good for 3 days, which is an eternity as long as you’re not in jail. The bus ride from Ekemai was 120 baht. Khim walked me to the Skytrain at the end of his soi. “I’ll see you later. Are you okay?”
“I’m perfect.” It wasn’t the truth, but he smiled in that ageless Thai way of understanding there’s nothing you can do about a situation other than say everything is okay. Anything else would have been a loss of face or nah sia and Thais hate that.
My wife called from up-country during the bus ride south. She wanted to know if I was okay. I said sure. She said not to worry. It was easy for her to say. The entire trip I accused myself of being a fuck-up. Hundreds of farangs sell copy gear. I was the only one to get arrested this year. I had done something wrong and I knew what it was. I told my wife I would be okay, not really sure that was the truth.
Two hours later I was in front of my house on Moo 9. My neighbors had seen me on TV the previous evening. The commentators announced I had been caught with 4 million baht and 2000 shirts. Actually it was 30000 baht and 20 shirts. I had even said so on TV. Guess that part of the interview ended up on the cutting room floor. I unlocked the door and went inside my house and sat on my couch.
I had been lucky.
There were two joints in a teakwood case in the living room.
The cops hadn’t found them, otherwise my problem would have expanded like a hippo in a donut shop. I got rid of the evidence the only way I knew how and unlike Bill Clinton, I did inhale.
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