Gay Boy Thailand

The boy had never asked me for money. He touched me by giving me small presents and if I paid for something he came back and gave me the exact change. I knew how little he had and how hard he worked for it every day in the heat in the park.

The boy had asked me how much I earned. I didn’t tell him and he speculated naively that maybe I was making as much as ten thousand baht a month.

But one evening in the park he took me aside because he had something to tell me. He was hesitant and ill at ease when he said that he didn’t have enough money to pay for his school fee next semester. His step-mother, who was in charge of family finances, had told him this. The fee was 2000 baht.

There is more to it, I thought. But the boy is too innocent to see it. The step-mother has told him to make the farang pay. Maybe the step-mother has the money, the boy has certainly worked for it, but now she dumps the bill on me. I can’t blame her, I thought, she has enough mouths to feed. Now she thinks it is time that the farang takes care of the boy.

I opened my wallet and gave him 2000 baht. The boy didn’t take the bank notes, so I put them on the grass between us.

- Why you love me, said the boy.

I laughed. Was this proof of love?

But I stopped laughing when I saw his face. His eyes were serious, almost sad, and they said “I can’t believe someone is doing this for me”.

Did I love him? I had not thought of the L-word before. Would it be phoney of me to say I loved him? I had not fallen in love with him at first sight. It wasn’t the feverish (and usually unanswered) puppy crushes I had when I was younger. With the boy it was gradual. I kept bonding with him. I thought of once when he had been waiting for me in the park. He came running towards me between the trees, beaming with happiness.

- I love you because you have a good heart, I said.

- No have.

- And because you are beautiful.

- Not beautiful.

- I love you because I like you.

Now I was using Thai logic. The boy accepted the answer.

- A bad move, said Farang D when I told him about the money. Now they will only ask for more.

- We’ll see, I said.

- Why did you do this? You haven’t even been to bed with him.

- It is only 2000 baht. I can afford to lose it.

- School is a month away. Do you think he will still have the money?

- I am giving him a chance. You can consider it a test. If he proves himself worthy of the support, then fine. If not I am not going to give him the money twice.

- Why bother? You know this won’t work, said Farang D.

While we were sitting in the park the step-mother had been trying to tell me something. She spoke in rapid Thai and gestured, pointing to her left arm and upper body. I didn’t understand what she said, but I picked up the words “ill” and “hospital”. The boy translated her message, using his dictionary and drawings on a paper. An older brother had been in an accident in a factory. He suffered severe burns to his chest and left arm. The doctors hoped the left arm didn’t have to be amputated. Now the brother was in a hospital in Rangsit.

Here we go, I thought. Should I believe this? Is she making it up to get money from the farang? Or is it for real and I am supposed to pay the hospital bill?

I just smiled and nodded when they told me the story and I pretended not to understand what the step-mother wanted. When the step-mother hinted I should go and visit the sick brother I ignored it. I asked the boy who he was and it turned out he wasn’t my boy’s brother. He wasn’t his step-brother either, he was the boyfriend of one of his step-sisters.

The unfortunate older brother wasn’t mentioned again for a while. I halfway forgot about him. Then the boy called late one evening and said I had to come and see him in the park at 9am the next morning. He didn’t say why. He was off the line before I could ask.

When I came to the park a party of four family members were ready to go to the hospital. They waited for me so we could get a taxi. I felt cheated. I had not agreed to this. But I didn’t want to make a scene that could hurt the boy. Play it Thai style, I told myself. Keep smiling, buy time and sort it out later.

Rangsit was in the north of Bangkok. The taxi ride to the hospital was 40 kilometres and cost me 300 baht. When we came to the hospital entrance I told the driver to wait. As the family got of the car out I surprised the boy by giving him a 500 baht note and saying it was to cover their return trip. Then I told the taxi driver to take me back to the Malaysia Hotel.

The boy called me on my mobile phone and asked what happened. He sounded confused. I said I wanted to go back to my room and work.

I felt angry and guilty at the same time. This was moral blackmail. If they took me in to see the poor burn victim I knew I could not refuse to help. But he was a stranger. He wasn’t even related to the boy. Of all the needy people in Thailand, why should I help this one? And what about the patient’s own family? Did they have money? It was a government hospital. Was he covered by public insurance? Shouldn’t the factory where the accident happened pay for it? And if the step-mother was so eager to help maybe she could start by selling her 5000 baht mobile phone, the one I had seen the boy with the first time I met him.

Still, I knew it could be true that they had problems paying for his care. It was a terrible situation but I had to draw a line. If I gave in now there could be no end to the worthy causes they would present me with. Since I didn’t know all the facts I had to trust my instinct. And it said I was being manipulated. I decided that next time the boy came to see me I would confront him about this trickery.