A smile to the sad

Cynicism: "An inclination to believe that people are motivated purely by self-interest."

Not quite the definition I had expected. It must be the "purely" word which clouds the cynic in misery. I scratched my head. I couldn't think of anything I was doing not motivated purely by self-interest. I must have slipped. It demanded a think.

What exactly is self-interest?

Easy enough to answer - a curiosity and concern for oneself.

What is the outer limit of self-interest?

Not so easy - possessions, family, friends, lovers,... their perceptions of me (not sure if or where that fits in).

What is non-self-interest?

Is that a trick question?

Okay. What is an example of a personal motive which is not within self-interest?

Too convoluted, try again.

Is it possible that a personal motive can be outside of self-interest?

Make it simple.

Can a real person really have an unselfish motive?

The Lady: Aung San Suu Kyi. Her motive was to gain freedom from fear for the people of Burma. She saw it as a duty to them and to her father. It may have been personal but it wasn't selfish.

Uh-oh, duty is looking at me.

Duty: "A moral obligation or responsibility."

Yikes!

Moral: "Concerned with the principles of right and wrong behaviour" and not the same as legal or illegal behaviour.

I stopped writing. It was past midnight after all. I hoped to see things a little more clearly in the morning.

Cynicism has a sense of blindness to me, a limited vision, smoke-tinted spectacles, self-defeat, a melancholy prison. Duty was unexpectedly emerging as a key to escape. Wasn't there an alternative? Couldn't the duty thing be plan B?

Duties had always been imposed on me by those who new better. As a youngest child that meant everybody. With a determination which matched recrimination; I had avoided any duty I could. By nature I had an aversion to the adoption of values I hadn't worked out for myself.

While I had a rare weakness for the subject it was probably best to remain with it and explore a little further. If I could choose my own duty it may not be so bad. It was worth a thought. A personal, yet unselfish moral obligation: What could it be?

'Unselfish' implies giving rather than taking. "Be giving," that's one of the grave precepts. It couldn't really be money. I was poor in that respect. What little I did give had only a fraction of consequence to the receiver. What I did have was the inclination and the time, limited as it always is, to attempt writing as an art.

That reminded me; I wanted to describe Loi Kroh Road after noon, the two halves, one crowded in dim though comfortable shade, the other a wilderness in the full fairytale colour of direct sunlight, too hot. That impression, though, is best left to the visual artist; the painter and photographer.

The writer draws for the abstract senses, those that let the blind man see, the deaf man hear and the numb man feel; those that give the old man youth, the young man wisdom and, perhaps, even a smile to the sad.

That was a duty I could attempt. If I could succeed would be another story.

The old falang monkey and the phi song nang

I saw the shock on Mook's face as I hit her, as her knees buckled I was swinging my arms around her, trying to prevent her slamming into the pavement, succeeding I thought, then lifting her back to her feet, sensing alarm from bystanders, feeling her dismay.

"I'm sorry," I was saying, "I'm so sorry. You walk fast. I was running to catch you. I must've tripped," I swivelled to look for what had tripped me, a parody, I hadn't tripped at all. She had heard the rapidly pounding footsteps and moved quickly aside, directly into my path. It hadn't been her fault. Stupid adolescent old man. I tried to skip the situation, "Are you going for a pizza?"

She pointed to a pharmacy. "No. I'm going there," no expression neither in her face nor her eyes. I had no choice but to dismiss myself, to wai in submissive apology, to turn around and to walk away in a blizzard of embarrassment. If I had looked back I may have seen the blood on her knees. I struggled for equilibrium, trying to discern my emotional position and direction. I had spiralled into an orbit with her at its centre. The writing of 'Secrets Of Loi Kroh Road' had got me to think of her more than I otherwise would have. It directed a discovery of details; a love of singing, a delicious half-giggle half-chuckle, a creative instinct - she too wrote. She showed me a notebook and let me glance over a few pages; charmingly naïve prose, all written in English. I queried the absent content - the balance. Where was the anguish and despondency? "I only write sweet thoughts," was the answer. I had taken her (together with a workmate) out for pizzas. I saw it as a step beyond a mere commercial relationship. At work she was triumphant, when twisting my back, if she could get it to click.

"Have you ever broken your customers' backs?"

"No," she had laughed, "only their hearts."

She claimed not to have a boyfriend but that was implausible to my heart and rigorously irrelevant to my reason. If I was much younger I would not have had immediate cause to twist my motive to a purpose different than the conquest of her heart.

The short story got a good reception and I had given her a copy on my way to the old city. I was proud of it. I was sure she would be flattered, Thai women seem to be suckers for flattery, and then, when returning on the evening of the same day, like an over-familiar besotted old fool I had knocked her down.

I stayed away a few days more than usual, hoping the time would fade her memory and, with the realization of how I perceived her, that she would forgive me. And so it happened that the cashier intercepted me. Mook would be finished in fifteen minutes if I cared to wait.

She emerged with minimal greeting. "I have to eat," she said and bought herself a noodle soup from a pavement vendor. "What kind of massage do you want?" she asked upon her return.

"I'd quite like an oil massage," I said timidly, "but you decide. Whatever you feel like doing."

"Up to you."

"No. This time it's up to you," I insisted.

"Okay, foot massage."

I was wearing long trousers. I did mention that it may be a little uncomfortable. She didn't think so, and that's how I ended up with tightly rolled jeans choking much of the blood supply to my feet.

"Did you like my story?"

She looked at me apparently puzzled.

"The one I gave you," I said with what may have been a note of dismay.

"I've been too busy to read," she snapped, "We've been cleaning as well." They had been expanding their shop, breaking down walls into the adjoining one. I closed my eyes to concentrate on the movements of her fingers on the soles of my feet. They opened again to the sight of an elderly American with a jovial face and the body of a balloon. He was escorted to a sofa by three beaming masseuses and presented with his after-massage tea. The girls crowded around him as he sprayed 100 baht tips in all directions, including to the cashier. "What about mine?" Mook pleaded, my feet all but forgotten.

"You weren't in the massage," the fat old American said dismissively. "How much for a joob-joob?"

"100 000 baht," she laughed.

He stayed for a long time it seemed. Mook joined the conversation between him and her work-mates, continuing my massage mostly by reflex. I slipped into a semi-conciousness occasionally opening my eyes to imbibe Mook's features in profile, yet again surveying the disquieting aspect of her beauty as it flickered across her cheek. It was at night when her image seemed most veiled by the sheen of external beauty. I was searching beyond the borders of occular vision but, not too far. I ignored a slanted sidelong glance and the words "I have a plastic heart." I was more comfortable outside of the conversation. It was banal and dominated by the fat old american. I pretended to keep my eyes closed.

A meek young man emerged from a massage with Fon, a new masseuse. Her features; her nose and eyebrows were straighter than Mook's, less oriental. I had remembered thinking she was as pretty as Mook when first I saw her. She had less self-confidence and consequently more sensitivity. I wondered what it would be like to get a massage from her. She stood at a sofa next to her customer while he drank his tea but, her eyes kept on meeting mine with a hint of concern. I was grateful. It would have been a lonely experience without her. I gave Mook a 100 baht tip, and regretted it immediately. She hadn't deserved it. I had done it merely to 'compete' with the fat old American.

It got me to thinking how life seems to come at me in waves, each arising from interest or excitement, many falling into confusion and pain. Nothing ends happily ever after. It just ends with nothing much more than backwash. Perhaps the ideal is to remain suspended at the crest of illusion for as long as possible and then, somehow, to exit decisively before descending into the gloomy trough of reality, the dwelling of most comfort to the cynic. I prefer to inhabit the brighter amplitudes when I can.

I recalled the sight of the bar-girls; the innocence in their eyes as they gazed up at those chanting monks, a clue as to how they endured. Innocence has been described as the filling of an empty glass, a sense of heightened reception. To regain it is to empty the glass. Was that what those monks had been doing for them? It reminded me of a moment (recounted in 'Drifting away') when I feared that to drop the weight of all my emotional baggage would mean the loss of my identity or even of my sanity. But could it, at least in part, be an enlightenment? The Zen Buddhist perspective views enlightenment and innocence as similar, maybe even the same. Though it was a late afternoon, my thoughts inspired me to ride up Doi Sutep and to visit the temple of Wat Phrathat.

It's about the height of 20 storeys from the base of a straight flight of stairs, lined all the way by the huge glittering bodies of two seven-headed snakes. The Naga (snakes) are revered as protectors of the Buddha. I walked up against an exodus of camera-wielding sight-seers, relieved we were heading in opposite directions. I was taken by the beauty of the place, and the variety and individuality of 'worship'. I witnessed a candle-lighting ceremony where seven monks actively participated. On completion, one of them turned to look at me with a twinkle in his eye, and an implied invitation to follow him to the bot. (It's the most sacred area of the temple reserved exclusively for monks. I didn't know that at the time though.)

I knew little of Buddhism so was cautious. I remained outside and noticed Thai lay-men did the same. It was clearly a ceremony meant exclusively for monks. Many small groups of falangs however, mostly over-weight and sweaty (despite having come up via the funicular), felt no qualms and continuously entered the bot to flash their cameras at the monks and themselves, heaving around in various grinning poses, oblivious to their own arrogance. I was one of them. They were of my own race. I was too embarrassed to remain.

I went to the old city, to a roof-top bar where the food is good and cheap. The festival of Yi Peng was imminent. I watched as some early sky-lanterns rose from the streets. It's said that when they float off into the air; they take your bad luck with them. I noticed a young good-looking Canadian, a regular customer. I felt a little envious. If only I had come to Thailand when I was his age. I shook myself, I had no excuse for envy. There was so much to learn, so much to enjoy.

Mook intercepted me on my way home, as friendly and charming as she had been before I'd knocked her down. She quizzed me about the first three times she'd tricked me. I remembered the names of her substitutes, and the circumstances, and she accepted my recollection. She made no further comment. I couldn't guess what she was thinking. She prided herself in never showing her true emotions. She asked me to take her to Burger King. I had vowed never to go to a falang-style fast-food outlet, over-priced and bland, but the Thais love them, it's crazy. Again, one of her friends was chaperone. Thais don't have a tradition of chaperones but I didn't mind. If I were to go alone with her it would have the appearance of her being a hooker. Why else would a girl as young and beautiful as her be accompanying someone like me? I walked a few paces behind the two of them to further lessen the appearance. It let me observe how other men perceived her. To me she seemed timeless in traditional clothes and the silver earings and her long black hair knotted around a silver hair-pin. Perhaps it was the silver which suggested an aura of ancient moonlight. The falangs gave her lingering looks but the Thai stall-holders surprised me. They were mesmerised, staring at her with an awed desire tinged with a semblance, it seemed, of fear. It's one of those things one notices but doesn't contemplate until some time has passed. She showed me the scab on her knee, still almost an inch across after more than a week.

She had once told me that she prayed to Buddha for two hours per day in the years before she started working. Thais follow the Theravada ('doctrine of the elders') Buddhism. It was established in the first century after the Buddha's death and is the only one of the original forms to survive. It seems to be based on paradox - whatever we believe to be reality is not real but merely a personal conception of it ("up to you") and, that opposites are alike ("same same"). There are the 'Three Treasures' of:

1. Buddha: The ideal or highest spiritual potential.
2. Dharma: The teachings of the Buddha.
3. Sangha: The community of those who have attained enlightenment.

There are various precepts (rules of behaviour) depending on how ambitiously one follows the teachings. These are from the 'grave precepts':

1. Affirm life
2. Be giving
3. Honour the body
4. Manifest truth
5. Proceed clearly
6. See the perfection
7. Realize self and other as one
8. Actualize harmony
9. Experience the intimacy of things

To become a Buddha is possible. Apparently, all one need do is fully realise the grave precepts and another 48 secondary precepts. I'm not that ambitious but, I did return to Wat Phrathat after sunset on a Saturday evening, hoping for some kind of subliminal revelation - an awakening of an inner faculty - a way to alter or to escape from the downside of cycles and the gravitation of orbits... Something like that.

The restaurants at the summit had closed. I sat at one of their tables on the outer edge of the northern side of the temple perimeter. The sound of monks chanting filtered clearly through the walls. I could hear many more voices than on my previous visit, some special occasion. I tried to get a feel for the rhythm. The words were evenly paced, monosylabic, the chant continuous, no discernable pause for breath. the timbre was medium with rhythmic dips to a deeper tone sometimes once, sometimes twice or three times every eight or so words. It sounded almost like the beat of drums. I didn't understand the words and I had been digging around on the Internet, so my mind wandered.

My thoughts drifted around those little shrines on the pavements of Loi Kroh Road and into the ancient pre-Buddhist realm of mythology and spirit worship. The spirits are called phi. Every family has a guardian phi which brings bad luck if neglected. So I guess the shops in Loi Kroh Road must have a similar, though less familial phi. Oddly enough, there was no shrine where Mook worked. I had dug a little deeper and came across a phi song nang, spawned by the death of a woman before marriage. It appears as a very beautiful woman, and at night it hunts for handsome men to prey upon. It lures the man to a secluded place with hints of sexual favors. Once alone, it attacks him, draining him of his blood. Thai men have been known to wear nail polish and nighties to bed, hoping to trick phi song nangs into believing them to be women. Back in the 1980s in Thailand, a phi song nang was blamed for the spread of a mystery disease which killed some 230 migrant workers. It was called Sudden Unexplained Nocturnal Death Syndrome. Those who claimed to be survivors described a sudden fear come over them as they slept and, upon waking, feeling a strange presence and an increasing pressure on their chest. They were unable to move or scream.

I had looked in a mirror with relief. My body is firm for my age. I move as easily as I did in my twenties. I do stretch exercises every morning and almost always walk up the nine floors to my room. My eyes have pigments of grey, green and blue with one or the other dominating in different lights, but I've lost most of my hair, except in those places where I shouldn't have any. There's a looseness to my cheeks and I have the beginnings of a turkey neck. Whenever I introduce myself to Thai women as a 'falang ling ghe' (old foreign monkey) it usually sets them off on fits of giggles, probably because I'm saying what they are thinking. If phi song nangs only go for handsome men then I was reasonably safe.

Chimes from a line of lucky bells brought me back to my surroundings. I ambled to the eastern edge where a crimson bougainvillea framed a view of the city below. Various pagodas housed priceless collections of drums, bells, statues, and intricately carved wooden frescoes. It could have been a museum but it was no sterile collection of artefacts, no protective glass panels, no signs, no warnings, no prohibitions.... I took off my sandals to enter a pavillion walled by enormous dish-shaped bells all facing inwards. When some were struck the frequency was so low as to resonate in my skeleton but to be virtually inaudible. The bells responded differently to each person, amplifying their touch, leaving a clear impression of their age and character without my knowing what they looked like, or whether they were man or woman. I left the one set of reverberations for another. They drew me up a broad flight of stairs to the inner temple. The chants were getting louder to my ears as I approached and then entered with bare feet through the southern edge of the western wall.

The temple is of white marble, a square with the perimeter roofed over statues of the Buddha and the walls painted with scenes from his life. At the centre is the gold-leaf stupa; luminous with the effect of concealed floodlights. It towers into the sky, easily visible from the far side of the city beyond the Ping river and thousands of feet below. Against the southern wall; a mixed congregation of about 50 lay-people, monks and nuns faced an equal number of chanting monks. In fact they were beating drums, but so subtly it seemed the drums were chanting too. I circled north and then east passing a young couple elegantly dressed in traditional clothing and kneeling in front of a jade Buddha. Behind them a few superstitious women rattled a box of sticks wrapped in paper. When one falls out the number written on the paper is the key to a page in a chest which tells them their fortune. In an alcove, set in the eastern wall a monk was giving councel to a lay-man. I was then within a few metres of the chanting monks, the sound at its loudest, and I relaxed into the Tai Chi posture for standing meditation, emptying my mind to let the rhythm flow freely past any preconceptions of my consciousness, but it wasn't doing anything for me that hadn't already been done. I headed back to the western wall to leave an offering at the Buddha statue for the day of my birth. The Friday Buddha stands in contemplation with his hands crossed over his chest; the right above the left. The hand posture symbolises his first sermon. Having left some cash in the bowl I stepped back to view the stupa with a strange sense of inversion, as though I was looking down from the temple to the sky. The moon seemed tethered to the golden stupa like a giant disk of raw white silk, as if it was a ghostly vessel floating on a deep blue sea. An electrical current coursed through me. An intense emotional desire tightened across my chest. It had nothing to do with Buddha. I was in the wrong place.

As I left I was looked at with yet another knowing twinkle of an eye; a blue eye, a narrow face, a wisp of blonde hair, her white robes revealing a slender figure; a Buddhist nun.

My rented scooter was the only one remaining at the base of the temple steps. It was raining. The road was 15 kilometres of slippery mountain pass winding steeply down through the night shadows of a jungle. I had broken a rib in two places just six months earlier on a scooter at a bend on a wet road. I had to concentrate. Once I reached the outer city limits the sensation which triggered my departure was all but forgotten and, I was to discover at my own inconvenience that most of the roads into the centre had been cordoned off. Of course, the full moon, I had forgotten all about Loi Krathong; the annual sacrifice to the river spirits, the three-days of festivities and carnival. It was only by luck that I found a way through to my condo.

Showered and shaved, I headed up Loi Kroh Road to the old city. I saw Mook through the window. She was massaging the feet of the fat old American. She made frenzied gesticulations at me to return. Her eyes flashed with an unusual gleam of hunger. The cashier came out. "Mook only start now. Come back one hour."

"Okay," I looked up at the wall clock, "I'll come back at nine," and gave Mook a confirming wave with a surge of the current which had moved me from the temple. Those of her work-mates who weren't busy were making loi krathongs using bread-sized slices from the trunk of a banana tree as a base which they wrapped with banana leaves into the shape of lotus flowers. They were selling them with the candles, incense and flowers which, together with a few coins, makes the traditional offering to the river spirits. I intended to buy one or two, if Mook would join me, on my return. I was ravenous by the time I got to my favourite roof-top bar.

I ordered Pad Thai Moo noodles with pork and a beer, lit a cigarette and wondered about what seemed to have become an amplified sensitivity; both sensual and emotional. I've had similar episodes, but never really thought about them at the time. Usually they had accompanied an obsession; a falling in love or, an inspiration which had seemed to offer unlimited opportunity. Was it one of those or was it neither? This time there wasn't the same rosy haze of euphoria. This time there was an unusual clarity. This time I had little fear, if any, of delusion and despite my preoccupation with the phi, no concern for the fragility of fantasy.

My food arrived as two plump english-women sat down at the bar counter next to me, the only two chairs available. They effortlessly ignored me. Falang women are unable to detect men over the age of forty. Fortunately I smoke, so my appetite wasn't much diminished by the invisible cloud of perfume which ruthlessly condensed on all nostrils within a two-metre radius. I had almost finished my meal when, to my surprise, one of them addressed me.

"No offence," she said; "after all I am 35, but do you know where the young men are?"

"None taken," I laughed. "There is a Canadian. You would like him but, he doesn't seem to be here tonight. Your best bet is to head to the north-east of the old city. That's where all the hostels are. Any other time I could have taken you there but, I have to meet a young woman in less than ten minutes from now."

Back on Loi Kroh Road I bought two big khom lois (sky lanterns), about 1.5 metres high and half a metre in diameter. They're made from the same kind of paper that chinese paper lamp-shades are made from. The base is a circle of wire with four spokes. I tucked them under my arm and headed down for my appointment with Mook. I would pay for a massage but instead of having one I would take her down to the river. We could launch the khom lois, wave farewell to bad luck, float loi krathongs and please the river spirits. I was almost skipping with excitement when I arrived. She had finished her massage of the fat old American and was sitting next to him.

"Look," I crowed, "I've got us a pair of big khom lois. Let's go down to the river." She seemed more than a little hesitant. "Don't worry. You won't lose any money. I'll pay for a massage, even if it takes us more than an hour."

"I can't," she said.

"Why not?"

"I have a customer waiting," she gestured behind her at the doors to the oil-massage rooms.

I don't recollect exactly what went through my mind. I don't remember saying anything. She may have read my eyes.

"No, not later either. I'm booked up for the whole night."

I felt someone's hand on my arm.

"Come," it was Fon, "I can do it with you, if you like."

She wouldn't come down to the river with me though; apparently Mook would consider it too personal.

"She isn't my girlfriend," I needed to remind myself, "She won't mind."

"I know, but you don't understand. These girls can be funny about some things."

"Is it okay for you to give me an oil massage then?"

"Yes, that's okay. It's her fault. She was supposed to give you one."

Using thin wire, we each tied a ring of wax, about the same size as a ring doughnut, to the base of the sky lanterns where the spokes intersect. Then we set fire to the wax, waiting until the heat inflated the lanterns before releasing them. Mine lifted smoothly but Fon let hers go too soon and I had to sprint across the street to catch it before it got entangled in electrical cables. I owed her. It would not have been fair if her bad luck remained. I needed a smoke. I asked Fon if she minded waiting. I knew she was heavily in demand but she was fine about it. My defences were up. Was she being a little too kind? I stubbed it after a few drags and followed her. The room had four raised massage beds, when in use a curtain is drawn for privacy. No curtains were drawn. We were the only ones there.

"Where is Mook?" I asked as nonchalantly as I could, "Has she gone to her customer's house?"

"No she's in the other room. Have you never been there?"

"No. What's the difference?"

"In that one the beds are on the floor. I can take you next time."

Her massage was a good one, perhaps a little more sensual and intimate than Mook's had been, but my mind was elsewhere. It was responding to a challenge, one I had anticipated and prepared for, a sub-conscious effort of discipline; a release and a letting go, the first real test.

When I emerged for my cup of tea I recognised another of the customers; the young Canadian. He was leaving. Mook was talking to the cashier, frequently glancing back at me with a guilty grin. The Canadian was waiting out on the pavement. Mook disappeared into one of the back rooms. I sipped at my tea and remembered Fon saying that she had to leave me; another customer was waiting. I was waiting but what was the point? I knew what I would see.

I left and walked up the road, thirty paces, then turned and retraced a few. What for? I turned again. No. She at least should know that I knew. I headed slowly back and, with ten paces to go, she came out the door smiling brightly at the Canadian, her handbag slung over her shoulder. She saw me and I smiled at her as I walked past then crossed the road beyond. I turned and watched her follow him, a few yards behind, she may have hesitated. I haven't seen him since, but that would be called circumstantial evidence, even if his corpse were to be found. It would be a coincidence only in the context of this story.

I was smiling because I was smiling. I could feel life stirring and flowing past me like the wind through my hair (if I had any). I could sense a clearing of the passage of perception from my senses to my mind. I was seeing more shape in the shadows. It brought a tingle to my fingers and a shiver to my spine. I was exposed to an intense sensitivity of colour, flavour and scent and, perhaps also to the the progeny of fear and hope. I had passed the first test. I had taken a small step into innocence, into the source of creative power.

"I think, therefore I am." A painter transforms figments to a canvas. From a fresh perspective of space and time, a writer makes history anew. A city exists only as a vision before the houses, streets and alleys become a material reality. In their shadows and behind their doors is much which is unknown, whether it be covered by indifference or disguised by design. The spirits of Loi Kroh road may only roam within the innocent confines of our minds, but what cannot exist in the mind cannot exist anywhere in any way which has a meaning to us.

I had crafted the extra dimension of Mook's beauty as an external and transient spiritual essence which could release her once I had passed the summit of illusion. The beauty which cloaked Mook is the spirit of Loi Kroh Road. The spirit of Loi Kroh Road is my heart.

Secrets of Loi Kroh Road

The events in the story are true. The interpretation/perspective is subjective. The places are disguised. The incident with the Norwegian was in the old city - not in Loi Kroh Road. Mook is not her real name. She doesn't wear red sandals.

Secrets of Loi Kroh Road

I ignored a warning from a man who knew Loi Kroh Road better than I do. He wrote a book about it. His name is Alan Solomon and the book is called "The Mango Tree Café, Loi Kroh Road". This (in italics) is, more or less, what he wrote:

'Loi Kroh' means 'wash your bad luck away'. For many this has been the case, but most who have entered Loi Kroh Road found this interpretation to hold the reverse effect, particularly for the spiritually naïve. The story goes that when King Mengrai the Great founded the city of Chiang Mai in the year 1296, the superstitions of the East entered the city and lay in wait in the shadows of Loi Kroh Road where today, it is told, they still wait patiently.

If you do not know the street yet, but wish to feel its magic touch, take the walk but be warned: do so at your own peril. For if you feel the strong allure to enter it, be aware. It is a temptress that offers a stretch of broken tarmac, street dogs, cooked squid, street kids and girlie bars which possess strange mystic powers, and if you can conjure just a little of the ability to see the Sight or hear messages from beyond, you will never be the same again. This street named Loi Kroh Road leads men to rejoice and give thanks, or to destruction and confusion. Whatever may happen, visitors to Loi Kroh Road will never escape the fate it has in store for them. Take the risk and walk the street, or stay as far away as possible.

I stayed away. I stayed away for more than a month, and then, one afternoon, I took the walk. It was a disappointment, particularly after such a dramatic warning. I ditched my fear and walked again - nothing. Was there something I was missing?

I walk Loi Kroh almost every day now, often twice a day. I'm addicted. If I don't feel like making my own breakfast I walk it in the morning. It sleeps until late. Only the bars serving breakfast are open. The pavements are bare, the vendors, artists and craftsmen who furnish them are doing whatever they do when not on the street. The bars and massage parlours are being cleaned. The occasional call of "Massaaage" at that time of the morning is more a reflex of habit than an invitation. On the bridge over the canal a seemingly frail, toothless and ancient bicycle rickshaw driver always greets me with a delight which leaves a grin on my face. Somewhere along the street, I'm not telling you where, is a massage parlour, a respectable one; no erotic extras offered or provided. That's a disappointment to many, as the masseuses are the prettiest on the street. I tend to glance at the sandals in the doorway. Is there a bright red floral pair? The clue of their absence is seldom needed as at least one of the girls will rush out and say "Mook sleeping.", or "Mook busy." or "Mook not here yet." She usually is there in the early morning though, busy cleaning, then we wave at each other as I walk by or, if near the door, she comes out to greet me.

Loi Kroh Road is the red light district of Chiang Mai yet it's unlike any other I've been in. It's ruled by women. There is no pressure other than the sing-song calls of "Massaaage" and happy shouts of "Welcome" from the bar-girls. There are no bouncers, no pimps, no drugs and no theft. Motor-cyclists leave their helmets on the handlebars returning hours later, or even the next morning, without loss. There is no sense of sleaze, not to me anyway.

It's in the mornings when the Thai women garland their shrines. The women, not the men, often kneel and pray beneath them at random times of the day. They hold smouldering joss-sticks between their hands and seem oblivious of passers-by. I remember seeing a group of monks walking down Loi Kroh Road. Pay-for-play bar-girls and masseuses rushed out onto the pavement to kneel before them, the palms of their hands pressed in prayer. The monks chanted their blessings while the women gazed up at them with eyes of an innocence I've previously only associated with children.

I don't have the background to understand much of what I have witnessed on this street. The fabled superstitions and spirits of the East came with the women of the ancient Lanna Kingdom. It's the women who sustain them, and that's why they are still here, still waiting in the shadows, still as powerful and mysterious as they have always been, and it's only the women who know them. It is their secret. That's the way I see it.

A small bar/restaurant at the top of the street used to serve a superb English breakfast. Perhaps they still do. Unfortunately the lovely waitress/chef left when it was sold to the new owner. I haven't returned for another breakfast since. It's my form of protest. If the eye-candy leaves, so too will I. One evening I entered; thinking it was her I saw behind the counter. It wasn't but that's how I met Bayo; a friendly waitress with an unusually good command of English. So a few nights later I visited again, hoping to learn a little more of what goes on inside those pretty Thai heads.

Each of the three round wicker tables next to the pavement was occupied. Only one man was sitting at the largest. I asked and received his permission to sit at it. I asked Bayo for a Chang (local beer) and offered her a drink. She poured herself an orange juice and charged me for a cocktail, pocketing the difference. It obliged her to join me socially for as long as it took me to finish my drink. That's how it works in Chiang Mai. The company of a good waitress here is often better than that of a good date anywhere else.

Bayo sat on a chair between me and the other man. He was from Luxembourg; casually and fashionably dressed, perhaps a few years older than me, but fit and good-looking and with all his hair - Henry I think his name was. He was fuming, though initially he hid it well. His anger became more apparent after a couple of terse phone-calls from his girlfriend, his ex-girlfriend he insisted. He unburdened himself. She told him too many lies, is what he said. That intrigued me. Thai women are consummate liars according to the expat discussion forums. I watched Bayo's expressions from the corner of my eye while Henry told us of money that he had given to help with medical expenses for her mother. Then his girlfriend had sent him photographs of herself. She'd used the funds for cosmetic surgery.

She, the villain, meanwhile, was trying to find him, occasionally annoying him with another phone-call. He told us of a few more examples. Bayo offered sympathy but she didn't appear to see anything wrong with the girlfriend's actions. She often glanced at me with an expression which is as close to winking as one can get without actually doing it. Thais don't wink as far as I know. Perhaps she felt that Henry benefited more from his girl's improved looks than he would have from her mother's good health. She kept her own counsel though. It's a Buddhist thing; "Up to you," is the response you're likely to get when asking a Thai for advice, or "same same" when asking their opinion. When the infamous girlfriend appeared I did have to suppress a wolf-whistle. "Give me keys," she demanded grimly. Henry tossed them to her and she absconded with his motorbike, her young son riding pillion while he, all the more furious, was left behind to walk home.

Bayo is pretty with a neat figure and long slender legs. She wears very short mini-skirts. I tell you this because it is relevant to what happened next. She was dolled up with make-up and false eyelashes. She called it her cabaret look and claimed to wear modest outfits when not at work. She did ask me if it looked stupid. Of course I said no. Her job is to lure customers into the restaurant and to make them feel welcome. She does it vivaciously and well. That's why I was there, and the two men at the next table. One was Norwegian and had arrived in Thailand that same afternoon. It was only after Henry left that I noticed them though I registered little more than their presence.

"I think he is big man in his country," said Bayo about the Norwegian after serving them. I sent her off to get us another drink while I observed him. He noticed and briefly came over to introduce himself, friendly enough but there was an edge to his voice which hinted at antagonism. It didn't bother me and I remember little of what he said. I wasn't really interested, not until I realised that he was 'competing' with me for Bayo's attention. All he needed to do was to buy her a drink but he didn't know that.

He called Bayo over and told her that should she Google his name next time she was on the Internet; she would discover that he was famous and celebrated, even in New York. She stood at their table for a short while and then excused herself to come back and sit with me. A few minutes later he called her over again, this time showing her photographs of his chalet in Switzerland, and again she returned to me. Perhaps he noticed my amusement. I had consciously kept a straight face, but I'm no poker player. Perhaps my eyes betrayed me. Perhaps he considered me to be the obstacle to his conquest. He stalked over to my table.

"I'm a dangerous man," he said.

I leaned back and relaxed as I've been trained to do when confronting danger (it helps to deflect the energy of the first blow) and looked into his eyes. I've learned how to find the inner-rage in a man's eyes. This Norwegian had no more in him than a puffed up poodle.

"Are you threatening me?" I smiled.

"I am in the CIA. I can have you eliminated in 50 minutes," he snarled.

I picked up my almost empty glass and looked at it. "Well, I had planned to leave after this drink, but I don't want to rush you so I'll stay for another hour." I looked at my wrist. I'd left my watch at home. "Bayo, can you go inside and check what the time is, and while you're there please get us another drink."

A flower seller with a large bag of flowers diverted my attention and I patiently refused her persistent offers while the Norwegian returned to his table. I was thinking of how vulnerable I had been when I first walked Loi Kroh Road. It had seemed an insult to decline the sensual offerings from some of the loveliest women in the world. Whenever I accepted; in a setting conducive to intimacy I would learn intimate details of her life. I would know her name and she mine and it would be so much harder to reject her offer the next time I walked by. Then I would meet another. I was being sucked into a whirling cycle and it was spinning me dry. That's when I first saw Mook.

"No no it's too much!" Bayo's protest interrupted my reverie. The Norwegian had bought the delighted flower-seller's entire stock and was presenting it to Bayo. He insisted and she had little option but to carry them inside.

Mook's face defies my description. I've examined it many times with a determination to describe her features, yet each time I try, something mysteriously blanks my memory. Her father was Chinese. Her mother is Lanna. She has the almond eyes of the Lanna and the Chinese genes extend the slanting shadows further at the corners of her eyes. When working she wears big silver earrings of a simple design. Her hair is usually knotted around a large elaborately wrought silver hair-pin. When she loosens it, it flows fine, heavy and liquid like mercury. It reflects the illuminated paintings of Buddha and tigers which line the pavement. It flashes gold and red; synchronised to the lights of passing cars. Her beauty has a weird aura, as though it has been transported through a curtain of time, as though it has a separate independent existence, as though it is eternal. She wears it lightly, almost as a garment. She acknowledges and enjoys it but it doesn't define her. Once her hair reaches her buttocks (it may take another month); she will cut it off, braid it and gratefully offer it as a gift to Buddha, as she has always done.

Bayo was back at my table and the Norwegian, having realised that I had no romantic interest in her, was making frequent forays to kiss her hand and to whisper in her ear. It seemed to me that he was not doing himself any favours, while I slipped further into reverie.

With that surreal beauty; an offer of a massage from Mook is never refused and, having accepted her offer, the trapped customer is presented with a lesser (though still pretty and no less capable) substitute. It happened to me three times in a row. Eventually I told her that I would accept none other than her, neither at her shop nor at any other. She was delighted and that's how I was saved from my downward spiral. Somehow it seemed that the whole street knew, almost instantly, and most offers became simple greetings.

"I'm sorry," Bayo was speaking to me after another Norwegian hand-kissing ear whisper; "I can't stay here any longer."

A minute later a different waitress placed a bill on the Norwegian's table.

"What!" he shouted. "I don't want the bill. I want another drink... Okay I'm going to buy the bar! Where's the owner? I'll give him five million baht right now!" He marched inside, "and if I own the bar I own you," that must have been aimed at Bayo, "and you will have to do what I ask!" He stormed back out in less than a minute, once more to sit at his table, his brawny companion doing nothing other than to look apologetic.

I don't normally interfere in a foreign country but this was clearly an exception. I saw the surprise when I faced him eyeball to eyeball. After ten years of Tai Chi, I can move swiftly and smoothly without that initial lurch which alerts the opponent. "Thais are very polite and courteous people," I said quietly "but you need to tone it down right now." He didn't argue. By the time I got back to my seat he was lurching across the road, a glass still in his hand. On reaching the pavement he gave me a final malevolent look and disappeared into the shadows. A short cry of protest swivelled my head like a spectator at a tennis match. The flowers had been dumped on the table. A lynch-party of enraged Thais was being hastily pacified by the Norwegian's companion as he held up a couple of 100 baht notes with outstretched arms; recompense for the departed glass. The sense of aggression quickly abated into a round of excited Thai chatter and a few yells at the departed falangs. I couldn't follow any of it.

"We thought you were going to get into a fight," explained Bayo brightly, a pretty Thai smile back on her face.

"No. No, that was never going to happen," I didn't want the reputation of a brawler. I never have been. Calm returned and then I remembered I had a date - sort of; from a brief encounter with Mook on my way to visit Bayo.

She had emerged from a side-door wearing jeans and a T-shirt, not the traditional Thai baggy trousers and cotton top. She wasn't wearing make-up. I like her that way; then she seems merely human. "Bai nai? Where you going?" she had asked. It's a standard Thai greeting, almost a rhetorical question but I answered anyway, taking the opportunity to study her face, while the unearthly veil of beauty seemed to have temporarily lifted. Her face is not perfect. Her teeth protrude slightly but I like that. It gives a subtly pouting character to her mouth. Her face is not round yet it is a collection of curves; her eyebrows, her nose, her eyelids, her lips, her chin... Her skin is silky and flawless, neither a blemish nor a wrinkle. "Come back later," she said and I smiled and nodded at an invitation I could not refuse. "I'll wait for you," she called as I walked away, struck by the way her eyes had wandered over my face; same as mine had done. "Same same," a sing-song voice echoed through my mind.

I headed across the street into the same shadows where the Norwegian and his henchman were last seen. I wasn't concerned. The odds of my being 'eliminated' were remote; anyway longevity is no longer on my list of priorities. I have lived long enough if needs be. He had no leverage on me. There was no way he could harm me. I dismissed him from my mind as I headed for my rendezvous. Yes, I had better things to ponder; things like what kind of massage I would ask her for... I liked the idea of a Thai massage, and the thought of her wrestling my body till the joints clicked, and all tension was gone.

I saw the commotion from a distance. Mook's workmates were clustered around her. She still wasn't in her working clothes. She was still wearing jeans. Her hair was loose and mussed up like a wild black cloud swirling around her face and shoulders. There was blood on her T-shirt. I was only a few yards away when I saw the jagged gash which stretched from her nose to her ear. A heart-shaped bruise smudged her other cheek. She saw me coming and flashed a ravishing smile.

"We all going to Halloween party," she embraced her work-mates with a gesture. She stopped smiling and looked at me closely; "You scare me." The adrenalin had not yet drained from my veins. "Tonight I only give foot massage." The smile returned to her face "Follow me."

We entered a room with reclining chairs, about six of them; all but one occupied. I could see by the way the occupants gazed at Mook that she had tricked them, in the same way that she had first tricked me. She filled a basin with warm water and squeezed lime and dropped herbs into it. She knelt before me and bathed my feet. The rest of us stared at her as if in a trance, even her work-mates, and I began to understand.

It was the ancient spirits of the East. It was they who clung to her in a wispy cloak of divine beauty, and I understood why she was so unaffected by it. It didn't define her. She knew that. It defined them. That beauty which defies my description isn't hers, it is theirs.

I had learned one of the secrets of Loy Kroh Road.

Mook looked up into my eyes and chuckled.

Twice blessed

Lawan's parents were to have their house blessed. I was lucky enough to be invited. Their house is in Lamphun province, in a small village 100km south of Chiang Mai. It's a traditional teak one on stilts in a beautiful rural setting surrounded by rice paddies, orchards and a series of miniature mountains, their edges blurred by the trees of the jungle. Not many rooms, but all large; a kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, a big open-plan living area which had been cleared for the ceremony, and an open-air balcony with a table long enough to seat a score of diners.

The living area was criss-crossed by a suspended matrix of white cotton thread. At each intersection was a carefully coiled length which would descend to touch the head of every guest when the ceremony started. All threads connected to the top of a decorated tripod which was in front of two mattresses in the furthest corner.

Five monks arrived and were greeted with very deep wais (A wai is the Thai greeting which includes a bow while pressing hands together to bring them up to one's forehead). The Thai women do it very gracefully, taking a step back and bending their knees at the same time - similar to a curtsy and bow combined. A wai should always be returned, though Buddhist monks are not normally expected to. They are representatives of the Buddha and constitute the highest class in society. Even the king should wai them first when meeting in ceremony.

They sat on the mattresses in lotus positions. Everyone dropped to their knees and bent their backs, as it is considered disrespectful to have one's head higher than that of a monk. I went down on my knees but, as I was twice the size of anyone else, I didn't attempt to be lower. Lawan and her parents settled under the tripod after persistently inviting me to be the one under it. I declined more persistently. It was too much of an honour, besides there would not have been space for anyone else under it with me.

Incense and 180 candles were lit. We were each handed a posy of jasmine to hold between our palms. I touched the petals to my nose, breathing the fragrance. The monks passed on a message suggesting that I sit as I please as I may not be used to kneeling, but I was determined not to have special treatment. The most senior of them, perhaps the abbot, tied a chord of soft white cotton to the tripod and unravelled it so that it ran through each one of the monks' hands. They chanted for half an hour, the two seniors without assistance, the other three chanted while reading from pages which appeared to be made from bamboo, each one different in content and length. As each completed reading, his chant merged with those of the others' until the last of them finished his script. Once the chanting ended the abbot dipped a branch into holy water, looked me in the eyes for a moment with a humorous twinkle of reassurement, and tossed the drops over us. I was urged to approach him and he broke the chord from the tripod and blessed me with a different chant while he tied the cord in a bracelet around my left wrist, then restrained me as I turned away, to do a similar blessing for the right. Thereafter the others approached and received blessings. It's much the same as taking communion in a Christian church (something I've never done, not having been confirmed). It seemed I was given special treatment as not many were blessed on both wrists.

At the end of the blessing the monks were presented a simple banquet of rice, vegetables and fruit.The rest of us went out onto the balcony to a much more varied and spicy set of dishes. They included prawns, pickled octopus, various curries with sweet jellies as fire-extinguishers, bunches of what appeared to be herbs where the leaves were plucked and chewed, giving an astounding array of flavours. My favourite was thin slices of raw water-buffalo in a delicious salty marinade.

My offer to help with cleaning up was rejected with much amusement by the women, and mock-outrage by the men. So Kikie, Marco and I went for a walk up the road to look at the rice-paddies. It was Kikie who explained much of what was going on in the ceremony. Marco is besotted with her. I understood why. She is very pretty with a neat figure, quite glamorous and sophisticated - so it was a surprise when she described herself as a jungle-girl and within a few paces showed us the leaf of a plant which, when the stem is broken and blown upon, produces soap bubbles which float like thistles through the air, and a leaf to cure bad breath, and another where the sap can be used as a bandage, immediately producing a plastic-like film. She rubbed a leaf from a teak tree to show how it exudes a red dye, daubing it playfully onto her cheeks as war-paint. I asked her if she had grown up in the jungle and she said no, in a city. It may have been Bangkok. I can't remember exactly. She had been a Buddhist nun for a year. She had worked as a tour guide for seven years, and before that? She left school and her home at the age of 14 when Her father had died.

"Ah, To make money," I had confirmed prematurely.

"No," she said speaking for the first time without a smile, "To live."

Lawan house

My room in Lawan House was quite dark, no view, no distractions - that was good, and it had a desk and chair. Da, a Thai friend of Lawan, came to stay for a few days. I was intrigued. She had been living in Milton Keynes for six years. Other than being a trifle overweight, how had the long exposure to British culture affected her?

They invited me out to a bar on the first night. It's owned by another of Da's friends. Three of us climbed onto one scooter, Da in front and Lawan sitting side-saddle behind me. We crossed the inner and outer moat roads, without falling off, and turned into a side-street a few blocks from Loi Kroh Road (more about that later). The bar was filled with regulars and friends; mostly Thais and a man with an Austrian accent who claimed to be Irish. I met Kikie and Marco, a delightful couple, she Thai and he German. I was treated by everyone as a friend, and lost a game of pool against Da. Lawan drank only fruit juice. She and I decided it was safer to walk home. Back in the old city a chorus of toads, mostly baritone with an occasional tenor, evoked a wordless memory from my childhood. Perhaps it prompted me to say something childish like "I wonder what they're singing?" I remember Lawan looked at me oddly and said "I don't know. I don't speak frog."

A room had its door facing the table under the umbrella. I felt an urge to move to it. Lawan seemed pleased, as though she had known I would. I discovered a few simple restaurants which served wonderful meals... A delicious spicy supper of pork, fried vegetables and rice with a beer cost less than the smallest cup of coffee at Starbucks in Edinburgh. My regular breakfast was a big bowl of fruit salad mixed with yoghurt and muesli. An early favourite was dragon fruit. They grow on a cactus and look like giant red-hot eggs rimmed with flame-shaped leaves. The flesh is the colour of beetroot. The taste and texture; somewhere between kiwi fruit and watermelon.

Every morning Lawan bought flowers for the house shrine, placed incense and a fresh cup of tea at its entrance, then kneeled and prayed for a few minutes, her back straight and the palms of her hands pressed together. I asked her who she was praying to. Was it Buddha? I don't remember her exact words but the gist was that she prayed to the house spirits, that the shrine was a place where they and visiting spirits, could rest and find refreshment.

What struck me about the Thais I met, was their lack of self-consciousness. They didn't pose. They didn't go for one-upmanship. They didn't seek to impress or to evoke the envy of others. They were quick to smile and always happy to match a friendly glance or a show of respect with one of their own. Part of it is the influence of Buddhism, but there is something else there too. I could see Da had been infected by western egotism. I'm weary and scared of our western culture, one which spreads like a virus. I think we call it globalisation - where traditional gods, customs and values become mere remnants in the coffins of museums. Is there a culture which can resist it, a place where the best part of it is not the shiny surface? Is it here in Thailand? Can it survive the power of greed and technology - the businessmen, social engineers and spin-doctors - the modern missionaries of a crusade without morals who create needs and desires neither needed nor desirable?

The Thais are no slouch when it comes to technology. In many areas they are more developed than the west. But they are not yet ruled by its sterilising laws. If they are ruled - it is by courtesy. Streets are chaotic but clean. Public toilets are of a standard one would expect in a good European hotel. The city air is charmed with landmark odours; fish and spices from the markets, the smoky smell of meat on the charcoal grills at food stalls, and in the old city there are areas fragrant with flowers.

Crossing roads

Walking around Chiang Mai is a little disconcerting at first. It seems that Thais seldom walk more than a block or two. The place is saturated with songthaws (go anywhere for 20 bhat), and the picturesque three-wheeler tuk-tuks (the haggling is as much fun as the journey). Motorcycles can be hired for as little as 80 bhat per day. Street pavements are cluttered with anything from pot plants and vendor stalls to sleeping dogs. Most streets are one-way. To cross them is an extreme sport - even at those with their own traffic lights.

I came to one on a busy three-lane street, pushed the button, waited patiently for the lights facing traffic to turn orange then red (which they did), and then for the one facing me to turn green (which it did - showing 13 seconds to make the crossing), and then... nothing happened. They ignored the red. A Thai couple approached from the other side, pressed the button and the traffic stopped to let them cross. Que? I tried again but instead of waiting on the pavement when the lights changed - 13 seconds, 12, 11, 10... I took a deep breath, closed my eyes for a moment and walked across. They stopped.

I turned right after Thapae Gate, and walked past massage parlours, agencies for tours and motorbike rentals... until I got to a quaint general-dealer store and a market selling fish, fruit and vegetables. Once through that I entered what some call the guest house ghetto. It's a network of narrow lanes where houses have been converted into hostels or guest houses for backpackers. There are laundries and back-yard workshops. Some of the restaurants double up as Thai cookery schools. Some are not much more than a kitchen in a tin shack with a couple of plastic tables and chairs out on the road. I liked the atmosphere. I ignored the hostels, I needed solitude for writing. Most other places rented out basic rooms, some very cheap but then either the place or the staff lacked character.

I was thinking about crossing roads and traffic lights and London. We wouldn't dream of going through a red light, even if it was four in the morning and quite obviously safe to do so. It would be an automatic fine, with proof of offence being a photo from an automatic camera. We are ruled by an uncompromising system of law - policed and punished by machines - ever more automated - increasingly automatons - discretion discouraged... I'm ranting aren't I?

A laundry was set a little back from the road. A round table and two benches under a broad canvas umbrella at its entrance. A small Buddhist house shrine was garlanded with fresh flowers, a cup of tea and burning incense at it's doorway, "Lawan house" on a large sign and "rooms to let" chalked onto a board. Lawan greeted me with a Thai wai (more about them later) and one of those famous Thai smiles which sweep the shadows from my thoughts. She had four rooms. She showed me all of them. I told her which one I liked most. She looked at me sceptically as though I had made a mistake. If I was to leave Parami it would be in two days time. I was undecided. I told her I liked the place but still wanted to look at more before making up my mind. Some had better rooms and were even cheaper, but none merged with my character as seamlessly has hers had done. It was an hour later when I returned.

"I've made up my mind. I'd like to stay here from the day after tomorrow."

"Kaa. I know." she said with a serene smile, as though I had already booked in.

"I'd better tell you my name."

"It's Dominic," she said "I'll be waiting for you."

I must have told her. The worse my memory gets the more mysterious my life becomes.

Drifting away

I was lucky enough to sit next to a real Thai woman on the flight to Bangkok. I liked her attitude. She was delicately respectful, yet without undue deference. She was spontaneously amused and amusing. She was particularly courteous to the cabin crew when they served her. She used both hands to receive things from them, even though one would have been easier. They in turn treated her with noticeably more respect than the rest of us. You get what you give. It reminded me of the Zulus back in South Africa. They have a similar custom of receiving with both hands - to show they don't have a knife to stab you with in the other.

A vicious head-cold attacked me without any warning. It was to be a battle lasting a week. I reluctantly turned my back to her to prevent collateral damage.

I took my dribbling nose and pockets full of tissues on a metered taxi ride from Chiang Mai Airport to Parami Guest House. We skirted the western and northern moats of the old city, crossed the Ping river and arrived - 75 bhat (£1 = 50) for what I had already noticed was an unusually grand form of public transport, the driver ecstatic with a 10 bhat tip. I was welcomed by Roger and his wife Ari. I'd guess they're both in their thirties. He's Swiss, originally from Zurich and she's Thai. Is there a better combination for the hospitality business?

Parami is remote from the clusters of guest houses, hotels, tourist bars and expat hang-outs. It was what I wanted. I wanted to be amongst the Thais, where they live and eat and shop, where they are the customers. I could cross the Ping at a pedestrian bridge directly into the corner of Warorrot Market where fruit and flowers are sold. It's the Chinese market of Chiang Mai. It's a labyrinth. They sell everything. Few tourists venture into it. Beyond is the Night Bazaar surrounded by big hotels, Starbucks, Burger King, Pizza Hut, McDonalds and restaurants where Thai food is adjusted to Western palates. Everything sold in the Night Bazaar is bought in Warorrot and resold at a higher price. And then there's the eastern entrance to the old city through Thapae gate. The old city, surrounded by the bustling, modern city is surprisingly tranquil, almost rural in atmosphere. With dribbling nose and aching sinuses I wasn't enjoying myself, but I'm always curious. I did a lot of walking and while my consciousness was mostly concerned with finding more tissues, the other side of my brain was looking and looking, and doing it's own obscure uncontrolled kind of thinking. Then it made a weird move and I came close to panic.

I was lying on my bed, dozing off when I felt myself drifting away. I've had a similar feeling when I was very young - a kind of transcendental meditation - the sense that my consciousness had separated from my body. This was similar but not the same. My consciousness - my identity was not only drifting away - it was leaving. I grabbed for it like one would grab for the leash of a dog as it tried to slink out the door and into the night. While I hung on I was wondering what would happen if I really did let go. What would leave? My sanity? What would remain? A part of my brain was trying to evict the concept I had of myself, the conclusions from every triumph and every tragedy, all my unhealed wounds, all my obsessions and hang-ups. I couldn't let them go! Why? Because that is how I define myself. How else could I? And... and I need them to finish the bloody book. That's what it's all about. I tightened the leash and it returned reluctantly. I felt a strange sensation that I should have let go while the door was open.

I did something after that which in retrospect had a connection. I put my tent, sleeping bag, coat, jacket and jersey into the suitcase and donated it to the guest house staff. The battle with my cold was over and I wandered off into the old city.

Silent lies

I visited my old hostel two days after returning to Edinburgh - the one which for three years had been my base in Europe - the one where the owner had banned me. It's a long story and short one. His manageress had joined me on the island of Mykonos for a 10-day holiday. That must have had something to do with it. I walked up to the counter and heard her voice. She was speaking on the phone. I didn't call out. I didn't need to. She could see me on the CCTV monitor. That's what it's there for. The camera stared at me. Her voice became agitated, impatient— The owner emerged.

"Hi. I don't know if you're still keeping my post, but I'm here to collect it if you are."

"Yes. We have some of it," he said and went back inside.

"Thanks. I'll change my postal address as soon as I find a new place to stay," I said it through the doorway. She would have heard my voice.

Her call must have ended. She was silent. He returned with a small pile of letters, far less than usual, and went back inside without another word. The letters had been hastily collected. I was later to discover wrapping paper, a postcard to him, and his motorcycle insurance policy (I threw them away). I spent another second or two straightening the pile and listening to the silence back in the office, long enough for her spontaneous emergence, should it occur. It didn't. I turned around and left with a small expectation that she would follow. She didn't.

I reread her last email. I had dismissed it as soap-opera, expecting to resolve it when next I saw her. Yes, there it was - she didn't "hate anyone on principle." It implied she should hate me. I had had a feeling of some closure, but the previously ignored implication weighed a wordless sadness into my gut. I got to thinking of how people believe what they want to believe, or what they need to believe. Almost everything in that letter is a response, not to things I had said but, to what he claims I did... and to whatever speculation ensued. Who knows?

Truth exists only at the moment it occurs. Even then it's uniquely filtered by the perception of the observer. Thereafter it's transported via motives of recall into something quite distant; a lie constructed then consolidated by repetition. It's the lie which is most adamantly defended. It's the lie which is preserved. It is lies which become what we call reality.

Distortions like his are spoken lies. Truths unspoken are lies of silence like hers. When hearing something which alters our opinion of a friend - it's a lie of silence if we don't confirm it. When we know of something which will be to their detriment and don't tell them - that is a lie of silence. When we could help them to understand our situation and don't - that too is a silent lie. Each one is a betrayal of precious friendship, until there is nothing but a shell drained of truth and filled with a poisonous fiction.

That's the short story. There's a long one too. Too long to end like that, too long for me to remain. I was trying to be a writer. The only way I knew how to write a story was to live it. It was time to start a new one.

The red-shirt protests were getting ugly in Thailand. Governments were advising their citizens not to go there. The air-tickets would be cheap. The cheapest flight was via Lufthansa believe it or not. I booked for the Friday evening. Edinburg to Frankfurt, then to Bangkok, then to Chiang Mai. It's in the north-western corner of Thailand, west of Laos and south and east of Burma. Apparently it's mountainous, beautiful and very cheap.