Same, same... but different

Rebecca briefly glanced up from the computer as I emerged from the bathroom.  We were in a new place--a guesthouse situated on a canal—in a new town: Bangkok.  That morning we shifted from a rather opulent (in a faded glory kind of way) place in the historic section of town to this guesthouse a bit further off the beaten path.  And though we had been in Thailand a week, there was still that unknown quality to the country and its customs which both confounds and excites. 

“Did you wash your hands?  With soap?”  There’s a couple of things I should probably explain.  First, no matter what one’s age and station in life, one (me, in this case) can’t help but revert back to the guilt of youth.

“There wasn’t any soap.  But I was vigorous with the water.”

“Use shampoo then.  How old are you?”  I assumed her question was rhetorical, which only sharpened my desire to come up with a zinger.

”In human years?”  OK.  So it wasn’t exactly biting.  But here’s the thing:  I understand the workings of Rebecca’s brain. Earlier that day she wondered aloud about the source of our tap water, something she hadn’t voiced concern over in our previous digs.  I’d like to think I’ve come to a place where I can read her fear, which makes for a certain sympathy, due in part to the character and ways of this town.  To wit:  Bangkok has that anything goes feel to it.  I’m confident—were I a less honorable sort—I could get into a lot of trouble in this town.  And with that get-away-with-it-if-you-can quality are various inevitable transgressions of social conscience.  One sterling example of said transgressions would be the canal our guesthouse sits on-and, by extension, the management of our guesthouse itself. 

We opted for the deluxe room, which sports a balcony over said canal, affording us the luxury of evening card games and morning tea while taking in the canal’s many ebbs, flows, and odeurs (It’s not one of the cleaner canals I’ve experienced.)

  Furthermore, one imagines the canal as common denominator in this part of the city’s waste disposal and water dispersal systems, an assuredly cozy relationship. Couple that with the aforementioned newness of this country and its people(to us) and one can’t help but understand Rebecca’s concern over—if not outright fear of—something as basic as the water which springs from the bathroom tap.  Calling for soap feels rational. Then this:

Shortly after check in, we were playing cards on the balcony when Rebecca was distracted by something making its way across the canal’s turgid waters.

“What is it?  Is it dragging something?”  The water fanned a slow, undulating wake, reflecting a disturbance of considerable mass.  No frantic paddling here: this beast had the confidence of a trident submarine.  From our angle on the balcony, its green head appeared roughly the size and shape of a cinder block, affixed to a ridged trunk and whip-like tail of prehistoric proportions.

“Hmmm.  Alligator?  Crocodile?  Are there crocodiles in Thailand?  In Bangkok?”  I found myself at a loss, feeling a Crocodile Dundee-like need to act as both protector and expert, but coming up woefully short on both counts. The creature made the far wall and nosed along a ways before, just across from our balcony, turned, and with a sure thrust of its powerful tail, started in our direction.  Could it see us?  Sense us with a canal-beast omniscience? Smell our fear?  We peered into its slotted eyes, transfixed by flickering tongue and long striped tail.

“Do you think it could somehow get up here?” Rebecca’s voice took on that shrill tone I’ve come to recognize as a precursor to anger or drunkenness.  Or both.  And though I put our height above the water at a good twenty feet, I couldn’t help but wonder.  Just what does a creature of this magnitude consume in a day?  A litter of puppies?  A Shetland pony? 

We turned to the computer and soon learned of a “problem” in Bangkok concerning the explosion of monitor lizards in the various canals and rivers of the city.  (Though the article made no mention of it, one assumes the rat population is on high alert.)  Needless to say, the canal immediately became my primary source of entertainment and contemplation.

The next morning, while waiting for Rebecca to pull herself from the fumes of slumber, I watched as a stringy old dude made his way down the center of the canal on an inner tube. He wore a pair of cutoff shorts and propelled himself along with thrusts of his arms. His legs and butt were fully submerged, and he smiled as he made his way through the soft, undulating waters.  In his lap was a large, wok-shaped bowl.  Balanced on the side of the tube, along his thigh, was a long metal pole with a flared end which he occasionally cradled under his arm like a jousting stick.  Just as he came to the far bend (which would have put him out of my line of sight) he began the task of stringing out a net from his bowl, complete with small weights attached, which formed a net-wall down the center of the canal, parallel to the canal walls but attached at either end, forming a corral, of sorts around a section of the water.  Finally, net set, he worked his way along the wall, pounding the surface and thrusting his pole against the bottom, presumably shooing fish into his wall of net.   

As I watched him at his work, I came to understand a clear and present truth:  These people, who are clearly unafraid of the dark possibilities of the waters—who in fact turn those possibilities to livelihood and profit—are not my people.  I wondered about the conditions of life which would lead me to a place where I merrily set off to harvest life from this trash-strewn canal.  Or, perhaps more aptly, the conditions of generations of people which leads, finally, to a fundamentally different perception of the canal.  I see waste.  This old dude in the inner tube sees conditions ripe for growth and harvest.  I put the question to Rebecca.

“What would it take for you to swim in that canal?” 

“I wouldn’t do it.” 

“A million dollars?”

“You don’t have a million dollars.” 

“I know, but if…”  I think we know where this conversation went.  Certain things just don’t get to the bargaining table.  There is too much other-ness in their composition, and the usually reliable and cross-cultural rules of barter lack any discernable or logical patterns.  The instinct is to seek separation, to get away from the stink, to use more soap. 

Yet we’re also drawn.