But, she’s different, to those other Pattaya girls

[Pattaya One]

Most schools, institutions (although this does not usually include prisons), companies, military regiments and many cities of the world have a motto, usually some trite Latin phrase that sounds impressive in what is almost a dead language, but totally nerdish in plain English.

Now that Pattaya seems to be developing (is that really the right word?) into a mini-Bangkok, with more traffic, pollution, and street vendors, I feel the time has come for the city fathers to present us with an appropriate motto for the metropolis.

Of course, given the very reasons for the expansion of the city, the motto should be in English -and translated into German, Lithuanian, Cantonese, and Zambian to reflect the vast numbers of tourists who flock here each year.

I would like to propose a phrase that, if empirical surveys are correct, is uttered by foreign visitors to their sceptical friends and acquaintances here at least five hundred times a night and twice as much on Sundays: ‘but, she’s different’. In Latin, this comes out as caveat emptor, which also means ‘empty wallet’.

The late British crime writer Agatha Christie was quoted as saying: “Any woman can fool a man if she wants to and he’s in love with her.” The young and not-so-young bargirls of Pattaya may not have read much Agatha Christie, but they know this to be a fact, even if only instinctively.

The Internet Cafes of this town are doing a roaring trade in e-mails passing between girls who have degrees in nothing more than horizontal folk dancing and deluded men ever ready to pump the bank account of their particular favourite in the largely mistaken belief this one is different from the rest.

Maybe she is, in that only two other men are sending money instead of four or five smitten foreigners feeding the bank vault. Alternatively, she might be one of the few who doesn’t have a Thai husband or boyfriend lurking in the shadows.

Actually, I don't blame the girls for getting whatever they can. After all, they’re a bit like elite athletes, with only a few years at the top. Say they kick off at age eighteen and manage to keep their looks and body in good shape, then their ‘career’ in the premier league might last until they’re about thirty. Then the pickings tend to become slimmer as the newer and younger ‘athletes’ take the cream.

After leaving part of their cranial matter in the arrival hall at Suvarnabhumi airport and venturing south to the warm climes of Pattaya, some men are apt to think the bar girl attached lovingly to their arm is actually some form of reconstituted virgin. Indeed one man I know protests that many have surely been cast adrift from the Home for Destitute Virgins and he is duty bound to help save a few lost souls.

I don’t like to boast, but my new girlfriend really is different to all the rest. She’d only been in Pattaya for three days when I met her, dancing around a chrome pole at a go-go bar in Walking Street. I was a bit suspicious at first because her English seemed so good, but she explained she’d actually been to high school for two years back in her province and every night after going to the Marine Bar she’d sit up and study her English. Clever girl I thought.

Even though she was dancing almost naked, she told me she was actually quite shy. What finally won me was she said she was working so she could afford to put her younger sisters and brothers through school; her mother and father didn’t need any medical operations and all the buffaloes, chickens, pigs, dogs, cats, and sundry barnyard animals were in perfect health. They were dirt poor but contented.

I took her home with me that night and was impressed when she turned off her mobile phone so we wouldn’t be interrupted. She even removed her two gold bracelets (“Mama buy for me,” she told me so sweetly) so they wouldn’t rub against my skin. Considerate, as well as clever, I thought.

I did say to her I thought her lace see-through mini-skirt might have been a little bit too short, but she explained she didn’t have much money to buy clothes and had to be content with hand-me-downs from friends, and they were all much taller than she. Her aim was to save all her money to give to her brothers and sisters. Once again I had to admire her thoughtfulness, but then after all, she’s different.

©Duncan Stearn

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