The Beach

It’s sometimes hard to remember that I am in a third world country. I live in my house behind a gate with my air-conditioned room. I drive my motorcycle or take public transportation. I have my Internet at work. I can go to the store whenever I want and buy whatever I want. I have running water (albeit cold), toilet paper, Ritz Crackers and Campbell's soup. Even the orphanage is nice with its fan rooms and air conditioners. It’s neatly trimmed lawns with flower gardens and a computer lab. It’s hard to remember that some of those kids come from villages not even an hour away, where they were unwanted, or where they could not be taken care of, or where they discarded, in danger or being sold, beaten or raped.

This past weekend I went to a beach in Khanom, about an hour and a half from my house. It is basically a deserted beach with only a few small hotels that are never filled, (maybe one room each night is occupied) and a bar/restaurant. It is a tranquil place of solitude, at least for the next few years, when the dive site is finished, and the condos are done. But until then, this is my beach, surrounded by mountains that the clouds burst through in the afternoon, with turquoise waters, white sand, and the infamous pink dolphins that are rumored to be hiding beneath the waters.

This is where our friend Charlie built his house, where he and his wife run a small bungalow type restaurant with hammocks as chairs. Charlie is originally from England, moved here many years ago and got married to a Thai woman. They lived for many years in Phuket, running a bar and a salon. His bar never got much business because he refused to provide prostitutes. It was near “soi thnn nrk” which in English means, Road to Hell. His wife ran a salon next door that catered to the untouchable crowd. Mostly Lady Boys and prostitutes. It was a safe place for them. They could go and get beautiful, which was allowed by their “owner” but they could also joke, chat like normal people, and Charlie and his wife would even set them up with email accounts and help them find work and help on the internet. Charlie remembers one specific story of trying to be persuaded to sell girls at his bar before he shut down. A father came in from the villages and said, “this is my daughter, and how much can I get for her.” Charlie looked at the man baffled and asked how old she was. When the father responded that she was 19, Charlie spit out his drink. “She doesn’t look 19! She looks about 14!”
“Yeah well, she (explicit) her boyfriend so why can’t she (explicit) here. At least if I take her here I’ll get some money out of her” He threw them out of the bar. Today Charlie regrets not just giving the father some money for her, and getting her out of whatever her father had planned, but hindsight is 20-20.

Charlie and his wife packed up shortly after as they were losing money and getting older. They took their savings and moved to Khanom. The quite town I previously referred. They built a huge house by the beach and their little restaurant. They have 3 dogs and 2 cats…. oh, and 8 puppies. They figured it would be a good retirement plan, but as all plans go, they are far from retirement. So far two girls and a lady boy have shown up at their doorstep. One girl from Burma escaped a civil war to be thrown into a karaoke bar in Phuket. Heard there was a kind couple that used to live there, and made the 6-hour trek to Khanom. She just hung around talking every day for a few months, until Charlie offered a job. She has no working visa, as she is Burmese, so he just pays her cash. The first thing that came out of her mouth was, “I don’t want to see men, and you won’t make me will you?” Charlie replied, “I sell food and beer, not flesh, you are my waitress, what you do on your own time is your business, but on working hours all you do is serve.” She does anything willingly, including taking me and a friend to the bus station when the taxi wasn’t answering his phone. She serves food, she cooks, she runs errands, and she practices her English. And for a few hundred baht, she will give a Thai massage on the beach. The other girl is a similar situation, from Vietnam, and same with the Lady Boy, he is Thai. The Lady Boy does the salon and spa. Massages, facials, pedicures on the condition that no flesh is sold. A welcome break to a forced action that had become habit.

Charlie’s leisurely retirement keeps getting farther from relaxing as time goes by. This past weekend while I was visiting, we made plans for this upcoming December. Last December he started getting volunteers to take the 900 some orphans from the circumference of his town, to his beach. This year I am helping. Many of these kids don’t see outside the confines of the orphanage, and their school, but on one day per year, they get to forget their troubles, neglect their chores, and go to the beach, a private beach that is all their own. Charlie donates all the food, and through his contacts over the year, we have a chef who is going to bbq for all of the kids. A mini bus station who has donated all their vans and drivers for the day, to pick the kids up in the morning, and bring them home at night, a satellite truck to show movies on the big screen and blast music all day, now all we need are some volunteers besides me, Charlie and his wife and three staff.