[Here's the More Space essay part 2 (part 1, wiki info). The headline really is the subtitle for the next section of the essay...]
The taxi driver at the Krabi airport asks us where we are going. Oh, so sorry, that hotel is already full, he begins. He hesitates, smiles and enthusiastically begins anew: But I know another place that… I insist that we’ve pre-paid and definitively have a confirmed reservation. He is sullen the rest of the journey into town.
Days later on the ferry, the touts are walking up and down the aisles with their colorful brochures. The signs for preoccupation and disinterest are instinctual and inaudible. For a brief instant I lift my eyes up from my book and in sweeps the voice: Hello. I look at him and shake my head, I’m not interested. He chides me, But I am not selling anything. I’m with the ferry and I just need to ask passengers where they are going. Sheepishly I drop my guard and nod ok. Again: Where are you going? An innocuous question as the ferry stops mid-route so that long-tail boats from Koh Jum can pick up tourists coming to their island or you can continue onward back to Krabi. He quickly navigates the conversation back into familiar territory: I know a great place that….
The long tail boats are bobbing in the open water below the deck where a handful of us are converged – and confused by choices. Where are you going? Come here. Come with us. Come here.
We’ve arrived on the broken shell-flecked beach from the Golden Pearl long-boat. The wiry boy takes our luggage and walks purposefully ahead. No, no, we are not staying here, we repeat once more. Finally reclaiming our luggage we start south – away from the thickly carpeted hills to the north – catwalking on the low wall. We watch the men constructing new sections of this wall ahead. A set of gleaming tan bungalows with rows of stately coconut palms spreads before us like an oasis in the Sahara. No, we’ve not yet reached the bungalows we’ve reserved. The young Thai man and the woman - Phen she says - are genuinely helpful and guileless. Like quicksand, we find we cannot budge. OK, one night then.
A few days later Phen and Mon have decorated one of the huge lacquered teak tables with balloons and flowers. The Danish family is gathered around a large chocolate cake with kaleidoscope sugar sprinkles. We sing “Happy Birthday” to the four-year-old. Last night he was chasing giant grasshoppers at dinner with his older brothers. One taste and I confirm it is from the Thai-German bakery in the village. It’s a sweeter version of hearty walnut bread with chocolate frosting.
I see Phen waving the scissors and Mon covering up her nose as we approach. My boyfriend’s self-deprecating remark about his big farung nose had led Mon to confess that her nose is too wide and too flat – a distinct characteristic of Eastern Thais – and she longs for a nose more like mine. Phen pulls out a map and Mon shows us the East Thai hometown she and her husband left to join Seasons when it first opened this past April. I’m never certain if the scissors are meant to graft one of our noses onto Mon’s but everyone scurries away from Phen regardless. Watching the farce, the blond German man sipping his beer behind us chuckles. The old Italian couple that walks over each afternoon to the restaurant from their southern bungalows smiles in acknowledgment. Part of the charm is that each of the guests – and visitors - has their own unique running joke. This becomes one of ours for the rest of our stay.
I walk up to the counter and Mon and Phen are laughing uproariously. It’s only when I peer over the counter that I see the maid – I don’t recall her name but we’ve danced at the Christmas party – sitting bowlegged on the floor, laundry basket to the side, holding a folded towel against her belly as if it will stop her insides from bursting forth in mirth. I feel my self-consciousness encroaching in such a moment of pure relentless connection even though there is no reason to. It makes no matter who is called owner, guest, waitress, maid. We all are the many faces of Kuan Yin - the Buddhist goddess of compassion whose name literally means “one who hears the cries of the world.”
I’m reading the guest book. Most of the writing isn’t English. As a marketing consultant, I know you can’t ply for testimonials like this: “I’ve been traveling for eight months in Thailand, and in all my travels these are my favorite bungalows.” “Thanks for teaching me how to cook the special “Seasons” Fried Noodle with Chicken. Now I can remember your family and Koh Jum when I cook it.” “We stayed for one night as we had to continue on to West Railey beach. Once there we realized we had to come right back.”
There is much more to the story – for instance, we could speak of that time when Mon bought us butterscotch ice cream from the old man with the freezer-mounted “ice cream bike" - but this is enough now. (And this interruption was not brought to you by a sponsor.)
There are two pianos in a room. Now strike the A note on one piano. Walking over to the second piano, you will notice there will be solely one string vibrating - the A.
When people are speaking the truth,” poet Olga Broumas once told me, “there are different vibrations than when they are spinning their wheels. That’s also something very audibly perceptual if someone brings their attention to it.” To tune to these vibrations requires us to hear our body’s internal vibrations, the vibrations from which language emanates. – Jeff Davis, from The Journey from the Center to the Page
Lovely. Just lovely.
And the quote at the end is good for meditating on, too.
I'm liking the story direction. Very much.
Posted by: Colleen | Feb 20, 2005 at 08:55 PM