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With Saturday being a budhist holiday and Monday being the resulting public holiday, everyone was expecting a quiet weekend in Bangkok as the business visitors delay trips and residents escape the city and spend 6 hours in traffic jams wondering if the whole of the city has left town at the exact same moment they did.
Ironically, nothing could be further from the truth as the bar itself was very busy on Thursday night, Friday was relatively quiet and then Saturday was the day that bars were instructed to close. Pandemonium broke loose though on Sunday morning when Jay was awoken with a phone call circa 10am. For someone to ring at 10am - it meant only two things - it was either her parents or some guy hitting up for a date after getting her number from the internet. Unlucky for her, it was her mum. "We decided to come and visit you as tomorrow is a holiday - we are on the way and will be staying at your cousins and will come and see you tonight" apparently was the message. Jay sat bolt upright in the bed, muttered something akin to "oh Shit" and turned white.
After jumping out of the bed and calling her sister - she said to me "so are you going to your house tonight or staying here?" I can only assume that meant her comfy little world in Bangkok, 400km's away from her parents was about to turn upside down. my first reply knowing her dad is something in the army was along the lines of "does he keep a gun is his car?" - "No, not normally" was the reply - "but he has them at the house" - big comfort to me; that reply surely was not.
Fast forward a bit after an uneventfull day of Jay getting into a blind panic whenever the phone rang or later whenever the door to the bar opened, sometime around 9pm that evening the family arrived at Guess Bar. Luckily for Jay, her flirtatious sister had been barfined about 10 minutes previously - completely unphased by the upcoming arrival of her folks. If anything, she, unlike Jay seemed to thrive on the riskiness of being caught and was extremely frisky with the poor guy she had set her sights on. I'll come back to that point as it was an interesting lesson - maybe Ziggy can provide an analysis for us.
So come the arrival and first of 3 young guys walk in - all circa 20-25 and one younger girl circa 20. Mum followed but dad was not there. Luckily for me I was at the bar chatting with a guy I know and thus able to view the proceedings and make a quick exit as soon as I saw a pump action shotgun or an M16 borrowed from the Thai army appearing. Luckily at the moment they walked in Gong the barman was getting us another couple of (stiff) drinks. So he fed us an ongoing commentary. I had forgotten that Gong and Jay went to school together and so he already knew all of Jays family and chatted with for a few moments as did Pong the cashier. Jays mum was surprised to see both Gong and Pong who she had taught as children attending the school where she is a teacher. So they were all ushered by Jay up to the comfy sofa which luckily had just been vacated by Jane not 10 minutes before and she rushed around opening bottles of premium whisky, beers etc for the gathered kin.
After about two minutes, the father appeared - presumably either having gone for a leak in the toilet or otherwise to check & load up the shotgun or whatever sidearm he had tucked under his shirt. To describe him as a small but very powerfully built guy is a bit like saying a tomahawk missile looks harmless enough from the outside.
I had already done my homework and dropped into the conversation (again) that my cousin had trained the Prince when he was seconded to the UK as part of this air force training. Gong was impressed by that, but Jay said nothing. This was all done to try and establish exactly where in the hierarchy Jays dad sat - ie was he an officer, an NCO or just a relative nobody. Nobody could tell me the answer to that except that he got promoted a lot (big deal - even a car park attendant in Thailand gets promoted and has medals in the use of a whistle) and had many medals and shiny bits on his dress uniform.
So after Jays dad walked in and greeted his daughter and then all the other staff with lots of deep Wai's (from the staff), he glanced around, presumably to see where the bullets may lodge and noting to avoid shooting up the plasma TV which might look good on his living room wall. Seeing the Arsenal match on TV he decided to sit at the bar and ordered a Heineken with lots of smiles and scurrying going on around him. Two of Jays cousins came and sat at the bar as well, barely 4m from me but luckily I somehow managed to remain invisible. I checked and did not see any tell tale red dots anywhere around my heart so I relaxed a bit feeling that a sniper did not have his rifle aimed on me at that given moment.
Jay meanwhile was chatting away to her mum and two cousins who remained on the sofa. Jenny however was eyeing up all 3 of the male cousins - more of that later. Jane was still up in the horizontal position somewhere on the 3rd floor.
After what seemed like forever, but was only really 15 minutes and 3 drinks later, Jay beckoned me over to meet her mum. I dont think her dad even noticed me as he was thrilled to be watching the English premier league and probably mentally sizing up which wall that Plasma would look best on in his house.
So I slowly walked over to the sofa ensuring no sudden movements that may induce an instant reaction with a loaded pistol from the said father and went and chatted to Jay, her mum and cousins. I did my own form of a pillow job and tried to disguise myself between the cushions wondering what ability they would have to stop a bullet. I think I found Jane knickers under one cushion and quickly put those back where I found them. Jays mum was lovely and a typical schoolteacher - easy to get on with, asking all the sort of questions she normally would of a shy nervous, 5 year old on his first day at school !!!! - Seemingly that went well and then Jays dad decided to come over.....
Ironically, nothing could be further from the truth as the bar itself was very busy on Thursday night, Friday was relatively quiet and then Saturday was the day that bars were instructed to close. Pandemonium broke loose though on Sunday morning when Jay was awoken with a phone call circa 10am. For someone to ring at 10am - it meant only two things - it was either her parents or some guy hitting up for a date after getting her number from the internet. Unlucky for her, it was her mum. "We decided to come and visit you as tomorrow is a holiday - we are on the way and will be staying at your cousins and will come and see you tonight" apparently was the message. Jay sat bolt upright in the bed, muttered something akin to "oh Shit" and turned white.
After jumping out of the bed and calling her sister - she said to me "so are you going to your house tonight or staying here?" I can only assume that meant her comfy little world in Bangkok, 400km's away from her parents was about to turn upside down. my first reply knowing her dad is something in the army was along the lines of "does he keep a gun is his car?" - "No, not normally" was the reply - "but he has them at the house" - big comfort to me; that reply surely was not.
Fast forward a bit after an uneventfull day of Jay getting into a blind panic whenever the phone rang or later whenever the door to the bar opened, sometime around 9pm that evening the family arrived at Guess Bar. Luckily for Jay, her flirtatious sister had been barfined about 10 minutes previously - completely unphased by the upcoming arrival of her folks. If anything, she, unlike Jay seemed to thrive on the riskiness of being caught and was extremely frisky with the poor guy she had set her sights on. I'll come back to that point as it was an interesting lesson - maybe Ziggy can provide an analysis for us.
So come the arrival and first of 3 young guys walk in - all circa 20-25 and one younger girl circa 20. Mum followed but dad was not there. Luckily for me I was at the bar chatting with a guy I know and thus able to view the proceedings and make a quick exit as soon as I saw a pump action shotgun or an M16 borrowed from the Thai army appearing. Luckily at the moment they walked in Gong the barman was getting us another couple of (stiff) drinks. So he fed us an ongoing commentary. I had forgotten that Gong and Jay went to school together and so he already knew all of Jays family and chatted with for a few moments as did Pong the cashier. Jays mum was surprised to see both Gong and Pong who she had taught as children attending the school where she is a teacher. So they were all ushered by Jay up to the comfy sofa which luckily had just been vacated by Jane not 10 minutes before and she rushed around opening bottles of premium whisky, beers etc for the gathered kin.
After about two minutes, the father appeared - presumably either having gone for a leak in the toilet or otherwise to check & load up the shotgun or whatever sidearm he had tucked under his shirt. To describe him as a small but very powerfully built guy is a bit like saying a tomahawk missile looks harmless enough from the outside.
I had already done my homework and dropped into the conversation (again) that my cousin had trained the Prince when he was seconded to the UK as part of this air force training. Gong was impressed by that, but Jay said nothing. This was all done to try and establish exactly where in the hierarchy Jays dad sat - ie was he an officer, an NCO or just a relative nobody. Nobody could tell me the answer to that except that he got promoted a lot (big deal - even a car park attendant in Thailand gets promoted and has medals in the use of a whistle) and had many medals and shiny bits on his dress uniform.
So after Jays dad walked in and greeted his daughter and then all the other staff with lots of deep Wai's (from the staff), he glanced around, presumably to see where the bullets may lodge and noting to avoid shooting up the plasma TV which might look good on his living room wall. Seeing the Arsenal match on TV he decided to sit at the bar and ordered a Heineken with lots of smiles and scurrying going on around him. Two of Jays cousins came and sat at the bar as well, barely 4m from me but luckily I somehow managed to remain invisible. I checked and did not see any tell tale red dots anywhere around my heart so I relaxed a bit feeling that a sniper did not have his rifle aimed on me at that given moment.
Jay meanwhile was chatting away to her mum and two cousins who remained on the sofa. Jenny however was eyeing up all 3 of the male cousins - more of that later. Jane was still up in the horizontal position somewhere on the 3rd floor.
After what seemed like forever, but was only really 15 minutes and 3 drinks later, Jay beckoned me over to meet her mum. I dont think her dad even noticed me as he was thrilled to be watching the English premier league and probably mentally sizing up which wall that Plasma would look best on in his house.
So I slowly walked over to the sofa ensuring no sudden movements that may induce an instant reaction with a loaded pistol from the said father and went and chatted to Jay, her mum and cousins. I did my own form of a pillow job and tried to disguise myself between the cushions wondering what ability they would have to stop a bullet. I think I found Jane knickers under one cushion and quickly put those back where I found them. Jays mum was lovely and a typical schoolteacher - easy to get on with, asking all the sort of questions she normally would of a shy nervous, 5 year old on his first day at school !!!! - Seemingly that went well and then Jays dad decided to come over.....
looks like Mum sees you as good marriage material, and Dad wants the Plasma.
In answer to brock's question - I guess your right - Jay has previously told me he has struggled with them becoming ladyboys, but is now comfortable with it. He genuinely seemed surprised at the quality of the bar and what Jay has achieved - maybe he was expecting some seedy dump with sawdust on the floor. Luckily the bar does look classy which works well in the impressing stakes. Not sure about his relationship with Jane, Jay certainly seems closer - maybe and infact probably Jane is the more rebellious of the two twins. Unfortunately the 3rd child, who is a real girl did not come down. Apparently she is stunning, albeit only 17 or 18 and about to start studying at a University in Bangkok. 
Good yarn bro. When did you get time to write this saga. I bet writing it all down was good to get it of your chest. 
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