1/19 -- Farang

"Farang" is the Thai word for "white/European person," and it is a term that (I believe) has a rich history both as as a pejorative by anti-Western Thais as well as a moniker for self-aware visitors. For this blog entry, the former use seems more appropriate.

After we had some Internet time on Sunday (1/18), I led Audrey through town to show her a coffee shop I'd seen on a ride through town with Wat the day before. I figured she'd appreciate it as another activity on an otherwise lazy Sunday (also, see "Addiction," above). The place I'd had in mind was closed, but right down the street, nestled in the shade of some tall trees and bordered by a wall of neon bouganvilla flowers, was a cafe. Now, from the name, the fully English-language signage, and the manicured facade, we expected Dusita to be touristy. But it exceeded even my cynical expectations.

We walked past a Harley Davidson motorcycle emblazoned with British flag metallic patches, and past a sign advertising "Good Taste / Clean Food" that featured some kind of official-looking seal and a cheery, slanty-eyed, yellow-hued chef. The restaurant's walls were glass from top to bottom, blending the aesthetic of the outdoor gazebos and gardens into the dining area itself and giving the whole room an oasis feel.

Noticing a pair of sandals at the entrance, we bent to remove our shoes (as is customary for entering Thai homes) before stepping onto the glistening aqua-colored tiles. "No, no, no!" cried a woman's voice, and when I looked up I saw a woman hurrying toward us, smiling and admonishing us against removing our shoes. Dressed in an odd hodgepodge of Western (or, at least distinctly non-Thai) clothing (including a fanny pak!), she seated us near a window/wall, triangulated between an old man and another man in his 50s or so, both of them white.

The two men were traveling differently than we were. Whereas they were garbed in Panama Jack's "Third-World Adventure" gear from head to toe, I looked relatively trashy in my goofy utility shoes, white water-resistant pants, and musty France soccer jersey (a Pomona trash-can find, not a signal of any loyalty). [Quick aside: one time we hitched a ride into town and the man, who spoke some but not much English, inquired if I was French. I forget how big soccer is outside of 'Merkuh.] With our backpack on my shoulders, a week's beard ("getting pubey," Audrey says) and a film of sweat upon my face, and my faithful Mt. Sac Agriculture trucker hat on my head, I looked...well...out of place.

And I felt that way too. At first I figured it was my usual discomfort at looking like a scrub when all my fellows have clearly bathed recently. But before Audrey could even place her order for an iced coffee (MOM ALERT: ICE!), our hostess was at work, self-ingratiating and making me uncomfortable. Spying the small, browning bananas Aud and I had schlepped from Wat's to eat along the way to town, she began to denounce them. "We have good bananas here, you don't have to eat those. Those for cooking...and feed to birds! I bring you good kind!"

Now, I'll spare our readers my lecture on the global Cavendish banana monocrop, but I hope y'all know that there are dozens of varieties of bananas in the world, even though 95% of the supermarkets we shop at sell only the Cavendish that we are used to. The bananas that Wat and his neighbors grow are three to four inches in length, come in bunches of ten or more, and are firmer and more moist than Cavendish bananas, with the sweetness of a slightly underripe Cavendish but without the that-wasn't-ready-yet aftertaste. And we'd gotten used to them. They are different, yes, but not inferior. And just as Wat takes pride in eating foods his neighbors write off as unfit for people, I began to appreciate these little Thai squylinder bananas of ours for being so un-Cavendish.

Torn between this reaction and the obvious determination of our hostess/waitress/Maitre de, I went along for the ride. Aud had her coffee, I a beer, and we shared some fried, extremely un-bold spring rolls. We each also ate one of the Cavendish bananas the woman brought out. They were good, but not superior.

While we sipped our drinks, I began ot soak in the atmosphere and fuel my impression that we'd stumbled upon a hyper-Westernized, ingratiating, almost anti-Thai establishment, geared toward arrogant foreigners who see Thailand as an inexpensive tropical playplace for retirement, rather than a different--but equally valuable--nation and culture, due the respect each connotes. In place of a Buddhist shrine was a tavern-style mahogany bar. Instead of a picture glorifying the Royal Couple, the walls sported posters such as a collage of beer bottles with the caption, "So many hard decisions."

The woman asked where we came from and declared excitedly that she often visits San Francisco, as part of some kind of Asian Royalty Society or something like that, seemingly an association of well-to-do folks from Southeast Asia who relish the opportunity to rub elbows with the mucky-mucks of the West.

Then the 50s-ish man piped up, making polite smalltalk with us about California and Bush and so forth. Aud and I got quiet, and the conversation disappated, after he declared that the Thai people, "well...they just don't have much culture here." He then launched into a tirade against their uncultivated aesthetic preferences, since his neighbors had not been thrilled that the ex-pat had painted his bungalow in multi-colored patterns of geometric shapes.

Once Aud and I exchanged a big-eyed glance and clammed up, he engaged the geriatric, interrupting the latter's futile, toothless attempts to slurp up some kind of noodle soup. In gloriously stereotypical British accents, they complained about the difficulties and expenses involved in importing their riches and pensions from the UK to this primitive land for their comfort and largesse. I can't say I was all that sympathetic.

This rant has gone on too long already, so I'll wrap it up. It's not that air conditioning and a Western toilet are bad things, but I was just very weirded out by palpable sentiment that West > Thai. My heart tells me that the expression ought to be an equation, not an inequality. (West = Thai, for the math-illiterate). And especially through the lens of anti-consumerism, or environmental consciousness, or what have you, it might be more appropriate to invert the inequality (West < Thai).

This trip keeps throwing us curveballs--our latest one seems to be negotiating our privilege as Americans while also exploiting it to do this learning and searching. It's a frustrating irony.

<3
Kyle