He Has A Broken Face

I know you've already seen this pic, but here it is again just in case you forgot. Meet Mr. Prasong, a drunk.

Here he is, keeping it classy.

Mr. P comes to school reeking of alcohol, and his English is good enough for him to talk in detail about his hangovers. Again, classy.

He has never been a problem for me, because A) he isn't around much at school, and B) he clearly favors Lia. Well, Lia wasn't there, and apparently my casual, off-work look was more appealing to him. He couldn't contain himself. After he had asked to shake my hand and I agreed over 10 times, I finally started to refuse. The thing is, it's a sticky situation because he is a man, a director, and I'm in Thailand. I'm not exactly sure of the appropriate response, and since I know he may be annoying but isn't actually going to hurt me, I didn't want to offend their culture by telling him to buzz off.

His hand shake obsession comes from the Thai obsession with scent. Instead of kissing, they sniff. They will ask to shake your hand and then smell it, getting a lot more than I ever meant to give from the ordeal. This is not always the case, for sure, but with him it was.

A group of us were sitting at the table and he walks up, just staring at me. Literally, everyone is talking, I am kind of blending into the background, and he stops and ogles me shamelessly. Awkward much?! And, I'm a little peeved because I have had two hard core babysitters throughout the trip who have all of a sudden deserted my cause. Now I want you to stand up for me, why aren't you saying anything (because he is a man and their superior, that's why)?? He asks me to shake his hand and dance, which pisses me off because there are only like 10 people around watching the situation unfold, and I politely declined. Burn.

He felt the burn, and according to the teachers, He had a broken face. Huh? Broken Face! Broken Face! Finally, I discovered they meant that I shamed him. Not quite sure if I had just committed an irreparable faux pas, I discussed it on the hush hush with Madam.

Me: Psst. Was it okay for me to turn him down? Should I go shake his hand and dance with him?

Madam: It's okay. He is eve. 

What? Eve?? I went ahead and assumed it was short for evil, and umm, loved it. Who knew she was hip to the modern abbrev- lingo.

This is quite a lead in, but Thais say all kinds of things along these lines that make perfect sense to them, and we don't have a friggin' clue what they mean. 

The other big one of the weekend was Sun stand up, like a man no hair. In the morning the teachers repeated this over and over, cracking up laughing. I was laughing as well, pretending to have a clue, when one of them asked me point blank if I understood. 

In my head I was debating how to respond as my immediate and honest answer would have been Uhhhh, abso-freakin-lutely not. I am laughing to blend in with this ridiculousness, and avoid the line of questioning you have just begun. Damn.

I went with, Uhhhh, A little.

This wasn't satisfying enough, and I was questioned further, which is so unusual. Are you able to follow the conversation? Do native speakers understand? Me, having already crossed over into Oh No Oh No Oh No, how did we possibly get to this topic? tried to put out the fire with Uhhhhh, I understand, but I live here. It's hard to say if others would follow (not hard at all, never in a million years would you know what was going on).

Man, quite an uncomfortable 5 minutes of my life. I was completely surprised the question ever came up, as it is certainly unusual to discuss in that manner, but the bottom line is, in general, the quality of English here is very poor. On the other hand, all countries have their own mixed and jumbled version of English-speak, so it's not really fair to be singling out Thailand. I just see it more because I'm here more.

And on that note, the need for English here is different than other countries. In general, spanning no further than for basic tourism purposes, as opposed to Korea, where they were fierce. Learning English as if their lives depended on it, all those kiddos wanted to leave their home country and go to college in England or the US. They were getting outta dodge, and English was option primo. Obviously, to be successful, their skills would have to be superb. Here, after learning How can I help you, and You are very beautiful, you are mostly set when it comes to pleasing the tourists. No one in Thailand wants to move away and never come back. Which is really pretty cool, since they like their country enough to be happy with it.

The follow up:

- Sun stand up, like a man no hair means sunrise, and they are comparing the sun to a bald man. Did you follow? I certainly needed to be told.

- I've since found out the teachers were so not okay with Mr. P's actions over the weekend as far as I was concerned, which made me feel a lot less crazy. They were disgusted actually, and I was glad to hear it.