Twirl in Pattaya

The man with the grooved face and the oversized spectacles read with sad but also somewhat frightened eyes at the regular table of Ons Moeder de Telegraaf. He reminded me of someone, but who?

What struck me most about him, however, was that he was wearing a raincoat, and not one of those plastic flubbers as is customary here in the rainy season, but a real Burberry! I couldn't wait to talk to him, but I restrained myself because undisturbed reading of the newspaper is sacred to me, I'm very old-fashioned at that.

After a while, when he pushed the newspaper aside with a sigh, I couldn't think of anything better than the usual question: "Is there anything left today?"

He looked at me with a tired look that immediately convinced me of the futility of my question and sighed again. He ignored my stupid question and responded with a question of his own: 'Do they have any other newspapers here? The NRC, the Volkskrant, the Parool perhaps?'

That voice, that lingering intonation, that somewhat posh, Hague accent ..... I knew enough. 'Mr. Carmiggelt! You here in Pattaya! What a surprise!' He looked around caught and said in a low voice: 'Say Simon, but not too loudly. I am here incognito and I would be very grateful if you would not publicize my presence here. I'm a bit tired of the pub life in Amsterdam and have heard that there is an extensive nightlife circuit here in Pattaya. It's high time for new inspiration.'

Of course I felt very honored that he confided in me, but I had to say something. 'Mr. Carm… er, Simon, with all due respect, but if you want to go unnoticed here, you're going to have to do something about your clothes. That jacket is really eye catching. They might think you're a quiet one, or worse, a journalist.'

'Then they're right, too, because I'm a journalist, a newspaperman, so this jacket is a journalist's jacket. According to Arjen Fortuin in the NRC, I'm even a literary giant in this coat, so I'll be careful not to take it off! But yes, I also think: what is a literary giant? Is that a giant who writes beautiful books? Giants don't write books: they prefer to kill each other and eat their own and other people's children. In my opinion, they are rather uncivilized and illiterate creatures. Have you ever heard of a giant reading a book or a newspaper? Well then! No, a literary giant is like a vegetarian tiger: a contradiction in terms.'

'Simon, now you give a quip. You know quite well what is meant by a literary giant: a man of gigantic stature.'

'Yes, of course I do. But I just love jokes. By the way, I'm not a giant literati. My stature as a man of letters is very modest and limited. I write short pieces in the newspaper, half-column italics, and not thick novels like serious writers do. I admit that I write well and it rains no complaints, but it is all small-scale and short-winded. So the title literary giant is completely out of place in my case and whoever came up with that has a twist in their head. Literary giants win Nobel prizes, I don't. Although, nowadays you also seem to be able to win the Nobel Prize with short stories…. Anyway, that coat can indeed be taken off now, don't you think?

With a sigh of relief he got rid of his much too warm Burberry and ordered us both a whiskey with ice. His look remained melancholy, but the shock had vanished, and when I proposed to show him around Walking Street, even a certain jollity took possession of him.

I promised Simon I'd show him around Walking Street, so off we went. As I assumed he would appreciate that as a writer, I led him into the Casnovy a Go Go bar.

A bar named after the eighteenth-century erotomaniac Casanova, who writes extensively about his busy love life in his memoirs. Simon's rather large glasses suddenly filled with eye as he took in the scene in the bar. Eight completely naked, high-heeled, long-legged and very graceful ladies populated the stage in the middle of the bar, where they danced to the rhythm of the music, all the while ogling the very predominantly male clientele.

We sat down in a place that offered a good overview. It took Simon quite some effort to tear himself away from the stage scene and think about what he wanted to drink. We both limited ourselves to a Jack Daniels and enjoyed the erotic ballet again. In silence, because the conversation was made very difficult by the violence of the decibels of the music. Only when you brought your heads close together and then screamed at hurricane force was it possible to exchange ideas.

When I yelled at Simon like that that all those girls were available to go with clients for an hour or for the whole night, he was completely taken aback and argued that prostitution was illegal in Thailand. yes right? Or was he wrong? I explained to him that no one was talking about prostitution, that you paid the bar an appropriate fee for temporarily removing a female employee from employment, and that it was nobody's business what the girl and the customer did with each other. Why prostitution? He had a hard time with this example of national hypocrisy, but he also liked the idea that the earnings went entirely to the girl and that there was apparently no pimp in the story.

Pensively, he returned his gaze to the dancers. The girls put on the tiniest thongs I'd ever seen for a change, and made way for a new crew. They descended the stage and scattered throughout the bar, seeking inviting glances from men who, as Oscar Wilde said, can resist anything but temptation. Apparently Simon had been staring a little too long and too interestedly at one of the dancers, because a leggy beauty resolutely turned her steps towards him, sat down next to him, introduced herself as Pon and asked his name.

Somewhat bewildered, Simon answered her question and I whispered in hurricane force that he could offer her a drink and have a chat with her. But about what, he asked. Well, I said, you ask where she's from, how long she's been working here, how old she is, about her family, if she has a boyfriend, if she likes her job, things like that. And of course you tell her that she is a beautiful, sexy woman and that she can dance well.

He turned to her and apparently the conversation got going nicely because new drinks were regularly delivered next to me and I had plenty of time to immerse myself undisturbed in the aesthetic and motor skills of the girls of the new team. I savored all that beauty, with the detached peace of mind of someone who has long since identified himself as an observing participant with escapist tendencies. Lucky, I said to myself: there you are again in the well-known win-win situation. When I decide to take a girl with me, I get dizzy at the thought of the pleasure she's about to give me. If I decide not to take her, I'm going to get dizzy thinking about the amount of money I'm saving!

Simon's sweetheart re-entered the stage to relieve her colleagues and he watched her dreamily. "And?" I asked him, "Is she going to be okay?" Simon let out a deep sigh. “Ah, you know,” he said, with a melancholy look in his eyes, “everything in life is a matter of time, money and meaning. Initially you have the desire and time but no money, then you have money and desire but no time for anything. In the end, your money and time just don't feel like it anymore. At least, not enough.”

I shared my view of the win-win situation with him and we decided to take off, detached but with deepened insight. We paid the bill, took a taxi and I delivered Simon to the condotel where he is staying, the name of which I am not disclosing at his urgent request.