You experience everything in Thailand (57)

You go to Thailand on holiday and meet a lady in a bar, with whom you have a drink and who then stays in your company for the entire holiday. And…, as Keespattaya says herself, one thing leads to another. A romance is born.

How that continued and eventually came to an end, Keespattaya tells in the story below.

My romance with Maliwan

I have been coming to Thailand since 1989, and after visiting Pattaya in 1991, I became addicted to this city. I have now visited Thailand 80 times. After the short visit in 1989 of 4 days to Bangkok, before a tour of Indonesia, a friend and I decided to make a tour of Thailand in 1990. Then we also went to the Isaan. That was the last for now.

In June 1996 I went alone to Pattaya again. That was usually a 17-day trip. I had already been to Pattaya quite a few times and was planning to make it another pleasant 2 weeks.

Coincidentally, there was also a photographer from Breda in Pattaya at the time, whom I had met before. The second day he asked me to go for a beer at the Wunder Bar (which was later called “We are the World” and now ”Lisa on the Beach”) I actually didn't feel like it, because that bar mainly Germans to drink, but to please him I went with him and his Thai girlfriend.

When we sat down at the bar, my eye immediately fell on a very beautiful lady. Leak was her name. She didn't speak a word of English and the mamasan wanted to translate, but I spoke to her in my best Thai. She said she arrived in Pattaya an hour ago. Yes yes girl, and I'm in Thailand for the first time, I thought. But soon there was a click, and not much later she was drinking a bottle of Heineken and I was drinking the Singha. The sequel can be guessed, one thing led to another and Lek went with me.

The next morning I asked where she slept in Pattaya. She rented a room in Pattaya Klang. When I asked if she was interested in spending 2 weeks with me, she replied positively. So together to Klang and in her room it turned out that she had indeed only just arrived in Pattaya. Everything fit in 1 weekend bag. She slept on the floor and the landlord had rented her a fan.

Did a lot around Pattaya in those 2 weeks. B, the photographer, took a lot of pictures in the area with his girlfriend and us. At that time people had just started with the Buddha Mountain. In the evening we often went to Malibu in Soi Postoffice. It soon became clear to me that she was really in Pattaya for the first time. My bond with Lek, whose real name was Maliwan, grew closer and closer. But she found Pattaya a bit too "rough" for her. She said she was going back to Khon Kaen after my holiday. But we would keep in touch.

At that time it was still done by mail. I wrote to her in English, which she had translated, and she wrote to me in Thai, which I had a friend of mine's wife translate. I also wrote a letter to the Dutch embassy in Thailand asking what we had to meet to allow her to come to the Netherlands for 3 months. I got a nice answer from the embassy.

Still, contact faded. In 1997 I went back to Thailand. Still contacted Maliwan again, who clearly didn't like Pattaya for 2 weeks and I didn't see myself going to KhonKaen that quickly. So we decided that Maliwan would come to Pattaya and then we would go to Khon Kaen by plane together. At the time I always stayed at the Sunbeam in Soi 8 and sure enough, when I got there Maliwan was already waiting for me.

Booked a ticket to Khon Kaen at JK Travel and off we went. On Don Muang, she still had to eat at McDonalds and, moreover, fries had to be brought for her daughter. Maliwan had arranged the Charoen Thani Hotel for us. After we arrived she asked for money to rent a car. Not much later she came back with a car. I asked her if she had a driver's license. “No,” she said, “but the police know me! I often drive my sister's pick-up to pick up the groceries.” Her sister turned out to have a supermarket near the central bus station in Khon Kaen. Went there together and met sister. Maliwan could immediately start helping, because it was busy. By the way, sister was even more beautiful than Maliwan.

The next day we went to her parents and her 2 year old daughter Nongsaay. They lived just north of Khonkaen in Khuanubonrat, right on the Ubonrat reservoir. Her father was working on the farm with the ducks and mother was lying in a hammock munching on a betel nut. We also went a few kilometers further to the reservoir, where there was a nice beach. I went here with Maliwan and 2 of her friends. Very very busy but I was the only farang. Of course plenty of food and drink.

During one of the last days something unpleasant happened. In the middle of the night the phone rang. Maliwan was shocked and immediately left. Her sister had been in a car accident and was in the hospital. I then went with her to the hospital. In no way comparable to a Dutch hospital. When we sat at sister's bed, several sellers of all kinds of food passed by.

Of course we often talked about Maliwan going to the Netherlands with me. Actually, I had already given up on this, until suddenly in 1999 she told me that she wanted to come with me to the Netherlands. That was during a holiday in Pattaya. I had persuaded Maliwan to go to Pattaya with me again. Suddenly, a passport had to be made for her. When this was done after 1 week, a visa had to be arranged for her at the Dutch embassy. So together with her to Bangkok, where we were not exactly welcomed. You heard them think: there's another one who fell in love during his vacation. This changed when they found my letter from 1996 in my papers, which showed that we had known each other for over 3 years. Visa was no longer a problem then.

Maliwan had a great time in the Netherlands, but she also wanted to work. Of course that was not allowed on a visa. After she went back to Thailand, we arranged a residence permit. In May 2000 she came to the Netherlands with a residence permit. Then she also found work. Simple packing work, because she only spoke Thai. She didn't mind. However, things didn't go so well between us and after six months she decided to go back to Thailand.

Since then I haven't had a real serious relationship. I did go to Thailand a lot and then keep going to Pattaya in particular.