The Neighbors (Reader Submission)

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We live in a relatively short street: behind the houses on the same row as our house is a fairly large eucalyptus forest that continues to a small lane where a state school is located. So there is relatively little traffic passing by. Unless… Sometimes, very occasionally, the police do checks. In such a case, a terrace with tables, chairs and parasols is first set up along the large road that runs through the village with 6 lanes. That 'police checkpoint' is always in the same place, and everyone can see it from hundreds of meters away. During Christmas and New Year's time, that terrace is there for a week.

The location of the terrace is clearly well thought out: a hundred and fifty meters before that there is a small road on the left – you officially drive on the left here – that leads to that school behind us. You follow that road almost to the school, then you turn right through the forest, then left, and now you are in our street. Follow for fifty meters, right again and you are back on the main road, but a bit past the checkpoint.

On inspection days, our street gets pretty busy, because everything that is not in order comes thundering past: cars that are barely worthy of the name, with everything rattling, young boys on revved-up motorbikes and of course without helmets, smoking tractors from the Japanese occupation. (I dare say that in every Thai village you can easily find enough material for a car museum.)
We find this extremely annoying, and we have even pointed out to the police that there is an escape route. Once it was checked for an hour, then it was over. Why? Perhaps a Major Resident (BI) had protested?

So this checkpoint, like so many others here, is just for show, and only very drunk drivers who don't belong here get caught.

Our neighbours also live along this street. At least: the visible neighbours. On the other side of the street, we look out onto the backs of a few houses. The windows are covered with plastic. Why windows are covered and covered is an unanswerable question for Sue too: it must be terribly hot there, because the kitchens are at the back. So we never see those neighbours, only hear them sometimes. Although cooking smells rarely waft over here.

Next to our house, on either side, is a very similar house, with the same fake Thai-Greek style columns at the entrance. That’s where the similarities end. The house on the right is occupied by a young couple – she a teacher in the school behind, he a doctor or nurse in the state hospital here. They rent the house, and every evening I see him neatly washing and hanging up the laundry – clear traces of a new generation. He also does regular gardening, although he limits himself to the bare minimum. She picks up the two children. Unfortunately, foreign languages ​​are not part of their new culture.

On the other side, the old culture neighbors live together in a whole bunch: an older man whose voice rasps like that of any general here, a woman who is always busy, a very fat older son, his wife, a child and the other son, younger and less fat.

Together they have three cars and four motorbikes. What they need all that for is one of the mysteries of Thai culture. And an old noisy washing machine, an old top-loader thing, that toils all night and day. Their house is as big as ours. Paint is peeling everywhere, especially from the ceiling on the terrace and in the living room. It may be the same in the other rooms, but we can't look inside them. The lamps on the terrace hang tiredly and belong to the generation of what used to be fluorescent lamps.

In the twelve years we’ve lived here, I’ve seen the windows washed twice. The first time I don’t remember: too long ago. The second and last time, there were a few possible reasons for this miracle: when the fattest son and his wife/girlfriend moved into the garage, a group of monks were invited to consecrate the new home, according to time-honored tradition; another possibility: a loan was taken out at a bank – Thais are the biggest borrowers in the world – and then the director came to take a look; third possibility? What was the third option? A family party?

Next to their house was – just like ours – a raised area with a roof and they came to see how we had made a guest room with a bathroom out of it. I have never been inside their house, but I don't see a bathroom in that small space, and they also seem to have never heard of windows.

What the sons do exactly is not very clear. In any case: they do absolutely nothing at home. In this they follow the father's tradition. He sells pork balls three times a week at a market in Chainat. He buys them himself somewhere in a small factory, so it doesn't take much effort. Some time ago the health inspectorate - they really exist! - raided a few factories and closed them all down. There were photos of what the production process must have been like. It really didn't look appetizing.

The eldest son must be something like a claims adjuster for car accidents. Given the number of accidents in Thailand, that could be quite lucrative. The child's mother works as a saleswoman at Toyota. Saleswoman? Yes, here girls or young women are still used to facilitate a sale. What they know about cars and earn from it is a mystery to me. Thai classic car sales have declined sharply in recent years, partly because loans that are already running are being looked at more strictly.

The youngest son is also in the car business: apparently you can also use your car as collateral to take out a loan, and he runs a small shop for a company that specializes in that. What that brings in? No idea.
I saw the two sons doing something around the house once: I had just repainted our house inside and out, and I guess the mother finally got the hang of it. I heard loud shouting, and that afternoon they both stood there laughing, painting the metal fence posts. That was the only time.

The grandparents are – as everywhere – also the babysitters for the grandchildren. Or in this case: for the son of Dik and Toyota. The child is a year older than my youngest grandchildren who are two. He has bushy, standing hair, a round face and a rather chubby body. He still doesn't speak a word, but he talks for two. Especially during the day: I suspect that he goes to the garage in the evening and that is a bit further away.

There are still clear differences with the neighbours on the other side: with the old neighbours everything is cemented up. No tree or plant has escaped. It must be terrible when the hot season comes around again. They also had the illusion for a long time that garbage that you throw over the wall (in the eucalyptus forest) is not seen by anyone. Until we told them that the forest belonged to the mayor, who just walked by that day with her entourage. The following week there were elections. Since then I sometimes see them lugging garbage. And since then we have not seen any more rats.

Submitted by GLipari