*

This was not the time or place. You don't understand me, he said. You don't understand me, the boy replied. And so it was that one of their most intense conversations followed; precarious, these days, yet full of wonder, different things, the party that never ended, hysterical moments, frustrating moments, time out of mind and out of joint, wanted, wanted, for all to see, for the times that were and never were, for things that should never have been, for a life that is now coming to an end, closing, closing, these days of happiness and good luck, times for all to see, times when we should have been free. It was going to be alright. I am free. These things will make no difference. Love and live and learn. I don't believe you, the woman on the beach said, as he hunted desperately for a love he could not deny and destined to be nothing but a malady of the heart, a passing time. You don't understand, you don't understand, I am Thai. These things were true. The endless succession of girls. Oh how it made a difference. How time passed and he grew older; and in these shadows and the dance floors and the laughter outside, in these times he found if not oblivion an even greater joy. He hadn't gone back to meetings, not yet.

There were times, here in the grip, when he could not have been happier. Finding these things. Doing these things. Making things happen. Shocking, shocking, what it all came to; the mistakes, those terrible expensive mistakes when everything moved and all was for free; when shocking things were done; when he made his way through the darkness only to be greeted by a doorman at a bar, by a summertime execution, by a significant other; by things that were nice but not nice, time that moved swiflty, only, only, fly quickly through these times. Coming back to Bangkok. Coming back to uniforms and sad times and moments when we were free; blessed; the heat of the day already settling in; summer time and the heat was blinding, and now in the morning and now in the night, walking walking through everything that had ever settled, through these dark moments, through rent boys. You don't know, you don't know. Take care of my friend. You don't understand Thailand. No, he did not understand Thailand. Take care of my friend.

Well he didn't understand and everything moved in shadows; walking, talking, through all these things. You show me you show me. At great expense. Everything cost so much money. He was marooned. That was for sure. But these things would end soon; very soon. And he would move quickly into another place; another condo, another apartment, into another life where we could be happy; where I am happy. Move to the centre of Thailand. I know everything. Everybody say to me, Baw, Baw, come with me, I give you tip, tip, and he sleep all day, part time, and not come to work when he did not feel like it. These things, these lazy days, were brutal in their simplicity. He wasn't going to be marked forever. He was just going to be a different person. Live quietly. Watch TV. Let the shadows walk upon the land. Let everything go free. Let the movement take charge. Let everything be quiet. Because now there was nothing and he rediscovered himself. There in the morning there in the night; in the night sky where everything could be free. I pay everything, tuk tuk, this, that, and now I have no baht. Well what a surprise. You give it all away. There is no moment when we can be free. The party must be over. Tonight, tonight, the party is over. That's for sure. We wake in the morning and we cry for peace. We wake in the evening and cry for forgiveness. We wake with a smile and hope for the best. That is the way of it all.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE64C0L620100522

(Reuters) - Troops searched for explosives while firefighters doused the embers of a torched luxury mall in central Bangkok on Saturday as the capital tried to pick up the pieces after the worst political riots in modern Thai history.

World | Thailand

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva had stressed reconciliation in an address to the nation on Friday but made no offer of early elections, the main demand of protesters who had demonstrated in Bangkok for two months until troops dispersed them this week.

The "red shirt" protesters who rioted in Bangkok come mainly from the rural and urban poor. They want new elections, saying they are disenfranchised by an urban elite that wields all the power and holds a disproportionate share of the country's wealth.

"Let me reassure you that this government will meet these challenges and overcome these difficulties through the five-point reconciliation plan that I had previously announced," Abhisit said in his televised address.

The plan, first announced on May 3, offers political reforms, social justice and an investigation into political violence.

The "red shirts" say Abhisit lacks a popular mandate after coming to power in a controversial parliamentary vote in 2008 with tacit military support.

The government says the protesters were manipulated by the movement's figurehead, ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a coup in 2006 and now lives in self-imposed exile to escape a prison term for abuse of power.

The military crackdown began before dawn on Wednesday, killing at least 15 people and wounding nearly 100. Erawan Emergency Medical Center said 53 people had died and 415 were wounded in the flare-up of violence from May 14.

Shoot to Kill

*

Shoot to kill, the government troops have been ordered; shoot to kill in order to defend the citadels of capitalism. The government now has serious bloodf on its hands. Even here in Chiang Mai there is a curfew, with none of the bars or clubs open, most everything closing at 8pm. Black smoke rolled over the Tapai Gate after a group of red shirt protestors set alight a pile of tyres. There was shooting at the airport. A general had his house burnt down. Against the wild night. Against times he could never understand. Against a cruel indifference. Too depressing, James said, throw in some humour. I'm going to meet someone I know, he thought clearly, 24-hours before running into him in chance encounter the prospects of which were infinitesimally small. Come inside, the English rent boy said. I'm in there. That means there's a party going on. Baw falls asleep at the bar. The succession of sex workers grows ever more frenzied. Time stands out of mind. He doesn't know anymore. Get this, get that, get the other; there's no oblivion; but there's certainly a fair amount of fun. Walking through the dawn raids, the bodies lingering outside discos. It's alright for you, you sleep all day, you are young. I am old and I don't sleep. Ever. As if the off switch had been destroyed. Master master.

Infinite in the gloom, and infinite in longing, the disco song beats out: I want to make love to you right now, right now. As if all this humping was getting anywhere. I wouldn't sleep with me, he laughingly declares, as tales of their exploits spread through the inner heart, that frozen frozen waste. I don't want to go home, he declared. Colonel Kurtz, the heart of darkness, James gibes, and we all collapse. Inky black clouds spread across the night sky. All for one and one for all. Take me to your heart, take me to your soul, goes another song of the moment. What is this? Give him 3,000 baht and he'll f... your brains out. As if anything mattered. They were all in a trance, mesmerised by the extremities, working, working, for all to see, time honoured and time out of mind, equivalent, I would say, to a four star general on a military operation; exposing all night life, all opportunity; the shuttered bars, closed for curfew, dragged through the brothels one last time; the heat is on, the heat is on; as if anything mattered and inspiration could rise. She lay between them with her wet hair strangled in the pillow. He was always more accommodating after a girl. That was the way they were made. Instant friends everywhere. I've come to give you kindness. Take away your heart. I made a few mistakes I don't want to talk about, he said. I'm your mother, not your confessor, she replied.

In the bleating heart of dawn; in a famous time, in a little piece of history; where everything was uncovered; here his old body lay sandwiched, and nothing could be more inglorious, more ridiculous; yet there was more fun to be had. They came and they went. Tfhey were shouldered on high. Their pert faces looked up. The girls were lined up for examination. Often the dark forces were gathered, as if this was the final spree. But insane as it was; here in the dawn, here in the night sky, there on the dance floor, there, there, where the heart was clear and free, where everyting was wild and nothing was for free, the baht rolling out, time out of mind, time for all men to be surrendered, for all that was there, cheap, cheap, insane little spirits, pigeons roofing on fibro rooftops; and he came short and long into another place; calling, calling, for forgiveness, for restitution, for the blessings of another day; for a life he never imagined, for gender benders galore; for time arrived and time pleasured; and the watching, the watching, I'm sorry, he said, after another disgrace involving short time girls; and was more accommodating than ever. He scowled into his old self and longed to be free. If only there was a way, to shed all these old pasts; to be infinitely clear on this; to make way for another and another; for the years to crawl past and for him to take a giant leap back int time; to those times when he stayed out all night every night and the city; and most anyone he chose; was all available. It was a different story now.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/thailand/7741635/Bangkok-in-flames-as-protesters-refuse-to-back-down.html

Rioters set fires at the stock exchange, electricity headquarters, banks and government offices. Siam Theatre, a much loved city institution, collapsed in flames. Hundreds of people had to be rescued from the burning headquarters of Channel 3 television. The death toll since fresh outbreaks of violence on Thursday now stands at 51.

The government issued "shoot on site" orders for a dawn raid as troops tried to disperse 2,000 Red Shirts who had been camped in Rajprasong, the capital's premier shopping and office district, for more than six weeks.

Seven of the Red Shirt leaders surrendered to police but militant gangs waged an arson and looting spree. The vast Central World shopping centre was torched as government troops shot to kill in a last ditch effort to defend it.

When the army finally marched cautiously into the protesters' former stronghold they discovered that the 2,000 strong crowd had dwindled to one woman.

Kuesadee Narukan, an elderly nurse, stood holding a red flag in the deserted arena. The sound system remained on and rice was cooking on the boilers. "I am not afraid. I am ready for my punishment," she said. "I am a fighter for democracy.

A few lame stragglers on the makeshift beds were arrested. The others had left for a sports stadium to be loaded on to buses for home.

A Red Shirt commander yesterday said that the violence would continue. "All this area will burn and wherever I go I am okay because the army is fighting ghosts far behind me," the self-styled Commander Toei said. "They are attacking the Red Shirt stage but all of Bangkok is supporting our effort."

An offer of early elections from Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, a 45-year old Old Etonian, has failed to defuse the impasse. In a televised address last night Mr Abhisit said that he would "get through" the crisis and "return peace" to the country.

"I would like people to feel confident that my government, all officials and I strongly intend to get through this and we will return peace to the country and recover", he said.

A curfew from 8pm to 6am was in place last night to stop the violence but there were doubts it would hold. With the police acting as bystanders, the army is the only force that can impose order street-by-street during the first curfew in 18 years.

In a mark of how widespread trouble had become the curfew was later extended to 23 province.

The protesters wants the dissolution of parliament and rehabilitation of Thaksin Shinawatra, a former prime minister deposed in 2006.

Thaksin Shinawatra, the exiled prime minister who commands the loyalty of the Red Shirts, was however officially branded a terrorist last night.

Mr Thaksin yesterday denied he had control of the Red Shirts and said: "A military crackdown can spread resentment and these resentful people will become guerrillas."

International concern over the violence in Thailand has grown more acute. Japan became the latest nation to call for a negotiated solution and the Foreign Office has strongly advised against all travel to the country.

Spring

*

And then, and then, the obsession broke, he came back into himself, life was glorious and he was sane and they danced till the early hours and woke up in sandwiches and thought, for everything that has happene3d, for all the hard times, for those years, isolated, walking at dawn, walking at two am, never sleeping, never sleeping, through the long hours. Was it worth it all to arrive at this point? Nothing mattered. I'll tell them I found you up a river in the tropics, James said, Colonel Kurtz, the Heart of Darkness, the first person from his old life he had seen since his work farewell. Nothing made sense and that didn't matter. Gary, Gary, don't say those things. Take control, take control, well he finally had; properly; and now; when money equalled power, everything was back in proportion. Mai pen rai. Never mind. A person is lurking in the dark. A stranger. Someone with a gift of darkness. Beware. Strangers in strange parks; easy lays, voices that were discontent, tall, dark, no doubt handsome in a lost way, cruising. These dangers were always present. It was easy to be killed. He made his way through the bushes. It was clear nothing was going to happen. I don't want to go home, he repeated, sitting at a mobile street bar at 2am, watching the night sky, watching everything pass, equal, equal, the shadows of their former selves, watching, talking to the mamma sans, this is what I want. At least he knew now exactly what it was he wanted.

And it wasn't heroin and it wasn't oblivion; here in the sins of the equally corrupt flesh; the flesh he had tried to use to lose himself, to wipe away all consciousness and self awareness; and instead had found a different being; walking, walking, for the talk, you know, lady, lady, for the talking, you no like? These endless phrases repeated through the ricocheting nights. And time stood still; and was marked, marked, for all to see, the time and again times; the night times, the way things were. He could only laugh in triumph. Finally the wave had reached the shore. Finally someone understood. Their demands were easy, promiscuous, marked by all sorts of devil marks and yet forgiven, in the kind flesh, in the marked ways, in demons that were there to9 welcome you if you strayed from the path. That was why it was so important to get back on to solid ground. All things were not lost, in fact they had come to some kind of fruition. But in the shadows, marked in the shadows, he could only feel that pleasure equals pain and watching someone else fuck was like losing the pin from a grenade, andf everything was going to blow, sky high in the demon light, for all to see, take care, take care, take care of yourself, love yourself, they kept repeating; and in these invisible ways he had now done just that. All was not lost.

And so he kept on going. Could never sleep. Reverted to his former self; out and about, this and that, working, writing, reading, talking; shadows of their formers selves; I'm so hungover it's ridiculous he cheerfully declared, sexually satiated and deeply amused; and not alone, above all not alone. I think that's what was at the heart of it, he thought; and all things moved quietly and quickly; and God was nigh and all things were alright; and shadows moved out of sight and he wasn't going to look, because over the precipice was another life he never wanted, another place too lonely to bear; walking, walking, through the shadows into the light, breaking out, Thai massages, Thai sex workers, easy privilege, vast expense. A heroin habit would be cheaper, he also cheerfully declared. He hadn't had so much fun in years. And so when the obsession finally broke and he could have sex with women again; it was like a relief; gusts of rain on a very early spring day, the daffodils lined along the English lane, the freezing cold of the surrounding hills, the birth of his daughter, the fragile limpid ways of them all, the hash dealing, those astonishingly picturesque valleys, those ways, our ways, our past. Here there was no consequence and no linkage. Never colonised; the place was organic in its heart. Apart from the tourists, and it was not tourist season, there weren't all
those people from everywhere else; there weren't the displaced anglos grizzling on talk back radio; there weren't the mad clash of cultures which led to such dysfunction, such as sense of not belonging; and so he reveled in a place and a heart and a desire he had never known.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/world/2010-05/18/c_13300819.htm

BANGKOK, May 18 (Xinhua) -- Thailand's red-shirts core leader Nattawut Saikua said Tuesday morning that he accepts an offer by the senate speaker to mediate peace talks between the anti- government protesters and the government, according to Thai PBS TV.

At the Ratchaprasong rally site in downtown Bangkok, Nattawut said the red-shirts leaders agreed to take part in peace talks, as proposed by the senate, in order to avoid more loss of lives.

The Senate Speaker Prasobsuk Boondej Monday offered to mediate a new round of peace talks to end the on-going clashes between troops and the red-shirts, which has claimed at least 37 lives since May 14.

The government's response to the latest statement by red-shirts is yet to know, though the deputy PM's secretary general Panithan Wattanayakorn said Monday afternoon peace talks can only resume after the protesters end the rally in Ratchaprasong.

Thousands of red-shirts, many of them women, still stayed at the main rally site, defying a deadline set by the government earlier to order them to leave by 3:00 p.m. Monday.

http://media.photobucket.com/image/spring/jew-lee-uhh/photography/VintageGarden.jpg?o=1

Post Apocalyptic

*

They had been ruined. But there was always a way back. He made some very stupid and expensive mistakes; as if letting everyhthing go, self abnegation. It was always going to be; these mistakes; these bars at 5am, these places in darkened streets, girls dancing, girls behind glass, oh how he had wanted to be a normal man. But nothing was normal inside there; except in a sense things were coming back to what had been. Except he didn't want to go back. The old him was lonely, craving company, craving sex, accustomed now to the role of one man out. Oh how significant is this? Can't anyone make any claim to decency? But what was decent about these long days spent watching TV while the rent slept beside him; what was decent about forgetting who he was, what he was, where he was? These were most unusual times. But these mistakes would not be made again. He could walk through the valley. He could take care. Love yourself, the cafe owner kept saying. He show no respect. The latest project was to get him to pay for a trip to Phuket to see his family. If you love yourself don't go, the cafe owner Joie warned. I hear him talking on the phone: he has money, he will pay. I don't think so. Not anymore. If you love him more than you love yourself, then go. I don't think so.

The reclamation was slow. Chiang Mai was stifling hot; too hot to do almost anything, except pray for the passing; to lie around indolently during the afternoon; never to take care; to be resolved, passing through, that this was what we were; an ancient breed, more ancient than anyone could imagine, these little transient pieces of light, lost in love, lost in obsession; equally important was the way they went about it. Easy, easy, he declared, but nothing was easy, everything was alright, day followed night, but I just did something, no can do. No respect. That's what it boiled down to. Perhaps it was his own fault. They had met at a time when there was nothing much else in their lives. Too true, the colours. Too true, the pain. But it was stupid, self brought upon, just stupid, an old man whining in the wind, railing against the inevitable, unprepared to accept that much of life had already passed. He couldn't go back. His body couldn't take it. And he didn't want to go back to what he was before all this. So he made hay, short time, and the darkness was kept at bay, sort of. That was it, that was all. Broken, perhaps, but things repair quickly.
Diseased, perhaps, but diseases can be cured. He was a marked man and yet had avoided the mark. Nothing was fair.

Nothing in the way these things worked; nothing in his own gross stupidity; nothing in the way his head worked; he had felt for so long; walking those empty streets at 2am, there was no one else; nothing for the company; and so when he abandoned himself, just there, just like that, under the influence, nothing to be gained; he couldn't bring himself to go down the full path. There were others who would take care; better care; and in the morning I am with you, in the evening I haunt you, in the night he roams jealously along empty beaches and saddened larks, washing, watching, taking time, everyone the same, they are all there, they are all happy, while he is haunted and walking, walking, always, through the blazing heat and the cool of the night and the empty streets he knew so well; everyone sleeping but him. He wanted to become a different person. There was no way out. There was nowhere to be. He took a frightened leap through the burning ring; he embraced the halos on the other side, these frightened moves, this sad old flesh; humping so sadly, so desperately, through the morning noon and the old night, through crazy times and everything; and he was gone, gone now, gone to a better place.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/17/2901011.htm?section=world

Australia's embassy in Thailand has closed its doors and warned its citizens to leave central Bangkok if safe to do so, as troops with shoot-to-kill orders surround thousands of Red Shirt protesters in the heart of the capital.

More than 30 people have died and around 230 have been wounded in clashes between anti-government Red Shirts and soldiers trying to close their protest camps.

This morning the Thai government rejected a Red Shirt call for the United Nations to step in and broker peace talks.

The government extended a state of emergency to five more provinces, ordered schools to stay shut and declared two days of national holidays to keep civilians off the streets as troops battled for control of the city.

Some of the violence has occurred outside the Australian embassy and protesters also burnt a pile of tyres in front of the building.

The embassy will be closed until further notice and the Department of Foreign Affairs has urged Australians to reconsider any travel plans to Thailand.

The Breaking Storm

*

The storm broke, finally; and he resumed his old life. There was a bit of shame, guilt, regret, remorse, a clarified image, a run at darkness, a ridiculous old man trying to keep up with someone more than 30 years younger, the ridiculous bars at all hours, the girls who don't want to do threesomes with two men, the moment of departure, time standing still in an agony of chaos, darkness, oh lord, that got me through, the girl sitting there as if she had been asked to suck off two diseased monsters, exiting the room, a disappointed boy, quiet, sulky through the night, these things, always, drove him into new paroxysms of self abnegation; so it was good one morning when he woke up and he was himself again. He wouldn't spend the entire day in the room; just to be there. He couldn't make sure. This was no way out. Time stood still; and yet there was so much to repair. He was on the edge of danger; and even greater darkness. And yet now the sky dusted poinks and the pigeons took their first morning flights; and nothing and everything, we came, we went; little spirits out of the forest, shadows of other souls, selves, and where once he had become an automatum, he came back to life.

These crying days, crying shame; he dealt in fractured spirits, he dealt in the art of lost, the symphony of chaos with which he had flirted so long, at much detriment to his health; and then, shame on shame, a 6,000 baht karaoke bill, the best times; laughing at dawn, time out of mind, savage games, warning signs, new boys, old loves, fractured; Hotshots tacky to the core; Spicey, which does not open until 2am, equally tacky, as they danced; and yet everyone took in the situation and no one said everything. Everybody knows why you are with that old foreigner; everyone can see. He pays for you. How else would a boy like you be drinking Black Label. Why can't we make for the future. Why cannot things work. We make the break; into the light, into the clearing; away from every entanglement. Let go of all attachment; the voice said clearly in the muffled sunset, the sound of a guitar and the melodic Thai voices singing songs they all knew; sabai sabai, relaxing, relaxing. Let go. Don't for God's sake Let God. There were too many strangers. I miss my friends, many friends Bangkok, here, there, he said, indicating he knew everybody. He had no doubt. All the same. All in shame.

All the same he felt the shame. It had felt like there was no way back. Happiness, sobriety, good times between the ears, these things were nothing but an island off a distant shore; water lapping at the river's edge, another picnic he was not a part of, another good time he had missed; other lives he could never live. He reached out but these voices broke his heart. He could see the young men in the canoe; good looking as so many Asian men were; and while the workers held their hands at inflated prices and another bottle of whiskey disappeared with expensive mixers; music blared. It was all such fun. As if there was no tomorrow. But unfortunately tomorrow always came; and with it the stabbing pains of misconduct. How could you have done it all again? Picking up a rent boy who thought nothing of drinking a bottle of whiskey every day would do it. That was their mask, their curse, but in a way their secret; how good it was between them; that in a sense they were sometimes genuine lovers; behind the doors; their secrets. Let in the light. Become a normal man. Start again; again.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/15/redshirts-warn-civil-war-thai-troops

As Bangkok suffers its worst political unrest for two decades, the Thai army has declared parts of the city "live-fire zones", warning that anyone found entering certain roads in the capital will be shot on sight.

The move came as one of the leaders of the redshirt protesters said that there would be "civil war" if the army did not pull back and declare a ceasefire.

After two days of conflict, the army stepped up efforts to cut off the redshirts from the rest of the world, sealing off swaths of the city.

Troops have erected signs at Ratchaprarop Road, on the northern edge of the redshirts' camp, warning, in Thai and English: "No Entry, Restricted Area. Live Firing Zone". Protesters still risked their lives to harass troops, drawing fire as they ran across the deserted streets to hurl rocks and bottles. Others, including residents caught out by the army's sudden move, were seen fleeing the area with their hands above their heads.

Since violence re-erupted in Bangkok on Thursday with the shooting of renegade army general Seh Daeng, 24 people have been killed, bringing to 54 the death toll since 12 March. More than 1,100 have been injured, including more than 150 during the past three days.

International bodies called for calm as the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, urged both sides to do everything in their power to avoid further loss of life. British ambassador Quinton Quayle and former US ambassador William Itoh have also called for the two sides to restart talks.

http://www.iphonefondos.com/img/medias/791.jpg

*

Now was seeking behaviour, now was the time to stop, now was the time when he was caught in kareokie bars at 4am, always the man with the wallet; and everything came to pass. It was not fair. It was not simple. He showed up at meetings in distraught states. He was often wanted, wanting, time out of mind, Christmas in the morning, profound moments lost in a sea of alcohol and obsession; as if his whole life began and ended on one handsome flank as if every obsession he had ever known had come back to haunt him. And there was no oblivion in this. There was no way out. There were times, sometimes simple times, astonishing in their freshness; and there were two men who made love during the day and went prowling the brothels at night, as men do, brothers in arms, the ultimate bonding, all out of mind, all sacrificed, because often we were free, often we were tempted to do things we knew were bad for us; often we found it impossible to stop. Whatever stop meant. Whatever we were stopping. Here in the aftermath. Here in a time when only he could be free, when he became trapped by the most simple of human obsessions. He had lived alone too long, that was what it felt like. And he had never known a more happy people. And he worshipped at their knees and was lost in the streets in the early morning, crying with an old prostitute at the side of the canal while young Thai kids continued their party into the waking hours.

Time out of mind, that was the constantly recurring prase for no other reason than they had been abandoned, lost in time, lost in the flesh, lost in paths he never thought he would take and a promise he never thought he would make. If only there was someone to tell the story to but there was no one. Simple things were done. The brothels were expensive and tacky and it took him a while to work out he could order a boy as well as a girl; and they were the typical gorgeous Thai men; and everything was easy for a price. They could drink all night. They could be in ruins. They could face the dawn and never be free; because they were trapped not just by their own obsessions but by the failing light, the failing body; the mind that didn't work anymore; those fragile arms those times when only he could see the wriggling worms and things would never be right; never be right. It all stemmed from the terrible loneliness of the west, these terrible mistakes, they said to each other knowledgeably, but who was to care, who was to want, who had an answer to these terrible mysteries. He didn't know why it had happened. Party champion; he choked to the boy, but he had never seen anything like it, kareokie in the early hours, the prostitutes at dawn, that great Thai tradition, the randy men, of how they needed what they needed; bonding, going, coming, together, together, he gestured, but it was not to be. Not today.

All was not lost becauswe he could never see his way out of the woods; some giant stooped to be kind, but it was of no purpose. There would never be answer. Slipping, slipping. He looked across the park where the meeting was being held, infinitely sad, as always, broken, when people all around him celebrated their every hour, their every day. Tortured, he had been such a tortured and unhappy soul, for what; what had it all menat. You'd have to have a lobotomy to be happy; he would say; it's a nice day if you lke that sort of thing. No like. No like. It was impossible to set any rhythm to any of it. It was impossible to fulfil some grotty western sexual fantasy; because these people were on a different path. If they didn't want to d it they wouldn't do it. Most annoying. Christmas time was broke; spilled out on the equal grass; cross referenced for longing; sometimes some friend; sleep with them, sleep with them, he urged, if only half in jest. You never know the culture until you sleep with them. It was too painful, too grotty, he knew every place in town. Oh how fresh faced some of these boys were. Oh how available for a price. Oh heart break, heart break, as if it meant anything, always lost; he rounded the corner and could see nothing but derelict buildings. These moments were at the end of time, his time; and they ran ruins through his heart and across his shattered flesh; and there was no saviour now.

It was all going to be free. He was going to wander and be faulous. He was going to make ends meet. He was going to triumph when there was no triumph to be had. There was always weakness. He looked across their knees. He watched them sleep. He rounded corners and wandered through green pastures; as if every Biblical cliche, every Biblical reference, meant something. It meant nothing. There wasn't an answer and he wasn't free. There were only passing days and failing health and psyhological, psychological, he gestured at his inability to perform another sex act, or to get it together to do even the most simple things. There are some absolutely beautiful boys here, he would say to some blatant heterosexual, just for the hell of it. If you're into them they're just astonishing. He kept it up just to annoy them. He was wronged. And yet in every wrong he had made the decision himself. There was no giving excuses. There was no wasting away. There were bleak fantasies that were ribald in the dark; well plastic in the ligiht more like, cheap like a cheap floozie these squalid dreams had never held any answer; there hadn't been any remote way of saying I'm sorry for my poor behaviour, I'm sorry for never answering the phone, I'm sorry for having walked off the face of the earth. But it was exactly what he wanted to do; disappear; oh celebrate, celebrate every passing moment because you will be alone again soon enough; and these unfamiliar circumstances; away, away, so beautifully far gone.

It had been easy to be distracted. It was easy to find himself lying in bed next to a sleeping form; just because he liked to watch him sleeping. Normally he never slept. Maybe two hours a night if he was lucky, in random snatches. So the advantages of being an insomniac were many; including the fact that even sober he got to know most of the nigt life; to see life in raw and coloured and purple terms; beer orgy here now, but in all ways; as if you could make love to me and ever mean it; as if this misshapen form could be easily loved. Take care of yourself, they would say. Love yourself; the local cafe owner would repeat. But he had already been lost. There was no bieng found. Caught on the edge of a rock and a great place; sandwiched between perceptions; storming out of yet another expensive joint; washing, washing the sins away, or was it loneliness, the way he had crept around that Redfern house at night; always alone; up by 2am at the latest, pacing the house, walking the streets, working the internet; as if everything could be lost and nothing found; as if his heart had not been broken already and he could pretend to be a normal person; as if he was not prepared to follow an alcoholic street boy to the edges of oblivion; as if his own failing perspectives were not enough to be aswered; all in a way; all in a turn of the wrist, a rent boy, from Classic Boys in Bangkok, joined them at the table in the Lady Boy Bar, downed whisky for whisky, I no like I no like, he said, grimacing at the thought of another day in Classic Boys. Wonder what they're doing back in Melbourne tonight? Andrew asked, raising his glass.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/15/thai-death-toll-redshirts-troops

Thai troops have clashed with anti-government protesters in Bangkok on a third day of violence that has killed at least 17 people.

Pitched battles continued to rage across the capital after a night of grenade explosions and gunfire, with soldiers shooting live rounds at protesters armed with petrol bombs, guns and homemade rockets.

Since the fighting began on Thursday at least 17 people have died with 147 wounded as government forces attempt to seal off the 1 sq mile (3 sq km) zone that thousands of redshirt protesters have occupied in an upmarket district of the city. The spiralling violence, which has moved from street to street over the past three days, has raised concerns that Thailand is heading towards civil war.

"The situation right now is getting closer to civil war every minute," a protest leader, Jatuporn Prompan, said. "We have to fight on. The leaders shouldn't even think about retreat when our brothers are ready to fight on."

Another protest leader, Kwanchai Praipana, told Reuters that the prime minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, should resign and take responsibility for Thailand's deadliest political crisis in 18 years. He said supplies of food, water and fuel were starting to run out due to the government blockade of the protest camp, but there was enough to last some days.

The centre of Bangkok is now a battleground, with rolling skirmishes being fought between protesters from the redshirts' compound, fortified with tyres and sharpened bamboo staves, and troops from hastily constructed, sand-bagged and razor-wired positions.

The Thai army has designated the Ratchaprarop area as a "live firing zone", meaning live bullets are being used. The protesters' and troops' positions are just a few hundred metres apart in most areas of the city. The areas between, some of the most exclusive addresses in Bangkok, are almost deserted. Shops have been closed and thousands of residents have fled.

"My ears are ringing with all the shooting last night," Ratana Veerasawat, a 48-year-old owner of a grocery shop just north of the protest encampment, told Reuters. "It's just awful and getting worse. Best to leave now."

The United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, expressed concern over "the rapidly mounting tensions and violence". A spokesman said in a statement: "He strongly encourages them to urgently return to dialogue in order to de-escalate the situation and resolve matters peacefully."

The redshirt protesters began their latest campaign to oust the government in March. Since then, more than 40 people have been killed and more than 1,600 wounded, according to government figures.

http://monsterrebellion.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/sci-fi-post-apocalyptic-36436.jpg

Not A Normal Man

*

You don't understand me one little bit, he could only think, lost in another expensive brothel. These were dark times, crazy times. I'm not the first westerner to come unstuck on the flanks of a Thai sex worker, he said. I swear to Almighty God, I have come unstuck now. He was lost in infinite sorrow and a terrible calm, as if he knew what was happening to him. As if it was a mistake that was always going to be made. As if time stood still. As if that last whiskey was not an oblivion seeking enterprise. He would normally be deep in the midst of a heroin addiction and didn't like the alcohol. Nothing, nothing. They made a whizzing gesture around their heads. Nothing, nothing. But his head was always full of chaos and his heart broken. Nothing could save him now. There was no one left to turn to. He turned to strangers and he hated them. He was oft riven and twice cast, from medieval times, from way before that, and these ancient slime, these dangers, these parasitic intelligences, took their delight and wasted him, wasted him, because nothing could come firm now, nothing would be right.

It wasn't easy being me, he sometimes thought, as he forked out yet more thousand baaht and some floozie was lost in the here and now; like him, entirely lost, yet now, other oblivion seeking behaviour failed and he was left with a chaos of emotions; nothing he wanted to hear. The sex workers lay in his bed. He wished he could adopt a better attitude to it all, have more fun. After all, we'll all be dead soon. He'lll be dead soon. Chaos wracked. I want you, I want you, and I am exhausted, come too often, and they do their bit and he couldn't care, as the baht flew out the window. I want you, you know you want me, the pop song of the moment here goes; and lost in that tunnel, lost at the bottom of a well, he was always here, he was always now, nothing would switch it off, nothing, and believe me he had tried everything. Everything but a trip to Cambodia, a lawless country. Where one can do anything. You no take care of me, he pointed angrily at the rent boy he was forking out thousands to, land yes it was true; nestled in oblivion and truly desperate, truly sad, they took my heart and cast it to the four winds; because nothing was free, nothing was easy. I am not a normal man, I am not a normal man, it was all he could think of to repeat. Chaos reigned. He had become truly desperate, truly sad. They looked at him in meetings and talked endlessly, these ex American military types; and told their stories. Give us a break.

It wasn't easy land he was now truly sad. It made him what he was. Deformed. Discurrent. The times were not his. These broken appendages on the outskirts of time, these wasted days and lost loves; and all for everything. Nothing. You could not be friends with me. I am forsaken, I am lost, default position. He could see things through broken eyes and even that meant nothing. He could waste away the days and even that meant nothing. Sure? Not sure. These were times broken and times that would never make amends. He sat in the park and listened to their stories. He couldn't bear it anymore. I make mistake, make mistake, he sobbed into the arms of a virtual stranger. But this world was full of strangers, willing strangers, they could take what they want, they could make amends, they could see their way through, they could mark this disaster walk, they could all be free, they could walk the walk with me but this will never happen; again, again, walking, walking, they are everywhere, these eyes, you can have any of them, money buys everything, and this is lost, I not take care of you, everything, they are wasted now, lost opportunities, opportunities, in a way, to be a normal man, nothing was coming, nothing was going, leave me alone.

He walked out of another brothel. He yelled at his friend. I am not paying for this. But of course he already had. Time and again. After, after, another time, these times, these days, the heat rising over the top of households. He remebered the time when the moon was full in Chiang Mai, when a giant orange moon hung over the city and he could see it wherever he went, over the rooftops, past those bodies, past flesh, past abandon, I am not awakened, I am dead inside, cruel, too cruel, true, too cruel, you may make my life and you can destroy it. But in the end I and my wallet will surive. Past darkness, past flesh, past everything he had ever believed in, past all his friends and the old times, the times when he thought he knew what it was all about. Time and again. Darkness. Past glory. I am not a normal man, he repeated, as the sun darkened and the lights darkened, sure, sure, he wasn't sure at all. His heart wasn't in any of it. I am not a normal man, he repeated, psychological, he repeated, again, wasing something against the side of his head, as if any of it mattered, as if anybody cared. fI am your arsewipe. I am your floozie for the night. I will do whatever you want. He wanted nothing. He didn't care. And not care for them.

These times weren't as normal. He became everything he wanted to be. Some dry old queen. Oh, they're so naughty. They take my money and they spend it on girls. To a normal man in a normal brothel; except he was not normal and nothing waited, nothing came, these were dry arenas dry valleys. You have a cool heart, they told him; and it was true. Off out there. The boy slept in his bed. Nothing worked. I can come to you. I can do. Not easy, he muttered; and for once in his life he didn't care. You are being well paid. You can care for me. You can do for me. But nothing worked. Always the lost time. Intimate and lost. Our future. Always together; and that was what he wanted; because he was sick of being alone. Heart sick. Nothing made sense. Sleeping alone. Nobody has slept with me all the time I have been here, gesturing at his bed. It was true. At the core of it is loneliness, the loneliness of the West, he said, gesturing, because for everything he asked for, everything that was given, not known, not known, that cute voice, I don't know, I don't know, I am not a normal man, he repeated, tears, there were always tears now, because he could not see, could not do, could not care.

These were not important times; times only to be remembered; times forgotten, times passing inbetween everything else, and always away, lost in time and space, lost and fractured and desperate for reassurance; they came, they conquered, they were never there. These voices. These pasts. These times when he was nothing but a fragment on a curved wing, a move in a discoquete, a glance at a too easy girl, it was not for me, not for me, and he was quiet, eventually, because these pasts would never haunt him and would always be there. He looked at the young face. He looked at a face that only he could desire. And even then, here and now, lost in you, you, Mr John, he was taken away by a darker force, by the sickness, by these times that had cruelled him so totally and left him so: well, high and dry. Beached. But it wasn't any normal beaching, he was not any normal man. They talked Thai around him. They made their peace. They looked askance. They were in darkness and they were in hell, they came away crying and they came away for peace. But there had not been any oblivion, not at all. This wasn't all.

This was the time to be nice and the time to cry. The time to show some consideration and the time to say, eff off, I not pay for this. Again. And again. Thousands of baaht, hundreds of dollars, they disappeared in whhast could never be the same, not other he discovered the real truth. That there was glory beyond glory. Pain beyond pain. A different place. Exctasy; the only place where he felt normal. Peak experience anonymous. Heightened experiences. He listened to these dark forces. He made as if to go. He was always there and never there. And nothing worked. Nothing worked. He came somewhere else. His heart was brokien. But his was no normal heart. These were always short time gigs. Always. You number one. I love you. Yes, for today, for the wallet, for money which opened up so many doors, and for times awry, for times out of joint, for nastiness that he could never understand, for a gift that was perverted, for a pleasure that was only pain, for a darkness that lit large in the sky, and devestated him. Because nothing had been more beautiful. If only I could tell the story.

t
He has withdrawn an offer of fresh elections on November 14th and the army has started to cut electricity, water and phone signals to the occupied zone, and blocking off roads and canals. Anyone seeking access to the area faces two years in jail, according to a televised announcement.

he bigger story:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2010/0514/1224270378042.html

LONG-SIMMERING UNREST in Bangkok flared up yet again yesterday when a 25-year-old anti-government protester was killed during clashes with soldiers, the latest bloody incident in Thailand’s ongoing political crisis.

Fighting began after Maj Gen Khattiya Sawasdipol, an active-duty soldier who has sided with the Red Shirt supporters of ousted former PM Thaksin Shinawatra, and who helped build barricades of tyres and bamboo around the downtown business district, was shot in the head. The soldier, also known as Seh Daeng (Commander Red), was unconscious in intensive care at a Bangkok hospital. He was shot during an interview with foreign media.

Gen Khattiya is a best-selling author who once threatened to hurl poisonous snakes and grenades at rival Yellow Shirt demonstrators. The government has branded him a “terrorist”, and his strident calls for a “people’s army” to take on government forces have led some Red Shirt leaders to keep their distance from him.

Gunshots and five grenades thrown on Silom Road, a major business area downtown next to the protest site, injured three people, according to police spokesman Prawut Thavornsiri.

There had been signs that the situation might be improving, but now there are worries the violence may spark more clashes after efforts to find a peaceful solution to the standoff broke down.

Various skirmishes between troops and protesters have killed 29 people over the past two months, fuelling Thailand’s worst political violence in 18 years.

Embattled prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva stepped up his pressure on the protesters after they failed to quit the occupied area after a midnight deadline.

Multiple Fate Lines

*

In time for flight, for another bout of naysayers, to sit silently in the corner and listen to the crap float over him. It all began what already seemed like centuries ago; but was in fact only weeks. He walked out of an AA meeting - the so-called seven by seven by seven at the Park Hotel in Soi Seven in Bangkok and fished his friend Ian out of the Biergarten opposite, an enormous bar filled with a hundred girls or more. His friend, as per normal, was having a whale of a time, surrounded by girls, drinking, laughing, perving. He had decided he particularly liked a mother daughter combination sitting nearby; something he had never experienced. But it was clear it was time to extricate themselves from this situation, as per so many other situations. So he paid the bill with Ian's money and they left; heading off to the notorious Soi Cowboy; newer than Patpong, perhaps less seedy but that was open to debate. Where girls without underwear danced above mirrors and he was enormously proud, circling high above, of all his achievements and experiences; a different fate to the doomed sad creature he had so often felt himself to be. There was an older Australian man standing in the middle of Soi Cowboy looking utterly bewildered; as if he had landed on Mars, which in a way he had. "You look lost," they said, grabbing him by the arm. "I am," he acknowledged. "Come with us."

They chose a bar with 70 baht beers until 9pm and settled right in. And he thought, oh eff it, I'll have a beer. And proceeded to have not one but several. He had always been the same, he didn't know why. Other people, well at least some people, stayed sober and straight for years on end. His off switch just didn't work. Hundreds of meetings later he would go crashing out the door; often just on little trysts, sometimes on blinding, suicidal, life threatening binges which would make the skin crawl under a cat, make him convulse with the poisons pulsing through his already damaged body. And make way: make way, for the times are strange and bewildering and nothing will ever matter, not now, not ever. And after Soi Cowboy, after their accountant friend decided to potter off and be loyal to his wife of 25 years and four children; even though she wasn't actually in Bangkok. Some blokes are beyond rescue; walking through the streets with their old wrinkles while all around some of the most beautiful women in the world offer their often accomplished, or at least friendly, services. It wasn't to be. It wasn't to be. So he and Ian, somewhere in the taxi, decided that before they hit the girl armada of Patpong they would go to the Merman show, where naked men swam under water in the nearby gay soi, so that both their wants could be fully satisfied. That was their plan: get a boy for him, then go and get a girl. Then go back cheap hotel.

Well it didn't quite work out that way. Ian, the most purely heterosexual and most dedicated to the cause man he had ever met, had never been in a gay bar before. The show was seedy. The boys were swishy. He was re-classified a hunter now; he knew he wanted something, but the previous mistakes, swishy boys unimpressed that he didn't live in an expensive hotel nearby or thieving little Aids infested pricks who went through his wallet but who he still liked anyway, much to his own despair. After the men had swum naked with condoms over their erections; and then as part of the show had come and flapped their appendages against the guests, including Ian, they exited the bar. Ian was practically shaking, he was so confronted; and then they went and sat down in a bar. Patpong, Patpong, Ian kept saying, I need an antidote. A man of the world finally ruffled; shocked to the core of what he had thought had been his broad minded being. I'm not leaving till I get a boy, he declared, watching the flouncing little queens in the Bangkok Boys bar opposite gesturing to him with their come on eyes. Too camp too camp; it was not what he had wanted. He had made that mistake before. He sat there, still drinking; and suddenly Ian stood up without a word and headed back down the gay soi. Well that's the end of him, he thought, God knows where he's going to end up. The music continued to pump out of the bars opposite, the boys continued to flounce and gesture.

Some minutes later Ian returned with a handsome, straight looking young man who had approached him in the street. What about this one? he declared; as they ordered another beer, if that was possible, in an already disintegrating evening. This was a boy who was not going to say no to a beer. They talked briefly and negotiated a price - three thousand baht stay till morning. It was always good to pay over the local price; that got their full and undivided attention. And suddenly they had a new Thai friend, Baw, who laughed with them when they went to get something to eat. By this time Ian had abandoned his plan to pick up a girl in Patpong, worried that his other long time girlfriend, who was off with her typically enormous Thai family, would catch him out. Already her ceaseless demands and sometimes unaffectionate ways were starting to pall, and he would find a happy ending or two in the massage parlours in the afternoons while she was out. She had broken his heart and he wanted her forever; her exotic, fascinating ways. But he didn't want to get caught with a girl actually in his bed; and so they just headed home. And then there was Baw. And unlike every other boy, Baw just never quite went away.

They had four shots of Vodka each, polishing off the duty free Absolut Ian had left in the room, in that atmospheric Romance Hotel, with the N missing and mirrors strategically placed; indicating its former hay day as a sex haven before it became a slightly run down haven for long term residents and grumpy old men. And a cheap hotel for people such as themselves, passing through, happy not be to paying ridiculous amounts of money for ridiculous hotels. Appreciative of the cheap and cheerful. Perhaps he should have realised at that point that four shots of vodka before breakfast was not the best start to a relationship; live for the day; haunting images; misplaced jealousy; a haunting depth so far down; so diseased; so polluted only the toughest of sharks survived; but instantly entertained, if not transfixed or besotted, he wasn't thinking anything at all. Day followed day. He was instantly dragged up to a remote province to meet the family, where the village boys all came on to him. And then they went back to Bangkok. For some reason they were happy together in that room; even though he knew the boy liked girls, they all did, this was never going to be a marriage in heaven; it was going to be a time together which only he would wish would last forever. They weren't like that. They just didn't think like that. Not for the minute. Sufficient unto the day. That was all. Nor, in any normal western sense, was there a gay culture. It's what you do; now, today. And then after the poisonous experience of Koh Chang, where Baw got hopelessly drunk and kept dragging girls back to their room, and he would wake up sandwiched between them or watch them, with some sad sick amusement, sleeping after the cavorts of the night before; his heart destroyed by blackout drinking and ridiculous notions. And so it was they ended up in Chiang Mai. Back in a room. Back in domestic bliss. A very very hungover Baw, having polished off two bottles of Jack Daniels and run up a 6,000 baht bar bill, determined to sleep for three days, "for the power". And they reached their agreement. You want take care of me? Not drinking not girl not every day. There are plenty of handsome boys in Chiang Mai. Cheaper than you. And he made the decision to go back to a meeting today. Oh dear. Not again. At least he would go, which was more than a lot of people ever did.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSSGE64700520100508?type=marketsNews

BANGKOK, May 8 (Reuters) - Two Thai policeman were killed and 13 people wounded in gun and grenade attacks overnight, threatening efforts to forge a deal on ending nearly two months of anti-government protests that have undermined the economy.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has put forward a plan to end the rallies that have crippled Bangkok and scared off tourists, but it remains in limbo as talks drag on over the details, including a proposed early election in mid-November.

The "red shirt" protesters denied involvement in the attacks and were quick to condemn the violence, which could add to pressure on Abhisit from the Bangkok middle classes and traditional elite to take a tougher line with the protesters.

The movement's leaders said they were committed to the reconciliation plan and were working on their own proposals to present to the government, which they guaranteed would be ready no later than May 15.

"This should be a peaceful solution. There are some issues on which we agree with the government, and some in which we disagree," a protest leader, Nattawut Saikua, told reporters.

"Our proposal will be flexible. We are ready to listen... because we want to make way for a conciliatory atmosphere."

A Stupid Old Man

*

They were class A arseholes and fun loving people and he was lost in a world he never intended, a place he never intended. This was not control. Take control of your own life. But every way, talking with old sex workers at the Thapie Gate, fantasising. Let's face it. That arse was worth any thousands of dollars. He could sacrifice here. As an old oblivion seeker, he said often: I understand, I understand. But in a sense he understood nothing; what had happened to him, what had happened in the world, even where he was. He had misread so many vital cues. The most handsome boy in the village. I want to go with you. Entirely acceptable in this culture. Not known, not known, these voices, this past, these desolate places inside his own head. While the sun drenched dread of a tropical island curdled every belief. You take advantage of me, he declared angrily, and of course it was true. Why did he have to like the straight ones, not the swishy boys? Was it ever going to end differently? Of course not. He couldn't believe his own destroyed psyche, how unhappy he had been his whole life, when these handsome people laughed together constantly, thought nothing of getting off with each other, celebrated everything. Oh how he dreaded his own heart.

Always, always, the constant crime. Against humanity. Against nature. Against, truly, himself. This was suicidal drinking, and there was no alternative. He couldn't even see a way out, even after he charged up his phone with credit. You couldn't be alone for long; not here. They regarded it as entirely unnatural. And so he worked and he played and sometimes he drank, and always, these poisonous dreams, this truly nasty village. He didn't like himself anymore, just a misshapen wreck on a remote highway. Very remote. So far from anything he had known; any normal culture in his own country. And yet here, nothing mattered. Everything was fine. You think you make a fool of yourself and it was just nothing, to them, to anything. Nobody cared. He was a wild stranger and a dark force. And stabs of jealousy shook his heart while he repeatedly declared that everything was alright. I don't mind, I don't mind. He minded very much. I don't believe you, Tammy said, and of course it was true. He hunted the beach. He searched everywhere for his obsession. And everyone looked the same, these slim toy men, so handsome, so astonishingly handsome, their shirts off in the hot weather. And he could die in any obsession.

There was nothing but nastiness in his own heart. He could not find the oblivion he sought, certainly not in the few legal drugs. And everything died, died, and he looked across barren rooftops which bore no relationship to the actual scene in front of him, which was picturesque, beautiful in the morning. He looked at the handsome boy in his bed, betrayed, always betrayed, and he found no heart in his predicament and cried early and long; because these were the obsessions which brought so many westerners to their knees. He couldn't see his way clear. He didn't understand. It was all like some crazy darkness, and yet he had brought it all upon himself. From tropical dread to Chiang Mai, back in Chiang Mai, at least now he was on his own turf, could take control again; was not in some tropical paradise with nothing but bars and a boy who thought nothing of knocking off a bottle of whiskey every day. Why this random pick, of all random picks. Off a soi in Bangkok, he said, joking to the boy, who had never been in a plane before and was staring excitedly out the window. He knew what he said. He knew too much. Be careful, be careful, they warned, when the said: I like him too much.

All was not well. He needed to take his own heart back. He needed to be free. He needed to have that dreaded conversation. You no want to take care of me, you can go. There are many handsome boys in Chiang Mai, Burmese boys, famous for their beauty. Cheaper than you. Muymar, easy to go, easy to collect, easy to pay. I want you, but the truth was he wanted only him; and when his rocks were turned and his obsessions realised; that became the cruelest moment of all. If all was let loose. If he travelled and planned and travelled again; he found his home here and did not want to go back to Australia, not in a million years. Not to a place where people said: you might be one of them, you might be a poofter. Tell me tell me. I tell you nothing, you dum effing red neck. Leave me alone. Let me be free. Let everything march forward. Baby baby, the old worker said, talking of the young Thai boys drinking by the canal. Not in Australia. Not anywhere. He didn't want to go back to Australia. He didn't want to die old and alone. He didn't want this daily torture. He didn't want his heart broken. He needed to take back control. Except it was already broken. And he remained astonished; if not alone; waking up with those workers in his bed.

Perhaps all was not lost. There is a Thai saying, bad things are a good thing, because after the bad comes the good. Maybe that was true. Maybe that was the only truth he could take out of this situation. Maybe he could admit that only this one had allowed him to do what he really wanted to do; and paradise had dawned for a brief time. But paradise is in the day; not in the heart; in the heat of the sky and the dawning shreds of being. You want to come with us, the handsome boy said; as if it was the most natural thing. And for them it was. Everything changed. His heart, his devastated heart, would recover more quickly than he suspected at this moment. The company was cheap. A thousand baht tip. That is all. Take it or leave it. Well at this point, without his fully optioned devency, to be blunt, without the heroin, then this was the obsession that would take him other places, bank him into another place, leave him warm and cosy and optioned, optioned for life. I am not your only life. This is not the only life. This is not the only path. There will be so many others. There have been so many others; in this travel of this ancient soul. So there it was; a stupid thing, a stupid old man, crashing his heart on the charming, astonishing flanks of Thai sex workers. And broken once, but never broken again.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/08/2893854.htm?section=justin

Thailand's Red Shirt leaders say they will consider ending their protest in central Bangkok on Monday when the government lifts the country's official state of emergency.

The state of emergency means that large groups of people can be forcibly dispersed by police.

Therefore, the Red Shirts do not want to leave their rally site en masse until that is lifted.

The anti-government protestors say it is appropriate to end their protest on May 10 as a sign of respect to those killed in protest-related violence on April 10.

A road map to reconciliation proposed by the government for November elections is still being debated by Red Shirt leaders.

They say they hope to finalise their plans for dispersal and release a detailed response to the government's road map today.

Meanwhile, four policemen have been wounded in explosions close to the Red Shirts' encampment.

Police say they suspect the blasts might have been caused by grenades.

Earlier, a policeman was killed and another wounded, along with two civilians, in a drive-by shooting in the same area, but it is not clear if this was directly related to the protest.

http://vyle-art.com/gallery/albums/homework/archi_L.jpg

He Finally Realised

*

Hunting, a sad and desperate old man made a fool of yet again by another young man, worshiping at the knees of an insane beauty, walking the beach in despair. I hate this place, he said of what most considered a tropical paradise. Bars lined the beach and he hated every last one of them, the backdrops to such an insane and dangerous bust. He couldn't be free. He couldn't see his way to dissolve anything. But arrangements were not kept. I am angry now. I don't understand your thinking, the boy said, when he refused to pay for yet another girl. This is Thailand. This is public humiliation. This is neglect. Easy to find a nice boy to take care of me, he thought, pay some money. Easy. They were everywhere, these slim, amazing looking men; dark, handsome, fun loving. The original gender benders. You can have me, the boyish girl said, but he didn't want anything, or at least not her. You do for you, not for me. I don't care anymore. The dream fell apart like an ocean crashing on a sure, and he should have known better. He should have realised.

Ancient dreams kept coming to the fore. Where are you? Why are you? How can this be? Why such a tortured soul. Nothing worked. Not for him. You have no power. Well not for you; not every day. And every dream that ever passed, every lonely year he had endured; they were like swords in the heart when he saw so many people having such good time. They don't care. One comes one goes. Easy easy. But nothing was easy, not for him; not in this place; not when he had so totally lost control of his own life. Time to flee paradise; this dreadful place, the malignant tide, the horror in the sweeping colours of the tropics. Time to go back to somewhere where he was happy. where there were meetings; at least some program. Where he could come back into his own place and time. Again. As if no lessons had ever been learnt. Silence is a safe place to be. He sat in silence and listened to the happy yabbering of Thais all around him. None of it was for him. This was not his place.

You used me, he thought, as if this should be a surprise to anyone. The times come and go. Yes he had made a fool of himself. Yes he wasted some money, more money than he could afford. But it was always going to happen somewhere in Asia, on some obsessional self dissolving odyssey. He thought of Gary. He thought of good times. He thought of all the things that had wasted away. He looked at a happy, good looking mother with her daughter outside the internet shop. He wondered how things had come so low. And he knew, knew deep in his heart, how pathetic he had become. An old man trolling the beach, looking, looking, for love, for fun, for the sole object of his desire; and knew, too, it was crazy to be like this. As if anything good could come of it. As if he hadn't known all along things would end badly. Crimes against humanity, crimes against nature. It was always going to be, in a Godless place where the horror dripped in the heat and his own self abnegation had reached dangerous depths.

It was going to be a long time before he recovered from this latest escapade. Time out of mind; things that should never have been, accidents that should never have happened. I go now. We march through the evening storms. We walk up and down the beach; lonely again. He traveled from one place to another in a flitting, crazy way, as if nothing mattered and all was lost and he was nothing but a broken spring in another dilemma, a crazy time, wild, and yet he had brought it entirely upon himself. And who was to blame for that? For this ridiculous situation. For months of denial. For disciplines that knew no counterpart in this country; where the entirely unintellectual population lived as they had done for years; communally, friends everywhere, no longer lonely. It was easy to see how so many came a cropper. It was easy, only now, to understand the mistakes that so many made. But all up, all up he wished it was over; that there was a different peace, a different time, toss the sex workers out of hotel room and get a wriggle on; for while all seemed briefly lost, he was free in a way that he hadn't been free for a long time; and expensive mistakes were just that, short term failures. There were other projects; other bodies to break his heart over; other personalities to be briefly entranced by; and he would survive; at least for a little longer.

THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article7119056.ece

Red Shirt protesters in Bangkok have refused to disperse despite an offer from Abhisit Vejjajiva, the Prime Minister, to dissolve parliament in September, paving the way for elections demanded by the Red Shirts if they end their occupation of the city’s commercial district.

The demonstrators said that they would not go until the promise was made official and a date was specified. Mr Abhisit also faced opposition from activists who see his peace offering as capitulation. The nearly two-month stand-off has paralysed vital areas of Bangkok, hammered the economy and tourist industry and ground government machinery to a near halt. Clashes with soldiers and other violence have killed 27 people and injured nearly 1,000.

On Monday Mr Abhisit made proposals that included elections on November 14, about a year before his term would end, if the protesters left their encampment. The Red Shirts initially welcomed the plan, but the date has become a sticking point.

“If you are playing hard to get about the dissolution date, we will continue,” Nattawut Saikua, a protest leader, said. “We can remain here for three or four months. No problem.” Mr Abhisit, however, is insisting on the opposite. “If they don’t go home, I’m not going to dissolve parliament,” he said. (AP)

Lost Time

*

He didn't know where he was. He certainly didn't know who he was. There were whole periods of lost time. He didn't care if he died tomorrow; finally all obsessions realised, all those sad days and wasted lust, it was something to be free, it was something to be different. The island was meant to be a honeymoon and turned into a debauched escapade of major preportions. At least he knew it now. At least he knew what was happening. Easy to understand how so many hearts were broken; here in the infinite, with the warm sea splashing against the white sand and the bars lined from one end to the other; the tropical green cliffs behind reaching up into what used to be a sky, before we disowned it, before everything was destroyed. He went for a walk because he did not want to be alone; not for some paid for boy who kept spending his money on girls and bottles of Jack Daniels. You don't mind? Tammy asked; and he shook his head. Boys will be boys.

He was papa now. They saw him as a money tree, but also as a subject of great curiosity and often affection. It was a long time now since he had spent much time with Westerners and only now, although he had thought he knew everything, was it all beginning to make sense. The easy gains; easy losses; the money that went like water and the boys who would do anything for you; well just about anything. It wasn't easy to be fair. Perhaps the west, used to notions of obsessional, life redeeming love and lifetime commitment, found it most difficult to comprehend, this entirely different attitude, where they rolled in the hay and did this and that; and if everything was lost then he had done it all on his own. This was a time for pleasure and a time for him; but also a time of immense discovery; if only he could save it; if only there was an answer to these many things. He couldn't be less sure. He was leaving now.

Nothing worked out as it was meant to work oujt; but those dreams, those pathetic little fantasies, were born from a great loneliness which had settled over him in his 50s. Unlike in Thailand, where in recent times there was usually at least one person in his bed, those years had been a trial of such infinite longing. No one wanted him; not physically, not mentally. It wasn't his time. And those sad little squirmy thoughts just kept going around and around; as if it meant something; as if there was a solution; as if chaos wasn't the only outcome. He could go and do it now; the final suicide trip; but he couldn't stand the despair at the end of the long tunnel. Nothing like that happened here. Even his man boobs, a subject of such personal embarrassment, were nothing but a joke here. Like me, the girls would say, poking him; or like a girl, the boys would say, suggesting that only added to his chance of success with them. What you do; whatever you do. This was not a subject of great surprise. He had finally conquered all doubt.

It wasn't as if the futu8re held anything but an increasingly difficult old age. It wasn't as if he could make anything out of what had happened; except for revelation about a culture that defied everything he had known; and which he might have thought he understood but understood not at all, not until he started sleeping with them anyway. It was crucifixion. It was time to die on a cross. But this was not going to be the moment, tortured or otherwise. Oh you are so handsome, he thought; and always they kept saying, I come to your room, no problem. He hadn't had so much sex since time began; it was just simply impossible to come so often. And yet the offers were easy and amazingly good willed; if of course commercial at their base. But they didn't do anything they did not want to do. They were crippled and alone, that had been his state of mind; so sad, so unbelievably sad, with the world and the beauty of the city nothing but a dissonant background for ever greater mentalo dislocation. And then he came here.

So they took him by surprise and kept him in surprise; and his furtiveness in seeking handsome boys was entirely misplaced. There were Go Go Girls and Go Go Boys. There was the boy on the corner who looked at you with dark appealing eyes which translated to: you can have me for 1,000 baht. There were the butch little moto drivers who he was initially suprised to see with men later in the evening. There were straight discoteques with bathrooms full of swishy boys who made it clear they would take care of you in whatever way you wanted. And so it was dark. So his fragile body kept walking through a deranged landscape. So he was loved, or serviced, in exact measure; like something that could only be resolved when he walked free of all the past; all the mistakes; all the things that had gone wrong in such a troubled; despairing life. All for what? For nothing. For brief flashes of comfort, for the ready availability of anything you wanted; for a serious case of the shakes and whole days of lost time. Oh save me, he thought: but didn't know how to save himself. Except to take time. To take care. To be taken care of. To love and lust and party in equal measure. Pity he was old. Pity he was "papa". Pity he hadn't done it before; instead of always surrendering to the first cry: Hey Johnny, you want something?

Beyond

*

If there was anything to be said for the infinite, for time across mind and a million spaces, for tropical beaches and strange situations, for dancing in the last bar in the last resort in town, there at 8am, for being lost, infinitely lost in the time zones between the places. He wasn't there. That was the point. There was no tomorrow. The declamatory voice held firm. He wanted to be high and he wanted not to think, he wanted to be in love and he wanted to negotiate a price, an understanding. Everything came back to haunt. They looked across desolated landscapes; but that was only the beginning. Every old queen he had ever known hung in the walls, laughing. He was very strange, stranger than strange, and if these haunted symphonies ever had any meaning; if these wild times on the cusp of the edge, in a place where no man could survive and no woman was welcome, he came to them, crawling, pitiful, I love you, I pay for you, infinite, that's what it was, these cries of pain and loneliness and desire, infinite desire, for the islands have come to you; and nothing is safe.

They came together, all these warm bodies. They danced to his tune and another tune, and a welcome passing and all that ever was; angry now, ratting away, but also, bless you, everything, orgasms so freely given, Thai sex workers so easily bought, things that were never the same once another person entered; places where they loved and lusted and held their private entreaties, their infinite lust, their infinite gratitude; time out of mind indeed. It wasn't everything he had hoped for. But every old queen he had ever met hung in the walls, laughing, and they said: we knew it would happen to you. We knew you were lost the minute we met you; even though you were young and handsome and desired at the time, every possibility, every permutation, everything he had ever hoped for and fantasised about were present, there in raised ass cheeks and there in the parameters which we had so illy defined. My friend my friend. Boys will be boys. Every cutting blow. You are old. I am young. I am beautiful. Every desire was gratified; and yet, yet, there wasn't any ending that could pass for an ending.

We are tired. We are worn out. We are moi, moi, past it, drunk, and their voices said: I told you so. But in these crimes, in these places where he sought out the best and the worst, where he was reminded of a youth and flesh and sleeping with someone and the joyous spread of I want you: it was all the same. It would all end. Bangkok not serious; the boy said; and it was the wisest thing he had ever heard. There was nothing serious about this. But we go on our escapades. Thai men tour the brothels together. We drink and stay sober and can hear the crackling in the trees, the lightning flashing out to sea; the darkness and the warmth. Nobody has ever been so kind. Nobody has ever let me do that; not to the same degree. So they warmed; they were parted; things were different now. Times had changed. People had changed. The orgies of the past were long over. He paid and he paid. Things were lost but only begun. I want you, want you, handsome boy, and in the laughter, in these lost opportunities, he made me cry: no, no, yes, yes, I want you only and for always; the heart tugging a microscope, a terribly damned opportunity, a past which could not be forgotten, an understanding which came from a life only few could understand.

We were disgusted and gratified at the same time. The bar girl looked so sad at 7am in the morning, the last bar open in Koh Chang, when the French boy said: I give you 1,000 baht if you match me drink for drink. The whiskey disappeared. We had disappeared. There were only old men who had lost their power; there were only things he could never imagine, never orchestrate, never come to a conclusion. Why, why, was this desire so urgent, so infinite? He saw them on corners. He saw them in restaurants. They looked. They smiled. I am yours for a price. They were always for a price. Never pretend your attractiveness extends anything beyond your wallet. These were the broken hearts that laid themselves out across the so-called boulevarde of dreams, a broken place, a wretched place, and yet he was understanding, he understood that desire took multiple avenues, he understood that he was old now. That boys would be boys. They come quickly they come slowly. Ditch the twink and lets go out, Gary texted, and he could have been betrayed by anyone, but chose to be betrayed by himself. All was lost, all was short term, he paid the price, a very high price, for these randoms lusts and strange desires, for crossing the border so long ago it didn't matter, for creating text where no text lay before.

THE BIGGER STORY:


http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5g3j-vAVG1fg3kEfnogTiH8_4EXvwD9FE1RRO0

BANGKOK — Thai officials on Saturday called an emergency Cabinet meeting in the face of unrelenting anti-government street protests that have raised fears of broader civil unrest across the country.

With negotiations between the protesters and the government on hold and hopes for a peaceful end to the standoff dwindling, calls have grown for international mediators to be involved.

Government spokesman Panithan Wattanayagorn said the Cabinet would meet Sunday morning in a special session. Panithan declined to say what the agenda would be, but it was widely expected to focus on the seven-week crisis that has paralyzed parts of Bangkok.

In recent days, pro-establishment protesters have called on the government to declare martial law and crack down on the Red Shirt protesters, whose barricaded camp occupies streets in Bangkok's commercial center.

The Red Shirts are demanding the government disband Parliament and call elections, and they said Saturday they would ignore any imposition of martial law.

"Even if they announce that we are not going to go home. We are going to stay put," said Nattawut Saikua, a Red Shirt leader.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/01/2887734.htm?section=justin

At least 27 people have been killed and nearly 1,000 wounded in sporadic violence between protesters and security forces.

Some officials have expressed hopes the protesters will grow weary and go home soon, but Weng Tojirakarn, another Red Shirt leader, said Saturday that reinforcements were coming to increase their presence in the streets of the capital.

"Red Shirts, people from the provinces, are coming in to Bangkok, starting from today. And this time they will stay a long time," he said.

The Red Shirts, drawn mostly from the rural and urban poor, are demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, saying he came to power through the connivance of Bangkok's elite bureaucrats and the military.

The International Crisis Group think tank said Thailand's political system had broken down and expressed fears the standoff could "deteriorate into an undeclared civil war."

The group appealed for foreign mediation, possibly led by East Timor President Jose Ramos Horta, to encourage both sides to stand down and help prepare for new elections and a government of national unity.

Thailand's iconic Buddhist monks have entered Bangkok's inner city rally zone to offer good luck to anti-government protesters.

Monks are expected to operate outside of politics, but at least some support what they say is a call for freedom and democracy.

One monk told the ABC their motives are above politics.

"We don't want any side to lose their life," he said. "That's why we're here."

There are 20 monks living in the protest site and their mere presence is a sort of neutral, visual conscience.

But some of their leaders, like Pra Sangian, relate to a quest from the rural poor and urban working class protesters for a better life.

He says all Thais want freedom and democracy, and the monks can also offer good luck.

"Buddha power, Dhamra power, Sangha power, protect you and everybody," he says.

Protection is needed. So far 27 people have been killed and almost 1,000 injured during two months of protests.

Wat Srapathum is inside the Red Shirts' barricades.

The temple is experiencing the same loss of clientele as businesses in the area.

There would usually be hundreds of people inside but many are too afraid to come into the city centre, even to a place of worship.

Nevertheless, Deputy Abbott Pra Thavorn Jittatarwaron says the temple continues to offer spiritual guidance and support to anyone who enters its gates.

"The nature of the world is not stable," he said.