Wednesday after

I wake up in that familiar state of mild panic - I forgot to go to the laundry yet again. Why is it that I can’t organize my life into any kind of shape or routine? Why can’t I eat three meals a day at the times my Mom recommended, and is it so difficult to make sure that there are always clean clothes hanging in the closet and my rent and bills get paid on time? I was never ever this disorganized when I lived with my parents. I swing my legs out of bed and go across to the linen basket (actually, it’s a black bin-liner). I have one clean shirt - it used to be white but is now an insipid gray. In addition, it has a stain on the breast pocket, which is unmistakably chicken tikka masala. That stuff just never comes out.

I look across at the devious Noi lying fast asleep under crumpled sheets and decide to give her a poke (a poke in the ‘I need a shirt ironed' sense) She groans audibly “araaaay” and goes back to dreaming about being let loose in a Las Vegas casino with unlimited spending money. I’m going to have to iron the shirt myself. A quick glance at the clock tells me that I have exactly 40 minutes to iron a shirt, take a shower, do my hair and get to Mrs Sakomoto’s apartment on Sukhumwit 39. Every minute has to count. It dawns on me that I have never had to iron a shirt before - my Mom never showed me. But I do as best as I can - a squirt of spray starch here and a squirt there. For a novice ironer like me, I still have to endure the challenge of ironing on one of those low ironing boards much favored by the Thais - when you turn the shirt over, the sleeve that you’ve just done drags across the floor and becomes a mass of creases again (which rather defeats the whole purpose methinks)

Eventually I’m away out of the apartment - no lesson plan, late for the lesson anyway, and a crap shirt. The insecurity guard wants to tell me about last night’s football but I’ve no time to offer opinions. Petchburi Road is bumper to bumper - total gridlock. I approach the loathsome gaggle of motorcycle taxi drivers on the corner of my sub-soi. “I apologize for disturbing your game of bottle-top checkers but could one of you fine gentleman ferry me from here to Sukhumwit 39 for forty baht and a song?” The fattest and most aggressive member of the group removes his sunglasses and takes a sharp intake of breath. “80 baht - take it or leave it” I realize that negotiation is out of the question. The traffic is getting heavier by the second and Mrs Sakamoto will be by now busy arranging a pen and notebook on the living room table. I reluctantly accept fat-boy’s extortionate offer. When I get to Mrs Sakamoto’s palace in the sky, I’m still fifteen minutes late. She then spends the next hour wrestling with the concept of British time vs American time, and all the while she’s trying to work out what kind of stain that could be on my breast pocket.