[Continued from "Thailand, Revisited, Reworked (Part 6)."]

The summer before, when I was in Thailand to study abroad, I had arranged for a student visa so I could stay in the country for the full three months.  If an American passport holder does no such pre-arranging, then the visa-upon-entry of 30 days applies.

My second summer in Thailand I didn’t bother to pre-arrange for an extended-stay visa.  I wasn’t a student, and I wasn’t sure if the law firm for which I worked would sponsor me.  No matter, that meant I had to leave Thailand every 30 days to renew my visa.  I was looking forward to traveling in the area.

Towards the end of my first month I realized I was short on time for planning any travel out of the country.  I talked to my friend Mike, whom I’d met in the study abroad program the summer before.  Mike and I had worked together at a law firm the summer before.  We had also gone out to clubs a lot the summer before.  Mike was one of those foreigners who loved Thailand and its people.  He liked to schmooze.  He liked being someone who knew how to make things happen.

So of course he knew someone who could help me with my visa problem.  Mike told me the guy was an expatriate American who had been living in Thailand practically forever.  He said I’d like him.  He gave me a phone number.

I called and talked to a pleasant enough sounding man.  He said I’d pay and leave my passport.  My passport, along with many others, would be taking a trip to a border, where it would be stamped with another 30 day visa-upon-entry.  My passport would then be returned to me and I’d be able to legally stay in the country for another month.  Very much illegal, which is why I had to pay a premium for the service.  The man gave me an address and we set up a time for a meeting.

I was told to go ahead and walk through the house’s gate, that the dogs were harmless.  There are a lot of dogs in Thailand: A shit ton of strays that travel in packs and take over empty lots for their base of operations, but even the dogs that people keep as pets tend to wander and usually aren’t fixed; they all looked pretty scraggly.  The dogs in the visa guy’s yard didn’t bug me, but I didn’t know where to go.

There were a few cars in the yard.  It was unclear where the house’s front door was.  Finally, I found a bunch of shoes by a door, a clear sign in Asia that that was the proper door.  I knocked.  A teenager came to the door and let me in.  After I deposited my shoes outside I was led through a series of rooms, one of which had a few children deposited in front of a television.

The teen who led me through the house – a very messy, extremely cluttered house – called to her father at the doorway of an office of sorts.  I introduced myself to a gray haired man who looked to be his 50s, but was truthfully probably younger – drink and tropical sun had done a number on the guy.  So he was the father of all the kids.  Ok.  He was white, they looked Thai, so I could assume their mother – if there was just one mother – was Thai (she was nowhere to be seen).

The man, along with looking older than his age, was also fat and sweaty.  Before his teen daughter left the room he asked her to bring him a fresh shirt.  She returned with the clean shirt, and he had her wait while he – and I so wish I were kidding – took off his shirt, which he then used to wipe down his face, the back of his neck, and his arm pits.  He then donned the fresh shirt so we could get down to business.

Business was him explaining to me that he had done this many times before, that my passport would take a trip under the guise of me taking a trip, that I was to pay cash upfront and leave my passport, and that I could return for my stamped passport in about a week.  If it wasn’t for the fact that Mike had referred me to the guy and that I was in a visa pickle, I would have run away – with my passport.  Instead, I turned over a rather large chunk of cash – almost as much as I would have spent if I had actually traveled out of the country – and my passport to this guy who, if he lived in the US would have been called white trash.  (I can do that, being as I’ve got white trash roots and all.)  He, along with many white expatriates in Thailand, had status only because they were white.

I talked to Mike about the guy and was incredulous that he’d think I’d like the guy.  Mike admitted that he thought the guy was just as repulsive as I did, but that he provided a good service and didn’t want me to be too creeped out before I met him.  Thanks, Mike.

About a week later I received my passport with a few additional stamps.  According to my passport, I entered Malaysia on 21 June, 2001, and re-entered Thailand on 25 June, 2001.  I did not actually go to Malaysia for another month, but that’s another story.

I swear.  True story.

[To be continued.]

Tags: foreign love, sexy?

Categories: True Story.

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