An Angel with a Gun Page 5

  I think the happiest and most exciting time in my early school years was when the puppet show was coming to school. It was a professional touring stage group and there was a lot of excitement around the school. Colourful posters were put up around the school and the puppets looked wonderful, almost magical. All the children were given a colour leaflet to take home and, for the price of two shillings, we could see the whole show in one week’s time when it came to the school. I, along with most of the other children, took the two shillings that my mum gave me into the school the very next morning. By the end of the week everyone had given two shillings to the teacher and was issued with a ticket for the performance, which the teacher kept so they wouldn’t get lost. The excitement just grew and grew each day. The next week, on the morning of the big show, there were two lorries parked in the school playground and men were carrying boxes and huge puppets and lighting into the assembly hall. The stage had already been transformed and all the children were scrambling over each other to get a glimpse through the windows of the hall. It looked amazing. There was a cottage, a castle and a wood. There were rocks and trees that looked real. This was going to be the best thing that any of us had ever seen. The show was going to be in the afternoon, straight after dinner time and it was going to be for the whole afternoon. I had never had such a good feeling of excitement and anticipation. Even at five years of age I already knew that this was going to be the best day of my life. After dinner we had to go back into class for the afternoon register and then the teacher, Miss Rogers, told us all to line up in twos because we were walking to the main assembly hall for the show. I had butterflies in my stomach. Mary just sat at her desk.

  “Come on Mary.” It was the first time I had ever spoken to her, but she just shook her head and I could see that she was crying.

  “What’s the matter?”

  Mary didn’t answer me. She just folded her arms on the desk and put her head down and I could see by the movement of her shoulders that she was sobbing. The rest of the children started filing out of the class room holding hands in twos and Miss Rogers came and put some colouring books and crayons on Mary’s desk.

  “You can do some colouring, Mary.”

  Mary didn’t respond and it dawned on me that Mary wasn’t going to see the show. I felt my heart breaking for her and the emotion just sort of choked me. It felt as if my heart was on the floor.

  “Come on Steven. We don’t want to miss the show. You can walk in with me” said Miss Rogers. I knew that she had no idea how much pain Mary was in. This was supposed to be the best day of our young lives and Mary was going to sit on her own with a colouring book all afternoon!

  “Miss, what about Mary?”

  “Mary isn’t going to the puppet show.”

  “Why not Miss?” All the children had already left the classroom now.

  “Because her mum and dad can’t afford to buy her a ticket for the show.”

  “Why can’t she go free? She has free dinners!”

  “It doesn’t work like that Steven. She needs a ticket. Now come on or we will miss it ourselves.”

  “Can Mary have my ticket Miss?”

  “What?”

  “Can Mary have my ticket please?”

  “I don’t know. I think your mother would be very angry if you gave your ticket away.”

  “She said that I can give it away if I didn’t want to see the show. I already asked her.”

  “Are you sure, Steven? You will be in trouble if you are telling lies!”

  I wasn’t sure and I was telling lies, but it felt like the right thing to do. I just nodded my head and the teacher let out a heavy sigh. She pulled Mary up by the arm.

  “Come on Mary. It looks like you are going to see the show after all.”

  I watched the teacher dragging Mary out of the class room as Mary dried her eyes on the sleeve of her jumper and I watched through the classroom window as they walked across the playground to the main assembly hall. As Mary was being dragged across the playground she looked back at me. I smiled and waved, but she had turned away again before she saw it. I spent the rest of the afternoon making up stories about puppets in case my mum asked me anything about the show, but she didn’t. It was never mentioned again by anyone, but I remembered that day as I sat in my dad’s kitchen.

  Dad didn’t realize it, but his words had a profound effect on me. I put my dirty clothes in the machine and poured the tea down the sink. I was going to find myself and I decided that the best place to start looking was in the public library. I wanted to learn more about Buddhism and I wanted to learn Thai.

  In my wildest dreams I had never imagined that I would become a Buddhist Monk living and working in an ancient wooden built temple on the edge of a huge lake in Khanchanaburi. For those of you who don’t know, it is the same province in the west of Thailand where the Bridge over the River Kwai stands and the province borders Burma, or Myanmar as it is now called. I have visited the Bridge since I have been here and I have also visited the war graves of the Commonwealth Soldiers who fell here, building what was to be known as ‘The Death Railway’.

  I just couldn’t settle in England. I was drawn to Buddhism and I was drawn to Thailand. I went to speak to some monks in the Buddhist temple in Kings Bromley in Staffordshire and I started studying Buddhism there. I knew in my heart that I could make a difference. I ended up staying in the temple in Kings Bromley. One of the older monks knew about the temple in Khanchanaburi, because he had stayed there for a few weeks when he was a young monk. He thought it might be perfect for me when I had finished my studies and I was ready to work in my first temple. He said that it needed a special person, because there were many poor people there - some Thai and some Burmese. He told me that the place was a little run down and neglected, because it was sort of out on a limb in the middle of nowhere on the border with Burma. It had no funding from anyone and the community around the area was the poorest of the poor. I liked the sound of the place as soon as I heard his stories about it and funding was not going to be a problem. I was getting royalty payments from the sale of The Flower Girl books every three months and I certainly didn’t want or need the money. So it seemed like a natural step to use it for the temple and the people of Khanchanaburi. It seemed to me that there had been a big problem with funding previously and none of the monks really wanted to be there. So few stayed and none stayed for very long. I knew that I would love the place even before I arrived. I was as excited to go to Khanchanaburi as the monks in Staffordshire were to see me leave. It wasn’t that they didn’t like me. I certainly didn’t feel like the outcast that I had felt all my life. I was just different somehow! I think all the monks were my friends. It’s just that they were the sort of friends who didn’t really need to talk to me very much - the sort of friends who didn’t need to share anything or involve me in anything. They just liked to keep themselves to themselves.

  I know that they really liked me, but they were happy for me to go. They thought it was important for me to work and study in Thailand and work amongst people who really needed me. The people in the rather posh area of Kings Bromley didn’t need anything - well maybe another accountant or another new car. I had never actually been anywhere in public in my saffron coloured robes and only people who visited the temple in Staffordshire had seen me in them and I have to admit I was excited about being seen in public in my new robes. Although I shouldn’t have bothered to get excited, as everyone in Manchester airport just ignored me or looked at me as if I was crackers. I flew from Manchester to Bangkok and then made a special trip to the old temple on Karon Hill in Phuket. I replaced Pin’s plastic urn with a silver one. Pin was The Flower Girl, who I had been arrested for murdering, but as previously stated, I didn’t do it. I stayed for two days in the temple before I travelled overland by train to Khanchanaburi. I was treated with a lot of respect and kindness by all the Thai peop
le. They were all interested in the ‘Farang’ monk and, because I was already fluent in Thai, I could answer all their questions.

  It took me a lot longer than I thought it would take to get to Khanchanaburi. Then it was a long trek through the hills and over lakes to the very edge of the jungle. I had to make that final trek on foot. It was a long trek and guess what? There was nothing there. The old monk in Staffordshire told me that there was a temple and a school and that the place was a bit neglected and run down. What was actually there was a clearing at the edge of a lake with a wooden built temple that was nothing more than a small barn on stilts. The wood had been bleached white and warped by hundreds of years of baking sunshine. The school was a blackboard with a small bamboo and banana leaf cover over it and, from the over grown weeds in front of the board, it didn’t look like any kids had been sitting there to learn anything for a long time - and I mean generations! By this time my Thai was very good, but I couldn’t speak any Burmese. There were a few dirt tracks leading to the temple and I had passed many homes scattered amongst the jungle hills as I walked to the temple. Some of the homes were quite big builds, belonging to wealthier Thai people from Bangkok and were only used a few weekends each year. There were also some holiday bungalows, which were rented out sometimes to farangs, but again mostly to Thai’s. There were some makeshift shops to cater for all the people who visited the hills and lakes. There were also a lot of tiny run down shacks around the lakes. These belonged to poor Burmese people who were living illegally in Thailand and made their living by fishing the lakes and living off the land - farming on a very small scale. It was also illegal to cut down the teak trees in Thailand, but this also seemed to be happening a lot and was a main source of their income. A lot of the local people were very interested in the arrival of the new farang monk and, by the time I walked into the temple on that first day, I had a small crowd of children and old people who had followed me the last mile or so to the temple. I guessed that the men must have been out fishing the lakes or maybe cutting down trees. I wandered around the temple grounds with my new inquisitive friends, who were all more interested in me than the old temple. I found some old dusty Buddha statues and a cupboard containing all the paraphernalia that I would need for services. I found a hut which really was just a hut and had nothing in it, which I realized was my sleeping quarters. I found an old over grown garden, a small pond, a huge bell and a gong that was lying in the undergrowth, on its side. I found some old books, some old pots and pans, some old Buddhist scriptures, but there were no old monks. There was just me, alone. Well, except for all the expectant faces on skinny brown bodies that were following me around. My heart was sinking until I looked into their eyes. I wondered how many other monks had come and looked around and then left again.

  I gave the people a blessing and they drifted away. I needed a miracle, but I think that they needed a miracle too.

  I spent the rest of the day just looking around at my future and thinking about how I could rebuild the lost temple. Everything was either half buried or covered with over-grown weeds. I came across the most beautiful views of lakes and mountains. I found the remains of an old wooden boat on the shore of the lake. Most of the wood had rotted away and now it just looked like the skeleton of the vessel it once was. Everything was going to need a lot of work, but I had a good feeling in my heart about the place. I settled down in the bamboo hut as it got dark. It wasn’t long before I heard footsteps outside.

  “Hello” I said, feeling slightly spooked. The footsteps stopped and I could almost hear the intruder listening to me listening to him. Then the steps started again and were coming towards the hut. I held my breath as I waited for the visitor to come into my hut.

  Then a head peered around the door. It wasn’t human. It looked like a crocodile, but without the teeth and the biggest lizard I have ever seen then padded into my hut. Well, maybe it was his hut before it was mine. We just looked at each other. My new friend was at least 6ft long. If I wasn’t so scared I would have walked past him and out of the door, but he looked big enough to eat me so I stayed still and we just looked at each other. I wasn’t scared because I knew that Buddha would protect me. But, just in case he was busy with something else, I slowly reached over and picked up the bamboo broom - just in case! After a long, long ten minutes my friend decided to leave and he turned around and walked out and back towards the jungle. My visitor was a lizard called The Water Monitor, which is in the same family as the Komodo dragon and can grow to well over 3 metres. Previously I had only ever seen the tiny Gecko lizards, only a few inches long and welcomed in homes due to their liking for mosquitos and other flying pests.

  Within Thailand the Monitor Lizard is one of the most hated species of lizard! Generally known as Dooa Nguen Dooa Thong or Dooa Hia (a rather strong obscenity in Thai) it is considered unlucky to have one found close to or inside your house.

  They are, however, extremely beautiful and very large in size. They have long necks, powerful tails and claws, well developed limbs and can weigh up to 50 kgs! Sub species can be either terrestrial, arboreal or semi aquatic - due to their ability to swim extremely well. Eating anything from small reptiles and mammals, fish, birds, carrion and even fruits, they have adapted extremely well to a life with increased pressure from humans. Any canoe trip down one of Thailand’s rivers will reveal Monitor Lizards either basking on the banks or high up in the trees. Over the months and years I was to see a lot of the nature of Thailand.

  The next morning people started arriving at 6am with food and water. I conducted the first service that the temple had seen for decades. Afterwards, we all ate food and then, together, we set about rebuilding our temple. At first the work was slow and hot and hard. Once we started working on the temple a lot of money was contributed by the wealthier people from Bangkok, who visited the area as a bit of a get away from the big city. They also contributed building materials and one man, who had a building company, even sent some of his professional builders to help us. The temple was rebuilt and we also built a small school building. When the bell was reset on a new built brick stand we held a blessing and now it is a wonderful sound when it rings out across the hills and lakes. The garden was reclaimed and we became self-sufficient with fruit and vegetables. The temple became a happy place, a bright place and a very busy place. I taught the children English and maths. Local volunteers taught other subjects. I couldn’t stop the poverty and hardships that these people faced on a daily basis, but together we had built something a bit special. Something that made their lives just a little bit easier. There was a great sense of community and the temple had become the beating heart of it. These people had become my friends and my family and everyday was a joy for me. If my life had ever been happier than this then I couldn’t remember it. There was always something funny and always something happy. Sometimes, of course, we are touched by sadness, but we faced everything together like the family that we had become. My dad died during my first year in Khanchanaburi. I didn’t go back for the funeral. I was too busy here in Thailand and my dad wouldn’t have wanted me to go anyway. Mrs. Thompson, the next door neighbour, rang me to tell me that dad had died.

  “Hello” I said, not recognizing the number.

  “It’s Mrs. Thompson here Steven. Your dad is dead.”

  “I’m sorry, it’s a bad line. I can’t really hear you.”

  “Your dad is dead.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Your dad is dead.”

  “What? I’m sorry. I can’t hear you. You keep breaking up. Can you hear me?”

  “Your dad is dead.”

  “What?”

  “Your fucking dad is dead. The bus fucking squashed him. He’s fucking dead.”

  The line had suddenly become clear and all I heard was Mrs. Thompson shouting and swearing down the phone. I’d never heard her swear before. Well, she was 78 years old and I always thought of he
r as such a sweet old lady. I guess it must have been the shock of my dad dying after ‘The bus fucking squashed him’.

  “Oh dear!” I said.

  “Are you coming back for the funeral?”

  “No. I don’t think so.”

  “Are you still in Thailand?”

  “Yes.”

  “You don’t sound as if you are in Thailand.”

  “How does Thailand sound on the phone?”

  “I don’t know. Do you want me to take care of everything then? I am the executor of his will. I signed some papers at Philpot & Sons with him a few years ago, just after you’d murdered that Thai girl.”

  “I didn’t murder her.”

  “Oh! I know that you got off it in the end. I can do everything and sell the house and send you anything of interest. I’ll sell everything else that I don’t want and I’ll send you the money when the house and everything is sold. Unless you want the house?”

  “No. I don’t want the house.”

  “I’ll sell it then. His life insurance will pay for the funeral. Do you have TV in Thailand?”

  “Why? Is the funeral going to be televised?”

  “No. He got a free TV when he took out the life insurance policy. I just wondered if you wanted me to send it over to Thailand.”

  “No thank you.”

  “Well, I’ll keep it then and sell my old one.”

  “OK. Well thanks for letting me know Mrs. Thompson.”

  “The funeral is next Thursday. Oh! You’ll be getting some compensation from the bus company, because you are listed as next of kin and the driver was drunk when he ran over your dad. He’d been having trouble at home and was secretly drinking.”