Read Online The Queen of Patpong by Timothy Hallinan - Free Book Online

goes to the counter that divides the kitchen from the living room and puts her cup in front of an electric hot-water pot. “I don’t know about you,” she says as hot water streams into the cup, “but I feel as though I’ve been through a sort of sea change myself, little bits of me getting less Korean and more Thai every year.”
    “How many years have you been here?”
    “Twelve.” She picks up the cup and inhales the fragrance, a brisk, trim, short-haired woman in her late thirties or early forties, wearing a brightly striped blouse in hard-candy hues, tucked into fawn-colored slacks. “And you?”
    “Six,” he says. “I’m becoming Thai by marriage.”
    “That’s a good way to do it,” Mrs. Shin says. “Twenty-four-hour tutoring. And you’re becoming Thai through fatherhood, too, of course.”
    “That goes without saying,” Rafferty says.
    Miaow says, “Does not.”
    “When I first got here,” Mrs. Shin says, “I was only supposed to stay a year, and for the first three or four weeks I thought I wouldn’t make it. I hated it. Everything was so different from Korea. Bangkok felt like a mess—more than a mess, it felt like complete chaos. The traffic, the heat, the noise, the dirt.” She shakes her head. “And I was dripping sweat, waking up with a headache from the exhaust, and wondering why everybody smiled all the time. I was suspicious. What did they want from me? After eight or nine days, I noticed that the muscles in my cheeks ached a little because I was smiling back at everybody. So that was the beginning of my sea change—sore cheek muscles.”
    “Mine was a keen awareness that my teeth weren’t very good.”
    “Your teeth are fine,” she says without a glance. It’s a very Thai response. She sips her tea and looks down at Miaow. “And the people, they . . . Well, from a Korean perspective the Thais are a little . . . haphazard.”
    “We are?” Miaow says.
    “From a Korean perspective.” Mrs. Shin emphasizes the words. “Koreans tend to be highly organized. We’re planners and list makers. Not particularly spontaneous, unless we’ve been drinking, and then we’re too spontaneous. The Thais, on the other hand, sort of flow.” She sees the confusion in Miaow’s face and laughs. “Don’t worry, I’m not saying anything bad about the Thais. It’s actually about me, and it has to do with the play.” She crosses the small room again, barefoot, as are Rafferty and Miaow. One of the things Rafferty loves about Asia is how close everyone is to being barefoot all the time. When the two of them came into the apartment, they kicked off their shoes beside a plumb-straight line of Mrs. Shin’s, just inside the door, and the backs of all the shoes were flattened, stepped on repeatedly to make them easier to slip on and off. After all his years in Asia, the sight still cheers him.
    “As a Korean, I didn’t think the Thais measured up to me,” she says, sitting down on her heels in a posture Rafferty has never been able to attain. “And now here I am, twelve years later, slowly turning Thai and delighted about it. And it makes me think about Caliban.”
    Rafferty says, “Ah,” and Miaow says, “Why?”
    “We don’t like Caliban. We’re not supposed to. Shakespeare doesn’t like him. Caliban is the only non-European on the island, except for Ariel, who’s clearly an upper-class spirit, almost English. But Caliban . . . well, Caliban is definitely not English, and Prospero treats him like a dog.”
    Miaow says, “And he’s . . .” She falters and puts both hands on the table.
    “He’s what?” Mrs. Shin asks.
    Miaow shakes her head. “I’m not smart like you.”
    “You’re one of the smartest children I’ve ever known,” Mrs. Shin says.
    Miaow’s mouth opens at the praise and stays open. She looks as if she’s just been hit on the head.
    “So what is it?” Mrs. Shin prompts. “What else is Caliban?”
    Miaow grabs a breath and plunges in. “He’s