Today I kicked a beggar

Sukhumvit road is the main artery through Bangkoks business centre. Tourists, ex-pats and busisnesmen abounfd - and so do those who feed off them. For the most part its honest, vendors simply selling their wares - overpriced but still cheap by any Western standards. On most corners are aggressive tailors exhorting you to come buy a suit from them, or massage pimps flashing lurid cards of naked women promising you earthly delights ( apparently most of them offer no such thing, all you get is a massage for your money, some have told me they've even had men massaging them when they were expecting a handy-shandy at the very least from a pretty woman!). There are other scams, young people pretending to do surveys when they're really trying to get you to buy something you just don't need.

Another scam involves well dressed children in school uniforms hitting the bars and restaurants with little signs saying 'I'm in an orphanage school, please give money so that I can have books for my education'. I fell for this one at first, there was a well heeled, nicely dressed woman in tow, offering official credentials. After a few days I got suspicious, why was it always the same two children, and more importantly, why were they never in school? I asked if I could take details of her licence and of course, she refused. Still, they never bothered me again.

And of course there are the beggar; for the most part they are wretches. People seeping pus and blood through badly bandaged stumps, filthy and dishevelled waving a styrofoam cup at you aggresively. Women with small children, or children operating solo, beautiful and wretched as they hold their cups up over their head, their eyes downcast. Their plight is plain and drives you to part with a few paltry baht in indication of how so much luckier you are than they.

But after a while you see throught the facade. In other parts of Thailand people smile at you and bow slightly in recognition for any small service or act of kindness. Not these miserable souls. When you drop money into their cups there's no eye contact, no smile, no trace of human interaction - instead they greedily add up how much money you've given and then its on the look out for the next mark. The small children are regularly changed, their so called mothers getting through three or four a shift. Your heart hardens, and you also notice that very few Thai people give anything at all., whereas all over Thailand when I've seen the odd beggar, food stall vendors always make sure they're fed, people stop and chat to them - in other words they are part of society. Back on Sukhumvit, there exists no such relationship. Your heart hardens, and you begin to ignore them. For the most part this isn't a problem but others are more aggresive and shout and curse at you. You undergo an inner battle - why are you such a bastard? Why dfid you ignore him, he's a human too - that could so easily have been you...and so on. Then you begin to resent feeling guilty and having these thoughts collide around your mind each time you walk past a beggar demanding your money - for that's what you finally come to see it as. And when you hear that they're bused in every day and belong to a mafia syndicate who cream off the money you feel contempt. Not for the poor souls in this situation - they no doubt need the money badly enough, but when you know that most of the money is going to people who will drink or gamble it away you wash your hands of the whole caboodle.

The most loathsome beggars are those who drag themselves along the pavement pushing a tray ahead of them for punters to drop money into. There's little wrong with them other than an amuptated lower leg, the crawling along the pavement is pure melodrama. Which sickens me. Oh but it works, their marks fall for the act dropping substantial amounts into their trays which they whisk away quickly about their person - can't let the marks see that they're making so much money. And what sickens me is the exploitation of people's good hearts, jai din, and the way that they have turned me into a black heart, jai dam. About three beggars use the same pitch just down from the restaurant where I sit and work for several hours a day. Me, sitting like a king on the raised floor, while they crawl pathetically beneath me. From my observation point I can see the whole operation. When it's time to change shifts, they pick up their concealed crutches and move ably off. Another takes their place and so on it goes. They operate in a tightly constricted place so people are forces to step around them, they slow down the people in the crowded street to make sure they are seen....and the money pours in.

It's hard not to let the place grind you down, to some Thais all Farang look the same - I recall once in Chiang Mai walking into a bar, where the Thai bar man said

'John! How are you? Singha beer?'

I nodded stunned, how did he know my name - I had never been here before?

'How Mary?'

'Mary? Who's Mary?' I replied, still wondering.

'Mary, wife you.' he nodded. Then I realised, it was just a coincidence and explained this. I was still puzzled though until he said,

'Ah, you Ferang! All look same!'

Back on Sukhumvit, the same people pester you for suits and massages and money and money and money - they don't seem to recognise the fact that I take the same route most of the time to the same places and no I do not want anything you have. It can get you down - I couldn't live here. One day, after nightfall, I was walking back to the hotel laden with supplies for a week as well as carrying my rucksack full of books and papers. Tourists thronged the pavements crowded with vendors stalls, progress a staccato at best. The bags were heavy, my eyes ahead, looking for a gap between the tourists drifting slowly through. I saw one and went for it. Suddenly I was falling through the air, having tripped on something, bags flying everywhere though I managed to hang on to them. The bone of my knee hit the concrete hard as did a flung elbow. Angry, I stood and looked back at what had tripped me. It was one of the crawling beggars whom I could not see among the crowds. To my astonishment I aimed a kick at him in anger, nothing hard but enough to show my contempt. I stormed away. Nobody said a word, I don't think anyone really noticed.

For days I had to live with that guilt, and that made me even angrier at those wretches, for they had shown me a side of myself I do not like. And still I own such contempt.

yechydda,