Snake Snake Fish Fish is an ongoing series based around Thai idioms/phrases/colloquialisms written about and illustrated by Cloé Fortier-King and guest contributors.
GUEST EDITION: This week, Kayla Kawalec is the contributing author/illustrator of the Snake Snake Fish Fish column
Kayla Kawalec, 134 YinD
There was a lone, red motorcycle parked where my bicycle can usually be found, against the profile of the Tessaban (local government office) building early this week. My bike was around the other side, under cover, in case the rain that had fallen with increasing regularity over the past few weeks made an appearance that afternoon. The air was thick but the sun was beating down and confusing my internal gauge of whether or not it might rain, a skill I thought I’d honed growing up in Florida but clearly isn’t tuned to the Thailand rainy season yet. My coworker and I were walking back from hanging a banner at the Tessaban School conveniently located next door. A Wan Khao Phansa ceremony would be held there the next day. She pointed at the motorcycle and teased, in Thai, “Who would leave their motorcycle here where it might get wet?” I say “teased” because I knew she knew exactly whose motorcycle it was. She recognizes everyones’ motorcycle and/or car and probably knows most of their license plate numbers, too. She, like many Thai people, searches for lottery numbers in places like license plates and dreams.
I studied this particular plate number, 178, and thought about the motorcycles that normally line the salmon colored profile of the Tessaban. My Tessaban. The place that’s become like a second home to me in the four short months since I arrived at my site. Excluding the two weeks that all volunteers gathered for a Reconnect conference and an occasional weekend trip to a neighboring “big city,” I’ve pedaled past the twin towering elephant statues that guard the entrance to the driveway of my Tessaban almost every single day (including most Saturdays and Sundays) – either of my own accord or for my regular work schedule.
I started to feel a challenge coming on; this particular coworker revels in teasing me. She’ll enter the office I sit in and start speaking rapidly in northern dialect, out of context, or she’ll play with conversation (and me) like a cat playing with a mouse. She’ll pull out obscure phrases or just generally muddle words in a dialect (forget an entire language) that still feels like wet noodles slipping through my fingers, leaving me grasping. She likes stretching the limits of my memory too, not satisfied with the triple language juggling act I perform daily, quizzing me on the names of fruits we talked about weeks ago or neighbors I’ve only met once.
I knew this was a chance to prove my labors, the days I spent in early April mapping out my massive Tessaban with its 12 offices and over 60 employees. I would awkwardly enter rooms full of unfamiliar faces, my hands full of kanoms (treats, aka bribes), and attempt to swallow my discomfort and general confusion in order to informally interview each person in this new place, this giant birthday cake building frosted in shades of pink. In the beginning, though, it felt more like a twisted carnival house. I’d bike up the long drive, my stomach doing flips as I prepared for my daily test. My bike was usually the first vehicle to arrive along that peachy wall, and I’d change out of my bike clothes, climb the stairs and wait in my quiet office for the motorcycles and cars to arrive. As my coworkers filtered in they’d pass my office and each person presented a mini memory challenge to come up with their nickname, approximate age and work position (which would then inform what title I should use to refer to them), along with bonus point opportunities for knowing their relationship status, number of kids, neighborhood they live in, and their American nickname (that was back when I thought handing those out would be fun, but backfired and gave me double the work of remembering names). I’d read my spreadsheet of information every morning like a study guide. I held on to those names as if they were the key to figuring out what in the world I was supposed to be doing there, an American in an office of Thai professionals. I thought, if I didn’t know what I’m doing or what everyone is saying, at least I’ll know all of their names.
It got easier, of course, as time went on and I settled in. I stopped dreading that long driveway, and now arriving at my Tessaban, still at least a half hour before everyone else, is like a present – getting to see all of those faces, now familiar and friendly, a joy.
My coworker and I had arrived back in my office, and everyone there was becoming more amused the more determined I got trying to narrow down the owner of 178. I immediately eliminated my friends, the three women whose office I share and whose vehicles I recognize. I went office by office, in my head, meticulously pulling the faces and names from the Tessaban map I’d drawn four months ago and trying to match them with their method of transportation. My coworker shook her head with each wrong guess, clearly enjoying my frustration. She teasingly pointed to her head and said something about põhm (hair), indicating her own short-cropped style, which I took to mean that it might be one of the men in the office, but regardless, eventually I ran out of people. Convinced this was just another entry for the “missed joke” series that’s been running since I started living somewhere with a native language different from my own, I threw my hands up in defeat. There’s a fine line between getting lost in translation and being punked, and I was toeing it.
My other coworker, and best friend at site, shook her head laughing and suggested we go downstairs to see if anyone had come to claim the motorcycle so that we could solve the mystery once and for all. I silently simmered in my loss as we walked outside into the mockingly beautiful sunny day: the sky bright blue, clouds puffy white and no rain in sight. My friend promptly strode over, sat down on her red motorcycle, license plate number 178, inserted the key, and started the engine. I hung my head in defeat. I’d been so busy proving myself, rattling off names and trying to affirm my place alongside those 60 people, that I missed the one person, my most important ally since day one, right there in front of my face the whole time.
She laughed kindly and repeated what my other coworker had said earlier about hair. I shook my head, still not understanding, “You two don’t have the same hairstyle at all, what do you mean?” She repeated it slower and I finally picked it out. เส้นผมบังภูเขา (sên põhm bang phuu-khão) or “A strand of hair before the eye obscures whole mountains.” I’d missed what was right in front of my eyes the whole time, caught up in my own strand of hubris.
I’ve thought back to this moment over the last few days and it feels fitting for my Peace Corps service in general. Some days I get so caught up in the future, in the potential for this program and my “impact,” so caught up in what I’ll teach, impart, or introduce, that I neglect to notice what’s right in front of my face. I’m in danger of missing my students running up to the wall of their school every morning just to wave to me as I bike by, the teachers at my schools continuing to gift me mangos from their yards or kanoms they think I might like even though my “newness” here has effectively worn off, my coworkers including me in their plans, making a name tag for my desk, helping me feel like I belong.
I can see mountains in the distance out the window of my house and every morning they appear different. Some days the sun is blazing and it almost hurts to look at them, so crisp I can imagine each individual tree. Some days the fog settles in and surrounds them, obscuring them in mist. When I look out I’ll try to remember to tuck my hair behind my ears and really see what’s right in front of me, the whole mountains.
Sticky Rice 
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