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English to Thai: UNESCO Bangkok news in Bangkok Post - Students struggle amid economic strife General field: Social Sciences Detailed field: Journalism
Source text - English Students struggle amid economic strife
Since the economic crisis hit in 2008, many students have reported hardships, including an inability to repay their student loans and deep concerns over their future after graduation.
A 50-country survey carried out by Unesco's Paris headquarters in 2009 revealed large-scale global cuts in education budgets due to lower revenues.
The Thai government reduced its 2010 education budget by 4 percent from last year.
Social impacts, such as job losses and income reduction, created by the financial downturn are exacerbating the financial burden on students and their families.
Professor Paitoon Sinlarat, vice-president for research affairs at Dhurakij Pundit University, said more students are taking out student loans to deal with the downturn. At the same time, more graduates are failing to repay loans as they are unable to secure employment.
Phubass Thammasiri, a third-year student at Chiang Rai's Mae Fah Luang University, admitted the crisis has been tough for him and his family.
"For the past couple of years, my parents have been struggling to send me money," said Phubass, whose family grows corn and beans in Nan province.
"They give me less, and late," he said.
Phubass cannot take on a part-time job as his studies occupy all of his time. His two sources of income are his family and a student loan.
He receives around 3,000 to 4,000 baht a month from his family, of which half goes towards his dormitory fees, with the rest saved for personal expenses.
He has to pay an extra 5,000 baht per four-month academic term as his departmental fees exceed the loan amount.
Phubass studies Chinese business in the school of liberal arts. He will have to pay back a 200,000-baht student loan when he graduates.
"I'm very worried," he said. "Many senior students who have graduated said it's really difficult to find a job. Many have had to take whatever is on offer, such as part-time tutoring."
A World Bank report said only 5 percent of Thai university students are from low-income families.
The report found that many Thai graduates in the fields of pure science and engineering were unemployed. The number of social science graduates was much greater than the market demand. Too few students were graduating in science, technology and health sciences.
Thailand faces instructional problems such as substandard teachers, as well as a mismatch between the skills of its graduates and the demands of its labour market. These system-wide issues further aggravate the unemployment rate.
Examining these education trends and challenges faced by Asia-Pacific countries is essential to national policymaking, as well as front-line education practices.
Dr Gwang-Jo Kim, director of Unesco Bangkok, said: "The economic downturn has a direct impact on education access, quality and investment. Therefore, this is a serious concern."
The recently-established Unesco Education Research Institutes Network in Asia-Pacific (ERI-Net) is taking on the study on the impact of the economic crisis on higher education as its first task. ERI-Net was set up by Unesco Bangkok during a consultation meeting on the "Impact of the Economic Crisis on Higher Education in Asia and the Pacific".
Dr Molly Lee, a senior programme specialist in higher education at Unesco Bangkok, said: "The initial study of this regional collaboration is targeted for completion in June 2010. Unesco will then present research findings to policymakers to raise awareness of higher education issues and to encourage evidence-based policy making."
Perhaps the findings from ERI-Net's first research will help the Thai and other Asia-Pacific governments to understand how the economic crisis is changing the higher-education landscape.
English to Thai: UNESCO Bangkok news in Bangkok Post - Knowledge empowers the disabled General field: Social Sciences Detailed field: Journalism
Source text - English Knowledge empowers the disabled
Education creates opportunity, drives society forward
Once suffering from dark, suicidal thoughts, Sompong Rakkot today cannot stop smiling.
The disabled farmer said his newly found happiness comes from the fact that he is able to help his physically-challenged friends, the community at large, and his family.
"Being a human being does not end when one becomes disabled," said Sompong, 42, chairperson of the Non Sawang Community Learning Centre (CLC) in Ubon Ratchathani province, in the northeast of Thailand.
"Life ends on the final day on earth. Till then, even with disabilities, all people should live their lives well as human beings," he said.
For 10 years, Sompong has been confined to a wheelchair. A work-related accident paralysed him from the chest down. The tragedy happened when his twin babies were only two years old.
After lying in bed and feeling desperate for a year, Sompong realised that he needed to get up and live again, at least for the sake of his family. He learned to help himself in his daily routines and learned how to mark out fabric patterns to help his wife weave fabric to earn a living.
Sompong is perhaps the first and only person with a serious disability to chair a CLC in Thailand.
"People with disabilities are not a burden [to society] and they're not just recipients. They can play key roles to contribute to society if opportunities are given to them," said Darunee Riewpituk, a Unesco programme specialist in continuing education for the Asia-Pacific Programme of Education for All.
"And Sompong has proven it," she added.
Over 650 million people around the world live with disabilities, and in most developing countries, they are often excluded from the rest of the society.
About 90 percent of children with disabilities in developing countries do not attend school.
Worldwide, the literacy rate of adults with disabilities is as low as three percent.
Unesco Bangkok has supported a pilot project in Ubon Rachathani to empower people with disabilities to play a key role in education and community development through CLCs and social integration.
The body has been promoting CLCs in the Asia-Pacific region since 1998 to provide learning skills to ensure the inclusion of the excluded, such as minorities and people with disabilities.
"Knowledge is power, and people with disabilities must be equipped with this power," said Preecha Soravisute, director of Ubon Rachathani Provincial Social Development and Human Security.
"They have the same equal rights in society. If they want to study, they must have access [to education]. Or if they prefer not to study, they must be given [some] help with income-generating skills training," he added.
Some CLCs have been set up by communities, while others have been established by the Office of Non-Formal Education and Informal Education (Onie).
There are currently over 8,000 CLCs supported by Onie across Thailand. However, currently no data are available on the numbers of CLCs operated by local people.
Non Sawang CLC, which Sompong chairs, is operated by the local community and supported by the Det Udom sub-district administrative office.
"[In Thailand,] when people with disabilities form a movement and try to live life like everyone else, they are seen as demanding, while it's actually their legal right that needs to be fulfilled," said Tongchai Chiampuk, director of the Onie Centre for Special Target Groups.
Sompong is now a driving force at Non Sawang CLC and he oversees activities for both disabled and non-disabled people, such as basic computer training, raising catfish, cotton weaving and batik cloth painting.
"Being disabled is nothing to be ashamed of. Attitudes towards people with disabilities need to be changed, not only among those without disabilities, but most importantly within the minds of people with disabilities and their families," said Preecha.
Sompong has set himself as an example. He makes it clear that it's not sympathy that people with disabilities want, but opportunities and understanding. "Many people suggested that I should become a beggar. But living with disabilities doesn't mean living without brains," said Sompong.
English to Thai: UNESCO Bangkok news - Testing times for exams General field: Social Sciences Detailed field: Journalism
Source text - English Testing times for exams
UNESCO report identifies ways to improve examination systems
By Yoko Kono and Rojana Manowalailao
In Asia-Pacific countries, more so than in Western nations, the media frequently reports about students feeling insufferable pressure before state examinations.
They also often report on the lengths parents go to ensure their children have every possible advantage to attain examination success.
On the big university entrance examination day in South Korea, a news article recounted that the workday began an hour late so students were not hindered by the usual morning rush hour. Parents also packed a temple in Seoul to pray for the success of their children
In India, the increasing popularity of coaching schools to prepare students to score higher university entrance exam grades is frequently reported.
Throughout the Asia-Pacific region, examinations are “the chief mechanism for controlling access to the next level of schooling, to the most prestigious schools, to good jobs, to universities, and to greater life opportunities”, stated a newly released UNESCO Bangkok publication: Asia Pacific Secondary Education System Review Series 1: Examination Systems, authored by Dr. Peter Hill.
In Indonesia, students sit a standardized examination at the end of the primary, junior high, and senior high school levels, which determines admission to the next level of schooling.
“These [examinations] were very important because one affected the other. If I could not pass the first exam level, I would not be able to enroll in the next level of education. [This would have meant] that I had to take one more year to study in the same grade and it would have been a disgrace for me and my family,” Puspita Dew, an Indonesian language instructor at a university in Yogyakarta said about her life as a student.
In the People’s Republic of China, the most significant examination is the gaokao taken by Grade 12 students who want to enter university.
Zhou Wenhui, a senior three high school student in semi-rural Hunan province, said she is aware that it will be harder for her to score a higher grade as her urban counterparts due to less equitable access to quality learning.
However, she believes the exam is an equalizer..
“The exam lets poor kids have the chance to change their life,” she said.
UNESCO Bangkok’s new publication on examination systems states that exams have three purposes. The first is a selection function and entails controlling access to secondary schools, courses within schools and entry to higher education institutions.
The second is a certifying function and entails finding out and reporting what a student has achieved, whether they have graduated and what they know and are able to do.
In addition, systems often make use of examination results for accountability purposes and in particular for evaluating the effectiveness of instruction, for motivating students and teachers to perform well, and for reviewing the effectiveness of schools.
But for many achieving high scores is the ultimate goal.
Examination systems throughout the region therefore are vulnerable to a number of problems including cheating, corruption and excessive drilling and commercial tutoring.
“[Thai] society puts too much value on score figures,” said Professor Utumporn Jamornmann, Director of the National Institute of Educational Testing Service (Niets) of Thailand.
“[Thai] students and parents don’t believe in teaching and learning in school so they opt for tutoring to achieve a higher score in exams. But to improve students’ performance, learning and teaching in the classroom should be developed and invested in.”
Asia Pacific Secondary Education System Review Series 1: Examination Systems reviews the salient features of examinations in different countries and reviews current practices, focusing specifically on public examinations. It also makes suggestions about what can be done to improve examination systems.
“This booklet aims to clarify different national approaches to examinations and identifies areas to be looked at for countries to improve their systems. It also contains information on the existing national examination systems to give general trends in the region, which cannot be found elsewhere,” said UNESCO Bangkok Secondary Education Programme Specialist Miki Nozawa.
Electronic copies can be downloaded at: www.unescobkk.org/education/epr/sepra/
For further information, contact: [email protected]
English to Thai: UNESCO Bangkok news - Economic storm batters the most vulnerable General field: Social Sciences Detailed field: Journalism
Source text - English Economic storm batters the most vulnerable
Since the breakout of the global financial crisis in 2008, all areas of human development including education have been struggling to mitigate its impact. The after-effects, as laid out by a UNESCO global education report released in 2010, include rising poverty levels, deteriorating health conditions, decreasing budgets and widening financing gaps in education and health.
Declining government revenues and rising unemployment pose a serious threat to progress in all areas of human development and leave already vulnerable groups at more risk of meeting basic needs, including education. Suffering the most are often the poorest and often aid-dependent countries.
“In response to this crisis, governments urgently need to create mechanisms to protect the poor and vulnerable. They must seize the opportunity to build societies that combat inequality,” the 2010 UNESCO Education for All Global Monitoring Report warns.
Thailand, like many countries, has put measures in place to lessen the impact of the crisis, including in education. The government prepared a 116-billion baht (USD$ 3.33 billion) economic stimulus package, approved by the Thai government in January 2009 in response to the economic crisis.
In terms of education in Thailand, the recent annual report reveals that the number of children not in school at the primary level was around quarter of a million (264,000) in 2007. Of this figure, 43 per cent were girls.
The country also experienced a decrease in primary education enrolment from 1999 to 2007. From latest available data, Thailand had a high rate of repeaters in all grades. According to the 2010 education report, there was an increase from 3.5 per cent in 1999 to 9.2 per cent in 2007. There were higher percentages of male repeaters than females for both years.
As part of the economic stimulus plan and to address remaining educational challenges, Thailand’s national education reform plan was implemented at the start of the 2009 academic year.
Based on discussions of the second phase of national education reform, Thailand’s government approved nine priority areas: quality of education/learners; teacher training and development; educational administration, management and participation; expanding educational opportunity; human resources production and development; education financing; educational technology; educational laws; and lifelong learning.
The annual global education report warns of clear damaging financial implications to the education sector. Now is not the best time for international donors to cut back on education financing. Cutting back will only stall or reverse progress towards achievements in education.
The total annual aid to education in East Asia and the Pacific region increased from an average of USD$1.3 billion in 1999 and 2000 to USD$2.1 billion from 2006 to 2007. Despite the increase, total aid to education in Thailand decreased by USD$2 million, from USD$36 million received in 2006 down to USD$34 million in 2007.
East Asia and the Pacific received an average of USD$621 million in aid to basic education from 2006-2007. From this pool, the share allocated to basic education in Thailand remained unchanged from 2006 and 2007 at USD$2 million (five per cent).
In contrast to countries in East Asia and the Pacific, available data show that Thailand’s primary education does not rely heavily on international aid.
At the secondary level, Thailand received USD$1 million in 2007 and 2006, with a 1999-2000 annual average of USD$6 million.
In 2007, a total of 20.9 per cent of the Thai government’s total expenditure was allocated to public spending on education. This is a decrease from 28.1 per cent in 1999.
However, cuts in education spending do not necessarily translate to setbacks or stalling of governments’ plans. The implementation of Thailand’s 2009 national education reform demonstrates the country’s intention to forge ahead and its reinforced efforts towards achieving quality of education. This is in line with Education for All (EFA) Goal 6 (Quality) and also addresses issues of teacher qualification and training, as well as educational management.
EFA is a global commitment agreed in 1990 at the World Conference on Education for All in 1990 in Jomtien, Thailand, which was reaffirmed by 164 countries and originations in Dakar, Senegal in 2000. Since then, governments, NGOs, civil society groups and donor agencies have taken up the cause of providing quality education for all children, youth and adults.
The six EFA goals are to: expand early childhood care and education; achieve universal primary education; improve the provision of life skills; increase literacy rates; achieve gender equality in education; and advance the quality of education by 2015.
Despite remaining education issues, Thailand has made notable efforts in a number of areas, according to the 2010 report. One example would be its efforts in technical and vocational education training (TVET) programmes.
In 2005, the country adopted the German dual system, which creates opportunities for students to combine school-based classes with in-company training. Thailand expanded its vocational education to combat child labour and provide opportunities for young people who drop out of school. From this, secondary enrolment has doubled.
However, the UNESCO report notes the need for a greater push in this area as there are evident concerns of parents and students about the quality of provision and the weakness of links to job markets. The 2009 economic stimulus package also takes this into account.
The Education for All Global Monitoring Report is the prime instrument to assess global progress towards achieving the six EFA goals. It tracks progress, identifies effective policy reforms and best practice in all areas relating to EFA, draws attention to emerging challenges and seeks to promote international cooperation in favour of education.
The 2010 report was globally launched at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on 19 January 2010. This year’s edition titled Reaching the marginalized focuses on reaching individuals whose right to accessing quality education are compromised and denied, usually caused by a combination of factors including malnutrition, geographic location (rural vs. urban), social background, level of mother’s education, being male or female and household wealth.
The full report is available online at: www.efareport.unesco.org
For more information access: www.unescobkk.org/education/efa/
or email: bkk.efa[at]unesco.org.
ในรายงานการศึกษาเพื่อปวงชนทั่วโลก (Education for All Global Monitoring Report) ประจำปี พ.ศ. 2553 กล่าวว่าในการตั้งรับวิกฤตนี้ รัฐบาลต้องเร่งหาวิธีคุ้มครองผู้ด้อยโอกาสและคนยากจนอย่างเร่งด่วนและควรจะใช้โอกาสนี้ในการสร้างความเท่าเทียมในสังคม
รายงานการศึกษาเพื่อปวงชนทั่วโลก (Education for All Global Monitoring Report) นั้นมีจุดประสงค์เพื่อวัดความคืบหน้าในการบรรลุเป้าหมาย 6 ประการของการศึกษาเพื่อปวงชน โดยจะคอยติดตามผล และนำเสนอการปฏิรูปนโยบายและหลักปฏิบัติที่มีประสิทธิภาพในทุกด้านที่เกี่ยวข้องกับการศึกษาเพื่อปวงชน นอกจากนี้ยังทำหน้าที่บ่งชี้ถึงความท้าทายต่างๆทางการศึกษาและส่งเสริมการร่วมมือกันระหว่างประเทศทางด้านการศึกษาอีกด้วย
English to Thai: A Dead Woman's Secret General field: Art/Literary Detailed field: Poetry & Literature
Source text - English A Dead Woman’s Secret
by Guy de Maupassant
The woman had died without pain, quietly, as a woman should whose life had been blameless. Now she was resting in her bed, lying on her back, her eyes closed, her features calm, her long white hair carefully arranged as though she had done it up ten minutes before dying. The whole pale countenance of the dead woman was so collected, so calm, so resigned that one could feel what a sweet soul had lived in that body, what a quiet existence this old soul had led, how easy and pure the death of this parent had been.
Kneeling beside the bed, her son, a magistrate with inflexible principles, and her daughter, Marguerite, known as Sister Eulalie, were weeping as though their hearts would break. She had, from childhood up, armed them with a strict moral code, teaching them religion, without weakness, and duty, without compromise. He, the man, had become a judge and handled the law as a weapon with which he smote the weak ones without pity. She, the girl, influenced by the virtue which had bathed her in this austere family, had become the bride of the Church through her loathing for man.
They had hardly known their father, knowing only that he had made their mother most unhappy, without being told any other details.
The nun was wildly-kissing the dead woman's hand, an ivory hand as white as the large crucifix lying across the bed. On the other side of the long body the other hand seemed still to be holding the sheet in the death grasp; and the sheet had preserved the little creases as a memory of those last movements which precede eternal immobility.
A few light taps on the door caused the two sobbing heads to look up, and the priest, who had just come from dinner, returned. He was red and out of breath from his interrupted digestion, for he had made himself a strong mixture of coffee and brandy in order to combat the fatigue of the last few nights and of the wake which was beginning.
He looked sad, with that assumed sadness of the priest for whom death is a bread winner. He crossed himself and approaching with his professional gesture: "Well, my poor children! I have come to help you pass these last sad hours." But Sister Eulalie suddenly arose. "Thank you, "father, but my brother and I prefer to remain alone with her. This is our last chance to see her, and we wish to be together, all three of us, as we--we--used to be when we were small and our poor mo--mother----"
Grief and tears stopped her; she could not continue.
Once more serene, the priest bowed, thinking of his bed. "As you wish, my children." He kneeled, crossed himself, prayed, arose and went out quietly, murmuring: "She was a saint!"
They remained alone, the dead woman and her children. The ticking of the clock, hidden in the shadow, could be heard distinctly, and through the open window drifted in the sweet smell of hay and of woods, together with the soft moonlight. No other noise could be heard over the land except the occasional croaking of the frog or the chirping of some belated insect. An infinite peace, a divine melancholy, a silent serenity surrounded this dead woman, seemed to be breathed out from her and to appease nature itself.
Then the judge, still kneeling, his head buried in the bed clothes, cried in a voice altered by grief and deadened by the sheets and blankets: "Mamma, mamma, mamma!" And his sister, frantically striking her forehead against the woodwork, convulsed, twitching and trembling as in an epileptic fit, moaned: "Jesus, Jesus, mamma, Jesus!" And both of them, shaken by a storm of grief, gasped and choked.
The crisis slowly calmed down and they began to weep quietly, just as on the sea when a calm follows a squall.
A rather long time passed and they arose and looked at their dead. And the memories, those distant memories, yesterday so dear, to-day so torturing, came to their minds with all the little forgotten details, those little intimate familiar details which bring back to life the one who has left. They recalled to each other circumstances, words, smiles, intonations of the mother who was no longer to speak to them. They saw her again happy and calm. They remembered things which she had said, and a little motion of the hand, like beating time, which she often used when emphasizing something important.
And they loved her as they never had loved her before. They measured the depth of their grief, and thus they discovered how lonely they would find themselves.
It was their prop, their guide, their whole youth, all the best part of their lives which was disappearing. It was their bond with life, their mother, their mamma, the connecting link with their forefathers which they would thenceforth miss. They now became solitary, lonely beings; they could no longer look back.
The nun said to her brother: "You remember how mamma used always to read her old letters; they are all there in that drawer. Let us, in turn, read them; let us live her whole life through tonight beside her! It would be like a road to the cross, like making the acquaintance of her mother, of our grandparents, whom we never knew, but whose letters are there and of whom she so often spoke, do you remember?"
Out of the drawer they took about ten little packages of yellow paper, tied with care and arranged one beside the other. They threw these relics on the bed and chose one of them on which the word "Father" was written. They opened and read it.
It was one of those old-fashioned letters which one finds in old family desk drawers, those epistles which smell of another century. The first one started: "My dear," another one: "My beautiful little girl," others: "My dear child," or: "My dear (laughter." And suddenly the nun began to read aloud, to read over to the dead woman her whole history, all her tender memories. The judge, resting his elbow on the bed, was listening with his eyes fastened on his mother. The motionless body seemed happy.
Sister Eulalie, interrupting herself, said suddenly:
"These ought to be put in the grave with her; they ought to be used as a shroud and she ought to be buried in it." She took another package, on which no name was written. She began to read in a firm voice: "My adored one, I love you wildly. Since yesterday I have been suffering the tortures of the damned, haunted by our memory. I feel your lips against mine, your eyes in mine, your breast against mine. I love you, I love you! You have driven me mad. My arms open, I gasp, moved by a wild desire to hold you again. My whole soul and body cries out for you, wants you. I have kept in my mouth the taste of your kisses--"
The judge had straightened himself up. The nun stopped reading. He snatched the letter from her and looked for the signature. There was none, but only under the words, "The man who adores you," the name "Henry." Their father's name was Rene. Therefore this was not from him. The son then quickly rummaged through the package of letters, took one out and read: "I can no longer live without your caresses." Standing erect, severe as when sitting on the bench, he looked unmoved at the dead woman. The nun, straight as a statue, tears trembling in the corners of her eyes, was watching her brother, waiting. Then he crossed the room slowly, went to the window and stood there, gazing out into the dark night.
When he turned around again Sister Eulalie, her eyes dry now, was still standing near the bed, her head bent down.
He stepped forward, quickly picked up the letters and threw them pell-mell back into the drawer. Then he closed the curtains of the bed.
When daylight made the candles on the table turn pale the son slowly left his armchair, and without looking again at the mother upon whom he had passed sentence, severing the tie that united her to son and daughter, he said slowly: "Let us now retire, sister."
English to Thai: The Dream General field: Art/Literary Detailed field: Poetry & Literature
Source text - English The Dream
He had always wondered what it would taste like. It looked such a joyous thing to eat. All those lovely shades of brown, the sprinkling of seeds on top, and that juicy-looking chunk of meat.
The little boy turned his gaze from the poster glued on the inside of the shop window. He looked over t his mother standing behind her makeshift food stall. He was glad that she was busy. There were three customers hunched over their bowls of noodles, perched on the rickety stools set by the road. A man had ordered a take away and his mother was ladling the broth into a plastic bag. She then gathered the bag holding the noodles and meatballs and deftly tied the two together, reached out for smaller bags filled the night before with sugar; chilli powder and vinegar, and put them all into a big plastic bag.
He thought the pale green plastic bag did not look as appetising as the big brown paper bags that people carried out of the shop. Those paper bags held so much promise.
He was seven years old. Only the other day he heard his mother discussing his age with the woman selling garlands. He wished he had a younger brother because then being seven would mean something.
His mother called. He ran to her.
"Aren't you hungry yet, son?"
He shook his head. He was hungry, but not for noodles. His mother pulled him towards her, ruffled his hair and looked at him thoughtfully. He loved her and wished that they could walk into that shop together to feel what it was like. He had asked her about it and she said that they would, one day.
He knew that the wait had to do with money. He knew that his mother did not have very much because they were not dressed like the people he saw in that shop. Their clothes were always colourful and the children had happy eyes. A lot of them wore very fancy shoes and when he watched them swinging their legs, waiting for the trays to arrive, he wondered whether he would like wearing shoes. He liked his rubber slippers, but preferred to go barefoot. He liked to feel where he was going.
The shop was getting busy. People were queuing before the counter, looking up at the list. The illuminated pictures of the food looked even better than the paper poster.
Laden trays were carried back to the tables. Children waited. Paper
cups were lifted off, followed by little bags trying to hold in the pale
yellow stickes. He noticed that children's hands always reached out for these. Then came the little bundles, wrapped in paper.
The boy salivated althought he did not know what it tasted like. His
imagination made his stomach rumble in hope.
He watched as a little girl quickly unwrapped hers. She spread the
paper out and picked up the food with both hands.
He swallowed.
The two hands were raised to her mouth, which was wide open. He watched her as she bit into the food. A bit of the red sauce oozed out and dropped onto the paper and, with her index finger, flicked the sauce up and licked it.
He turned to his mother and saw that she was looking at him intently. He smiled and walked to the makeshift kitchen. He pretended to be a customer and ordered a sen mee nam mai sai phak. His mother lifted the wire net strainer and made to pick up a fingerful of the thin white noodles. Her gaze went to the shop, and then down at her son. His eyes so bright and brave.
"I'm sorry, but we've sold out of sen mee."
The boy laughed out loud. He continued with the game and asked for kao lao luk chin.
His mothe put the huge tin lid over the steaming broth holder. She
walked to the garland lady who was merchanically folding rose petals and threading them on the long needle. His mother squatted down beside her and said something. The boy saw the woman nod, her face pulling up into a crinkly smile.
His mother straightened up, undid her pha sin around the waist, pulling out one end to a tension and bringing that end back to the waist and tugging it in. she smoothed down her blouse and pulled back her shoulders, at the same time smoothing her hair. She walked back to her stall and picked up the money tin. It used to hold powdered milk. His mother said it was the first tin of baby milk that she bought for him.
She uncrewed the lid, straining against it till the veins showed on her hand. Rust had taken over but his mother refused to part with it. Inside there were four 20-baht notes and three 100-baht notes, and some coins.
Out came a 100-baht note. She then took the tin to the flower lady for safekeeping.
His mother called to him.
"Let's go in and find out, shall we?"
The boy looked at his mother to make certain that she meant what she said although she had never given him any cause to think otherwise.
She walked over to him, took his hand and together they went up the shops, passed the grinning figure dressed in yellow and red, pushed open the door and walked in.
It was very cool inside. His hands were already cold from anticipation. His mother tightened her grip as if to reassure him.
They stood behind a college student with long dark brown hair tied in a ponytail and both were impressed by the confidence with which she ordered her food. With the exception of iced coffee, her order meant nothing to them.
The girl paid and stepped to one side of the counter to wait while her order was arranged onto a tray.
His mother felt his hand tremble as they moved to stand before the
till. The girl behind the counter smiled and said "Sawatdee Kha."
His mother looked down at him questioning with her eyes what he wanted to order. He could not read. He did not know what it was called. He looked at the girl behind the till and pointed to the picture. She said the word that millions of people all around the world took for granted to confirm his order, but to him that word had a magical ring to it. It was not a Thai and he repeated the sound in his head to memorise it.
The girl asked whether he wanted any thing else. He shook his head but asked his mother with his eyes whether she would want something. She, in turn, shook her head almost imperceptibly.
It arrived on a brown plastic tray. A dream wapped in not-quite-white paper.
The boy rached up for the tray and proceeded to find a table, as he had seen so many people do, his mother following behind.
He clambered onto the swivel seat thanked his mother, again with his eyes, and reverently unwrapped the little package.
The smell was wonderfully different. Admittedly it did not look as
plump as it did in the picture but he did not minde. He picked it up with both hands and, very slowly, bit into it.
He grinned at his mother and loved her even more in his young heart.
Outside, people were looking into the shop. Looking at him. He felt
that he was like the other children., all sharing the same liking for this handful of warm, delicious lump of meant and bread. Except for his bare feet.
He curled his toes and uncurled them. No, not having shoes did not
bother him. He was living a dream and in dreams shoes did not matter.
Expertise