Bangkok forever summer, but I never fell in love with him

I grew up in Chiang Mai and my grandfather and grandmother were both from Chaozhou.

They came to Chiang Mai in the 20th century with the business wave. My grandfather was a Chinese doctor, and later my father became a Chinese doctor, my mother was a herbalist, and my uncle helped my father open a Chinese medical clinic after investing in real estate.

At that time, Chinese people were not allowed to teach their children Chinese in Thailand, so my father and uncle did not speak Chinese, and I only took an elective course in college, so I could read but not speak.

I grew up listening to my grandmother talk about my hometown, about Chaoshan, and about how Chinese people always go back to their roots. So when I meet Chinese people of my age, I always pay extra attention to them as if it is a matter of course.

The first time I met him was at a club in the international section of Chulalongkorn.

It was hot that afternoon, maybe any day in Bangkok, just because I thought of him and felt everything around me start to fog up and rise.

"Not bad, not very handsome either." I shrugged at my friend as the eyes in the room followed him.

He was white, his side face looked like a Korean star, and he spoke Thai well, or at least I could understand it.

At that time I didn't think I would cross paths with him, I just heard something about him.

He was Chinese and was probably chosen for the honor guard because of his good looks, and he always attracted a lot of people to look at him during the rehearsals after class.

By the way, he has a very beautiful girlfriend.

Well, she was pretty, I saw her when I took pictures of the honor guard, and she was a standard mixed-race beauty.

If I just took pictures of him, I would never have crossed paths.

At that time, the drama group was determined to find him to act, and he refused two or three times, but the drama club put down the word that he could say nothing and play a tree that showed his face.

The Chinese are still thin-skinned, and he finally agreed to go to the International Department's social gathering.

For the first time, my camera was so close to him because he was sitting right in front of me, smiling slightly and saying Savadica to me.

"Hello." I replied to him in somewhat rusty Chinese.

His eyes widened in surprise and he said, "Do you speak Chinese?"

My back started to get wet, regretting that I hadn't gone to practice speaking properly, and even more so that I hadn't practiced my Chinese with Grandma.

"A little." I smiled back at him.

I didn't actually understand anything he said later, I just remember his eyes curving when he smiled, remember him picking up my camera, remember his hands were cold and touched my shoulders.

He performed the background so successfully that I recorded all his appearances.

Oh, and I was asked privately by my teacher if I would like to study in China because I was too serious in my elective class and he could write me a letter of recommendation.

After becoming friends with him, perhaps he felt an inexplicable closeness to finding someone in a foreign country who knew his home language, and he often invited me to walk around the streets of Bangkok with him.

I grew up in Chiang Mai and wasn't familiar with Bangkok, but he didn't seem to care much about it.

So the two of us didn't go to any famous places or netflix hit spots, maybe a certain alley, maybe a certain patch of grass.

"It's too hot, hotter than Chaoshan." He helped me carry my camera, and the clothes under the camera strap were already wet.

"Chaoshan? I kinda want to go there too."

"Yeah, I'll take you there sometime."

He is not a very good travel partner, we are together when he is always followed by his girlfriend's phone calls, I listen to the two of them every day on the phone quarrel and good again quarrel.

"Girls, they need to be coaxed." I said to him.

He shook his head and laughed, "I understand, but she doesn't want to leave the air conditioned room, but of course I have to walk around when I come out to study."

We were both on a green train to northern Thailand when he said this, and with the sweltering heat and humidity and sticky, dirty tables, I couldn't really think of any reason for myself to take a ride I thought I'd never use in my life.

"There's a Chinese saying about giving up your life for a gentleman."

He sat right across from me and said this, as gentle and good-looking as a painting, like a four-faced Buddha.

I know good-looking can't be used to describe a boy, but he was just very good-looking, more delicate than many girls grow.

I looked at the mole on the tip of his nose and suddenly remembered which star he looked like, Han Ga Ren.

The two of us went to many places together and wandered almost all over Southeast Asia when we didn't have classes.

I knew he was special to me, but I didn't know exactly what that specialness was.

My friends told me I should go and confess my love. Confess? I didn't think about it.

"He's got a girlfriend." I said to my friend.

"You only have to confess when you have a girlfriend, you let him choose."

Maybe it was a good time when he sat next to me and watched the moon, but I didn't ask.

Maybe it was a good time when we went to a concert in Taiwan together, but I didn't ask.

Maybe it was a good time when he had diarrhea to the point of dehydration in a hotel in Mumbai and I was rushed to the hospital, but I didn't say anything.

Maybe it was a good time for him to break up with his girlfriend, but I didn't ask.

Maybe I'll never have the chance to say anything in my life because he said he was going back to his country.

On the day of the drop-off I was muddled, but braced myself to talk to him about something.

"Is your girlfriend not coming?" Why did I mention his girlfriend again.

"She doesn't want to go back to China with me, and she has fought for it. He still smiled and sighed.

"What about you, come with me to Chaoshan to see? We've finished all the places except China." By finished, he means we both have a map of Asia, and every time we go somewhere, we put a marker on it.

Chaoshan, Chaoshan, huh?

"Sometime." I kind of wanted to cry, and I still didn't say it.

"Okay then." He looked at the time, "I'm leaving, if you get married later, you must come to drink the wedding wine ah, you are my best friend."

Later I met nana, oh yes, nana is his mixed-race ex-girlfriend.

We were both quite surprised when we saw each other.

I suddenly felt hot when talking about him and felt like I was back in Bangkok five years ago.

"Have you ever been to Chaoshan?" nana asked me when we both came out of the coffee shop.

I didn't say anything and helped her call a cab.

Of course I had, because his invitation had a little note attached to it saying he wanted to eat the mango sticky rice he had eaten in Chiang Mai.

Only I hadn't told him that the sticky rice wasn't made by Grandma, it was made by me.