Six hundred thousand baht. Eighteen months. And a 29-year-old American I never met.
A retired teacher thought he was building a future with Lek. Eighteen months and six hundred thousand baht later, he learned who he was really funding.
Bars in Chiang Mai show up in several stories as the setting for a first meeting, often between a woman working in hospitality and a foreigner just passing through the city. These accounts often start with assumptions on both sides — about the other person's intentions, about what that kind of relationship is supposed to be — and in some cases end up dismantling those assumptions completely. Not all of these stories end well, but all of them offer an honest look at what really happens behind the bar in northern Thailand.
A retired teacher thought he was building a future with Lek. Eighteen months and six hundred thousand baht later, he learned who he was really funding.