“I am so glad to see you,” Jennifer said, hugging me tight. A shy young man hung back a few feet.
“Hello, Chat,” I said, giving him a peck on the cheek. “It’s nice to see you again, too.”
He blushed. I would have to remember that public displays of affection were frowned upon in Thailand, and now that he was back home, my greetings should be less effusive. “Hello, Aunt Lara,” he said. “I am very happy to welcome you to my home.”
A very efficient-looking man in a crisp beige suit came forward, his palms pressed flat together and up to touch his forehead in the traditional Thai greeting, the wet. I find it difficult sometimes to tell people’s ages in foreign countries like Thailand. My usual reference points are gone. But I would put him in his late thirties, with rather owlish glasses over high cheekbones and a quite distinctive somewhat flattened nose. “I am Yutai,” he said. “Secretary to Khun Wongvipa. I am most pleased to meet you. You are most welcome to the residence of the Chaiwong family. The family has retired for the evening, except for Mr. Chat here, but I will see you to your room. The family hopes you will sleep well, rest tomorrow, and that you will join them for dinner tomorrow evening.”
I turned back to the car, but my bags had already disappeared. “Your suitcase will be brought to your room,” Yutai said. “Please,” he said, gesturing toward the entrance, an enormous carved wood double door, which swung open as if by magic, but in fact was opened by two young men in uniform. A gold sign beside the door said Ayutthaya Trading and Property.
“Wait until you see this place,” Jennifer whispered.
I found myself in a marble lobby. The ceiling was wood, painted in the most extraordinary colors of gold and coral and blue. Ahead were two elevators, and beyond that, glass doors through which I could see banks of computers and office cubicles.
“Those are the offices,” Jennifer said. “Ayutthaya Trading. The offices are on the first six floors; the family lives on the top four. We go this way.”
A separate lobby with another two elevators was off to one side. Yutai beckoned me into one, and using a key, pressed Nine. “The guest floor,” Jennifer explained. “There’s just you and me, and we have the whole wing to ourselves. I’m really glad you’re here. It was a little daunting all by myself.”
“Khun Wongvipa would like you to have the gold room, if it is to your liking,” Yutai said, as the elevator door opened to an entranceway the size of my living room. The walls were stenciled in gold, figures of some kind of deities as guardians, perhaps. Extraordinary carved wood doors led off the foyer on either side.
“This way,” Yutai said, sliding out of his shoes before turning left. I stopped gawking long enough to follow him. Jennifer, beside me, giggled.
The gold room was just that. It was paneled in teak, but then gold leaf had been rubbed into the wood to give it a rather sensuous sheen. There was a canopy bed in black lacquer, already turned down. In addition to the bed there was a sofa, a coffee table, an armchair with a reading light, and a desk. There was a platter of fresh fruit on the coffee table and a large bouquet of orchids on the desk. Heavy silk curtains were pulled against the darkness. “Your dressing room,” Yutai said, leading me into another paneled room with rows of hangers and a bench where my suitcase already rested. Beyond that was a huge bathroom with tub, glass shower stall, two sinks, and a toilet and bidet. Fluffy white towels and a bathrobe awaited me. A spray of orchids graced the space between the sinks. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.
“And now I will leave you, if there is nothing else I can do for you,” Yutai said. I assured him there wasn’t. “I have arranged for jasmine tea to be sent up. It will be here in a minute or two. Extension forty-three,” he said, pointing at the phone beside the bed. “Call me at any time, day or night, if there is something you require, or, if you wish, you can come to my quarters, which are on this floor on the other side of the foyer. In the morning when you wish breakfast, dial forty-two. The cook will have whatever you like sent up. There is a small kitchen, again on the other side of the foyer, which you are most welcome to use. There is bottled water and some light food in the refrigerator. Dinner is at eight P.M. tomorrow evening on the tenth floor. This key activates the elevator. In the meantime, the car and driver are at your disposal if you wish to do some sight-seeing while you are here.”
“I, too, will leave you,” Chat said. “I look forward to seeing you tomorrow and hearing about your journey, Aunt Lara. Also telling you about ours,” he said, smiling at Jennifer.
“Isn’t this something else?” Jennifer said as their footsteps faded. “Rather grand, wouldn’t you say? Especially after the dump we stayed in on the beach near Phuket.”
“This would be rather grand after Buckingham Palace,” I said. “So where is your room?”
“I’m just down the hall. The silver room, my dear. Do join me, won’t you?” she said, affecting a veddy British accent. “Oops, here’s the tea.” A pleasant woman in bare feet knelt by the coffee table and set down a tray, then poured tea into exquisite little celadon porcelain cups, before backing out of the room.
“Who is Khun Wongvipa?” I said.
“Chat’s mother,” she said. “The woman I have been incorrectly referring to as Mrs. Chaiwong. You’ll meet her tomorrow. I don’t know what you’ll think of her. I find her kind of scary. His dad seems nice, but he’s really old. Everybody calls him Khun Thaksin. I call him sir.”
“What do you mean by old? Marginally older than your father and I?”
“Even older than you and Dad. Like ninety or something. Well, eighty anyway. His first wife died, and he married Chat’s mother. Chat has a half brother, the first wife’s son—I haven’t met him—and a younger brother named Dusit, and a little sister, who is a bit of a brat, called Prapapan. Her nickname is Fatty, if you can believe it. I have no idea why. She’s actually rather tiny.”
“What do they call you? Miss Jennifer?”
“Yes,” she said. “It’s just as well. They’d have trouble with Miss Luczka. It comes out sort of Roocha.”
“I love this room, this suite, I should say,” I said, walking over to a carved chest. “I think this is quite old, and rather fine. It’s a manuscript cabinet, did you know that? It’s used to store religious manuscripts, or would have been at one time. The gold and black lacquer is wonderful. Probably mid- to late eighteenth century.”
“I’d like to talk to you about this,” she said. “Not tonight. I know you’re tired. But this place is all rather overwhelming.”
“And look at these gold boxes. Gold nielloware. Did you know these were once made exclusively for royalty?”
“If you think this floor is something,” Jennifer said. “Wait until you see where they hang out. I swear they own half of Bangkok. I exaggerate, of course, but only slightly.”
“And those doors when we came in. Did you see the carving? Exquisite! I think they’re temple doors, real ones, I mean, off a real temple.”
“I had no idea Chat came from this kind of home. He has a nice enough apartment off campus, and yes, he drives a BMW, but this is way beyond well off, you know. I find it all a bit much.”
“Do you know what this is?” I said, picking up a small bowl on the desk. “It’s called Bencharong, which means ”five colors“ in Sanskrit. This kind of ceramic was made in China for Thai—at the time it would have been Siamese—royalty. It’s lovely, isn’t it?”
“I feel as if they’re sizing me up all the time, and I’m sure I don’t measure up. I don’t think he wanted his family to meet me, but they insisted.”