Sensually Transmitted Wanderlust

- Pok-pok-pok!
The jaunty street vendor encourages me to pound the shredded raw papaya and a handful of other exotics into a sweet-sour-spicy gorgeousness that is the Thai somtam salad by way of very enthusiastic onomatopoeia.
I am vegan (fortunately, the historic present tense here) and I have just taken control of making an animal-products-free somtam to a great amusement of the whole community in the coconut-smelling soi where I’ve settled myself in. Their shiny grins and cheerful comments in a vernacular dialect I don’t really understand make me painfully self-conscious. I am by far the only foreigner in the area and everything I do or even don’t do, like my towering height, attracts ceaseless public attention. Every day I walk through a toothsome sea of curious faces. Smiles, smiles, smiles. Where I come from you only smile when something is funny. Am I funny? I do suspect that with my pasty complexion and lanky limbs I surely must come across as such to the comely, beautifully olive-coloured Thais.
As much as I anticipate my forthcoming somtam lunch, making it in front of everyone feels a bit like an ordeal. Apparently, I mix up the order of ingredients and then add something that is not supposed to go in – all to joyous bursts of laughter around me. My sense as a culinary failure increases with every minute. I sweat profusely, both from the heat and embarrassment, and try to fend off the latter by attempting to say something nonchalant in Thai. I get the tone wrong, much to everyone’s glee. My mistake gets repeated and passed on to the back rows of this open-air theatre to make sure that everyone can relish it. Now I feel like a linguistic failure too. I speed up the tempo of my pok-pok-pok to get it all over with as soon as only humanely possible and a splatter of pungent chili-laden juice ends up on my face. Ah, the fiery agony! As I grunt, double up and burst into tears at the same time, everyone, with giggles and chuckles, rushes over to help me. The vendor’s wife in a violet sarong kneels down next to me with a bowl of water and a wet towel.
- It’s nothing, it’s nothing, it’s okay.
She keeps laughing gently as she wipes off the burning broth of my countenance. In a Zen-moment of truth, the meaning of the enigmatic Thai smile finally dawns on me: take it easy, it’s not worth sweating, let’s have a laugh. And I do laugh along, feebly, through the pain and tears, with a liberating relief, with the joy of conquering yet another demon in my closet.