Before reaching the stars - Wanlyangkun

Content note: writing about self-harm and murder.

Before reaching the Stars

By Wat Wanlyangkun

Mother walked slowly
away from the abbot’s residence, past the sandy courtyard and the
shade of the pikun tree,
towards the rear of the central shrine, One hand carefully supported
a water-bowl, while the other held a rattan basket used for carrying
the things needed for merit-making. A horned owl moaned softly from a
dark corner of the shrine’s eaves. The sweet scent of frangipani
blossoms drifted towards he with the breeze and the gentle waving of
the flowering grass. Mother sank wearily down in front of the
mortuary containing her dead son’s body¹.
With its oblong shape it
looked like a coffin, except that it was made of cement-- and the
smell of fresh cement still lingered in the air. There were other,
identical mortuaries stretched out in a long row. The empty ones
looked like dark caverns. And adjacent to the mortuaries little
memorial stupas ringed the central shrine, whose dingy white walls
were crumbling away in places from sheer age.

Mother
carefully laid down a tray, on which she’d placed white porcelain
cups filled with rice, kaeng som phak krajiap, fried salted
fish, chiffon- and sticky layer-cakes².
The smell of the kaeng som wafting into her nostrils reminded
her of him so much that the tears welled up in her eyes. Roy had
loved it ever since he was a little boy, especially with fried salted
fish, and he’d eat up rice like no one else. The soft, fluffy, pink
chiffon-cake looked so tempting to the touch, while the sticky
layer-cakes had the red of blood. So Roy used to tell her. Sobs
formed a choking lump in her throat. She had never dreamed that her
son’s life would come to a bloody end as two bullets pierced his
tender flesh. Roy must have suffered, but her suffering was still
worse. A pain not visible to the eye, but experienced in the heart,
in the feeling, above all in the feeling of a mother. She didn’t
understand how some people could be so cruel as to devour the flesh
and blood of their fellow men… Softly Mother muttered his name…
“Child, come and eat your food…”³
Then she pushed forward the engraved water-bowl, which still had a
few grains of well-cooked rice stuck to it here and there, dipped her
forefinger into the water, murmured prayers⁴.
And, as she slowly closed her eyes, clear drops trickled from the
corners down the wrinkles on her cheeks.

Before
she’d rowed the boat away from the temple-jetty, the abbot had been
kind enough to come and talk to her, and speak to her about her son.
The words that still rang in her ears were: “Roy was a good boy,
dear lady, well-behaved, quiet, and serious. Who could have had the
heart to do him harm?… These days people have become so cruel…”

Mother
had heard praise of this kind ever since Roy was a little boy. And
when she heard it repeated now, she couldn’t help feeling proud and
happy. When Roy had grown up to be a young man and had gone off to
study in Bangkok, he remained her own adorable son, unchanged. When
she said that students didn’t have to wear their hair long, he cut
his short. It got to the point that she felt hesitant to scold him.
If she wanted to give him some advice, she had to think it over very
carefully before she brought it up: so much so that Ro, her youngest
boy, used to tease her by saying that she had a saint for a son.

There
was only one thing she couldn’t stop him doing-- when he broke the
news to her that he probably wouldn’t be able to finish college in
four years because he had to devote part of his time to “activities”.
Mother later came to understand that these “activities” meant
politics.

“Politics
aren’t what I’m really after. I’m using my time to study and
learn about the problems of the poor, who are so much poorer than we,
who don’t eat three meals a day, and who have to do heavy work as
manual laborers, hiring themselves out for low wages. When they
demand fair pay, and appeal for help, how could you have me stand
idly by, Mother? Or when the peasants demand justice, sometimes to
the point of having to make demonstrations, I can’t possibly rest
comfortably through it all. I’m concerned about our poor, not about
politics. But politics concerns itself with me. So we can’t escape
it…”

But
no matter what reasons he gave, Mother loved him too devotedly to
accept them. The very word “demonstration” pierced her to the
quick. She couldn’t bear to look at the photos of the young men and
women gunned down on the streets during October 1973⁵.
Worse than that, her thoughts would fly ahead in so many directions:
if there was a mass demonstration, and someone threw even a single
bomb, rows of people would be killed or wounded. She urged him to
hurry up and finish his studies, hurry and get a job and settled down
like his older brothers and sisters, so she could stop worrying about
him… Roy couldn’t explain and get his mother to accept his
reasons; so he’d just keep silent, listening quietly to her advice.
But as the days passed, she had to recognize with a sigh that he was
not following that advice. After that, Roy gradually drew away from
his mother. Only once in a long while would he come back to visit his
riverside home, even though it was really not that far from Bangkok.
The one thing that deeply pleased his mother, though, wast Roy
finally graduated, even though he took longer than usual to complete
his studies.

She’d
written to congratulate him. Yet in the letter she’d used the words
“obstinate child”. For, no matter what, she remained just as
concerned as ever, and urged him to hurry up and find a job.

“It
won’t be many years now before Ro finishes high-school, and we’d
like him to continue his schooling in Bangkok. If you can get a job
with a salary befitting your education, it’ll mean you’ll have
got settled, and won’t have to go on being a burden to your uncle.
Your little brother can depend on you from then on, and I won’t
have to worry any more. Now that you’ve graduated, you won’t get
involved with those demonstrations any more, will you? It was all
well and good while you were still a student. I’m sure someone like
you, Roy, won’t take more than a few years to get settled. It’ll
be much better if you set your mind to establishing yourself first.
I’ve never been disappointed in your elder brothers and sisters.
They’ve all done well, every one of them. Just two weeks ago, in
fact, your elder brother Rong bought me a radio-tape recorder set,
boasting that he got it in Japan. I think his company must have sent
him there-- his boss must like him a lot. I feel very happy for him.
And it looks like your little brother’s crazy about this present.
Ro listens to it day and night, and pays no attention to his books,
so I’ve had to put my foot down”.

Mother
tied the boat to the bridge and scooped up some water to rub her face
clean of the dirt and dust of her grief. The samun-tree by the
water’s edge was beginning to change its leaves to welcome the cool
season. Little Ro, wearing nothing but a pair of khaki shorts, was
lying prone on the floorboards reading a newspaper. By his side lay
the brand new radio-tape recorder set, playing a song.

“Any
news today?” Mother asked, picking up the betel-tray from inside
the rattan offering-basket.

“They
say Elder Brother’s case is still a mystery. They have to interview
the people close to the case, but so far they haven’t been able to
track them down. And the bullets taken from his body aren’t any use
in solving the riddle. Another paper makes it out to be an affair
with some woman. It also says he was an extremist and a troublemaker.
So I didn’t buy that one. I was afraid you’d be upset”.

She
was struck dumb. She sighed and shook her head without a word.

A
moment later she told her youngest son to get the cassette, murmuring
very softly “I’d like to hear it one more time. I miss him so
much”.

She
still remembered very well that after she’d sent the letter
congratulating Roy on his graduation and urging him to hurry up and
settle down, she’d heard nothing more from him. He seemed to have
vanished as silently as a needle dropped into the sea, until one day
he sent her two cassette tapes through the mail. The one with a dove
on the outside was simply filled with songs; the other contained a
recorded message for her from Roy.

“Dear
respected Mother, I received your letter a long time ago. The reason
I’ve been so long in answering isn’t because I don’t care about
the family, but because I’ve been very busy with my work. Then,
when I heard that Elder Brother Rong had bought you a radio-tape
recorder, I waited till I had enough money to spare to buy a
cassette. The other tape has songs on it that I want Ro to hear….

“I
understand your love and concern, and I’ve been turning over in my
mind for a long time how I could best express myself to you, so that
we can really understand each other. Right now, I’m a reporter for
a little newspaper. The salary isn’t very high, but I’m
satisfied, because the paper takes its stand on the truth. It speaks
for the poor and attacks those who take advantage of the great
majority and sell out the country and the people. The truth is, I’ve
been at this job since before I graduated. I didn’t dare tell you
then. I was afraid you’d be upset. I hope you aren’t angry with
me, Mother! If I’d waited till graduation to join the movement for
justice, I’d have proved to be the kind who thinks first of
himself-- and it would have been too late. So I joined in before I
finished school. It was a golden opportunity for someone who believes
danger for sure, especially for investigative reporters. I’ve seen
poor, pitiful peasants murdered, one after the other, like fallen
leaves. I’ve seen women workers bravely resisting the clique of
savages. Sometimes they’ve been cruelly mowed down. If you’d met
them, if you’d seen them, if you’d understood them, you wouldn’t
be able to stand it either, Mother….

“Your
love for your child may be so great that it prevents you from seeing
things as they truly are. You’re afraid that your child will get
hurt, get wounded by a fragment of an incendiary bomb, or be gunned
down. I feel a deep warmth in my heart whenever I think of your
loving concern. Yet I’d like to pass on to you something a friend
of mine who works here with me once said. He said that death is a
common thing and comes to everyone without fail. But before we die,
we have three choices as to how to spend our lives. The first is just
to drift along worthlessly, seeking only our own safety, and in the
end dying in oblivion. The second way is to seek meaning in life,
struggling against the oppression of the many by the few, working
with a heart brimful of good intentions for our fellow-men, not as a
sacrifice but as a duty. The last way is to live by seizing
everything in sight for ourselves, to live without conscience,
wallowing in selfish pleasures over the blood and tears of others,
before dying to the sound of curses. Mother, which road would you
want your son to take?….

“So
it’s no wonder that sometimes we have to risk danger. Right now I’m
investigating a case of some Thais who are conniving with the
Americans to swindle our people out of a huge quantity of the
nation’s priceless resources, destroying what ought to be for the
people’s benefit. The accomplices of the farang are all
bigshots with a lot of political and bureaucratic influence. The
profits they’re making in this case are so enormous that we guess
that any attempt to expose them will certainly be blocked. A modest
step would be to shut down the markets to prevent the public reading
the newspapers. The decisive step, though, could be shedding blood.
Right now. We’re getting death threats on the telephone. But I
won’t choose money or bullets, because I have my own right choice
already. If such persecution develops, Mother, don’t be frightened;
be proud that your son hasn’t lived in vain….

“Please
tell Ro that the songs I’ve sent are songs with real substance and
value, because they tell about the vast numbers of people who live in
darkness and utter despair. I’m sure Ro will like the first song.
The words are a kind of vow by someone who is ready to sacrifice even
his life to help win peace and happiness for the mass of his
fellowmen…

We
ask to be corpses turn by turn,

piled
on top of one another like a staircase,

high
enough to reach the sky,

bringing
the stars down to the earth.

If
we make this world beautiful, and make the people in it happy and
equal,

this
world will be a star…

“Mother, in your life you’ve found some happiness. You’ve had
enough over to give food to the monks every morning, while so many
others have nothing, not even something to eat. They drown in the
swelling flood of their debts. If you were ever really to experience
all these things, I know that someone with your sense of justice
wouldn’t be able to stand for it, and you’d see the need to join
the struggle.

“I tried to communicate my thinking to the girl I used to love. I
tried to get her to understand my work. But she left me. I’m sorry
about it, of course, but it was unavoidable. We always went separate
ways. She had no love to give to anyone else, not even to the pitiful
and the starving. She saw only herself and me. She was trying to
enter a framework from which I was escapiing. I’ve already lost one
person that I loved. Don’t let me lose you too, Mother…”

The days passed smoothly by like the flow of water in a stream. Every
evening, when her youngest son sprang up out of the outboard
riverboat, she would poke out her head and ask right away whether
there was any word of Roy. From this daily routine, she came to
experience the sale of lies on the pages of newspapers. The more she
insisted that Ro buy every newspaper that had any news of Roy, the
more she was able to make comparisons, beginning with the
investigating of Roy’s background. There were two papers which
tried to show that Roy was a despicable character, with a deep
inferiority complex. They also included an interview with a police
officer to the effect that her son’s activities showed he was
involved with the “ideology of the other side”. On the other
hand, there was almost no interest in his unsolved murder-- to the
point that the paper which had so often smeared Roy finally went so
far as to say that his exposure of the giant mining swindle had
sabotaged the national economy, made foreign countries afraid to
invest their capital, increased unemployment, and led to chaos,
following the blueprint of the “ideology of the other side”.

Mother
put the ricebowl and the metal cooking-pot away in the rattan basket.
She knelt respectfully before the abbot and then took her leave. She
cast a glance at yesterday’s newspaper lying against the veranda of
the abbot’s residence. The moment she could distinguish the color
of the ink, she shuddered with disgust⁶.
The abbot spoke up:

“Are
you in a hurry to go and feed your boy”? She answered softly in the
affirmative, and so he continued:

“When
he was a boy your son seemed such a good lad. It’s only now I
realize how mistaken I was. Who’d have thought that as he got older
he’d turn into one of those extremists who are destroying the
country. Too bad! Must have gone around with some fine friends, I
suppose….” the abbot went on sarcastically. “That’s why these
extremists don’t live long. Keep a close eye on little Ro; watch
out or he’ll follow in his elder brother’s footsteps. Ah, the
young people these days, they’re no good at all…” and he shook
his head.

Mother’s
face went burning red, her heart beat violently, and huge beads of
sweat suddenly bathed her forehead. She quickly took her leave,
unwilling to take any time to dip up water for the memorial
libations. However, she didn’t want to blame the abbot either.