Most of the acquaintances from the small salsa community and Capoeira community in Bangkok had the same reactions when they saw me: "Ow! I thought you left!?"

"Ow," said with a sharp raise in tone, is a common Thai expression that doesn't quite have an English equivalent. Perhaps a mix of "huh?" or "hey!" together, you'd usually say it if someone did something that confused you, or surprised you, or both. Just picture both eyebrows raising up as one says "Ow!?"

One of my Farang friends (Farang is equivalent to the Cantonese "Gwailo," - white foreigner) said to me "I thought you'd died from a Motorcycle accident or something!" He was a friend from the salsa scene I ran into a lot, and it was our running joke that we'd always greet each other with "so you're still alive!" because we were both motorcycle drivers in the chaotic streets of Bangkok. I guess he never got a farewell from me, and not having seen me for 3 months, assumed the worst.

I ran into him at the new salsa club, Dream. Fogo Vigo has been closed to dancing! Apparently the Brazillian club did not have a "dancing license," and was thus forced to close by the police. I think what this really means is that they refused to pay a bribe demanded by the corrupt police force.

And at the school I used to teach at, I just popped in to say hello. Children can be intensely boisterous and mischeivous in one situation, but totally shy and irresponsive in another. Most of them exclaimed a "teacher Felix!" when they saw me, but got quiet and mumbly when I asked how they were doing, how they liked the new English teacher, and if such and such a student was still around. As always, the fifth-grade girls were most talkative (now sixth-grade!)

"Teacher, you come back to teach?" Amy asks.
"No, I've come back just to say hello. How do you like your new teacher?"
"Uh, good." Cream says not so enthusiastically.
"Teacher, you come back to teach!" Amy says.
"Really? You want me to come back and teach?"
"Yes!" Amy and Cream say simultaneously.
"You liked my teaching?"
"Yes!" Amy and Cream say simultaneously. I puzzle over this a moment.
"So does the new teacher ever play games with you?"
"No, teacher," Amy says to me with excited dissaproval. "Never! And so much homework!" I quickly realized that they missed me not because I was a good teacher, but in fact because I was a bad teacher. They missed me because I was an entertainer. But that's all in the past.


Strangely, walking around Bangkok, it felt as if I'd never left. But now that I've come back to the US, it's like everything in Bangkok was a dream. Memories from distant places always seem to end up that way - like dreams that one day you yourself begin to doubt whether they ever really happened.