JUNGLE FEVER

Hat Yao, 03.03.10

The mosquito is buzzing in my right ear, only in my right ear. At one point he even goes in and I have the terrible feeling that in trying to fish him out I have pushed him further in. My temperature is very high and my glands are swollen. So much for Ella’s theory that I get sick when I’ve been with her too long and get well when she’s gone. Maybe it works the other way around too and now I will only get well when I see her again. It’s hot and sticky and I’m having one feverish thought after another, thoughts that I am too weak to put in paper. Maybe I’ll remember some, maybe I won’t. The mosquito is breaking my balls but I don’t want to use the coil, it makes me sicker, or the mosquito net, there is no air inside. I go paranoid. Maybe it’s malaria. And to make things worse my mother’s birthday came and went and I didn’t call her or sent a message. First time I’ve missed it. There is no phone and no internet in Hat Yao. I even walked a couple of kilometers down the road in a fever to a place that might have had internet. It was a private home and I was told there was “no signal”, but maybe the kids just didn’t want to interrupt their video-game. I bought some aspirin instead. I need to rest. Even though this is no island, I feel isolated.

Hat Yao is a muslim village, mostly of fishermen, and I hear a soft, melodious call to prayer, quite unlike the powerfully assertive voices of the muezzin in most muslim countries, perhaps because although they are a majority here, they are still a minority in a buddhist country, or simply because they are a gentle people. One can tell a muslim shop from a buddhist from the clock on the wall with its image of Mecca or the name of Allah, and from the fact that they don’t serve beer, or pork. Everything is peaceful, but one mustn’t forget that there is an ongoing tension that was sparked by a small insurrection and fuelled by a full-fledged repression.
This whole region is an important centre for rubber production, real rubber, from trees, and although the interest and prices dwindled with the arrival of petroleum substitutes, the trees are still there and may soon make a comeback. The other interesting produce is cashew nuts, which I had never seen fresh before. The actual nut forms bellow a bright and tempting and sweet-scented fruit in the shape of an upturned apple. It looks edible so I took a bite but found it strangely bitter, and too sharp for my taste. The nut itself cannot be eaten raw, and must be roasted and cleaned first. Across from the mainland, very close when the tide is low, is the island of Ko Libong, home, they say, of the dugong, one of nature’s most fascinating creatures. Sadly I’ve heard that not one has been seen in ages. Muslims, like jews, are not very good with animals: they consider some impure, and all the others they eat. None of course are holy.

*

I left Hat Yao at noon today feeling much better. Went by minivan to Trang, and from there in a second minivan to Ko Lanta, which we reached before sunset. We were twice on a ferry, first from the mainland to Ko Lanta Noi, which is Ko Lanta Yai’s “mangrovian” sister, and from there to our final destination which, as far as I’ve seen, is Playa del Carmen all over again. I think I’m just not cut-out for these places (or maybe I just need some friends to hang-out with, or my girl).