Sometimes
life throws you curve balls and sometimes it throws you giant ripe
watermelons that you shatter with a baseball bat. As the little black
seeds peck at my skin and the red pulpiness spits through the air I
realize that perhaps things just can’t get any better, and then
they do.
I
started off my work this time around in Thailand with a series of job
offers that provided me with the opportunity of picking a very full
schedule that yielded a good amount of money and a rigorous work
schedule. Then I was brought on as the co-writer for the play Nana is
directing and that made my full schedule nearly overflowing. The work
was good though and I continued.
After
much deliberation we also decided to move into a new apartment as
Nana’s studio was just a little too cute and quaint for the both of
us.
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| The view from our bedroom window to the left. |
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| The bedroom window. |
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| The view to the right. |
Luckily we moved about one hundred yards down the road into a one
bedroom with half a kitchen and a gorgeous view. I thought things
were going pretty well with life. Nana and I were happy to be living
together and the transition back into Thai life had been rather
smooth for me. Then things got crazy.
Casually
after football one day someone asked me what I did here in Thailand.
I gave my usual response but thanks to working on Nana’s play I
added a little something extra. I said that my “day job” was
teaching. So then they asked what my night job was. I told them that
I write. The guy who asked me was one of the only people I play
football with that I really don’t like so my responses became curt
and short after that. The guy sitting next to me during this
conversation was a regular patron of Nana’s theater and took an
interest in my involvement as a writer. He said he might have a job
for me. Two weeks later I was in a meeting with he and another
football buddy discussing a side job of writing two minute scripts
for this internet start up they’ve been working on for the last
four years. I explained to them how busy I was but that I’d love to
help out if even in only a small way and so we set a couple of small
goals. Two weeks later I produced a single one hundred and
thirty-three word script. They had asked me for four and the one I
gave them wasn’t even on the subject they asked for. The head guy
emailed me and told me he’d like to have lunch with me and discuss
the script. We set up a meeting for early on in the next week and
while I casually thought about it from time to time I tried to put it
far from my daily thoughts as I had a new and very important job to
focus on. Little did I know the coming week would provide me with
many distractions.
I
wish things had been all sunshine and roses. My working hours are
noon to nine in the evening so it’s not unusual for me to be
drifting off to sleep around two in the morning. On one such night I
heard dripping water. I checked the faucets and there was nothing, I
opened the glass door to the balcony and there was nothing. I flipped
the lights on in the bedroom and there were some water lines coming
down the wall of our new apartment, but still no dripping. I walked
into the living room and water was splashing down from the window
sill and soaking our couch and floor. By four the water had saturated
a number of towels and had spread to two other walls. The building
security guards were helping us to clean up but no one could get in
contact with the owners of the upstairs apartment and they were
obviously not home as water was streaming out from under their door.
My first instinct was that some stupid farang had pissed off his Thai
girlfriend and while he was away on a trip she’d turned on all the
faucets and hit the road. When I left for work I didn’t know why
but the water had stopped flowing and the apartment was starting to
dry out.
When
I arrived at my meeting with Anthony, the head of the web startup, we
began discussing my script. Now, he’d mentioned more than once some
sort of compensation and my “deal” as he called it but we’d
never agreed on any numbers or even discussed the ball park figures.
I assumed I had pretty much let him down by not producing at the rate
we had discussed but to be fair I was working about fifty-two hours
per week. I sat down in his office and we briefly went over my script
and some other ideas. I thought the script was good even if it wasn’t
exactly what he asked for but he thought it was really good.
Additionally I’d put him in touch with a few artists and a very
technically gifted curriculum writer who could help him with the
creation of educational videos for his website. He was happy with the
way things were going and he said that it was unfortunate I was so
busy because I could never manage the story bucket section of his
website and get it ready by the January launch date that they were
shooting for.
“Wait
a second, you want me to manage the story bucket project?” We’d
previously discussed this project but never in more than a conceptual
way.
“Yeah,
but you can’t do it with how many hours you’re working for all
these other people.”
“That’s
true.”
“Let’s
say I offered you a job and paid you a little bit more than you’re
making now.”
I
told him I’d consider it and talk with Nana about it but basically
I just didn’t want to seem too eager. I called him that evening and
accepted the job and in two weeks I will be working for
www.binumi.com as a script writer, project manager, copy editor and
all around creative idea man.
So
let’s recap. I got to Thailand and managed to get almost a sixty
percent raise from my previous job albeit working two jobs and about
fifty or so hours a week. I also got back into teaching which is
infinitely better than restaurant work. Then I consolidated that into
one job working about forty hours per week and making slightly more
and not only making more but getting to do it as a writer.
Sometimes
life throws you curve balls and sometimes you hit ‘em for home
runs.
