I had a nice afternoon walking around Sampheng market which was only five minutes walk from Chinatown. I liked to visit this old market once in a while as my original home was behind this market. I went there to reminisce about my childhood and get some grounding for my life and existence. Somehow, walking around the old places where I used to cycle around with friends in the evening gave me a sense of assurance and being alive in the real world. Though things have changed a lot over the years, the oldest flea market remained active and lively, a place where lots of people made their livings.
I liked to look around at the old shophouses which were originally of two levels and built during the reign of King Rama V. These houses were built by the King and let out very cheaply to poor Chinese immigrant families. That’s how our family could afford to have a home and a place to make a living. Lots of Chinese or Thai-Chinese became wealthy later on from their small businesses in this market. They have all moved to middle class areas of the city with famous schools, universities, big shopping malls and many financial institutions.
I could find some old shops with original owners; their grandchildren generation would be running the businesses as a part time hobby. Most of the old settlers have already moved on the social ladders. New renters were mostly young people selling cheap imported goods from China. I was glad to see that some old shops had not changed their front doors with old name plagues. These shophouses could be well over 110 years old, so the solid teak wooden door panels had stood the test of time.
It’s a shame that some people had no sense of history and didn’t know the value of solid teak wood. New fashion in architecture and building industry had made stainless steel and metal doors very popular and modern. I used to grow up with solid wooden furniture which were considered old fashioned at a time. Now people started to get back to antique look so old furniture became very expensive. My grandmother gave all the teak wood furniture to the temple! My father changed the teak wood doors to stainless steel door while I was a kid. So, I had no way of intervening in the adult’s’ decisions.
Just walking around the old maket could open a flood gate of forgotten memories. I found myself revisiting some old mistakes and bad decisions in my family while feeling that it was a shame that I couldn’t mitigate these situations. Grownups were just imperfect human beings, yet I thought they could never do anything wrong when I was a kid. But I did save them from some bad situations when I became a grownup with common sense and quick lateral thinking. My father once had to ask for my opinion and assistance with his business decision even though I had no interest in his business.
It’s a well known fact that the eldest boy in Chinese family would take over the father’s wealth and business. So, I knew my future had to be away from home as my siblings were very competitive. The good old days of cycling as a gang along empty narrow alleys were only a nice snippet during our childhood. I was the black sheep of the family with strong contrarian’s views in all subjects. So, I was no longer a shareholder of the old company. We drifted apart as we grew older as I became a disappointment for the family. I didn’t go along with my parent’s’ expectations and wishes; so I had to become an outsider.
But they didn’t have a clue how deeply I was concerned about their ignorance of fast changing financial and business conditions. Had some of them listened to my warnings, financial losses during the famous financial crisis could have been averted. They all lost their money in the stock market at that time. They couldn’t believe someone with no business background or skills could have known what was coming in nine months. I just had to let go and told myself I had done my best to prevent my family from the impact of financial collapse in the country.
I wondered how these small business owners would cope during the great Reset by the World Economic Forum. I coukd hardly save anyone while I was struggling along myself. But I did try to give some warnings to people around me. I told my gardener about the next engineered collapse and the death of fiat money. So, we should try to plant trees and edible plants. My gardener have been getting used to two solar lamps in her house. I told her we needed to plant certain trees for fire wood and making charcoal in the future.
My reminisce and concern about how to survive the future without electricity and gas gave me a headache. So, I had to switch back to practical reality and observe my surroundings. I knew I could probably find some snacks or sweets on wheels near the main road. My urge for a refreshing sweet made me walking at high speed towards the main road. I saw a vendor selling barbecue stick food. So I stood there making a wish and looking up at the sky.
Surprisingly, within two minutes after I took photos of the vendor selling brooms, a sweet trolley came to stop right by me. I couldn’t believe my luck as that was my favourite sweet next to coconut ice cream. The vendor was very kind to me and gave me extra portion. I wished I had an ice box with me so that I could take away too. Iooked across the road and saw two workers with many boxes of merchandise on top of small trolleys. I used to grow up surrounded by workers like these. They were very hard working and hardly complain about life. They had high hopes of working hard and save lots of money for their families.
I was very glad to see my father, sitting at an old wooden table during Chinese New Year, handing out crisp banknotes to each worker as a bonus for their hard work. The three big piles of money were spent within two hours. I saw these workers smiling and laughing in front of the house; they congratulated each other for fat bonus and talked about holidays. I wondered why my father never gave me a bundle of cash and I never asked about my bonus. Money wasn’t on my mind and I was too young to know how to make use of money. I had been trying to persuade a sibling to take a look at Bitcoin but I wasn’t very successful. I knew they should have some BTC and gold bars for surviving future calamity. Even my friendly dentist friend thought I was crazy as BTC existed on ‘thin air’; so long as they couldn’t touch it, it ain’t money. I had to give up in the end.
Even during my walks, my mind continued to work on how to save ‘humanity’ and the ‘world’ around me. My close friends also thought I was crazy and thought about nonsense. But they forgot I correctly forecasted the financial troubles in our country twice so far. The next one is coming next year with terrible political upheaval. What I could sense and see into the future wasn’t pretty at all. So, I had to pray and meditate more often, hoping that Divine intervention could mitigate the severity of the situations.
Wishing you peace, good health and prosperity.
Stay strong and cheerful.
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