Farang Mascot

Farang.  Literally, it means guava.  As in the fruit.  The very white-fleshed fruit.  Colloquially, it means white western foreigner.  As in the farangs that plague Phuket in the high season.  The farangs who come to Thailand and expect everyone to speak English.  The farangs who are big, loud, smelly, and rude.  But "farang" isn't necessarily a bad word, or a negative one.  It is perfectly acceptable to call someone, or even yourself, farang in the right tone.  I am a farang.  I call myself a farang.  I call other westerners farangs.  And they return the favor.  I am called a farang teacher both officially and unofficially.  And I don't take offense.  What I struggle with, however, is that is sometimes ALL I am perceived to be.  Particularly at school.  I am Tea, your farang mascot.

The school likes to parade their 2 farang teachers out whenever they have guests, a performance, assembly, or fair.  Sometimes I'm just asked to wear a polo shirt and be there, which I wouldn't mind if I didn't have to miss class. Sometimes I have to speak, or lead a seminar.  No problem.  Sometimes though, I am painted, costumed, and put at the front of the party like a farang mannequin.

Don't get me wrong.  It's not all bad.  It's kind of fun to play dress up, and on a day where class has already been canceled for a holiday pageant/fair it definitely breaks up the boredom and waiting.  But the actual experience of it?  Not the biggest fan.  

A half dozen teenage Thai ladyboys attack me with pancake makeup, virulently pink blush and lipstick, and enough black eye makeup to make Cleopatra blush to her roots.  They like to darken my eyebrows til I resemble Frida Khalo, and they tend to take my glasses off and get huffy when I put them back on.  

They then tease, rat, pull, and pin my hair into some lavish creation that resembles a wedding cake, replete with fake pink roses.

Next, the dressing begins.  Some costumes are better than others.  Some worse.  One, my roommate referred to as the transvestite tellytubby look.  Inevitably, they give me the costume they intend and I try to explain that it wont fit, but the communication barrier makes that impossible.  So I demonstrate; they watch me try to struggle and grunt my way into clothes that have no hope of fitting.

They try to force it on.  They try to haul zippers and buttons and clasps together.  They walk around me in circles, examining me from all sides like a fine Grecian statue, a difficult math equation, or a cut of meat-- I can never quite decide which.  Then the costume team engages in a rapid, ostensibly heated exchange of words, throw up their hands, and give up, going in search of clothes to fit me.


In the end, breathing is usually a challenge.  I'm sweating my pancake makeup off in the heat and humidity faster than the ladyboys can retouch it.  I can't use the bathroom without a wardrobe attendant.  And there are so many pictures taken that I go flash blind. I've learned to say no to some of it.  No more pancake makeup for me.  No more ratting or hair spray.  But, despite these restrictions, I still come out feeling like a Frieda Khalo-esque streetwalker in clip on earrings.

My students think it's hysterical.  The administrators find it indispensable to a proper school function.  I feel ridiculous.  Just as a farang should.