Role

Chapter 8

Rebirth, farang (in case youre wondering): You are lounging on a magnificent
balcony open to the starry sky, divine music is playing with such exquisite
perfection you can hardly stand it, when all of a sudden something terrible
occurs: the magical sounds break up into an obscene cacaphony. What is
happening? Are you dying? You could put it that way. That awful noise is the
first scream of an infant: you. You have been born into a human body
hardwired with every transgression from the last time around and now you must
spend the next seventy years clawing your way back to the music. No wonder we
cry.

Note: Farang is Isaan slang, referring to outside travellers, usually
merchants stopping for the sex trade.