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cuts,
    usually carried out in a rage under the influence of drugs or drink. For much of their lives the girls have little or no control over their environment or their relationships. Women are generally subservient to men in Thai culture, and throughout their childhoods they are under strict control as to where they can go and what they can do. In the poorer areas of the country, especially in rural communities, sexual abuse is common. Many are abused by their brothers or fathers or by male relatives, actions over which they have no control.
    Often the girls themselves are unwilling to complain of the abuse, accepting it as the norm.
    Even when the girls leave the environment of their village and move to Bangkok, the family continues to exert control on them with requests for financial assistance. No matter how much the girls earn, they are often unable to save because of the family's ever-
    increasing demands. In an effort to establish some sort of meaningful relationship, the girls often become involved with Thai men working in the bar environment - DJs, waiters, and touts. Often these men have been working in the bars much longer than the girls and tend to be older and more experienced. As a result, they are adept at getting the girls to give them money and early on in the relationship they begin to exert control over them. The girls then find themselves trapped between the demands of their family and the demands of their newly-acquired boyfriend.
    To aggravate the situation, the Thai boyfriends usually refuse to wear condoms, which frequently results in pregnancy. If the girl keeps the baby, as many do, she has yet another demand on her, emotionally and financially. All through her life, the girl has little or no control over her surroundings, and as a result anger and resentment builds up until it cannot be contained any longer. But when it is finally released, it is often directed inwards,
    at herself. The girl feels that she is worthless, that in some way she is responsible for her own predicament, and as such she tries to hurt, to punish, herself. JOY Pretty much all the girls in my family have cut their wrists at some point or another. Except Sunan, she never loses her temper. Everything Sunan does is thought out in advance. Me, I'm totally different, I do all sorts of crazy things on the spur of the moment, especially if I've been drinking or taken a yar bar tablet. Like the time I got back to the room early and found Park in bed with Daeng. Daeng's a little slut, she's only seventeen but she'll have sex with anything in trousers. She's a nymphomaniac and she's bar fined every day that she works, sometimes two or three times a day. But twenty-odd farangs a week isn't enough and so she decides she's going to seduce my man. Pete had come into the bar just before eight and had paid my bar fine. We'd gone to dinner, but he wasn't saying much. I did my best to lift his spirits but there was something wrong with whatever book it was that he's working on - to be honest I was having trouble understanding him because his Thai is awful - but I nodded and sympathised and tried my best to make him feel better.
    He didn't want to go short-time so he gave me a thousand baht and we got into a taxi and I dropped him off at the Dynasty Hotel. I thought about going back to Zombie but it was Park's day off so I thought I'd go home and surprise him. Take him out for a meal, or maybe go and see a movie. He was surprised all right. He was lying on his back with Daeng on top of him. She was screaming so much that they didn't hear me open the door.
    I could have killed her. In fact, I almost did. I took off one of my high heels and belted her across the head with it. Park didn't notice at first because his eyes were closed and she was making so much noise in the first place, but I slapped her again with the shoe and this time I almost broke her nose. I started calling her all the names under the sun. Park leapt off the bed,
    throwing Daeng