A Bottle of Water

colorful silk patchwork quilt
Silk quilt circa 1890
a woman sitting and a man standing along a railing next to a canal
A pair a kind strangers along the canal

I went for a photo walk along a canal recently. It was late in a hot day (hey, it’s Bangkok), and I had spent much of it outside. As I approached a food cart tucked under a pedestrian bridge, this man in blue asked me where I was from.

That wasn’t quite the end of of his English, but it was close. Still, his English exceeded my Thai. However, we talked for a minute about the fact that I lived in Bangkok and that Heidi worked as a math teacher.

I took a photo. They took selfies with their phones.

Then he held his hand up, telling me to wait just a moment. He trotted a few yards away, to a glass-fronted fridge, and grabbed a bottle of water. He returned and handed it to me, an offering to our new friendship.

Late in a hot day, I was so grateful.