Kitik’s Plight

This is a story about a man named Kitik. His name is not really Kitik though. It is actually a little more complicated, but no one here remembers his real name. And so he is called Kitik and that’s just how it is.

Kitik comes from Thailand but lives in Germany. Sixteen years now he’s been busting his balls for a Thai family who own a restaurant and rent out the apartments above it. They once even owned a second restaurant, but then the Euro replaced the Deutsche Mark and business has never been the same since. The lady of the house spending more of her time in the casino than catering to her customers may have also had a hand in that. Either way, it doesn’t matter for this story, because even when they were the best of times, no one had told Kitik.

That’s really because Kitik is a slave by any other name. He’s paid some petty cash each month, which the landlady says is worth a lot in Thailand. Kitik sends most of that money to his family back home. He’s got a wife, he says, by pointing to his wedding band. “Teuer!” he says. Expensive. The rest of his money goes to the food he gets in the kitchen, or to cassette tapes, or to the beers he drinks at concerts on his bi-weekly night off.

Kitik is passionate about music. It allows him to communicate. “Light My Fire” and “Born to Be Wild” are not just songs, they’re words Kitik can share with the few people he encounters nowadays. There is recognition there, something he finds so rarely.

This handicap has made a terrific mime of Kitik. Lost for words, he goes to great lengths to portray his feelings in very literal ways. Kitik smiles a lot because it makes life easier, but truly he feels lonely, mostly after those nights off. Do you know anyone who still has the patience for a mime these days?

Kitik is a man of many talents though. He helps in the kitchen and he cleans the staircase, fixes bathroom pipes gone bust and rebuilds entire ceilings. He can even cut the most intricate woodcarvings to inject the restaurant with an air of authenticity. He’s a small man who lifts wardrobes twice his size on his sturdy little back with ease.

That’s life, as he has come to know it. Kitik has been living in the basement for all these years. It’s dark as hell but it’s cool in summer and for the cold of winter there’s a little stove. But the best part about living in the basement is that the lords of the manor cannot hear Kitik dig at night. His tunnel is almost finished. Now he just needs to figure out where the bitch hid his passport.

TO BE CONCLUDED