The stench struck again, stronger than before but this time recognizable. It
smelt like human waste mixed with stale sweat, foul body odour, and
cheap cigarettes. I glanced around to see who smoked; everybody did.
Something smooth and oily ran under my right hand. I shuffled back and
saw a cockroach scuttling off to run under someone’s head. I raised by
body as another appeared, ran under my leg, followed by more. As I
brushed them away I felt the golden sand had gone and left a dark, hard,
filthy floor. My body started to tremble - my nerves on edge.
I glanced up at the sky but could only see thick black smoke. I coughed
uncontrollably until the smog cleared and several stained panels emerged
with flickering strip lights. The sky had switched to a ceiling of a filthy,
neglected cell, crammed completely to capacity.
My heart-beat raced and throbbed in my throat as I realized I had to
face this reality and deal with the torment all over again. My mind had
played tricks on me, creating a mirage of a beach, an illusion of freedom.
Struggling with my sanity in the worst-place-in-the-world, I sat amongst
murderers, drug-dealers, rapists and paedophiles in a Thai prison;
otherwise known as ‘The Bangkok Hilton’ or Hell.
THREE
A thick blanket of smoke circled above and hung over my head like a
dark, polluted rain cloud. Prisoners smoked like they had minutes left to
live, dropping their smouldering butts between the cracks in the floor. Still
burning beneath me, smoke drifted up from below as I feared fire or
suffocation.
My throat felt dry and sore as my pounding heart continued beating
through every inch of my being. I needed water. I needed to get out.
Being the only foreigner or farang made me an outcast and although
packed in so tightly, I’d never felt so alone.A creaking noise of an old warn
out ceiling fan wobbled as it spun, hanging on for its life with two rusty
screws.
My sweat-dampened clothes clung to my back and my body ached from
sitting cramped on a hard floor. Thick with dirt, covered in blood stains and
other stains I couldn't identify and didn't dare to try, some of the others had
a bed-roll; I had the floor.
Bugs gathered beneath me, probably waiting for me to sleep, pass out
or just die. Fending them off felt exhausting, frightening and futile as some
sampled my blood as others left foul traces of their presence. My mind
played tricks on me and even when I thought they’d gone I still felt the sick
sensation of them crawling all over me.
A man with a faded tattoo of an eagle on his chest held a syringe and
sucked something into it. He stuck a needle into his friend’s arm, drew some
blood and combining the two substances, he injected the mix back into the
emaciated arm, his friend gazed, sickly into space.
After several long, drawn-out hours, the yelling subsided and most of the
others tried to sleep . The thick fog of smog began to clear and my fear