It was seven-ish and I was sitting in a pleasant-enough room overlooking the front doorway to the pub above which I had just moved in. The pub was the Pig and Whistle on Soi 7 in Pattaya. Across the lane was a large hole, which they were hoping to build a hotel in and next door to that, right opposite me, was a tiny bar with one lady sitting on a stool outside it. Not that there was a wall there, it was open on two sides. The Soi was nice and peaceful, I thought. I also thought that I might go and sit in that little bar and talk to that lady, if my friend was late, because I would definitely see him arrive from two metres away, the width of the Soi.