The Flavour Cipher

In the dim wash of lamplight falling across the page, slender fingertips touched the cover of a green notebook with the lightest of pressure. This journal had long kept safe the memory of her first mission alongside Araya and Emika — a volunteer trip that remained vivid and undimmed in her mind. Oei traced her eyes over the handwriting, its familiar weight and slant conjuring the smell of old paper, which rose like incense and sharpened the images of that day until they were almost painfully clear…

Traces of Memory: Between Floodwaters and Human Kindness

“ Emika — have you seen the news about the flooding in Na Mom?” Oey tapped out the message rapidly, her eyes fixed on the phone screen with barely suppressed hope.

“Seen it,” Emika replied, characteristically brief.

“I’d like to go… I was thinking of putting my name down. Are you interested?

“Let me ask Araya first… just that for now. I’ll ring the Raviwetsiri Hospital to get the details sorted.”

Whilst waiting to hear from Araya, Oei sent a message to Darin — a senior she held in quiet but genuine esteem.

“ Darin, are you going as a volunteer with Raviwetsiri Hospital?”

“I don’t think I’ll be able to, Oei. It’s rather far for me.” The refusal was simply put, though something in it carried a trace of genuine regret.

Not long afterwards, Araya’s call came through with news that made Oei’s heart swell.

“Oei — I’ve got the details. Dr. Rak, the hospital director, says there’s a helicopter running daily between Bangkok and Na Mom. Our team will go in the second rotation — next Saturday and Sunday!”

“I’m in!” Oei answered at once, quite unable to keep the smile from her face.

That same evening, checking her messages again, she found a note from Darin that had been left earlier.

“I’ve spoken with Araya and Emika. Have you really made up your mind to go? I’m already committed to Trat with the family, as it happens.”

“I’m going, .”

“What a shame… if I’d known the whole lot of you were going, nothing would have kept me away.”

“Could you still change your plans?” Oei teased, sensing plainly that the other truly wished to come.

“No, I’ve already booked accommodation.”

“Then have a lovely time, . Safe travels.”

Darinth’s parting words were ones Oei still carried with her, word for word, to this day:

“Thank you, Oey. Safe travels… Send me photographs, won’t you. Remember — an experience like this cannot be bought, not with any sum of money. Simply standing in that place is something you cannot arrange for yourself on a whim.”

Three days before their departure, a call from Araya brought a slight but distinct shift in plans. The journey by helicopter — that dream of crossing the sky — had been rearranged to a minibus instead. The flooding at Na Mom had receded more quickly than expected; most of the displaced had already returned to salvage their homes, leaving fewer than fifty migrant workers still sheltering in place.

“The helicopter in my imagination, gone — replaced by a minibus,” Oey muttered, exhaling slowly.

“Oh, come now, Oey. Twelve hours, that’s all. We’ll get there.” Araya’s voice was warm, and she laughed gently, though Oey received this with a faint, unamused look, contemplating what promised to be a journey without end.

“Are you packed?” Emika asked.

“Not yet… are you?”

“Same here. I was thinking we ought to each pick up a sleeping bag — we have no idea what the sleeping arrangements will be like on site.”

“Ah — I have one, but it’s at my other house. I’ll need to go and fetch it this evening.”

On the morning of their departure, Oey drove to collect Araya, Emika, and Mind from Tharin Clinic before heading to the assembly point at Raviwetsiri Hospital. The director’s office was quiet and formal. After a short wait, his secretary came in to explain the arrangements: travel expenses, daily allowances, and welfare provisions for the volunteer medical team throughout the mission.

Presently, Dr. Rak himself appeared, all warmth and easy smiles. He spoke of the hospital’s traditional Thai medicine department and, half in jest and half in earnest, mentioned that anyone with an inclination to work there in future would be most welcome.

“For this trip,” Dr. Rak concluded, “we shall have a traditional folk doctor travelling with the party as well. That brings our volunteer team to five.”

Throughout the long drive south, Oei sent her mother messages at intervals to report their progress — a habit she had long maintained to spare the woman unnecessary worry whenever her daughter undertook any distant journey. The driver stopped at petrol stations along the way to let everyone stretch and use the facilities.

Oei kept the map open on her phone, tracking their position, until the glow of a notification drew her eye to a message from Darinth — something in its tone like a gentle check-in across the miles.

“Where have you got to, Oei?”

“Just entered Surat Thani province.”

Three hours later, as the clock moved with the kilometres, the same quiet concern arrived again.

“How are you getting on? Have you arrived?”

“Not yet. We should reach the accommodation around midnight.”

“That’s very late… Have you all eaten?”

“All sorted.”

“Good. Be careful travelling at this hour. Look after yourself.”

“Will do.” Oei sent back the short reply in the spare, unhurried way she always typed, then set her phone down and turned her face to the window, watching the roadside lights flash past and dissolve into the dark.

At half past midnight, the minibus turned into the quiet lane leading to their lodgings. The accommodation team had arranged a large room for the four women together — two bedrooms, a sitting room, and a small kitchen — whilst the two men were placed in a separate room nearby. The driver had made remarkably good time; had they not stopped for a proper meal along the way, they would have arrived before eleven.

By the time the commotion of sorting luggage had subsided and everyone had truly settled, it was nearly three in the morning. But when the clock reached eight, the whole team appeared in the dining room without being summoned, ready to begin their duties at nine sharp.

A ten-minute drive brought them to the temple serving as the central volunteer medical hub. The atmosphere was an odd mixture of sanctuary and relief camp. Before they had even unfolded their tables or hung the “Raviwetsiri Hospital” banner, four patients were already queuing outside: one Buddhist monk and three villagers, all bearing marks of the flood’s aftermath, hoping for help with basic wound care.

The brushstrokes of healing… had begun to press upon the canvas of reality that morning.

In those first hours, resources were spare: in the small medicine box there was only betadine, a handful of common remedies, leptospirosis prophylaxis, gloves, and paper tissues. They worked with what they had, cleaning wounds until, around ten o’clock, the steady stream of people became a proper wave. Araya and Emika took their places at the consultation table, where alongside the hospital’s modern medicines sat Oey’s personal ‘luam ya’ — a portable medicine bundle containing traditional Thai preparations ready to be dispensed on diagnosis, including Waraprasit aromatic pills which the whole team kept close for emergencies.

For patients requiring closer examination or acupressure, they guided them into the pavilion, using straw mats in place of examination beds and donated sports shirts as pillows. It was a picture of utter simplicity, utterly earnest.

“Doctors, please — my friend!” A man lurched through the entrance supporting another whose hand was streaming with blood.

Araya assessed the wound quickly and made her decision. “You should take him to the modern medical centre directly opposite — their equipment is better suited for this.”

Whilst Mine and Oei grabbed tissues to press against the blood running down his arm and leg, when his friend returned afterwards to thank them, all the doctors raised their hands in acknowledgement, and smiled — one small act of warmth in the midst of difficulty.

Shortly afterwards, Emika called Oei over to assist with a male patient who had recently received acupuncture on his back.

“Oei — would you apply pressure-point therapy for this patient? He’s presenting with numbness and weakness in the legs.”

“Of course.” Oei raised her hands in a respectful Wai. “May I proceed?”

She located each point with care, working through the classical sequence to open the wind gates — the abdominal winds, the intestinal winds, the downward-flowing winds, and the wind pervading the whole body. The moment her fingers completed the final point, the patient gasped with surprise as heat rushed through his legs and across his abdomen. When he stood, the relief was plain on his face.

Whilst Araya and Emika were occupied taking histories from the unending queue, Araya glanced sharply at a man who had come in with a companion.

“Does the patient experience episodes of snoring so severe he nearly stops breathing?”

The patient faltered, then answered with a slight laugh: “Doctor — you’re the fourth person who’s said exactly that to me!”

Without hesitation, Emika took a jar from Oei’s medicine bundle, tipped some into a small zip-lock bag, and passed it over. “Take this before bed. And when the trip is done, do see a traditional Thai doctor near you for a proper follow-up examination.”

“Doctors! Over here — my friend has severe diarrhoea, he can’t walk. He’s lying on a lorry out there!”

“Mind, come with me!” Araya moved at once.

A few moments later, Mind rang back with the name of a medicine, asking Oei to prepare a liquid dose to be sent out. As Oei worked, Emika came to oversee the preparation. Once the medicine was ready, Oei dashed out into the crowded car park until she spotted Araya waving from the back of a lorry.

Treating someone on the back of a lorry — well, why not.

Oei had to stand on her toes to reach up and pass the bottle to Araya, unable even to see the patient. On the way back, she walked along the queue of villagers waiting to receive bedding — stretching far out of sight in the blazing heat — and found their smiles, and the hope in their eyes, restorative.

Back at the station, she found an elderly man sitting in wait. She asked his permission and took his pulse. After her questions, she found he had poor appetite and a weakened spleen. The moment Araya returned, Oei consulted her directly.

“ — this patient has splenic deficiency.”

“The remedy that addresses this directly would be…”

“I have exactly that!”