Paul was a deep-sea fisherman of credit and renown - I know this for a fact as he tried to sell his rod to me. What caused him to be washed up on the shores of Chiang Mai I never discovered.

On the second day of the Songkran holiday the central police station called to say that they had arrested a very drunk and obstreperous British citizen who had been molesting girls near the moat. Since it was the New Year they said they would release him if I would come and take him away.

Paul was one of your typically scruffy, tattooed layabouts and he was not in a good mood. Apparently he had tried to escape so the police handcuffed him to the bars, standing up. 'Wouldn't even let me down to piss,' he growled. I paid his fine of B100 and took him back to his guesthouse. He seemed grateful.

A few days later he turned up at my house and told me that he had overstayed his visa and run out of money. He asked me to contact a friend in England and ask for L800. This I did through the Embassy in Bangkok. Five days later, much to my surprise, the money arrived. I left a message for him to come and collect it. He turned up totally drunk, weaved his way along the drive and collapsed on the floor. I finally managed to arouse him, gave him B200 and told him to come back for the rest next day when he had sobered up. He left.

On the following morning three of us were sitting at my table discussing the editorial content of the next edition of the Chiang Mai Newsletter, when Paul arrived escorted by an attractive Thai girl who owned the guesthouse where he was staying. Again Paul was hopelessly drunk. He fell on the front doorstep, gashed his mouth and lay still. I washed the blood off with the hosepipe. This revived him enough to crawl into the house where he lay looking up at my surprised friends. I left him there and settled his outstanding debt with the guesthouse owner. We then went on with our meeting.

Paul stirred and tried, without success, to get up. He seemed to take particular dislike to John and started abusing him.'Want me money, where's me money? I'd get you f***er if I could stand up, I would.' The situation was hopeless so I called the tourist police to come and take him away and lock him up until he was sober enough for me to give him his money.

In the evening I went to the police station and gave a cheque for B20000 to a very chastened and sorry-for-himself Paul who promised to go to Bangkok on the following day.

I assume that he did for I never heard from him again. I sometimes wonder what happened to his fishing rod.