The book-packing journey visits Thailand, and a working class tenement community.
Kampol Changsamran, five years old, lives with his mother, father, and baby brother in Mrs Tangjan’s collection of rented tenement houses. It is a close-knit, urban, working class community where folk rub along together and support each other. That is just as well as when Kampol’s parents split up and go their separate ways, vacating their house, Kampol gets left behind.
Someone invites him in for tea, someone else beds him down for the night, all expect that he will be picked up soon. But no, and he soon falls into a peripatetic existence as a community responsibility. Through him, we get to know the local characters: Chong, the grocer; Tia, the fisherman; Bangkerd, the mortician; Dong, the bicycle repairman and drunk; and schoolfriends Jua, Oan, and Samdej.
Episode by episode, the everyday lives of the community are revealed through Kampol’s eyes. Sometimes he is centre stage in events, getting up to mischief or into trouble; other times he is observing the adults, often misinterpreting events hard to comprehend through by young mind.
There is no harm in Kampol, so we cheer his little wins and feel his occasional pain. The portrayal of life in working class Thailand is interesting and has an authentic feel. The reading is easy, but it is not lightweight, as Kampol’s insecurity is always a worry.
The name Kampol means Bright, hence the title,
and in a potentially dark situation, he shines as best he can.
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