I grew up with my dad and my stepbrother on a rubber tree farm in Surat Thani. My mom left me and took my two siblings with her when I was just three years old.

Growing up with them nurtured me to be a bookworm. I didn’t like to go out and play with friends and stayed at home or at the library to read books. So it’s kind of hard for me to interact with people now. My social life was mostly with my cousins. We loved to draw pictures. I wanted to be a cartoonist.

I dropped out from school to be a cartoonist. But I didn’t stay there for long. I wanted my work to be successful but it clearly wasn’t. It was just a cheap local Thai cartoon and I only got paid B1,000 per story. The local cartoon industry was a flop, too.

Being a cartoonist led me to read novels because my senior taught me I should read a lot to come up with more cartoon stories.

I became addicted to reading and it made me want to write. I am enchanted by ink on paper. I started writing, as well as working as a painter for commercial signs. I felt like I wanted to write everything in my mind.

The writer’s community at Nakhon Si Thammarat is unique. You can show your writing to other writers to get feedback and improve your work. Then I sent my works to many publishers. Some was printed but some wasn’t.

I have had mental problems for the past six years. I thought I was physically sick and dying so I tried to see doctors, who said I wasn’t. It may come from worrying too much about life.

I met people who believed they had super natural powers. They were having the same problems as me, so I decided to believe that I have supernatural powers, too, rather than accepting what the doctors said—that I had mental problems. If you compare mental patients and those who have supernatural powers, which one sounds better?

I decided to move out from my house where I lived with my wife and went to live with relatives. I didn’t want to be a problem for her. It’s about the same time that the tsunami struck the South of Thailand. I went looking for my niece who died in the wave.

I found hundreds and hundreds of bodies. It made me realize that death is so close to us. You can’t run away from it. It made me see things clearly. Even though I was supposedly sick, I wasn’t dead yet. So why not fight for my own life?

I went back to my wife and went to work in Koh Samui as a painter. When I found something interesting, I would take notes and write it up at home. They became the short stories that comprised my first book Dad Chao Ron Kern Kwa Ja Nang Jib Kafae [Morning Sunlight Too Hot To Sip A Cup of Coffee], which came out last March.

I tried to make my book fun instead of trying to be serious. I just want readers to absorb the stories by using their own perspective. Everyone will understand the stories in different ways.

I am just an outsider who happens to have a book that won an award. It might shape me to be more focused on writing. But it’s just the beginning for me. I don’t have a job as a writer but there is a writer in me. He’s waiting for the right time.

The award is only a stamp to guarantee this book, not me. I’m going to give myself all the time I want. I will wait until I feel my writing is perfect before trying to publish again. I don’t have anything to prove anymore.

My dream changes every day. I now want to write more books, draw paintings and write music. I will go back to live as a painter on Koh Samui for every couple months of and continue writing at home.

Thai reading culture is quite strange. Sales are high, but they’re only confined to books about dharma and self-help, not literature. I don’t understand why you have to read books where others tell you how to live you own life.

I would like to encourage young writers to not rush into writing books. It’s like growing fruit. If it’s not ripe, you can’t eat it.

I wouldn’t be who I am today if I had stayed in Bangkok. I have a slow life in Nakhon Si Thammarat where I live with my wife and two kids. If I stayed in this fast-paced city, I would get different materials and perspectives.

Hold on to the awareness that you cannot hold on to anything. People might love to write diaries or take pictures. That’s fine. But if you don’t feel compelled to remember or gather every memory, you might be happier.