The End of Chaos – Ep 13 Pon Prom Onlaweng

We knew that in order for Tanyong to return to her body- sparing her life in essence- required ending Nong May’s. But we never knew that this tragic closure to this spiritual chaos could be so heartbreaking. A melancholy episode, wishing farewell to a girl who will never reach her seven years of age, but making peace with her necessary death. For that is the only way the family could move forward, and the only way that Uncle Wee could have a normal semblance of an adult life. Yet death never makes anything easier.

The tragedy stems from Aunt Prang’s nature of envy. She had hired Khun Methee’s ex-mistress and brother to rob and scare her cousin, despite regretting it and trying to stop it from happening, the damage has been done. Nong May had recognized the man’s face and told the family, upon waking up from her previous threat, that she saw him talking to Aunt Prang.

A family meeting is called and they not only learn the motive behind Aunt Prang, but also her lifelong secret. Khun Prang is remorse and apologizes for her transgressions. Grandma couldn’t believe she is capable of something so harsh and cruel towards her cousin and niece.

“My daughter almost died because of you!” exclaims Khun Methee.

Grandma questions what possessed her to do such evil deeds, and the truth comes out.

“I was wrong. It stems from the envy that is deeply rooted in my heart and mind. It made me do awful things. I don’t hope for any forgiveness.”

Grandma doesn’t understand why she is so envious and thinks that maybe she hates Khun Methee so much.

She denies it. “Since I was a child, I tried to study hard to be your favorite. But you care only about Pat and Wee more. I get it, they’ve lost their parents, but I’ve always realized that you play favorites. Pat got everything over me, no matter how hard I try.”

She pauses and tells everyone a secret that came out of the left field, “Until the man I love, Khun Methee, you completely supported for him to marry Pat.

Everyone looks shockingly at her.

“No one understands me,” Khun Prang continues, “So I immediately married Khun Sun because I didn’t want anyone to notice- then I moved here. But everything changes.”

“You are misunderstanding me,” Grandma pleads, “I worry about each differently, but I have the same amount of love for everyone. I noticed that Pat and Nong May are weak, and you and your brood are very talented and brave. I never knew this is how you feel. It is my fault that I didn’t understand you. My fault you turned out this way. I was wrong.”

But Khun Methee couldn’t be more astute and correct when he said that Prang almost caused his daughter’s death- because shortly after, the ex-mistress gets arrested and her brother vows to revenge her.

Back at the hospital Tanyong visits her hospital bed and finds Piram there yet again. She seems resigned and less indifferent to Piram.

“Does that mean you’ve forgiven him?” Kru Bie asks as she walks the little girl back to her room.

“There’s not much else I can do.”

“Well you did right,” says Kru Bie.

Tanyong wonders to herself why she still has only Uncle Wee in her mind when she has forgiven Piram? Well that’s an easy question to answer..

“Even when he knows the truth he doesn’t even care. He loves his niece, he doesn’t love you, Tanyong,” she reminds herself. It’s funny how people always talk themselves out of stuff.

Dr. Wee on the contrary is really conflicted. On the one hand he knows that it is not her fault, that he shouldn’t be treating her like this, but on the other hand, he’s human and he couldn’t help but worry about his own niece. He has no idea where her spirit lies, but still hopeful that maybe she can return to him.

Dr. Wee approaches Tanyong in her hospital room, she is standing by the balcony doors, looking down.

“What are you doing?” he questions.

She turns to him, “I’m not thinking about jumping because I know you’ll be worried about Nong May.”

“I didn’t think that.”

“Don’t worry, if I wanted to do it, I would have already done so,” she replies.

“Like that one day you were trying to fall down the stairs?”

“But I didn’t do it because I know that if anything happens to Nong May, Khun Pat wouldn’t be able to handle it.”

“Thanks for worrying about my family,” he comments.

Dr. Neung shows up and gives Tanyong a teddy bear, but the little girl hands it over to her uncle instead and tells him to keep it for the real Nong May. Oh the stingers.

At the hospital café, Kru Bie asks her newly minted beau how he thinks this will end.

“How do you want it to end?” Nawin retorts.

“Dr. Wee will be the one to choose.”

“Why is he involved?”

“But no matter who he chooses, someone will end up hurt. That person is Dr. Wee.”

This doesn’t sit well with Nawin so the next opportunity he sees Dr. Wee, he asks him point blank, “Between Nong May and Khun Tanyong, who would you choose?”

Although Bie steers him away, the question has already been asked, and the repercussions weighing on Dr. Wee’s mind. It is a horrible choice to make and the lakorn gods take the choice away from him.

Prang’s marriage ends, for the betterment of everyone, and her husband moves out. This affects the two girls the most, as they tearfully say goodbye to their dad.

Nong May is finally released from the hospital and she rides in the car with her uncle in awkward silence.

She thinks to herself, “He must be worried about his niece.”

A beat passes and she comments again to herself, “Just say whatever you want to say to me.”

When they reached home, he finally utters her name before she gets out of the car. But he doesn’t say anything else.

“Don’t worry, I’ll fulfill my duty as Nong May to the best of my ability,” Tanyong says.

He looks conflictingly at her. He eventually utters what he intended to say, but to himself, “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault.”

The final duty as Nong May for Tanyong was being lifted in the air by her father, Khun Methee, for the next thing we know, the thief veers by in a motorcycle and opens fire.

Dr. Wee rushes out of his car and reaches his family members who were on the ground. They appear to be ok, but to his horror, as he turns to see his beloved niece, she is covered in blood, a shot is embedded in her chest.

The years of experience as a doctor takes over and he carries Nong May to his car. He phones the hospital to prepare an operating room, his mind is focused on making it to the hospital- until he reaches the hospital and gets a good look at her. Her body is so still, limping on the seat, covered in blood. Dr. Wee is frozen with shock as he slowly feels her pulse.

The EMT emerges from the corner and takes Nong May’s body out of the car. They immediately rush her into the operating room, while Dr. Wee could only look on with numbness.

But his last hurrah occurs and he joins the operating team, determining to save his niece- and ignoring everyone’s plea for him to stand back. Not a good idea to operate on your own niece. But there’s no operating required when they couldn’t even get her pulse.

Dr. Wee tries and tries, pumping her unresponsive heart. He repeats over and over, “come back Nong May.”

Dr. Neung tells him to let her go.

Until the reality dawns on him and there is no hope for his niece. He stumbles out of the operating room, only to meet head on with his family members, who determines the result based on his expression. They all erupt into tears while Dr. Wee stumbles away and hides himself in a hallway.

That is when the tears fall. His body wracks with sobs over his beloved niece, that perhaps he knew she had been a goner a long time ago, since Tanyong took over her body, yet was never confirmed until now, and the sad fact that she was never meant to come back to him to begin with.

Oh, the heart mourns for Dr. Wee who is mourning for Nong May. This is Boy Pakorn’s best role yet. He plays it flawlessly as Dr. Wee.

Life Goes on

The birds fly in the air. The sound of violin playing. The whole family in black, going through the motions.

A couple weeks later, Khun Pat tells her grandma that she dreamt of Nong May, who had told her that she’s happy to reincarnate as her daughter again. She has made peace with her first daughter’s death, and can only move forward to embrace the new life.

Khun Prang is taking up Dharma and will be heading to the temple for seven days to cleanse her sins and pray for Nong May.

Among the family members, it is the hardest on Uncle Wee. He goes to his beloved niece’s room where he remembers her sleeping there each night. His sister sees him and tells him that she’s comforted by the idea that Nong May’s spirit will still live with them.

“It’s fate,” she says, “we have to move on.”

“I’m happy to hear that you are strong,” Uncle Wee says.

“Nong May taught me to be strong,” Khun Pat replies.

That night as Uncle Wee gazes at the starlit night, he asks Nong May to help Khun Tanyong too.

The next morning Dr. Wee takes his usual orchid to Tanyong’s bed. He brings along the bracelet that Nong May has been wearing while she was alive.

He looks down at Tanyong’s sleeping form, “When you were in Nong May’s body, you said you wanted this bracelet from Uncle Wee. You had asked me to put it on for you. Allow me to put it on for you once more.”

He reaches for her wrist and with tears in his eyes, puts it on her. “Khun Tanyong, please wake up to talk to me. Come back to me- no matter the method. I’ve already lost Nong May. I don’t want to lose you too. I beg you, wake up,” he pleads.

As he’s crying quietly, Piram enters the hospital room and is concerned why the doctor is crying over his fiancé.

As they pass each other, they heard a familiar voice calling out, stopping them in their tracks. “Uncle Wee!”

Hah, totally makes everything better.

Tanyong slowly opens her eyes. The face before her blurs out but it’s Piram. He’s hugging her. She looks beyond his back and sees her favorite face. She smiles at Dr. Wee, who smiles back.

She panics as he walks out of the room.

In the hallway, Dr. Wee tells Dr. Neung that she can have Tanyong’s case back. Dang it.

Dr. Neung congratulates the patient but is then weirded out because she knows her name, when they’ve never been introduced before.

Dr. Wee thinks about her first words with a smile. It certainly pleases him to hear it. Grandma coaxes him into having a girlfriend, even mentions that Dr. Neung would be a good match for him. But Dr. Wee merely avoided that topic and says that it’s best that he spends time with his grandma right now.

Tanyong gets her MRI scan to make sure her brain waves functions properly. Dr. Wee watches her from afar. But just after the X-Ray, he hears the 3 words that always manages to stop him in his track. “Nah Wee Ka (Uncle Wee ka).”

I know it makes me sound like a pervert, but I love hearing her call him Nah Wee! LOL.

She tries to get out of her wheelchair but she stumbles and he catches her before she falls.

“Be careful, you’re not strong yet.”

She smiles at him but he avoids her gaze.

He tells the assistant that he’ll take her back to her room. As he wheels her along the hallway, the accapella version of “I want you to hear my heart” plays, telling us exactly what the two are thinking but are afraid to say.

When they reach the room, Piram is waiting for her there. He thanks the doctor for taking care of his fiancé so well (he couldn’t resist adding the word fiancé to remind the good doctor what’s what.)

Kru Bie and Nawin heard of her good news and the two best friends embrace each other. Nawin questions Dr. Wee what he plans on doing now.

“What can I do? I can only do my best as a doctor.”

“I’m not asking about your work, I’m asking about your personal problems.”

“Nothing,” he says and they walk off.

Piram looks lovingly at his fiancé, “Have you forgiven me?” he asks.

“Let the past be the past,” she replies, “I’ve forgiven you.”

But that doesn’t mean things will be the same (wish she said that..)

“I’m so happy that you’ve forgiven me,” Piram says, “From now on I won’t do anything to hurt you again.”

During lunch Dr. Neung mentions that Dr. Wee looks much happier now. She surmises that it must have to do with Khun Tanyong’s case. Just to remind him, she talks about how much Piram and Khun Tanyong are in love. What a sneak. She tries to comfort him but all he could say to her is that she has always been a wonderful friend. LOL.

Later Dr. Wee wonders to himself why he can’t seem to stop thinking about Tanyong, to free his mind of her.

It is a starlit night and Dr. Wee approaches Tanyong’s bedside. Her eyes open slowly and her face lit up when she saw Uncle Wee.

He smiles and leans down to kiss her tenderly on the forehead.

“My good girl,” he says quietly.

The next thing Tanyong knows, she wakes up from her sweet dreams.

Tanyong reunites with her parents, as they cry tears of joy. She goes through physical therapy to learn to walk again; Piram is by her side the entire time. When she finally achieves the walk, they embrace. Dr. Wee sees their jubilation and walks away, hurt.

This episode exemplifies a lot of Thai and Buddhist beliefs. The reincarnation, the comfort of a loss, karma in one’s actions, that one loss is another’s gain, and that moving on is the only option.

I am very sad that Nong May is out of the picture, she had been such a wonderful addition to Pon Prom Onlaweng.

What I like most about this drama is that the conflicts are so organic. Things happen organically, not contrived or plotted by the evil people. The characters are genuine- like Piram truly loves Tanyong and has been by her side through her toughest time, so it would be cruel for her to kick him out the moment she opens her eyes. It’s going to be a natural competition between Piram and Dr. Wee, but ultimately, it comes down to love, and whom Tanyong loves. No matter how nice someone is, you have to figure out whom you love. And Kru Bie is correct that someone always ends up getting hurt. But that it is a natural process.

I’m glad I waited to write this recap after watching it, because I cried like a baby and wouldn’t be able to coherently put words together, aside from being a blubbering idiot.

This lakorn is wrapping up and let’s find out how Tanyong and Dr. Wee overcome their inability to admit their love and see if they can hear one another’s heart. Because we already know what they’re both dying to say.