Dao Reurng Episode 3

Episode 3 Recap

Preuk takes miss prissy Rose to her destination, weaving through Bangkok traffic with ease. But the humidity, air and being on a motorcycle can do wonders to the hair, so as Preuk drops her off, he notices her wind blown look (more like afro) and couldn’t help but smile. Heh.

“What are you smiling at?” Rose questions, gathering her things from his motorcycle. When he doesn’t answer, she peers at herself through the mirror, “My head! How the hell did you drive? My hair is an afro!”

“It’s better than getting arrested and put in jail,” he admonishes. “You didn’t even wear a helmet.”

Point taken.

She hands him some bahts. “Here, take this. You rushed to get me here.” Aw, that’s nice of her.

But he declines the money -which shocks her, what not enough money?  Heh- he trades it for a thank you instead because he needed to come to Central World anyway.

Saying thank you seems to be harder than offering money, so Rose throws a ‘thanks anyway, I hope I don’t see you again,’ and stomps away.

He mumbles a ‘wth’ and takes his handsome self into the mall to deliver flowers.

But yunno in the lakorn world, you always, always meet those that you don’t want to see. So Preuk delivers a bouquet to Rose again, but he thinks Namwarn is Rose (because she didn’t correct him last time) so as he hands off the bouquet to Namwarn, his voice is heard through the room, where the real Rose is at.

She walks out, “I’m Rose.”

Eh, they meet again.

Preuk takes the bouquet back from Namwarn and offers it to Rose instead, “I’m sorry, I thought your name was Sudawadee.” Gosh, what’s not to like about Preuk, he’s so sensible.

“Rose and Sudawadee are the same person,” she snatches the bouquet from his hands, “I’m so famous, how is it you don’t know? What rock did you crawl out of?” Heh.

“I was in Bangkok. But it could be that you weren’t all that famous, Rose Sudawadee,” he retorts and gets his last word.

Namwarn tries to divert her client back to the prep room and tells her there is another time to chase after a man- which Rose scoffs, she chases after no man.

Pardon me.

In the countryside, our Khun Palat arrives at Reurng’s food booth. His assistant, Kamjorn asks if it would be a good idea to keep the car running, in case Reurng runs them out of her shop. Heh. But Khun Palat says that they come in peace. Furthermore, Dao Reurng would be a good ally for them because she’s smart, if they could get her on their side, developing the town would be easier. Kamjorn is disinclined to believe that Reurng would let Khun Palat use her like that. But Khun Palat has his ways.

He goes straight for Momma Bancheun, who at first is paranoid that her daughter has caused more trouble, but becomes all ears when Khun Palat asks for her help in spreading the words about his attempt to education the townspeople. He wants her to use her powers. (He thinks she has powers, which is a huge compliment to her.) What he is really going after, is for her to use her powers against Reurng. A light bulb goes off in Kamjorn’s head and he applauds Khun Palat: above Reurng is her momma, and above her momma is Khun Palat. Clever man indeed.

In her large expanse of a house, Rose freshens her bouquet and phones Jin, indicating that she would prefer him over the flowers. Jin apologizes for what happened earlier, he really had pressing business to tend to, he hopes she’s not mad. Rose replies that she’s only sulking but he can make it up to her by coming back. She can’t fathom why that town could possibly be more important than her. Um.. Jin explains that he works in the ministry, it’s his job to work for the people. He thinks she would understand it by now and smiles when she tells him she will allow him to do what he loves, but immediately frowns when he hears the ultimatum: by three months’ time, he would need to choose between her or his job.

Khun Palat is stuck in a bad place, the town is backwards, his girlfriend has given him an ultimatum, what’s a guy to do? (Totally rhetorical..)

Reurng stops by Mer’s shop to purchase more ingredients for her alcohol production. Mer asks if she’s still going to make more when Mer heard that Reurng had such a close call earlier. Reurng questions whether Mer heard the outcome of that? She even puffs up her chest, feeling untouchable by the cops.

The trio swings by with a song for Reurng hoping to please her, but instead she wonders what pack of dogs is howling around here? Heh. Wan apologizes for falling asleep first before he could respond to her phone- then he questions whether the phone he purchased for her is in her hands. At the sound of that Mer pales, but Little Pian laments that his phone is tossed a long time ago. Reurng adds that it might have already turned into fertilizers.

Wan blocks her path and she threatens him not to follow her or else she will kick his balls so they won’t function again. Poor guy, always gets his manhood threatened.

The trio stares after her in surprise, they wonder why she’s acting like that. Mer chimes in that perhaps she didn’t want anyone to know.. which at first the boys bought, until Wan turns to Mer and questions how she knew. Mer merely explains that she understands another woman’s trifles.

Phoo Yai complains to his wives that due to Khun Palat’s request for a large congregation today, he had been calling on people to recruit them to attend. He hadn’t the opportunity to tend to his favorite kid (the chicken mind you.) He also shares that Sia Gampon is on board, which surprises his first wife, who thinks perhaps Sia Gampon has something up his sleeve. Why would he support someone who is going against his fertilizing methods? But Phoo Yai trusts that Sia Gampon is a good man, he won’t have any ulterior motives.

Momma Bancheun prepares to make her way to the committee meeting as well when Reurng advises that her mom would only fall asleep sitting (heh.) Momma wonders what Reurng has against Khun Palat, when Reurng says that ever since he came on board, he has only tried to find fault with her. Momma thinks maybe it’s a good thing and hauls her kid with her.

The agenda gets passed to each committee when Phoo Yai’s first wife wonders where her hubby is. Reurng chimes in that maybe he’s out looking for his new wife, heh. Momma Bancheun adds that he’s mention something about number 4, what an insatiable man. Perhaps the ones he has now are getting too old? The crowd laughs. We can see where Reurng gets her sassiness.

Phoo Yai finally shows up but with Sia Gampon in tow, and Khun Palat meets the man who tried to bribe him on his first day. Khun Palat thanks him for the basket of gifts, but that he didn’t accept the ‘other’ gift, and he hopes Sia Gampon’s minion told him that. Sia Gampon replies that he’s happy to put this newbie to the test. Sure… but even Khun Palat falls in the trap nicely and smiles, glad that it was only a test and not the real deal.

Momma Bancheun wonders to her daughter out loud what Sia Gampon and Khun Palat are talking about. Reurng says she will go ask them for her. Heh. Momma of course stops her tactless daughter from embarrassing her.

I like these secret snide comments between Sia Gampon and Gamnan Term. We know they hate each other, but the crowd doesn’t. They all think Sia is a god. So when Sia instigates that he has heard that Gamnan was ambushed and he thought he would be laying low for a few days. Gamnan laughs and says that the shooter is weak, lame.

The meeting commences, but before he could even get through his ‘thanks for coming, I’d like to use this room (at the temple) for our ongoing meetings…’ he gets interrupted. Phoo Yai says that no one’s going to be interested, but his wife chimes in that she would. Momma Bancheun wonders if the couple lives in the same house. Heh. So Khun Palat tries to continue, that in their hands are the sample plan, but Phoo Yai interrupts again, and the next thing you know Phoo Yai is about to get into a fight with Luang Taa.

Khun Palat couldn’t contain the crowd, so Sia Gampon shows his hand (his power) by quieting the crowd. He tells the crowd that he supports what Khun Palat is proposing. Momma Bancheun raises her hand next, the monk, and soon everyone else chimes in to support Khun Palat.

Phoo Yai, not one to be outnumbered, tells Reurng that whatever she sides with, he’ll go with that too, thinking that she would be against Khun Palat. Much to his chagrin, Reurng agrees with Khun Palat’s plan. Reurng adds that she always supports a good cause. She smiles (albeit boyishly) at Khun Palat and offers her services. Khun Palat is beaming ear to ear at the pleasant cooperation.

Sia Gampon takes a seat in his cool air-conditioned car and is apparently tired of his own act. Phoo Yai stops by the powerful man’s car and wonders why he’s overtly supporting Khun Palat’s plan. If he succeeds, his own chemical fertilizer sells would suffer. But Sia Gampon is adamant that the townspeople like comfort. They are not going to try their hand in something so difficult, like using natural fertilizers.

Phoo Yai apparently is so naïve. When Sia Gampon says they don’t want the baddies to win, Phoo Yai is confused as to who and why they have baddies. Perhaps when he told Khun Palat that their town is safe and good, he really believes it. Phoo Yai wonders who would be able to stand in Khun Palat’s way then?

Phoo Yai is still complaining about Khun Palat doing his job, because you know, he doesn’t think anything needs improving in his town. But he also doesn’t want Khun Palat to be the only one who’s looking good, so he pesters his son, Wan to be productive. The three wives chime in and try to motivate Wan to help with the town, but the guy refuses, says he’s lazy, until one of the moms catches his attention with the mention of Ai Reurng.

He teams up with Ai Reurng to drive around town announcing Khun Palat’s first endeavor with a natural fertilizer demonstration tomorrow morning. Ai Reurng is really going out of her way to help Khun Palat drum up interest, which even Luang Taa smells something fishy about it. Khun Palat surmises that perhaps her momma has something to do with Reurng’s good intentions.

But we all know it was too good to be true that Dao Reurng is supporting Khun Palat’s cause right? When Phoo Yai wonders who would be the one to stop Khun Palat, he gets his answers.

A little girl stops by Khun Palat’s house to drop off some sweets that her mom made, she says that her mom is a fan. Khun Palat thanks her and proceeds to stuff his face with the sweets. But little did he know that Reurng had paid the little girl to deliver the goods which are filled with lethargic medications. He starts to get sleepy, it’s only 5pm, so he sets his alarm clock for tomorrow and passes out.

Our troublemaker smiles at her brilliant plan. Before paying the little girl, she asks, ‘what do you do when an elder gives you something?’ heeh. Remember this sentence? Even it rings a bell to Little Pian who said that Khun Palat was the one to teach her that. Lol. The duo spy on the sleeping Khun Palat and then strike his assistant next: they know the man likes to drink, so they cunningly ask him to be their taste tester for the new batch of alcohol, but he must drink a whole bottle. Confident that he can still wake up and be ‘responsible’ the next morning, Kamjorn agrees and of course, passes out in a drunken stupor by the truck.

As morning rolls around, the townspeople gather at the temple, there’s welcoming music, a few ministers are there, especially the all-important Nai Umpur, Palat’s boss.

Khun Palat stirs awake in time, realizing that his phone is completely dead, he rushes to shower. Meanwhile Reurng climbs on Khun Palat’s deck to spy on him, she suddenly sees him coming out of the rest room and he strips off his towel, revealing his privates to her. Haha, well she saw it, not that he intended for her to see it. Reurng bristles down the ladder and blushes, rushing out of the premise. Khun Palat hears some rustling and peers out of the spy hole, spotting Reurng and her minion.

Angry, he breathes, “Ai Dao Reurng..” and vows not to be deterred. Much to his surprise however, he is locked in his room- the doors and windows nailed shut.

At the event everyone wonders the whereabouts of Khun Palat, the whole town is waiting on him, Phoo Yai can’t get a hold of him. Reurng is convinced he’s screwed for sure; Nai Umpur would have to reassign him to a different province. Little Pian, always the devil’s advocate, wonders what will happen if he is able to leave the house? Ensuring that all of her traps are secured, Reurng pays a local man to deter Palat.

Khun Palat had to break out of his own house, destroying a door in his wake. He can’t take the car out because his sidekick had puked all over the tires. Shaking his head, he opts to go by foot instead. Heh, and thinking it’s his lucky day that he meets a kind civilian willing to take him to the temple, Khun Palat gets tricked into searching for a bull’s-eye. Once they found said sign, the driver races through the mud and deposits Khun Palat in it. Late, and dirty yet again.

At the temple, Nai Umpur tries to stall time by talking about what he knows regarding fertilizers, which is scant since he hardly knows anything. Dao Reurng steps up to the mic and says that they should take advantage of the fact that they have a powerful Luang Taa who could conjure up Khun Palat. Luang Taa is in the corner sweating bullets.

Walking and muttering that he will refuse to lose to Reurng, he spots Momma Bancheun on her motorbike, making a delivery. She offers to take him to the temple, but Khun Palat is reluctant. He asks her if her bike is fully functional, whether she has anything up her sleeves. Lol. Can’t be too careful! And for his own protection, he offers to drive the motorbike himself.

As Luang Taa starts his prayers, Reurng is on the sideline knowing that she’s hitting two birds with one stone, because both Khun Palat and Luang are going to be screwed. Much to her chagrin however, in rolls Khun Palat with her mom in the back seat. Heh.

Khun Palat steps up to the mic and apologizes for making the people wait. It’s his first project so he is determined to see it through. The townspeople seem to forgive him as he starts the demonstrations. The bigwigs all leave as the intros are done, Khun Palat knows one way to get back at Dao Reurng, he introduces her as his assistant during the demonstration. She would be the one to show the people (with his guidance) how to make fertilizers and use them.

Afterward in the shower stall, Reurng bitches to Little Pian that they will get back at Khun Palat. Little Pian advises her to perhaps stay away for a bit, things seem to backfire a lot lately. Khun Palat is standing outside of their shower stalls and says that he won’t let her back out now.

“You perve! Why are you peeping at a girl in the shower?!” Reurng questions, as she steps on a pail to peer at him through the shower stall.

“A tomboy like you don’t have anything for me to look at,” he replies. Lol. “I just want to come and tell you that between you and I, it’s not over yet. You’re gonna fix what you broke.” He orders her to fix the door and remove the barring from the windows.

But Reurng refuses, of course, so Khun Palat threatens to tell momma, and as predicted, she succumbs, but only vows to revenge him further.

Now on to the situation between Wan and Mer, as we know, Wan is in love with Reurng while Mer is in love with Wan. She has been leading him on to thinking that she’s Reurng through her text messages, which gives Wan so much hope because he thinks Reurng’s just being mean to him in public, but she secretly loves him.

So at his house, Mer drops off some products that she has made by hand, Phoo Yai wishes his own son would look at Mer too because she’s such a good catch. Ai Wan walks in and declares that he will only marry Reurng, he has been fantasizing about being married to her since they were little. Any woman in his opinion can cook and clean, but only Reurng can play cards and make alcohol. Lol. His mom wonders if that’s the prerequisite for a wife then? Mer looks on tritely, but decides to proceed with her deception because it gives her happiness to flirt with him over text message.

Reurng and Little Pian had to go fix Khun Palat’s house when she overhears that Khun Palat’s conversation with Kamjorn and she knows how she would get back at him.

Kamjorn tells Khun Palat that his truck has been fixed, but next thing we see is that Kamjorn is dragging the truck along. Apparently the mechanics place is too busy and the truck is taking up parking spaces. During the time being, they will be leaving the truck at Khun Palat’s house until the mechanic is free, which makes Jin shake his head at the nonsensical of it all. Khun Palat doesn’t want to keep it at the house if it cannot be put to good use.

This prompts Reurng to come up with a great idea to put his truck to good use. The following morning she draws the townspeople to Khun Palat’s house. Reurng had created a duck pen on Khun Palat’s truck bed. There are ducks swarming the bed and Reurng pours homemade food right into middle. Khun Palat wakes up to a ruckus and demands to know what in heck she’s doing to his truck. Reurng merely states that she’s putting his demonstration/teachings to good use. He taught them all earlier how to make duck food so she thought to create a duck pen. But Khun Palat says that this is not how it’s done and he proceeds to show her.

Earlier, before coming up with this plan, Reurng had screeched that she hated this Khun Palat. Her mom told her to be careful what she wishes for, because we all know in the lakorn world, if you hate someone, you always, always end up with that person. Momma tells her the story about her and papa, that they didn’t meet on good terms either, but they ended up together. Reurng does not like the sound of that.

So her mood gets surly further as she watches Khun Palat and his assistant build a duck pen at her house. Her momma is even offering free drinks for them but Reurng demands payment.

Meanwhile in Bangkok, Rose is being questioned by the media on her relationship with her ‘friend’ outside of the industry. Rose says that they are just friends, and are focused on doing their own thing. The media surmises that wouldn’t it pull the two apart then? Irritated with their questions, Rose motions for Namwarn to save her.

As she waits for her boytoy whom she calls a “friend” as well (she likes to categorize all of the men in her life as friends.. which is easier to deal with should things turn sour) Rose spots Preuk getting out of a white car. An older man hands him an envelope with money. As he walks towards her, Rose says, “I know why you don’t know me.” Rose proceeds to say that he has an ‘auntie’ who’s supporting him.

Preuk just shrugs it off and tells her that he so happens to like using his free time productively.

Soon enough, her boytoy shows up and Preuk adds that she seems to utilize her free time productively too. Heh.

After receiving another poetic text message (in which he always has trouble reading) Wan and his minion decide that it’s time to take out the big guns, they need to announce to the world (ok to the town) that he and Reurng are an item. So he arrives at her food booth, dressed in his traditional grooms outfit, and tells the patrons that he and Reurng have been seeing each other for a long time now and that they love each other. Much to his chagrin, Reurng is actually at the market. They decide to quickly change location to make sure they announce their relationship in front of Reurng too.

At said market, Khun Palat is there as well. He figures, since he made the duck pen, he would need to fill it up with ducklings too. He purchases a box of them, thereby taking the rest that is available. Reurng is disappointed that she couldn’t purchase any, and Little Pian wonders if Khun Palat is already being so effective with the people (that the ducklings are sold out) that would only present a problem to them.

Reurng hears Ai Wan announcing that they have been dating for a while now. Affronted, Reurng confronts him in front of the townspeople that they are NOT seeing each other.

Ai Wan comes up to her, “You have to accept it, you love me. Will you marry me or not?!”

“NOT,” she retorts and leaves.

He follows her and she threatens to kick him. He tells her that she could smack him with her lips or her feet, but he will kiss it either way, right in front of everyone because he loves her so much. LOL.

Fed up, Reurng says she won’t marry him. She will marry anyone who brings her ducklings.

Heh, next thing we know Kamjorn finds her and tells her that Khun Palat has purchased some ducklings for her. He places a large box into her arms. Reurng could only gaze at it in surprise, then she looks up into the face of Khun Palat.

Ai Wan and the minions are slack jawed. Surprised.  The minions remind Wan what Reurng said earlier: that she will marry the person who brought her ducklings.

Wan is pissed. He comes up to Khun Palat and grabs him by the lapels, threatening him to stay away from Reurng because Reurng is his. Which of course angers Reurng.

Khun Palat remains tall, and tells Ai Wan calmly that he’s in the ministry, his responsibility is to care for the people, whether they are Dao Reurng or Nai Wan himself. If he misunderstands, he should try to come to a better understanding. The crowd applauds Khun Palat’s answer, and the trio decides to retreat for now.

Reurng could only look at Khun Palat from the depths of her eyes, sort of touched that he bought her ducklings.

What makes matters even more confusing for Ai Wan is that he receives another text message from the supposed Reurng. BUT finally, the truth reveals itself. On their walk home, they bump into Mer who is in a good mood after a recent text message she sent. She accidently drops the phone right in front of the trio, who picks it up. One of them says that the phone is identical to Wan’s and they read her last text message: it’s the same as the one she sent to Wan earlier. Furious, Wan demands for the truth. Mer finally admits that she had been the one to text him. Ai Wan demands his phone back and calls her shameless.

At the duck pen, Reurng takes each duckling out of the box. Khun Palat watches her pure joy in caring for the ducklings and he smiles. Reurng realizes that she’s being watched and quickly rushes out of the pen. Reurng wants to pay him back for the ducklings but Khun Palat says he’s letting her raise them. He has a challenge for her, he wants her to raise the ducklings and educate the townspeople. She can sell the eggs and keep the profit, but she would need to keep a weekly financial report on how she’s raising them. Should she succeed, Khun Palat would bring her more.

Reurng pretends that this is too much work and boasts to walk off, but Khun Palat knows where to hit home with her: he says that she’s not capable of doing something good. She’s only capable at playing cards and producing alcohol. How could Reurng resist proving him wrong?

—

Thoughts:

If I was solely watching this lakorn for a good laugh, I was kind of missing it half way into this episode. It started losing steam which at times made me question why I’m still watching it (only because I’m recapping this.) Fortunately, certain things I was waiting to happen finally did towards the end of the episode and it’s keeping me awake, for now.

For example, I wanted the deception between Wan and Mer to end, although she’s giving herself some happiness by text messaging love poems and quotes to Ai Wan, she not only is doing that in the name of Reurng, but she is also hurting Wan, who thinks his love is reciprocated. I’m glad things came to a head, and although Mer ended up hurt because Ai Wan is insensitive, she needed to come to terms with her unrequited love.

Also, this back and forth of I’m going to one up you between Reurng and Khun Palat is all fun and games but I wanted more with their relationship. We’ve gotten to the basis of it already, Reurng doesn’t think he’s going to stick around, so why not hurry his departure? Which the premise of her hatred hasn’t been quite explained, does she hate him because he’s always in her way (because he’s doing his job and she wants to continue breaking the law) or does she hate him because she thinks he’s just like the other Palat who are crooked too? But that’s like calling a kettle black, Reurng! I do like that she’s developing some sort of crush though, because no matter how much she thinks he can’t last, he’s starting to prove her wrong. And he bought her ducklings! How cute is that? Just a small action, can make her fall slowly. I want to see more of that.

Because in reality if you want to pit Khun Palat and Ai Wan together, it’s clear who the winner is. I mean, Ai Wan is barely literate, he doesn’t do anything with his day, and he’s lazy. If he wants to be a true contender, and measure up to Khun Palat like he said he would, then he needs to up his game.

I know this is a comedy, but we’ve seen bits and pieces of a potential contemplative, serious tone to this lakorn, and to keep me truly invested, we need to see a good balance of that. Funny but meaningful, not funny just to be funny. So I’m glad towards the end of this episode, Khun Palat is challenging Reurng to do something more. Whether she steps up to the plate, or pretends to just to tease Khun Palat, we shall find out.