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Photo: Decoration on a Buddhist Temple door What's On This Page?
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Thailand - Culture Page 3
You may wonder when it starts to happen and the answer is straight away when you arrive in Thailand. Many Thais are very afraid of farangs. Their physical presence can be quite intimidating and until a recent trip to Bangkok I had forgotten just how large they are. I am just under six foot tall and I don't meet many farangs in Thailand. Very rarely are Thais as tall or taller than me but I was dwarfed by farangs in Bangkok. Not only is it their physical size that intimidates the Thais but their unpredictable and sometimes volatile behaviour. However, you would never guess there is any sense of fear. Do the Thais look afraid? No, they just smile. The famous Thai smile is used for many things but one of its primary uses is to disarm unknown and potentially dangerous strangers. It is very difficult to be aggressive when people are smiling at you. Non-confrontation and a peaceful way of life are important to the Thais. To avoid confrontation they avoid saying things that may upset someone. Ask them what they think about something and you will get a positive answer. If you are teaching you can repeatedly tell your students to let you know about any problems. You can ask them to tell you if they don't understand something or if you are talking too quickly but very rarely do they say anything negative. You might find out a month after their course finishes that they couldn't understand a word. I have even started doing the same thing in Thailand but the reason was that I thought it was a waste of time telling the truth. I was staying in a rented room and had several issues but every time I spoke to the landlord he would just dismiss them, make excuses and tell me everything would be OK later. In the end I just found another room and told him I was leaving. He was upset that he would have an empty room which was overpriced for the local market and was likely to remain empty. He asked me why I was leaving, was there anything wrong? "No," I replied. The positive aspect of hiding the truth is that living in a world where there is little confrontation is quite pleasant. However, nothing gets fixed in time. If there is a problem with my teaching I need to know at the time so I can address the problem. Not only do issues not get resolved but there is no safety valve. People harbour major grudges about things but refuse to speak about them. Sometimes they just explode from the pressure inside but if they had let off a little steam it would never have got to that.
Have things started to change in Thailand? I mentioned above how customer service is generally not very good because customers don't like to complain. I attributed this to the cultural notions of losing face and avoiding confrontation. Brits don't mind complaining, in fact they're very good at it. Americans won't accept poor service. As a result, levels of service in the West are fairly high compared to Thailand because it is demanded. It is March 2005 and an emerging trend in Thailand recently is dissatisfied car owners making very public protests. One woman drove her Honda CRV to the dealer who allegedly wasn't interested in helping to fix faults with the car. In a very public protest, which was televised and reported in all the newspapers, she started to attack the car with an iron bar. During the Bangkok motor show, five car owners drove their Japanese vehicles to the Japanese Embassy and threatened to torch them unless the manufacturers changed the vehicles or fixed defects. A dissatisfied Mercedes-Benz S280 owner also took similar action. Now, this kind of thing is hardly non-confrontational or face-saving. Where expensive cars are concerned though, Thais get a little emotional. Drivers can do the most outrageous things on the road and other road users don't show any degree of road rage. However, that wasn't the case with one Mercedes owner I heard about. When a motorcyclist drove into his brand new Benz he took out a gun and shot the guy dead. Do whatever you want to a Thai but don't mess with his new Benz, the ultimate goal in life for most Thais. If the allegations about 'lemon' cars and poor after-sales service are true then what is interesting is how the manufacturers have come down to Thai levels. The perception I have of companies like Honda and Mercedes in Western countries is of giving exemplary customer support.
Thais have a completely different value system to many Westerners and this can sometimes give the impression they are lazy. I am very much task driven and I think that many Westerners are the same. My life is about getting things done. I work from a written 'To Do List' as well as the list of tasks that exists in my head. This is how I was brought up; my parents think the same way. This is how it was when I went to school and when I worked in the UK. People have to be seen to be busy and achieving things all the time. Even during those times at work when there is no real work, employees have to find things to do because it isn't acceptable to do nothing. It used to frustrate me having to do ridiculous tasks when things were quiet at work because doing a ridiculous task was acceptable whereas doing nothing wasn't. The Thais are focused on relationships, not tasks. A successful day to me is getting several items on my 'To Do List' done so I can tick them off and get more things done. It doesn't matter if I am alone or with other people. The social interaction isn't important. The only important thing is to keep achieving. A successful day to my Thai friends is getting together with lots of other people where there is an atmosphere of sanuk and sabai. Being in the company of other people is important, as is engaging in fun activities (of which eating is the main one) and just being generally happy and relaxed. An activity such as Karaoke is popular because it's fun, relaxed and many people can join in. It doesn't matter if tasks aren't completed. Who cares? In a workplace environment there is a big difference between Thailand and the West. In the West everyone has to be seen with their heads down, working hard and achieving lots of things. Generally the workplace environment in Thailand (like the school environment in Thailand) is very relaxed. At times such as Loi Gratong it is perfectly acceptable - encouraged even - for all of the employees to stop work and be engaged in making decorations for the evening festivities. The day-to-day tasks of the office can be forgotten for a while as people get together to join in with a common, fun activity. Most Western employers would not be impressed if their staff stopped working and spent a day making Christmas decorations or something. Again, it's not because the Thais are lazy, it's just that they have a different set of values in life and who is to say they are wrong? The weather is another factor too. The Thai hot season is enough to make even the hardest worker want to lie down and take a nap. I believe in work/life balance but this doesn't exist any longer in many countries. People devote their lives to their careers and that's it; nothing else is important. Relationships break up - or are never formed in the first place - and people live lonely, soulless existences in order to climb the corporate ladder. Work/life balance does exist in Thailand and I think it's a great thing. Unfortunately there are external pressures on the Thais to consume more and thus earn more and work more for material things they don't really need or want. This has come from other countries as part of globalisation but fuelling the domestic economy by encouraging household debt and increasing consumer spending is also a key part of 'Thaksinomics'. Already, the stress of the modern, Western way of life is starting to show on the faces of Bangkok commuters and it is sad to see that in the Land of Smiles the smiles have started to disappear. I don't think Thais are lazy. If they can't see a reason for doing something they won't bother and unfortunately this applies to quite a few students but they're not necessarily lazy. In busy restaurants and other businesses some people never seem to stop working. They work all hours, seven days a week. Thai construction workers are quite incredible, I just don't know how they do it. Just watching them work long hours in the midday sun is exhausting. Many women are involved in the construction industry and they work like horses. I don't know how they do it. If I tried to do the same in the hot season I would be exhausted after a day. The lady in the photo is 60 years-old. She and the other women on the site come from Kanchanaburi province but are working in Songkhla which is a long way from home. They start work shortly after sun rise and continue working after sunset under floodlights. They live in corrugated shacks which have been hastily constructed on the building site with no proper bathroom facilities. Living in such conditions far from home and working so hard is a huge sacrifice and it might be understandable if they were earning a fortune. They earn Bt200 a day. Thai fishermen and fisherwomen lead incredibly busy lives. One woman I know of goes out on her boat at 5pm to get her catch and doesn't get back until around 4am. Once back she takes the catch to sell at the local fresh market. She finishes at the market a little after noon. She then has to eat, feed and take care of her children (of which she has several) do chores around the house and try to get some sleep before going out on the boat again at 5pm. She works seven days a week with no weekends off and few holidays.
Suffering, Non-attachment, Impermanence And Karmic Forces
Life is suffering, said Buddha. Bad things happen in life and if we accept this fact then the bad things don't seem so bad when they happen. Nothing and no-one is permanent in this world. Being attached to something or someone or a state of mind that won't be there forever is not a good thing. I have been quite taken aback at times though regarding the Thai attitude to the death of close relatives and friends. There is sadness obviously but they are almost nonchalant at times and don't seem to have a problem getting on with their lives. The receptionist where I used to stay mentioned one day that her father had been killed in a road accident a couple of weeks previously. I thought I had misheard her at first because I was sure that if I had heard what I thought I did she would be grief-stricken. But no, I heard correctly. Her father had been killed and I had actually seen her at work immediately after but had no idea that anything so awful had happened in her life because she seemed the same as usual. A visitor to this site wrote an e-mail telling me he had met a girl in a bar in Pattaya who had gone to Phuket two days before the tsunami. He was concerned about her after the tsunami hit and returned to the bar to see if he could find out if she was OK. The people at the bar told him very nonchalantly that she had been killed and that was it. It is not unknown in the West for a person to almost stop living if someone they were very close to dies. They continue to exist but are never the same person they were. It is a tragic situation but it happens. But what good does it do? The deceased person will not come back. The Buddhist philosophy recognises problems in life and suggests ways to deal with those problems. No blind leap of faith is required. It's logical, pragmatic and makes a lot of sense. Bereavement was an extreme example. Unpleasant things happen all the time in life and when they do, it is up to us how we react. We can walk around with a long face being miserable. We can blame ourselves for not doing something to prevent the bad thing from happening or we can blame someone else. None of these things do any good though. As they say, there is no point crying over spilt milk. The alternative course of action is to put the bad event behind us and get on with life. This is what the Thais are brilliant at. No matter what is going on in their lives they normally manage to display a cheerful disposition. It certainly helps to make the world a more pleasant place but can confuse foreigners at times. What you see in Thailand is not always what it seems. On the surface a pleasant image is presented to the world but if you get to know Thai people well and dig below the surface a little you will see a different side to life. There seems to be an air or resignation regarding life events in Thailand because of Karma, the law of cause and effect. Good and bad things that happen are seen to be the result of previous actions in this or a past life. It is the Buddhist theory of rebirth. This one concerns me a little but may account as to why young Thai males ride around recklessly on motorbikes with no apparent regard for their own safety. Perhaps they think that their fate has already been determined and it is out of their hands? It concerns me because many accidents on the road in Thailand are avoidable. Thais do not seem to worry about the future very much but live for the moment. It's a great way to live because we only ever exist in the present. Worrying too much about the future is not a good thing but those with over analytical minds have a propensity to do so. I have been guilty of this at times. The Thai attitude when this happens is to tell me I think too much ("khit maak") and yes, they are normally right. Not worrying about the future is helped if you believe that your life is already mapped out and that Karmic forces are what will determine events. That way there is no reason to think about it very much. I have also seen this attitude in Christians but for a different reason. Their reason for not worrying too much is they believe there is an omnipresent God watching over their every move and making decisions for them. It's not a bad thing actually. Worrying is the problem and it doesn't matter what faith we believe in so long as what we believe in cuts down on the worrying.
Even countries that trot out the old lie about all men being born equal know it isn't the truth. Sure, anyone born in America can become President theoretically but the reality of the situation is that only the very rich can run for office and it helps if you are a Hollywood star or if your father is an ex-President. In Thailand the pragmatic Thais don't even bother with this silly pretence. No one is equal and no one considers that they are. So, how unequal is Thai society, exactly? Is it divided into working class, middle class and upper class? If only it were that simple .... I read somewhere that there used to be a numbering system where everyone was given a number dependent on their social standing. It went up to 10,000. At the very top of Thai society is HM the King. Then come other members of the royal family, politicians, civil servants, military officers, and so on. Buddhist monks have a special standing in Thai society and monkhood is one way a person from a low background can elevate his position in society. It is a complex subject but basically few people are equal in Thailand. When two Thais meet there is a subtle system of 'weighing up' each other to decide who is the more important person in society. I don't understand all the nuances but several factors are involved. These include, but are not limited to, age (older people are considered more important), job, wealth, car, education. The Thais will question each other to get the answers they are looking for. In Thailand it is not unusual to be asked your age by a new acquaintance when this might be an unusual question in the West. The assessment goes beyond direct questioning. There are several levels of politeness used in the language with coarse, normal, polite and very polite terms for some words and expressions. At the very top is a completely different vocabulary used by, and when referring to, the monarchy. Thais with a good education and family background will use a higher level of language than market-sellers and will use the politeness particles, kha and khrap, much more frequently. Once the relative level has been established the lower status person will defer to the other person who is perceived as having a higher status. This is sometimes referred to as the patron-client or patronage system. The patron will look after the client, maybe helping them get a job or lending them money, in return for respect and subservience. Even in everyday life, at restaurants for instance, Thais will be assessing other people and how they address that person will give an indication of where they think that person stands in relation to them. A younger or inferior person will be addressed as nong. An older or (perceived) more important person will be addressed as pii. I don't particularly like this aspect of Thai culture. Back in the Western world I would never look down on anyone unless they had done or said something to make themselves inferior. There is quite a lot of snobbishness in Thailand but, as I mentioned above, they are a very pragmatic people and I believe there are other reasons for this behaviour. The Thais have a remarkable ability to self-regulate society. Elsewhere in these pages I talk about the general lack of law enforcement by the police but I also make the point that Thai society isn't anarchic. Because of the respect Thais have for people higher than themselves they do not often step out of line. There aren't too many rebellious individuals who cause problems in Thai society and, if they do, it normally only takes a word or two from someone higher up the chain to get them back in line. At the apex of the pyramid is HM the King and if he makes comments to the nation, people listen and they obey. My attitude in the West is that of a bit of an upstart and many people are the same but it can cause problems. The Thai way of doing things may seem restrictive and oppressive but it works. Thais are masters at assessing other Thais but have a problem when trying to weigh up the status of farangs. The way they do this with other Thais doesn't apply to farangs because they don't understand the language and knowing facts about where the farang comes from, which school they went to, etc, is meaningless to them. It comes down to a very superficial level, that is, the appearance of the farang and how much money they are seen to be throwing around. Image and personal appearance are discussed elsewhere in these pages. I found some more information about the old method of Thai social hierarchy in a book titled Making Revolution by Tom Marks. At the start of the Ayuthayan period of Thai history (a time of mass migration), it was important to control and organise the population for production and also for purposes of war between rival kingdoms. King Borommatrailokanat (otherwise known as King Trailok) introduced the sakdi na system - a complex hierarchical system - in order to achieve this end. The new laws gave everyone a number of units of sakdi na. "Buddhist monks, housewives, slaves, and Chinese merchants were assigned a sakdi na of 25, slaves were ranked 5, craftsmen employed in government service, 50, and petty officials, from 50 to 400. At the sakdi na rank of 400 began the bureaucratic nobility, the khunnang, whose members ranged from the heads of minor departments at a [sakdi] na of 400 to the highest ministers of state, who enjoyed a rank of 10,000.The system of sakdi na was abolished eventually but this sense of an extremely complex hierarchical social order is still deeply ingrained in the Thai psyche.
Tony Blair's 'Respect Action Plan' is a typical political response these days which doesn't do anything to tackle the root cause of the problem, it just gives the state more powers. Police have more authority to close down buildings which harbour troublemakers and hand out on-the-spot fines, thus bypassing the courts. None of this will do any good. It's just more hot air and political rhetoric from self-serving politicians who have enough money to be able to avoid the problems faced by ordinary people on the streets. The problem is that the moral fabric of society has been allowed to erode over the years. Respect cannot be enforced by the state but needs to be enforced by parents and neighbours. However, because of a variety of reasons, including political correctness and a culture that promotes work and money above everything else, it no longer works like that. The situation in the UK will only continue to get worse. I talked above about the hierarchical structure of Thai society and mentioned that I do not like some aspects but it has some major benefits. In Thai society everyone knows their place and generally people don't step out of line. There is enormous respect shown by children to not only their own parents but to all adults. According to Niels Mulder, "Fifty to seventy-five per cent of primary school time goes to the teaching of how to be a good and tractable subject." Critics might say that this constitutes brain-washing or stifles creativity and individualism but I would disagree. The social problems being experienced in other countries as a result of allowing individuals to forget their place in society are huge and almost impossible to fix. The only hope these societies is have is to fix the root cause of the problems and hope that future generations will reap the benefits. Thai society, on the other hand, does not suffer from the same ills. Apart from a few individuals it is an amazingly smooth-running, self-regulated society that does not need massive state intervention to prevent the wheels coming off. It's not perfect but given the choice of where I prefer to live I already made that decision a few years ago. Go into any Thai office or government building and it is extremely likely that you will see a large organisation chart on the wall in a very prominent position. It doesn't matter whether the organisation is a government department or a language school, the organisation chart has a very special purpose in Thailand. The company I used to work for also liked organisation charts but their purpose was slightly different. By showing business units, reporting lines and responsibilities it was easy to work out who to talk to about different issues. The charts had nothing to do with hierarchy. Professionals were sometimes at a higher level than the managers they worked for. Managing people was just a different job, not a higher or better job. In Thailand the organisation charts are purely about hierarchy. They are never flat but always Christmas tree shaped with the big honcho at the top and his underlings beneath him - in every sense. Many organisation charts have photos and the employees will be photographed wearing their white uniforms covered in medals, with a brightly-coloured sash over one shoulder. Status is of immense significance to the Thais so a huge statement on the wall declaring everyone's status in the form of an organisation chart is very important.
After coming to Thailand to live, and becoming more familiar with the language, I started to notice it a lot and found it very amusing. In very broad terms pii is used to address an older person and nong a younger person. The subtleties go beyond age though. It can be used as a kind of superior/inferior form of address and nong is used as a term of endearment for children and young females. A child will normally prefix nong to their nickname when they tell you their name. Some young female pop singers and Thailand's famous porn star, Nong Nat, also use this form of address. This is all very respectful but there are many pitfalls. Observing my Thai girlfriend's use of these terms is most amusing as she tries to assess the age of other people to determine whether to use pii or nong. She looks young for her age and makes the most of this fact by addressing as many people she can as pii even though the people are probably younger than her. To wind her up I always get involved when I can by questioning her use of pii. Another scenario is acted out fairly regularly when I am with her. She will come over to me and ask how old I think a particularly person is. When she does this I always know exactly what has happened. The other person has addressed her as pii when she thinks they are older than her so should be calling her nong. It's silly but it happens all the time. One particular incident was highly amusing when we went out with a couple of my PhD students for dinner. The female student was obviously older than her so that wasn't a problem but she and the male student were quite similar in age. Before dinner could get underway it was essential for the pair of them to work out who was the pii and who was the nong. I was interested in the outcome. I knew she was older by a couple of years but wasn't sure how much other factors would enter into the equation. He came from a much wealthier background and was a lot better educated. They batted it backwards and forwards for about 10 minutes but still could not decide so it came down to directly asking each other's age. It might seem a little strange when a Thai person you have only just met asks you your age but there is a reason. Personally, I don't like this aspect of Thai culture. As I have just described, a lot of it is about making assumptions regarding the age of other people and that is dangerous. I also don't like it because some people use nong in a quite condescending manner as if to say, "You are an inferior person to me." I might use it with very young waitresses but I think that khun is a much more respectful form of address. How do farangs fit in with pii and nong, you might ask? Well, they don't really. I have never been addressed as pii or nong, just farang. What has been apparent at times though is that some Thais have considered themselves to be superior to me for whatever reason. It might have been because they have a big house in Thailand and I don't, or because they own a car and I don't, or because they have a senior job and I don't. Nothing has been said verbally but I am expected to comply with their wishes. It has all been done very subtly but ends with bad feelings because this farang doesn't bow down to people who think they are better than he is.
Thais - The Ultimate Diplomats
How did a country who had given free access to the Japanese during WWII so that Japanese troops could land quite happily on the beaches of southern Thailand for their assault on British-run Malaya and onward into Singapore manage to remain friends with the Allies immediately after the Japanese and German forces had been defeated? Thais are incredibly diplomatic and pragmatic when it comes to dealing with difficult situations. They will always attempt to find a solution where both parties are happy and no one loses face. During the time of the British Empire, a time also when France was colonising large parts of Indochina, Thailand signed trade agreements (such as the Bowring Agreement) which gave extraterritorial rights to Western countries. Part of these agreements included giving away large chunks of what was then Siam but the Thais realised that to preserve their independence they would have to make some sacrifices. The other factor was Thailand's location. Being sandwiched in between French run Laos and Vietnam and the British colonies of Malaysia and Burma it was a convenient buffer country to keep those two old enemies apart. When Thailand sided with the Japanese during WWII the Thai government declared war on Britain and the United States in January 1942 but the Thai Ambassador in Washington refused to deliver the declaration. The United States therefore never declared war on Thailand and then helped Thailand to rebuild after the war. The Burmese completely sacked Ayuthaya in 1767 (the Thai capital at the time) and could have gone on to occupy the country but Thailand got some help from the Chinese when China attacked Burma. Thais are fiercely proud that the country has never been colonised but they don't quite tell you the whole story, or they don't fully understand it themselves. I have used some extreme examples of Thai diplomacy but this skill (and it is a skill) is used in all areas of Thai life. Western corporate businesses would describe this as a 'win-win' situation and Westerners, in general, could learn a lot about tact and diplomacy from Thailand.
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