What's On This Page?

• Underestimating the Talented Thais [more]
• Thais At Work [more]
• Sleep [more]
• Overdose [more]
• Thai Opinions Of Foreigners [more]
• Insincerity [more]
• The Chinese [more]

Thailand - People Page 2

Underestimating the Talented Thais

While shopping in Tesco Lotus I heard some beautiful Spanish classical guitar music being played. There is nothing the Thais can't do if they put their mind to it.

I used to be guilty of underestimating the Thais but no longer. Thai society is massively divided and there is a huge underclass of people with little education who do rural and manual work.

When tourists visit Thailand who are the people they come into contact with mostly? They meet taxi and tuk-tuk drivers, hotel staff, street vendors, shopkeepers, etc. Nice people but not always supremely talented. It's easy to think that everyone in Thailand is the same.

It has been a real eye-opener for me living in Thailand and especially having the privilege of working at one of the major universities. Once you get beyond undergraduates, you will find Thai students who are involved with all sorts of complex studies. There is no field of science or technology that they aren't involved with.

There are excellent Thai doctors, musicians and I have even seen a Thai lady on TV singing Italian opera just like an Italian soprano. When they put their mind to it and are motivated they can do anything.

Thais are modest and unassuming because their culture promotes these qualities. I wouldn't go as far as to say they don't like to show off because they do in a visual sense. Their outward appearance is important but they don't boast about other achievements.

I helped a Thai PhD student prepare his thesis defence presentation and I wanted him to tell me what his research had achieved so we could put together a snappy opening to grab the audience's attention. At first I couldn't get anything out of him but after a while he let on that his research could help to increase palm oil productivity in Thailand by a significant amount thus resulting in big profit increases for the palm oil industry.

This was a major achievement but he was reluctant to say anything because of modesty. Underestimate the Thais at you own peril. They are a very talented race of people.

Thais At Work

Thais aren't lazy but I've taken the liberty of having some fun taking snaps of Thais asleep at their work place. When working 12 or more hours a day every day of the week it makes sense to take a nap during the hottest part of the day.

The work environment for many Thais is quite different to the one I am familiar with in the West. I don't know much about office work or working for large international companies in Thailand, just what I see on an everyday basis.

Thais say they work hard but it is not like working hard in the West for many of them. There is no doubt they work long hours, ridiculously long hours in fact. In shops they might start at 8am and finish 12 hours later on a quiet day.

On busy days they will work until there are still customers around - sometimes until midnight. For Thais not working in banks, the civil service or similar organisations, weekends do not exist. Every day is a work day. Massage girls might get three days off a month, say on the 5th, 15th and 25th or the 7th, 17th and 27th. Other workers appear to get time off at the discretion of their boss but days off are not assumed or taken for granted.

The very fact they are at work so much can be tiring but while they are at work they are not necessarily doing very much. It's not like the West where everyone has to be busy all the time, or at least, seen to be busy. For a start there is chronic overstaffing in most places.

Wages are generally low so employers can employ more staff and if workers are being paid on commission only an employer can employ as many as he likes at no extra cost. I have seen tiny counters selling mobile phones or something that are barely large enough for one person but there will be five sales assistants.

The official minimum wage is currently Bt175 (May 2005) although the government wants to increase it to Bt233, which some people say will drive investors away. Even though these are the official figures, this is Thailand where workers don't exactly have a lot of rights.

Many of the jobs don't take a lot of brain power and the pressure from bosses to get work done quickly is not there so the mental stress that Westerners suffer from doesn't really exist. Thais might be at their workplace most of the day but only a small proportion of the time is spent working.

If there aren't any customers around creating work it's not like the West where bosses will find other activities to keep employees busy. The Thais will eat, talk, read, watch TV. It is not at all unusual to see them slumped over their desk or sales counter asleep. Quite a common sight, actually. Thais have a remarkable ability to be able to sleep anywhere, on anything, in any position with all manner of noise and activity going on around them.

The Chinese Thais are quite different. They are hard working, industrious and own many businesses in Thailand. Any gold shop you see in Thailand is most probably Chinese owned as are many hotels, shops and other businesses. The Thais of Thai and Chinese descent are motivated quite differently. The Chinese are motivated by material possessions, the accumulation of wealth and the conspicuous display of this wealth. They look after themselves and are quite insular.

This isn't just in Thailand, it is a Chinese trait and can be seen in the Chinese wherever they live. Many Chinese businesses are family run which keeps money in the family and outsiders are excluded. The education of their children is important in order to give the next generation the best chance of making lots of money to continue this lifestyle and support the parents when they get old.

Ethnic Thais have a different set of priorities. They are not so focused on material goods although this mentality is creeping into society. They like an easy life, want to be happy, content and comfortable (sabai) and want to have fun (sanuk). The Thai outlook is more attractive to me most of the time but it gets frustrating when I am focused on something and become serious minded. I would therefore be very reluctant to attempt any kind of personal business venture in Thailand for this reason (and other reasons).

Thais make big personal sacrifices in order to earn a living. They go where there is work and often this is at the other end of the country so they leave their families and friends behind. As I've already stated they work exceptionally long hours every day of the week with little time off and for small salaries.

Labour is cheap so a lot of work is done by hand. There are big factories but there are also thousands of one-man and one-woman operations. It's really nice actually. Getting repairs and alterations done to clothes, for instance, is never a problem.

The quality of workmanship is excellent and it's very cheap. One woman who I asked to repair a hole in my pocket wouldn't even charge me because the repair only took her a few minutes. She stopped what she was doing and repaired my pocket there and then. I'd never expect that to happen in England.

Sleep

I was having a laugh looking through an Internet dating site for Thai women. The site boasted that none of the girls (almost all of whom were from Isaan) had never been bar girls but this claim was very doubtful judging by a few of the photos.

The descriptions described charming and demure young ladies who were fed up with unfaithful Thai men and just wanted an honest foreign man to love and take care of. Age, looks, existing children, bad habits, prison records and psychopathic backgrounds weren't important. Just send $80 to join and $4 for each e-mail sent and received.

What gave me the biggest laugh though was that one of the sweet young things listed sleeping as one of her leisure activities. It really is a national pastime.

On several occasions I have asked a Thai what they plan to do on their day off and they tell me sleep. And they mean it. Young Thai school children have scheduled sleep breaks at school. If you walk past a traditional Thai school at around lunchtime you will see lots of sleeping children.

Officially the sleep breaks disappear when they get older but the habit is difficult to break and Thai students of all ages will just fall asleep during lessons. They have a remarkable ability to sleep at any time, any place, anywhere - even in what appears to be the most uncomfortable of locations.

On bus journeys do you see Thais looking out of the windows enjoying the scenery? No, the curtains get drawn and everyone goes to sleep. If sleeping was an Olympic event, Thailand would have more than its fair share of gold medals.

So, so they sleep more than other people? I'm not sure they do but they have completely different waking hours. A quick survey of some of my students revealed they went to bed around 2am or 3am which accounted for why they always looked like zombies for a 10am lesson. Thai students do not like early starts.

Many Thais get up very early, especially if they are involved with selling food at fresh markets, and sleep later during the day. Some lead almost nocturnal existences. While I work and play they sleep and while I try to sleep they stay awake all night drinking, talking, singing and playing music very loudly.

Thai Opinions Of Foreigners

What do Thais think of farangs? The easy answer would be as banks. Money is an obsession for many Thais and many think it grows on trees in other countries. Thais are very, very careful with their own money and have very fixed ideas of what things are worth in Thailand.

They don't complain about high prices, instead they just don't buy. If goods are thought to be too expensive they remain unsold, or if rooms for rent are too expensive they remain empty. Most farangs are completely clueless though, or they compare prices to their own countries which have far higher costs of living, and they hand the money over.

A friend of mine teaches Thai massage to local people for peanuts. He has heard wondrous tales of how much foreigners pay for Thai massage courses in Chiang Mai and when he tells me, his eyes glaze over. A previous landlord wanted to know if I had any farang friends who needed a room because the locals wouldn't pay what he wanted for his expensive rooms.

Thais in their thousands flock to tourist resorts such as Phuket where tourists hand over ridiculous amounts of money. I would guess that tuk-tuk drivers around Thailand would be doing well to earn on average Bt80 an hour. In Phuket however they operate a cartel charging a minimum of Bt100; and Bt300 for 20 minute journeys. For poor Thais it really must seem that the streets are paved with gold in farang tourist resorts.

Single male tourists will get lots of attention from local girls purely for the money in their pockets. I have spoken to a number of Isaan girls who have foreign husbands and have found out they have two or three sisters who also have foreign husbands. In certain parts of the country the ultimate goal in life for many girls is to get a foreign husband. It doesn't matter what kind of a person he is, what he looks like or how he is, as long as he has money.

Western influences have made many Thais quite greedy but most people do not have - and will never have - opportunities to earn the money to buy what they want. The only option is to get it from foreigners somehow or other.

Forgetting money - which is not an easy thing to do for many Thais - what they think of foreigners, I guess, is down to the kind of foreigners they meet. A doctor or university professor meeting professional foreigners probably has one opinion.

However, what the locals think of foreigners in places like Phuket I dread to think. On a trip to Patong beach I got chatting to the hotel staff who were all very respectable southern Thai girls. As I sat talking with them I observed what they must see every day of the year.

Obscene sex tourists were walking around the street outside, shirtless with their huge guts hanging over their shorts, clutching bottles of beer. They arrive alone and within hours come back to the hotel with fierce-faced, hardened prostitutes who they lounge around the pool with.

I read somewhere on-line that foreigners who stay in Thailand for a while are resented by Thais. I have never found this and think that resentment is probably the wrong word. In some cases there is envy but not resentment. Many Thais rely solely on foreign tourists for their source of income and they are under no illusions about this so welcome visitors warmly. There is only one other place on earth I've been to where I have been welcomed as warmly as I am in Thailand and that is Bali.

The Thais are probably the most tolerant race on earth and it is very difficult to cause offence. Because of the culture they will not speak out about things they don't like or find unusual. As a short-term visitor it is almost impossible to gauge what the locals really think but after a while in the country little snippets of information start to emerge.

Relatively, foreigners are wealthy compared to the vast majority of Thais. The fact they can go to other countries for holidays demonstrates this. However, there is not a bottomless pit of money available as most Thais think and this misconception can cause a few issues at times.

There is a common Thai stereotype image of foreigners that gets a bit boring after a while. Because I am a farang they always assume I have just come from Phuket or I am just about to go there. Actually, I can't stand the place. According to them, foreigners cannot eat any spicy food and survive on bread alone. Whenever they eat bread for breakfast they always drink coffee with it. In the evenings they drink copious amounts of beer and engage the services of Thai prostitutes.

Because of the way many farangs carry on in Thailand it is easy to understand why the locals think all foreigners are the same but it does irritate me at times to be tarred with the same brush. There is also an assumption that foreigners can't understand or speak any Thai so it is perfectly acceptable to talk about them in their presence.

Thais are quite fascinated with the physical differences of farang bodies. Different eye and hair colour to the standard Asian brown and black are of interest to them as are light skin and body hair. Their curiosity sometimes takes a tactile form. I am no longer taken aback when a Thai man touches my leg and remarks on how white I am or grabs a clump of hair on my leg.

Neither am I surprised any more in public urinals when the Thai guy next to me stands there staring down at my equipment. (What I do object to however is when I am alone in an empty public toilet with 40 urinals and a Thai male who comes in chooses to use the urinal next to the one I am using).

They love my nose too and some Thais have expressed an interest in swapping noses with me. I've hated the thing for most of my life so would love to swap it for a cute little Thai one ... if only that were possible.

The farang obsession with the sun, and trying to obtain darker skin by lying out in it, is completely unfathomable to Thais. As they walk near a beach doing their best to cover up from the sun they look at the fat, lobster-coloured farangs lying on their sunbeds with utter disbelief.

There are some other things they find strange about foreigners because certain things are so alien to Thai society and culture. Thais just cannot understand why I have no desire to get married or to father children. "Who will take care of you when you get old?" they ask me.

They find it very strange that I have never married, despite being the wrong side of 40, and have no strong desire to get married. They can't understand how I am happy living on my own or that I like to travel alone. Even eating alone is something they find weird. Thai society and culture is not solitary so any kind of solitary behaviour comes across as unusual. (Their fear of ghosts is another reason why they don't like being alone.)

I have no strong desire to own a car or a house in Thailand which is also something that raises eyebrows. They can't understand that I've done all that stuff and now I want less in my life instead of more. I understand though why they think I am strange and I also realise why they will never understand.

Insincerity

I've met insincere people everywhere I've been but never in such numbers as I've encountered in Thailand. My Thai girlfriend told me that when Thais see a farang, many have an ulterior motive in mind for wanting to get to know that person. The Thais say, "Mii joot bpra-song," which means the person has an aim, or a purpose. This hardly needed confirming, as it has become very obvious ever since I came to live in Thailand, but it was interesting to hear it coming from a Thai's mouth.

I guess the obvious example is the 55 year-old farang guy who walks into a bar with bad hair, bad glasses, a replica England football shirt, jeans and Reebok training shoes and is told by the bar girls he is handsome. Yeah, sure. However, insincerity in Thailand goes way beyond flattering sad sex tourists and can be quite subtle.

Kit-teung is something I hear a lot and it means to miss someone. You only have to meet certain Thais for five minutes yet they will keep telephoning to say they miss you. Yeah, sure.

Often it is Thai girls being insincere to foreign men just to get money but not always. Thai men with business interests will also do it with foreigners to get business. I had a bad experience with an exceptionally greedy landlord and have had unpleasant encounters with Thais in tourist areas trying to sell tours or rent cars, etc. Sometimes it isn't necessarily money. Perhaps they think you could be useful by giving their children free English lessons or something?

At this point I have to make it clear that the majority of Thais are very kind, very sincere people but that still leaves a lot of insincere ones. In my first year in Thailand I thought I was beginning to develop a circle of fairly influential Thai friends. I mentioned this to an expat who had been in the country for about 12 years and he warned me to be very careful.

He said they would just use me for whatever purpose they had in mind and would think nothing of dropping me completely or actually causing me problems. At first I was a bit disbelieving but now I think it was good advice.

What is interesting - and to be honest, something I found quite shocking - is how quickly and how radically people will change once they realise they cannot get what they want from you. I am currently staying in my third apartment and there was a lot of bad feeling on both occasions when I left the previous places.

Everyone was very nice while I was a paying resident but as soon as they stopped getting money from me everything changed. Exactly the same thing has happened in restaurants I stopped going to. Smiling men in Phuket or Krabi trying to sell you day trips or wanting to take you on tours in their cars can suddenly become quite aggressive when you tell them you aren't interested.

Girls who 'miss me' and call me frequently to tell me how much they miss me will drop me like a stone once they realise that I'm not a winning lottery ticket or a walking ATM and won't hand over large sums of money as they had hoped.

On my way to work, and generally just walking around the neighbourhood, I talk and joke with a lot of people - the majority of whom are girls. Most of the time I am on my own and maybe some of the girls think they can get some money out of me if they make a good impression.

There have been occasions though when this kind of thing has gone on for months but one day I walk past the same place with my girlfriend. The next time I go past I am completely ignored. They don't even make out they haven't seen me; they look to make sure I have seen them, give me a filthy look and then turn away in order to deliberately ignore me.

This behaviour drives me nuts. Not once did I lead them on or tell them I didn't have a girlfriend so I didn't do anything wrong but all of a sudden I am a villain. I love most of the Thais I meet dearly but boy, can they be a strange bunch at times.

A little cynicism is a good thing in Thailand. Don't be too cynical because sometimes it is undeserving but be wary of people's motives. Many Thais think nothing of flattering to deceive and that famous Thai smile can help to hide the deception.

Fortunately, sincerity is very easy to test. All you have to do is not go along with what is being asked for and the reaction you get from the other person will be a clear indicator of how sincere they were being - or not.

The Chinese

Thailand has policies in place regarding land purchase and employment to protect Thai nationals from the threat of a foreign invasion but it is rather a case of having shut the stable door after the horse has bolted.

The Chinese have already cleaned up in Thailand and they have done a pretty thorough job. Ethnic Chinese Thais run the government, most businesses, hotels, shops (lots of gold shops), money lending operations and just about everything.

As a race, their emigration from China has been quite remarkable. From having nothing in China they have gone all over the world, worked hard and prospered. They assimilate well into other cultures but nowhere better than in Thailand. Many second and third generation Thai-Chinese speak only Thai, no Chinese, and most foreigners would have a hard time distinguishing Thais from Chinese in Thailand.

Chinese in Thailand have Thai names, which may not seem a big deal to most Western tourists because all the Asian names sound foreign, but this is the equivalent of Chinese in England being called John Brown or Tom Smith. How weird would that be? The Chinese assimilation in Thailand is like no other country on earth where Chinese have settled.

At one point, as a minority race, they were discriminated against but now they pretty much run the country. They are very protectionist with their wealth and often quite ruthless in how they run their businesses.

My relationship with Thai-Chinese is mixed. Their education and general intellect is more like I am used to in the West and there are situations where I find it a lot easier getting things done when dealing with Chinese.

However, they are business people and it is money that drives them. Just like Chinese everywhere, they can be friendly if they think you are a potential customer but decidedly rude if you show no signs of parting with your money. If you actually owe them money, things can get very uncomfortable.

They have their own distinct culture which in some ways is quite contradictory. The Chinese, in general, have terrible attitudes towards the environment. It's not only dam projects in China; their love of killing endangered species for medicine and for the dinner table is legendary. The contradiction is that because they are generally well educated they are more aware than most of the harm these activities have on the environment and wildlife.

They only make up about 10% of the population but in Thailand there is no escaping the Chinese. It's not like some countries where they just live in certain neighbourhoods and the local Chinatown. In Thailand the Chinese can be found everywhere.