Understand Thailand & Thais

Rejoice Serial expat

Member since 10 January 2012

RejoiceSerial expat17 June 2015 06:44:37

356

Greetings Everyone

I'm writing this for foreigners who live here understand Thailand and Thais especially from western countries.

Originally Thailand is an agricultural country and the ONLY country in this region, not colonize by any western country before.

Singapore; Malaysia and Brunei were under the British. Indonesia by the Dutch. Philippines by Spaniards. Vietn by the French. Other surrounding countries too.

Therefore when Thais look at westerners (Farangs) they see and think of them differently.

Thai education is a lot of in house that is Thailand first. Learning about other countries is very little.

Don't be surprised to know university graduates are very poor in geography and world history. They may not be able to point you well know cities in the world.

Neither can they tell you famous leaders of countries or famous explorers like Ferdinand Magellan; Stamford Raffles; Christopher Colombus; Marco Polo etc

Go to any banks and you see the tellers need to use calculator even for simple calculation. Pay 250 baht and give them 1,000 baht still need calculator to do.

Thai education is learning by memorizing and not by creativity. News article and world reports show the level of education here.

Therefore if you chose to live here, accept their short comings and thank them for giving you a chance to be better than them.

No one is perfect, neither is any country is perfect.

Ask deep inside yourself, can Thailand be the same standard as your country? Perhaps it can in 10 or 20 or 30 years time.

But can your country be like Thailand that will be smiling all the time, keeping cool and take things easy.

For those who are married to Thais and living in Thailand, try to adjust yourself if you think you are better than them.

Have grace in your heart to guide; teach and share your expertise with them.

How can they be better if we don't impart our experience and knowledge to them?

Life is short, enjoy the beauty of Thailand and Thais.

If anything not to your liking, brush it off quietly like dandruff on your shoulder.

No point complaining as you cannot change them as you are not Thai citizens and no voting rights.

Be happy and stay healthy.

SMILE!

bkk tea blog Serial expat

Member since 20 August 2014

bkk tea blogSerial expat17 June 2015 09:25:08

426

This might be better suited to the Thailand sub-forum.

I live in Thailand and I can't disagree with most of this, but it's general enough there isn't a lot to agree with either. Americans aren't so great with geography either, and really how can anyone keep up with the history of all the regions in the world. Thai people are nice enough, quite pleasant.

There is something to the "developing country" idea but it's hard to pin down. Western countries tend to differ, and other countries don't want to be just like them. Infrastructure development and such is one aspect, but even then it's not as clear as higher and lower. The roads are terrible here, but rail is pretty decent, and there's no way a country like the United States could ever match it for being affordable.