10.000th article on Thailandblog: How I became a blog writer

From the editors: Today is a special day, because we are proud to announce that the posting below from Gringo is the 10.000th article on Thailandblog. Since the start on October 10, 2009, when the first article was posted by founder Khun Peter, Thailandblog has become a household name in the Netherlands, Belgium and Thailand.

The fact that more than five years after the start, readers can choose from 10.000 articles is an achievement in itself. The connection and interaction between writers and readers is even more apparent from the number of reactions that have been given: an average of 9 per posting. In short, there are now exactly 91.495 reactions under these 10.000 articles. This makes us not only the largest weblog about Thailand, but also the most active.

It is now Gringo's honor to present you with the 10.000th article. Enjoy reading.

How I became a blogger

Since December 2010 I can call myself a blog writer or blogger for Thailandblog.nl. In those four years, 600 articles of mine appeared and coincidentally coincides with the 10.000th article on Thailandblog.nl. An admittedly considerable production of mine, but still only a small part of the whole. After all, there are dozens of others who have made more or less interesting contributions in those four years.

Not a reporter

Now I am not “from the profession”, it is not a habit for me to contribute to a weblog, newspaper or magazine, because I am not (or have been) a journalist. I spent my working life in business, also writing a lot, but in a different way. I'll get back to that.

When Khun Peter asked me to make this story as the 10.000th contribution, I started thinking if I hadn't even written a “nice” story in the past and three incidents came to my mind.

Essay

In high school as part of the Dutch subject we regularly had to write an essay (remember that?) Just a story about or a topic that was assigned or a free choice. In the latter category I once wrote an essay about “not wearing a watch”. Indeed, I did not have a watch, which seemed to become problematic when we moved from the south side of Almelo to the north. Now I had to cycle a long distance every day to get to school and of course I had to keep an eye on the time. In that essay I described all the clocks I encountered along the way, from shops, church, town hall and so on, there were twelve if I remember correctly. Although they were not all the same, they always helped me to be on time at school.

By the way, I still don't wear a watch because the time is shown in many ways nowadays. The only occasion where I did need a watch was during a football game where I acted as a referee.

De Volkskrant

Yes, I also appeared in De Volkskrant with a nice story. Many years ago, that newspaper had a weekly column in which readers told about specific language used in their work. In other words, expressions that would not or hardly be understood outside that company or professional group. I then wrote a little story about the language we used in the Navy. It contained many Indonesian words such as spatoe = shoe, kajoe = carpenter, tulis = writer/administrator, mandien = shower and much more. But also many expressions, which were used inappropriately and often inappropriately. If you are surprised about something, you might say “my mouth fell open”, in the Navy it is called “my job fell on deck”. If something just doesn't surprise you, you might say, "So what?" and a Navy man says, "Should I get a hard one out of that?" So I wrote about it, but I actually hated that language and therefore I hardly used it during my navy time.

Voetbal International

I could also include this football magazine in my CV as a magazine I have written for. Even years ago, VI offered readers the opportunity to write a column. That could be about a club, a player or about an experience that had to do with playing football. I then wrote a story with a plea for more Dutch football players in professional football. I thought - and still do - that there is enough talent on the Dutch fields to become a professional football player if only they would be "discovered". However, the scouts prefer to travel to African and South American countries than to watch matches on a bumpy soccer field behind the church somewhere in an Achterhoek village.

Business

After my navy time I went to work in an office in Amsterdam. After an internship in the company I was placed in the export department. I don't know why, I had no experience in that area at all. By the way, not in any business area, the director apparently saw something in me: “I don't know you, you don't know us, so prove yourself worthy of the job!”

I was trained as a trade correspondent who had to handle the contacts between the mostly German factories that the company represented and our offices in a number of Asian countries.

My first business letter

In time, I was instructed by my mentor, an experienced tradesman, to answer a German letter. He indicated what I should write. I could have put my school English into practice at the navy, but I hadn't really mastered German with all those cases. Anyway, it had to happen sometime so I started writing. So just write, because a PC with a German spelling program did not yet exist.

When I finished it after starting over three times, I had the epistle approved by my mentor. “Fine,” he said, you did that nicely. Let's just walk through it." At the first sentence he remarked that he would formulate it slightly differently. He wrote – in red – a completely new sentence in correct German. It was no different with the second sentence and with the following text as well. He kept saying that he thought it was a good letter from me but the result was that the two sheets looked very red because of all the improvements. I could never forget that lesson.

Career

Over time I got the hang of the profession and gradually I became an old hand in the profession. When I took (early) retirement as Commercial Director of a medium-sized machine factory, I had written thousands of letters and other text documents in Dutch, French, German or English. It could be anything: quotations, order confirmations, contracts, financial and commercial annual reports, job classifications, texts for brochures, travel reports, sales and management courses, etc.

Retirement

I retired after being a widower for some time and then decided to move to Thailand. I had been there often enough, but when you go to live there, it is different. I wrote long E-mails to family, friends and acquaintances to tell about what I experienced in this new country of residence. About where I lived, where my Thai wife lived, where we went for a trip, where and what we ate, how I experienced certain customs in Thailand, etc. etc.

Thailandblog.nl

I also showed the e-mails to a friend from that time, who advised me to post the stories on Thailandblog.nl. I didn't like that, who cares about people who don't know me, now what I'm going through, I thought. He persuaded me anyway and to my surprise those stories were all posted. There were even comments and that started my activity for the blog. I got a lot of fun writing and then seeing the result appear in “printed” form on the blog.

What am I writing about

I haven't written about my own events for a long time, although that still happens. When I walk through Pattaya I see all kinds of things and think, that's nice for the blog. No, I write about anything and everything, about touristy nice places, Thai history and legends, interesting people, fun (sports) events, foods, relationships, hotels and restaurants, transport and much more. You can only write about things that interest you so I hardly ever write about politics, religion and the Thai language. Others are good at that.

Finally,

So I'm not a real writer and yet many blog readers like my stories. Like me, you will probably experience all sorts of things, either as a tourist or as a resident of Thailand. Do not think that it is not interesting to others. Thailand lovers want to know everything, so I invite everyone to make their own stories and send them to the editors.

So together to the 20.000 stories on Thailandblog.nl