Column – Easter Bunny in Pattaya
Easter in Pattaya. Not exactly the resurrection that Jesus once signed up for. No spring sunshine here, but a merciless heat wave that boils eggs hard if you leave them outside for a while. Chocolate melts faster than the ideals with which you once left the Netherlands. While in Mokum and Maastricht respectable middle-class families crowd around Easter bread and moderately hidden eggs, I stroll past half-naked expats who celebrate their rebirth mainly with ice-cold beer and questionable life choices.
In Pattaya, the Easter Bunny is usually a Brit with a belly that looks like he’s been pregnant with Guinness and fried sausage for months. His bunny suit has been replaced by a Manchester United shirt with sweat stains in strategic places. Chocolate eggs are scarce, but ovaries are plentiful. No wonder even Mary Magdalene would frown upon this.
On Beach Road there are few solemn processions unless you consider wandering tourists in neon-coloured shirts as pilgrims. Pattaya remains a cross between the promised land and Sodom by the Sea where religion mainly consists of beer brands and temples dedicated to the god of temporary affection. While the Dutch scour the furniture boulevard during Easter to score a corner sofa, my fellow expats mainly look for confirmation of their own rightness. There is no better place for spiritual reflection than a bar stool that has borne your name for years.
Self-reflection seems to be as scarce here as snow in Bangkok. No crucifixion or crown of thorns, but there is that constant hangover and the tragicomic realization that we all too often walk around here as lost apostles of our own lack of direction. Many came to Thailand for a fresh start, but got lost somewhere between Soi Buakhao and Walking Street in the catechism of cheap entertainment and expensive mistakes. Easter? At most a memory of the past when grandma's lawyer had nothing to do with legal help after night-time incidents.
And yet this absurdity also has charm. Because Pattaya teaches you that salvation is not in finding hidden eggs, but above all in acknowledging your own shortcomings. An expat or pensioner stays here because Thailand is confrontingly comfortable. Every attempt at improvement usually ends up stranded in the same beach chair as last year.
So I toast to Easter with lukewarm Leo and sticky bitterballen in a bleak imitation of Dutch glory. No resurrection or ascension. Just the comforting realization that things will never get better here. Just what you need to realize that paradise is just a delayed disappointment.
Happy Easter!
About this blogger
- The Expat (66) has been living in Pattaya for 17 years and enjoys every day in the land of milk and honey! Previously employed in road and hydraulic engineering, but fled the capricious weather in the Netherlands. Lives here with his Thai girlfriend and two dogs just outside Pattaya, a 3-minute walk from the beach. Hobbies: enjoying life, going out, sports and philosophizing with friends about football, Formula 1 and politics.
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Another great column Expat, with lots of satire and self-mockery. The rose-tinted glasses wearers will probably start to buck up again. Beautiful prose too, I really liked this one: No crucifixion or crown of thorns, but that constant hangover and the tragicomic realization that we all too often walk around here as lost apostles of our own lack of direction. Many came to Thailand for a fresh start, but got lost somewhere between Soi Buakhao and Walking Street in the catechism of cheap entertainment and expensive mistakes.
Awesome! Can be placed on a tile.
Happy Easter
A fresh start? Who goes to Pattaya for a fresh start? Pattaaaaaaya as the Dutch always call it. Hopefully your cynical piece is not read by potential quality tourists. Is this another caricature of Pattaaaaya or is the invasion of the potbellied tattoo brigades the sad reality?
The closing line is a nice variation on what Nietzsche said: 'Hope is deferred disappointment'. He had a lot in common with Schopenhauer who had already stated: 'Hope is the confusion between the desire for an event and its probability'. I had to smile, yes, yes it must be Easter behind my ears.
The Expat as Nietzsche, especially if he means with his column what Nietzsche really said: “Hope is the worst of all evils, for it prolongs man’s torment.” The idea is that by holding on to hope we may postpone the inevitable disappointment that life can bring. There is nothing wrong with that in itself. For centuries, Easter has been fulfilled with it.
The Expat as Schopenhauer: he generally held a pessimistic view of the human condition. He believed that much of human suffering stems from constant wanting and dissatisfaction. The latter provides The Expat with material, and Thailand is no stranger to you. Wishes and desires can be so strong that they cloud our judgment about the true likelihood of their fulfillment. Hope, Schopenhauer argues, arises when we blur these boundaries. We want something to happen so badly that we start to believe it will, even when the objective evidence suggests otherwise. Schopenhauer points to the cognitive error, Nietzsche to prolonged suffering. The Expat to everyman in his everyday life.
Gerrit explains it so accurately, I don't dare to do it myself. I am already being dismissed as a kind of übermensch (referring to Nietzche because I would use difficult words. Looool Well Pattaya as a will and idea. Everyone has their wishes and desires there. The will and the path to it can lead to colorful and remarkable scenes (as described by the Expat). What one then imagines afterwards as having achieved is somewhat clouded by rose-colored glasses or is presented as paradise. Both philosophers had also carefully read Buddha, right? Uh, the reactions today are a bit different: at his Easter best and blissful (my idea). Especially don't start now, hope Rudy
Oh, dragging all those old German vinegar pissers into it? You could also drag von Hartmann into it. Cheerfulness was not an asset in those days! Did expat read all that? According to us, we are simply dealing with a spontaneous modern-day vinegar pisser. But he does it just nicely.
Quality tourists will be pleased to read the 'Pattaya Guide' before visiting Thailand.
Now (again) they know clearly where they don't have to go. 🙂
Well… that's kind of the feeling I had when I visited Pattaya twelve, thirteen years ago and decided never to go there again.
I am happy with my place in Pranburi. Last year I had built a plunge pool myself, and this year I am working on improving it, because – as an amateur – I had made quite a few mistakes.
But hey… it keeps you off the streets! No time to walk around like a lost apostle…
There are plenty of other reasons to settle in Pattaya besides beach chairs, bars, women and shopping malls. The unparalleled beautifully restored medieval city center is one of them! But also the modern architecture that carefully harmonizes with the old city center is a sight in itself.
@ “In Pattaya, the Easter Bunny is usually a Brit with a belly that looks like he's been pregnant for months on Guinness and fried sausage.”
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I sometimes wonder why the British are so overrepresented in Pattaya. Compared to Germans, French, Italians and Beneluxers. Why is that?
Hoppa https://ap.lc/OIGfD
They have been suffering from it for quite some time now if you look at history in a slightly different form.
Nice people, by the way.