The long journey, through the (almost) earthly paradise (final)
Hans Bos has lived in Thailand for 10 years in December: a look back. Today the last part.
I'm not going to talk about corruption here, because everyone knows how rotten Thailand's civil service is. I don't have much to do with that, with the occasional cop holding up his hand. Because I always wear a helmet and my papers are in order, the officer invariably cuts corners.
I have rented my properties from the start and that gives me peace of mind. I paid tuition fees with Lizzy's mother and I can't/don't want to afford that a second time. Moreover, in normal cases (yes, I know the exceptions), a foreigner in Thailand does not get a mortgage and does not become the owner of the land (again: yes, I know the workarounds, so spare me this advice).
In a nice moo job outside Hua Hin I rent a nice bungalow for a reasonable price from a Dane. At first I lived in a slightly larger bungalow one street away. After two years I only got a lease for three months. The owners had not paid the bank, so the building had to remain vacant. After my departure, two more years of Thai lived in the bungalow. The building has been vacant for some time now. Strangers have demolished the remaining furniture, as well as curtains, rods, air conditioners, water pump and even the water tank. The bank is asking 7,8 million for it, about twice the actual value. For that unsaleable amount, the house is undoubtedly on the books, making all banks in Thailand appear much richer than they actually are.
And then the traffic in Thailand, a source of constant annoyance. One half of the car and scooter drivers do not have a driver's license, the other half have bought one or do not comply with the rules. Sometimes I have the idea that the Thai have not yet outgrown the stage of the buffalo. You only put on a helmet if you expect to run into a cop, not for your own safety.
Women with a number of children on the front and back of the scooter, with one hand on the steering wheel and a mobile phone in the other. How stupid can you be. The obligatory mirrors are for checking your makeup, or pulling hair out of your chin, not to see if someone is coming after you. Pick-up trucks loaded with workers racing to the floor, while clouds of black soot spewed out. Uncle cop only stops when he thinks something is sticking to his bow.
The Thai motorist thinks: my car is my castle. As friendly as he is after getting out, he becomes so fanatical behind the wheel of his Vios or Yaris, invisible through the dark film on the windows. Estimating distances is a big problem, cutting is part of it and turning on the flashing light is too much effort. And Thai road builders who repair a hole in the road often make a bump out of it, just to be sure and to compensate.
Losing face is the worst thing that can happen to a Thai driver or not. The easy thing about Thai society is that a rebuke is a loss of face. So you are not allowed to honk or signal with high beam. And you shouldn't address people who dump their garbage on their behavior along the way. Thais keep sweeping their own sidewalk clean and then dump the waste out over the nuur or along the road. I have seen in Bangkok that some residents of my moo lane refused to pay 20 baht a month for their garbage to be collected, which was then promptly dumped out of the car outside the moo lane. Yes, an expensive Mercedes…
You have to unlearn complaining in Thailand. Because your complaint causes someone else to lose face. Then it is called that you do not understand Thai culture. A comment about the yapping mutt from the neighbors? Delivers angry faces because it's your problem, not the neighbors. A remark to the boy next door about his excessive shouting in the swimming pool caused an angry neighbor who told me that in great detail. The other neighbor walks her dog by slowly following it. Thailand is the country of the 'no have', sometimes while the saleswoman is standing in front of the product you are looking for.
Before I close the litany in a minor key, a few more positive topics. The food in Thailand is almost unsurpassable, even outside the door. Unfortunately, I cannot answer the question of whether vegetables have been extensively sprayed with insecticide and whether the chicken/fish may be stiff from the antibiotics.
Where in the world can you take a nice bike ride every morning, followed in the afternoon by a splash in the swimming pool of the moo track? The medical care (at least in Bangkok and Hua Hin) is excellent and affordable. I have to say that the Dutch health insurers are insufficiently responding to this. I now pay 495 euros a month to Univé, while healthcare here costs less than half of that in the Netherlands (spare me your Thai alternatives). I have crossed Thailand from east to west and from north to south. And experienced two coups.
The fixed costs of water, electricity and internet are easy to cough up. And a Dutch neighbor can always be found for a cup of coffee or a chat. Lizzy is growing fast and doing well at her Kindergarten. What does a man want more? Family (children and grandchildren) and Dutch friends closer to home? That's right. That is the price you have to pay for emigration. I tasted the sweet, but also the sour.
If the next ten years go the same as the past period, you won't hear me grumbling. Well, occasionally then. In Thailand and in the Netherlands.
Seems hard to keep your head down all the time, but it must be a necessary survival strategy. Occasionally the concept of 'mo job' falls between your words. What is that?
It's always been hard for me to keep my mouth shut, Rieks, you know that. But I've also mellowed a bit over the years. It is better not to write about the royal family, you should watch your words about politics. Well, when I criticize the Netherlands, I always get the accusation that I foul my own nest…
A Moo Baan is what the English call a compound or village. So a number of houses with a (low) wall around them and a guard at the entrance who provides an alleged sense of security.
Someone once explained to me that a 'moo job' is a pigpen. Moo = pig, and job = home.
If it were a sarcastic translation, it would be clear.
Then that someone has fooled you... Moo Baan is pronounced differently from Moe Ban. Moo means something like 'group'. But still a nice idea. Almost as fun as dark ling. That stands for monkey's butt and not honey.
Quite funny. Just to clarify, with the correct pronunciation and tones:
mòe: low tone, long –oe-, 'group', as Hans said; job, falling tone, 'house'. Mòe: road, so group of houses, general word for 'village', also incorrectly used for 'guarded community'.
mǒe:, rising tone, long –oe-, pig. 'Pig house' would then be: bâan mǒe: . Two completely different word combinations and pronunciation.
And then 'darling'. Really no one who thinks of ape ass, except farangs. It is only Isan: dàak ling: 'monkey's ass'. A completely different statement. But funny.
Dear Hans,
You hit the nail on the head with this edition.
I wish you a future with much less frustration periods in Thailand and beyond.
Dear Hans,
You've got it right, most people would be jealous of you.
As for the misery you've had, everyone has that in their life
but in yet another way.
You become stronger and wiser.
Good luck with your family in the future and thank you for your blunt story.
Yours faithfully,
Erwin
Dear Hans.
Your stories are peppered with things like this.
I'll take 1, quote: And then the traffic in Thailand, a source of constant annoyance.
Giving in to constant annoyances makes you sick to a greater or lesser extent. Accept that mother on the motorbike, bags with groceries on the handlebars, child in front and behind her, with the mobile in one hand and the other hand on the handlebars, let it go, don't you have a constant stomach ache.
Admittedly, your experiences are very recognizable, may also be shown, that is also Thailand, the other Thailand is also there and luckily you decide with that.
Wish you more beautiful and less unpleasant experiences in the almost Paradise.
Regards,
Nico B
It is indeed a totally different world here in Thailand. Of course you've had your share of misery.
If you have never lived in Thailand. Can't you imagine this. But because everything is very gradual, it just happens. I have seen many such stories in Chiangmai. Often you can see it yourself from the beginning. But if you say something about it. Are the turnips cooked? But often you think that things are going very well with a farang and Thai woman. And then suddenly you hear about the same horror stories as above.
And it's all true, those stories about traffic, barking dogs, and double prices Family and so on... When you find yourself in such an unpleasant situation. You will automatically start to see everything much more negatively. And then you talk to more negative people and it gets worse and worse. This is also because many farangs have nothing to do. Being bored and therefore becoming even more negative. Fortunately, I was lucky. We have a small resort and it is doing very well. That's because 95% of our customers are Thai. I have a good wife who works hard and is very frugal. My in-laws are all lovely and hardworking people. Who don't need anything from me or my wife. In fact, when we go out to eat, I or my wife almost never pay.
But I still often get annoyed by all those things that I experience every day. But since I'm usually busy I don't make it a problem. Because you can't change it anyway. And further I hope
Hans that you can continue the next 10 years very happy and healthy with your daughter.. Good luck
Thank you for sharing your educational experiences with us.
“LiveLife”.
Rick.
Yes Hans , thank you for your Life Story . It's all true what happens in Thailand but some men don't want to admit it, they will always wear those Pink Glasses. Good luck Man!!!!!
Hans,
Agree with you, there are many but also some positive things in your life in Thailand, but in everyone's life these are experiences that are personal and are therefore resolved that way.
I haven't gotten that far yet, I live partly in Thailand and every 3 months I usually go back to the Netherlands for 2 or three months to try to get used to the climate and other cultural differences. During the time that I stay in the Netherlands, I still work as a taxi driver in Amsterdam, not because one of the reasons is really necessary, but I also do not want to sit behind the geraniums in the Netherlands, as an explanation I am 77 and still refuse to feel old. to feel, and I think that is one of the reasons why I am still fit and still enjoy life. So a positive attitude is a good attitude to overcome setbacks and keep going. Your story touched me to the extent that it is real and not a farce. Good luck and success in the rest of your life.
In the Netherlands everyone talks about integration.
Everyone talks about it and almost no foreigner really integrates.
In Thailand this is the same.
Everyone looks at Thailand from a foreign perspective.
But try looking at society with a Thai eye.
Difficult isn't it?
For me, if I read everything, the price was too high to take a splash in the swimming pool of your moo job. real fun. Apart from the winter months, you could enjoy a daily bike ride in the Netherlands, a lot safer, so that Thailand is not really convincing here either. The only advantage I see in a moo job is the fact that people here are more bound by rules that can support the quality of living. The disadvantage of a moo job is that you have to defend all these possible rules and advantages by placing walls and constant surveillance, so that it looks like a prison to many. Even if you didn't want to talk about the corruption, because the rotten corps of officials, if you call it, is known to everyone, do you let it be known, that this too is negative. Also the fact that you have to be careful with criticism of the politicians, and other people who can lose face, force farangs who want to function here, to undergo their own personality change, and to give up freedoms, which were normal before. Also, in Thailand you are never allowed to ask the question why, and you have to accept most of the fact that you want to stay. Furthermore, as a farang you have the obligation to report every 90 days, and in order to have the right to stay, you must have sufficient income or bank balance, so that you can only offer help to others, but never have to ask for it yourself. Perhaps I am being too critical or too realistic that I don't have the courage to burn all the ships behind me to immigrate for good, the more so I don't trust the current political situation. I admire Hans Bos's honest article, because he also had the courage to mention the many negative things, only my rose-colored glasses are only suitable for a temporary vacation, and most transparent to live here forever. I hope Hans stays happy here, and that he can enjoy his child and new partner for a long time to come.
Those 'pink glasses' are often worn by men who have had one or more failed relationships or divorces, often also by men who cannot or can hardly decorate a women's bicycle in 'farangland'.
After meeting a (young) Thai lady weighing 50 kg with fawn eyes and long straight black hair, one is often overcome by the so-called 'Thailand fever', everything is idealized and from that moment on nothing is good about the home country anymore, everything is more beautiful and better in Thailand, the Dutch women in particular will have to pay the price, they are all over-emancipated and if there is anything negative to say about Thailand, it is quickly condoned and or waved away because, well, who cares, After all, that also happens in the Netherlands, as if it were less bad.
On the other hand, it is also remarkably funny that in conversations with compatriots who cut down on their homeland, they often want to improve the Thai and educate them on how things can be better, because 'that's how we do it in Holland'.
Let's just say that both countries can learn from each other, both have their advantages and disadvantages. Count our blessings, be happy with what we have by not complaining and complaining about what we don't have, it can be that simple.
Congratulations for your candid story.
I am currently traveling through Thailand for the third time in a year and a half and today (with my Dutch wife, so without rose-colored glasses) I drove by rental car from Udon Thani to Buriram. Heavy rain showers on the way, lots of holes due to broken bits of asphalt on some roads, but the constant criticizing the traffic here in Thailand on this blog is starting to irritate me. Whether I drive through Bangkok, on busy highways or the gravel roads around Chiang Rai – the Thai seem crazy about their (relatively expensive) car and scooter and in many cases rely on them. Driving to smithereens for fun is not an option and a lack of training forces you to be careful. Traffic simply works differently, but not necessarily worse.
Driving in Thailand requires insight into traffic situations, anticipatory driving behavior and, above all, a give-and-take attitude. All three things that many Dutch motorists are not familiar with. I do not encounter the antisocial and especially aggressive driving behavior that I see in the Netherlands. Zipping from three lanes to one while there are also two streams of merging traffic… In the Netherlands it is unthinkable that this would go well without hooting, cutting and middle fingers, while I saw it happen a few times here this afternoon without any problems.
Everywhere there are road abusers, drunks and tough men who take too many risks, but sitting on a scooter with four people is really so much more dangerous than in jeans and a T-shirt with 180 km / h on the motorcycle between a traffic jam over rip the A4…?
“Traffic does not necessarily work worse”.
27000 road deaths per year compared to 500 in the Netherlands.
The most dangerous country in terms of traffic in the world, after Namibia.
Do not let me laugh. I'm happy here every night when I come home unscathed, and I don't even live in Bangkok!
It strikes me that people who do not live here permanently have a completely different view of driving in Thailand. Thailand is in the top 3 for the most traffic deaths for a reason. Just drive between 17.00:19.00 PM and 4:5 PM. I live in a small village. But every day there are an average of 75 to 2 accidents around that time. Usually caused by drinking after work. When I drive to the city ( Chiangmai ) a XNUMX km ride it sometimes happens that I don't encounter an accident. But more often I see XNUMX. And often inexplicable. Car on its side on a dead straight road. Way too heavily loaded pick-ups that simply fall over in a bend because the load starts to slide. Double-decker buses that drive very fast at night, also fly out of the corner.
The four of us on a scooter, often also dad, mom and two children, the eldest still a toddler in front and the youngest often still a baby in diapers 'safely' in the back of mom's arms Comparing it with a motorcyclist speeding does not imply it is indeed that you have glasses on (despite not having a Thai clean one) with very deep dark pink glasses.
Hans,
I have read your articles with interest over the past few days. Now we will take a good look around us in February next year to see where we might want to stay. We also have Cha Am on our list. A week or so ago I made a request on this forum to get in touch with emigrants. Could we also make an appointment with you to go through it while enjoying a drink. everything is new to us, except that we are already in Thailand for the 5th time.
Like to hear from you,
Ben
Email: [email protected]
if others read this, don't be shy. We like to get in touch with people who now live in Thailand. We come in: Chian Mai, Phuket, Krabi, Cha Am and Bangkok.
Dear All,
I made a typo, Cha Am should be Hua Hin.
Regards,
Ben
Unfortunately, safety is not highly regarded in traffic in Thailand. Motorists simply overtake in totally obscure bends. The worst part is that 70% only turn on the lighting when it is pitch dark. So never overtake during heavy rain or between sunset and total darkness. Because then you play with your life And no, lights are not flashing or honking, because several people have already died. The most beautiful being you turns. Imagine that this is on the Dutch highways, often you suddenly stand still. In Thailand they got their driver's license with a packet of butter
It is a pity that you still want to hand out a complaint to the health insurers regarding unsubscribed persons. As far as I'm concerned, that can also be equated with non-deregistered, not of that.
Keep me in the right wish it to everyone, however, knowingly and willingly well in advance and then making the choice to leave with that knowledge as a disadvantage is entirely up to you. In short, leaving or deregistering is a choice, not an obligation.