Some thoughts on the last two months, spent in Thailand

After we return from longer trips to different countries I like to give myself a few days to reflect and then write down my thoughts, and in this case share them.
Before you proceed, accept the fact that these are my observations and opinions.

Preparation for a trip to Thailand
• You cannot do enough research. 

• Most of the research you will do will give you information that is not quite right.
You need to sort out the bullshit and what you want to hear/see/read from the facts.

• Don’t be a “Cheap Charlie”, which is derogatory term in Thailand. There is a massive difference between getting value for your money and thinking that cheapest is always the best. Always keep that in mind before committing to something. 

• Make sure you are aware of the weather at the time of the year you want to go.
It will never be cold, but it can be wet. Really wet.
Or, it can be humid. Really humid.
The longer you stay the more you will acclimatise. Some do it faster than others.

• Find out what is happening in the area(s) you want to stay or visit. 
For example, we knew that it was going to be just past the high season but we didn't know it was going to be during the "long break". 
The "long break", aka school holidays, was from the beginning of April to the middle of May. This too seemed hard to establish when we were looking at dates.
Being in Cha Am during this period meant that we were staying in THE most favourite beach spot for Thais in a 300km radius, including all of Bangkok.
It was incredibly busy but gave us a great perspective on how they enjoy themselves.
Also, we were there, and in Pattaya, at Songkran. It starts on April 13th but went for varying periods of time depending on where we were. Cha Am - 3 days. Pattaya - 8 Days.
You can read about that in one of our earlier blog post.

• Plan on getting sick, as in getting a stomach bug. Some deal with it better than others. 
You need to know how you will cope and plan for it.
This doesn't mean that you need to take a complete inventory of medicines. 
You can get every type of medicine in Thailand that you can get at home and more.
Simply make sure you know where the local chemist is and how to ask someone that knows. That might include putting that in your pre-prepared phrase book.  

• Do not pack a lot of clothes. It does not get cold and you can get all the toiletries you need there. 
We took less than 20kgs each and most of my stuff was laptops and associated chargers and cables. Next time I would probably take far less.

• Load up maps.me on your mobile phone as it is a very good map app for wandering around and avoiding getting lost.
Take your time to learn how to use it before you go.

• Take out travel insurance, especially for unforeseen accidents and for delays in flights/transportation, which inevitably have a knock-on effect that cost money. 
Medical and dental services are world class and comparatively cheap but not free. 
You would be stupid not to have insurance to use these services, before you leave home.
As the old saying goes "It's the best money you ever wasted." ... if you're lucky enough not to have needed it. 

• Take photocopies of your passport, visa, license (both home and international), insurance and any other important travel documents and never leave your passport with anyone for any reason. If they insist on holding your passport, leave and find somewhere/someone else to do business with.

• Take a good look at the map below before you start any planning whatsoever and know that anyone that has lived in Thailand for any length of time considers most, if not all , and not limited to, the towns you see on it to be "no go places". 
Not because they are dangerous but because by staying there you are unlikely to get to know and enjoy what Thailand is really about.
Having said that, we went to Pattaya, twice. I had not been before and I'm glad we went.
I saw a side of humankind, which is probably a poor description of some of the "beings" there, which you are not likely to witness anywhere else on earth.
It was not "bad" as such. Just really, REALLY, different.
I think the majority of these "no go" places rate as such because they are full of tourists, lazy and disgruntled expats and are expensive. 
All good enough reasons to warn people about.

Most of the towns you see on this map are busy and expensive.

There is a lot more of Thailand to see and enjoy if you put in a little bit of effort.

Interacting with Thai locals
• Never forget that you are their guest. Behave like a good one.

• Do not judge their culture. You are not equipped to do so nor do you have the right.

• Be aware that the “At home we do it differently so the Thais are wrong.” mentality is going to lead you to a world of unhappiness.
It is their country and you need to be aware of their rules and you need to abide by them.

• You need the patience of a Pope in Thailand. Why you ask? 
Because, Thailand. That's why! So, suck it up sunshine or stay away.

• Suspend your sense of disbelief. 
This is Thailand and anything and everything is possible, and likely.

• Sometimes you will see contradictions in the way police deal with rules and people.
Do not get on your “western” soapbox and start arguing or preaching about fairness or right and wrong, as it will make matters much worse. 
Almost without exception they haven’t singled you, as a westerner (aka ‘farang’ in Thai slang), out as they treat everyone, including other Thais the same. 
One of the best and accurate, and possibly most useless, articles for dealing with police is here. 

• Learn a few common phrases before you go.
It’s not that hard and it shows that you are making an effort to be respectful.
Jot them down on a pad and practice them. As Thai is a tonal language, which is foreign to we westerners, and extremely difficult for us to master, you will probably get the words wrong.
You won't be able to hear your incorrect pronunciation, but a Thai will.
Thankfully, Thais are forgiving and aware of our shortcomings and will understand out efforts.   
Thais will be grateful and return your respect tenfold.

• Do not confuse Thais with other Asian people, especially Chinese. 
Thais are respectful and mindful of others, although sometimes it may seems as if it is in a strange way.

• Thailand is known as the Land of Smiles, and deservedly so.
Almost every Thai, with extremely few exceptions, will have a smile for you. 
Most of those smiles are genuine. 
But, some are smiling at you as the opening gambit for a ripoff. Sadly, it happened to us. 
Return their smile, and mean it, even if theirs was less than genuine.

• If you're going to go beyond a smile and the "sah wat dee krup (if said by a male) or kah (if said by a female)" greeting and want to wai (🙏), as Thais do to each other, do some research as the cultural rules are complex. You would never be looked down upon by a Thai for not wai'ing, as you are a farang. If you get it wrong you will look like a "try too hard".

Travelling around and touring in Thailand
• There is a service called Grab, which is Thais local version of Uber, and I think it is in other Asian countries too. It works on cash, not cards, and the app tells you how much it will cost before you commit. It works on a local basis, as in ~20-30km radius.

• If you want to save money you could use other forms of transport like their (back of a ute) ‘taxi’. The seats are a plank of wood running the length of the ute over the wheel wells. You can hail them down and they are generally very cheap.

• Motorcycle taxis are popular, and cheap. You can spot them by the fact that the riders wear orange safety vests with a large number on them. In big busy cities they can also be quicker than other forms of transport as they can lane split and weave between stationary cars.

• In Bangkok there are canal boats that operate like buses, the Skytrain, which is very modern and sits high above the main road through the city, and the MRT (Mass Rail Transit), which is underground.
All of them are cheap, as in ~AUD1.50 for a 10 stop/ 20 minute ride.

This is the station close to the U Sukhumvit Hotel, where we stayed on our last night

This shows the main canal public transport route through Bangkok

This is the main public transport map of Bangkok.

When you use these methods + a tuk tuk or a motorbike taxi etc.

 you can to anywhere in Bangkok quite easily.  

• Tuk tuks work well for locals, but they are a minefield for foreigners.
We used one once and it was part of a very clever scam. I won’t go into the details but I will say that you should not take any offer of a ride, often for ‘free’, which is part of a ‘cheap’ tour or riverboat ride.
If you want to take a tuk tuk ride I suggest you approach one and know how much it would cost using a normal taxi and then settle on a price, which is less than the taxi.
Let the tuk tuk come up with a first price and then start haggling.
Do not be scared to walk away if it sounds like you’re being conned.   

Some are very colourful and tricked up with flashing lights, stereo systems, mag wheels

• Should you decide to choose a more personal mode of travel I suggest you do it after having been there a week or two and having observed how locals, and long term expats drive.  

Road rules, such as speed limits or driving on the correct side of the road, are meaningless and are disregarded in Thailand.
Indicators are rarely used and the faster the vehicle is travelling, which can and is often 50-60 kph over the speed limit, the less likely they are to be used.

When entering a crossroad with a 'GIVE WAY' sign, at way over the speed limit, they will often flash their lights, sound their horn and accelerate. 
We witnessed this often at the intersection of Chao Lai and Narathip Road, and intersection we walked past many times every day, and why we did not witness a fatal accident, there or anywhere else in Thailand, is anyones guess.

Thai drivers do not look right or left as they enter an intersection nor do they look any further than smallest of distances beyond the front edge of their bonnet. 
It is fascinating to watch, when you can, as they have black tint on their windows. And by black, I mean so dark it amazes me how they can see out of it .... and that includes the windscreen.  

Thai drivers in general are dangerous, mainly because they are allowed to get away with bad driving.
Police roadblocks are there to stop cars and motorbikes to check for licences, no helmets etc. but not for unroadworthy or dangerous cars or motorbikes.   
From what I am told Thais are neither trained to drive and their driving test is comically inadequate to qualify them to venture on to roads so congested.

That, and the belief that destiny is determined more by a person’s merit-making (tham bun) over a long period, and less by their actions in an isolated incident. Even if it that incident has significant consequences, the way killing other people or being killed in a road traffic accident tends to.

As of 2016 Thailand had the second highest road traffic fatality rate in the world at 36.2 per 100,000 with an annual estimate of over 24,000 deaths or 66 deaths every day. 
It comes second to Libya, which is higher only because deaths caused by armaments and explosive devices on roads are counted as "road traffic fatality".

Libyan "road accident"

While globally 49% of road traffic deaths are among vulnerable road users (pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists), it is 83% in Thailand including 73% among motorcyclists or 48 per day.

I contemplated hiring a scooter for a few days, which would have cost ~AUD6.00/day, but then commonsense kicked in. We ended up hiring a car for AUD30.00/day. As much as I love riding on motorised two wheel vehicles I do not want to die, be maimed or cause the ones I love the grief they went through the last time I had a serious accident. 

  

Food 
• Good food handling practices and hygiene, almost without exception, does not exist in Thailand.

• You are very likely to get a bug which will affect you in a range of ways. Hopefully it will simply make you feel a bit uncomfortable in the tummy and you will pass it quite quickly. 
Four main ingredients of Thai cuisine - chicken, eggs, rice and pork - are notorious for food poisoning, even when treated with the utmost of care and following all the known requirements for safe handling cooking and storage.  
Some believe, as I did, that locals develop a bug resistant stomach biome and are unaffected by the poor handling and preparation hygiene and unsafe storage practices. That’s wrong. It is a myth which probably came about because Thai don’t moan about it. They just put up with it and treat it as a normal part of life.

• Thai food is rich in its use of chilli. The use of terms and questions such as “ … a little bit of chilli …”, “…not too spicy …”, “How spicy is it?”, in my opinion and experience, are useless and more often than not lead to disappointment.
Even when you specifically ask for “No chilli, please.” (which in Thai is "Mai sai prik khrup") you may or may not get no chilli.
Thai cuisine relies on chilli for the spicy part of the sour, sweet, salty, bitter and spicy flavours that work together to make each dish come alive and, more often than not, by the time your request gets to the chef/cook it will have been lost/forgotten as simply their misunderstanding of "what the farang said".
For more info on Thailand’s chilli pastes go here

• You can easily find food very similar to what you’re used to eating where you’re from, which partially defeats the purpose of going to Thailand, in my opinion.  
One excellent example was the burger Tiz had at Passport Cafe, out the back of Hua Hin.

If you choose, or need, to eat the way you would at home it will be both expensive and of a lower quality.
By ‘expensive’ I mean it will cost at least what you pay at home for ingredients and or completed dishes at restaurants and cafes.
By ‘lower quality’ I mean that most ingredients that are not common to Thai cuisine are often imported and simply lack the quality we are used to at home, even if they are grown locally. 
I don’t know why that is but it is what it is. It is the same in reverse. 

Travelling with others
• It’s not easy and although some of the people we have spent time with, and not only here in Thailand, have been great. 

• If someone says “You organise it and I/we will be fine with whatever you come up with.”, beware. 
Be very aware. 
The likelihood of them not liking what they were going to "be fine with" is high.
In our case that has not always been so, but it has happened.

• Do your planning well in advance. Make sure that everyone knows what is planned, including where, when and how much.
As I stated earlier, it is best if everyone gets involved with at least some of the research and planning and if anyone prefers not to or does not know what is going to happen because of lack of interest then alarm bells should be ringing loudly. 

• No matter how well you think you know someone travelling overseas with them, as in making hotel and flight bookings, going through airports, eating together day in day out, etc. etc. can strengthen or consolidate or fracture or stress or destroy a friendship.
Does the possibility of having some holiday time together outweigh the risk of damaging a friendship?

• I prefer to simply travel with Tiz. 

Tiz, not an ewok 😉

To explain this pic, which will probably get me into for putting it here, 

we were on the train home from a failed visit to the Italian Consulate 

and this is what happens when you are on a train, the temperature is 

10ºC and you have come from a place where it is 38ºC at this time of day 

and we had had ~5 hours sleep in two days.

She is patient, thoughtful, forward thinking, interested, adventurous AND she puts up with me and all my sh!te. 

I am lucky beyond words to have her as my travel, and life, companion. 

Finally, a very big thank you to Som, Tiz's Melbourne based Thai language teacher. 

Som did an amazing job and I know that Tiz is an equally amazing language student. 

Tiz grasp of basic Thai made our trip so much easier and enjoyable that it would have been by a very big margin. Tiz did the same when we went to Japan.

By the by, Som is currently in Italy with her boyfriend, Marco, and recently told us she really misses her Jok (โจ๊ก, pronounced joke), which is Thai Congee aka Comforting Rice Porridge, as she seems to be eating way too much bread and cheese.

Jok

Som's comment made me laugh as Tiz and I really missed good Italian bread and cheese, such as are commonly available in Melbourne, whilst were in Thailand, or, more to the point, in Cha Am.

We all pine for the foods of our childhood, I guess. 

I could go on and on and on, and probably already have.
Thailand and its people are gorgeous, admirable, enjoyable and complex.
Prepare yourself and go there to receive far more than you will give.

We will return, knowing just a little bit more about it than we did over two months ago.

Thank you for having followed our blog with all its flaws and my opinionated views. 
We hope you got something out of it, even if it was what not to do or say.

Lots of love

 ❤️❤️❤️

Marino & Tiz