Culture

Thai Wedding Costs – The Cold, Hard Facts

As many know from listening to my podcast and reading my rants comments on Twitter, I'm getting married at the end of this year. For some reason, the gods have smiled on me, as I have somehow managed to navigate the minefield of finding a bride in Thailand, emerging on the other side with a girl who is beautiful, smart and funny, has a great job, speaks English at a near-native level, and is not reliant on me for money (which is a very good thing for her). So, yeah, marriage seemed liked a good option. But now we have to deal with the wedding, which is both a monumental headache and a joyous blessing. I thought I'd write a post about what the costs are looking like at this stage, both as a service to the many gents who get married here, and also as kind of a way for me to look back in ten years and laugh at what a n00b I was.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:20+00:00Culture, Religion, Thailand|37 Comments

A Perfect Songkran

Good lord, it's been three weeks since I posted last. Well, it's been a busy few weeks, plus I had a case of the lazies for a while, but it's a good thing they're over, because next week is all about: sleeping in! That's right, it's Songkran, the Thai New Year. I'm not going to write a post about the history of Songkran or its background or customs. It's a huge-ass waterfight for four or five days that pretty much shuts the country down. Think Christmas/Thanksgiving but it's 38ºC and everyone has a water cannon. But Songkran becomes a bit tiring once you've done it a few times, so this year I'm doing what I do best - staying in and ignoring the whole shebang.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:23+00:00Bangkok, Culture, Holidays, Pop Culture|0 Comments

Marriage Advice in a Bangkok Bookstore

While browsing the local Kinokuniya the other day - in my humble opinion, the best English-language bookstore in Bangkok - I came across a couple of gems that I knew I had to put on my website. There's a famous old saying in Thailand that in a marriage, a man is the front feet of an elephant and the woman is the back feet; they are both responsible for support, but the front feet lead. (I often joke that in my case, I'm the front feet and the back feet, and my girlfriend is the guy who sits on top and beats me with a pointed stick, but I digress). At any rate, the battle of the sexes certainly isn't a foreign concept here, and although these books are written with a western relationship in mind, I'm curious as to how a Thai would view them.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:23+00:00Culture, Fun Stuff, History, Print Media|0 Comments

The Fallout of the (sometimes)Truth

In the online war of words between representatives of Thailand’s various cultural groups (sexpats, expats, students, teachers, businessmen, hi-sos, etc), there’s never a shortage of interesting wordplay to read through. I’ve written about this before, but the one piece of advice I give to prospective expats is to be very selective when boning (heh) up on how Thailand works, simply because there’s so much crap out there that it’s easy to get a very distorted view of the country. The latest salvo in this ongoing battle was written for CNNGo by a friend of mine, and is causing quite a little uproar. Well, I’m here to defend him… sort of.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:25+00:00Culture, Thailand, Web Media|0 Comments

Cultural Counterweights

The topic of navigating inter-cultural relationships in Thailand is something that comes up a lot in books, bars, and especially on the web. In Bangkok, it’s kind of assumed that a foreigner will have a Thai girlfriend – with a few thousand of us and a few million of them, it’s simply a numbers game. (So much so that it's still a bit odd when you see a foreign guy with a foreign girl, or even odder, a foreign girl with a Thai guy, but that’s another post). The topic was being discussed and dissected long before I was even born, but I’ve been mulling it for a while and wanted to put something down on, err, a thin liquid crystal display panel. Obviously, this post will be from the perspective of a foreigner (that’s me) and will obviously not cover both sides of the coin, but I’d like to hear what you think.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:26+00:00Culture, Pop Culture, Thailand, Video|12 Comments

“You Just Don’t Understand Thailand.”

One of the favorite activities that expat barflies love to do is complain. In fact, one of the favorite activities that most any expat living in Thailand likes to do is complain. Some are loud and obnoxious about it, some (like me, I hope) are more subtle and kind, but it’s important to know that at its heart, all of this complaining is borne out of a love for Thailand. Most conversations begin with, “Why don’t they do it this way…” which is not a critical attack; more often than not its an attempt to offer alternatives. But what bugs me to no end is the worst, most lazy retort imaginable: You just don’t understand Thailand. I don’t hate many things in life, but I really hate that.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:27+00:00Bangkok, Culture, Thailand|11 Comments

Term Limits on a Return Home

Back when I was living in the motherland, I was a media junkie. I had subscriptions to Entertainment Weekly, full cable on my TV, a membership at Rogers Video and a fast (for then) internet connection. I stayed current on new music, television, movies, celebrity gossip, fashion, scandals and gadgets, and never missed the season premiere of a hot new show. But one of the things I wasn’t prepared for when I moved to Thailand was how quickly I would fall out of touch with the things that used to allow me to fit in to western culture so well. As an expat, you often get sharp reminders of just how disconnected you are, and then one day you realize that you might not fit in so well if you ever moved back home.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:27+00:00Culture, Travel|6 Comments

Comparing Bangkok to a Few European Cities…

Well, that was a long break. As previously stated, I took a wee vacation to the far-off land we call “Europe” with my lady, and am only now getting back into the Bangkok groove. I only manage one big vacation every few years, so it was a long time coming. Enjoyed it a lot, spent too much money, but it was worth it – you know the drill. At any rate, it was interesting to me, living in one of Asia’s biggest, most culturally important cities, to experience some of Europe’s biggest, most culturally important cities. I had a few thoughts on Bangkok while there…

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:28+00:00Culture, Holidays, Thailand, Travel|0 Comments

Five Things I Wish I Knew About Thailand Before I Got Here

After a few years as an expat, you look back on your first days/weeks/months here and smile. Or cringe. Usually cringe. The amount of mistakes and cultural boo-boo's you make in your first foray into fitting into a new culture is often the source of much guffaws for Thais, and - hopefully - act as benchmarks for the progress you've made in adapting to living in the Land of Smiles. However, hindsight is 20/20, and I was thinking recently about a few things I wish I had known before I came overe here. It could have saved me a few grief-filled afternoons, but... then again, I wouldn't have some of the cool stories I do. At any rate, here are my top five things I wish that I had known before I moved to Thailand.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:29+00:00Bangkok, Culture, Thailand, Tips on Visiting, Travel|0 Comments

Bangkok’s Darwinian Filters

Life in Bangkok tends to shatter many preconceptions that many foreigners have; that's a given. One that’s most often seen is how loosey-goosey some standard guidelines of day-to-day existence can be over here when compared to back home – simple things like how close you can comfortably get to moving traffic, the cleanliness of restaurants, or where children are allowed to play. After a while here, the elasticity with which these rules are enforced become second nature, but every so often I get a reminder of how anally-retentive and just plain stupid we in the west can be. Like the following true story of this woman who put a bit too much faith in technology.

Greg2016-11-17T15:48:30+00:00Bangkok, Culture|0 Comments