Anecdotes ....

[Confuscious]

As I will leave Thailand next year after spending more than 2 decades in this beautiful country, I wanted to write a few anecdotes about my life in Thailand.
These anecdotes describes the good and the bad experiences I had in Thailand.
I hope the Mod's will not delete this thread.


1. The Thai (local) post office.
The first year I moved to Korat, I was trying to set up a company with a few friends.
I had written some letters to my list of customers, subcontractors and suppliers and needed to post them.
At that time, the internet was not so widely used as now, and official letters as these had to be send by post or by fax.
So, I went to the local post office to send the letters (about 25 letters).
Arrived at the post office, I took a queue ticket and want to the back of the queue.
It was a small post office.
A few minutes later, a woman came in with some kind of cheque, skipped the queue and wanted to get in front of me.
At first glance, she looked like halfway in her 30's and she was dressed like a Hi So from Pattaya or Soi Cowboy.
The best way to describe her, was to compare her to the lady in the Esan song "a grapao crocodile (a crocodile bag).
She spoke very well English and started to shout at me:
"This is Thailand, sir."
"A country where the THAI people have priority over a foreigner everywhere."
"So, please step back and let me join the queue here."
I didn't want to start a fight and wanted to step back to let her join the queue in front of me, but the man behind me was hindering me.
She started to shout again and pointing at her breast she repeated:
"I am a THAI and you shall let me go BEFORE you."
I was ready to leave the queue and join the queue in the back, when the man at the counter stood up and went to the lady.
He grabbed her by her neck, just like a puppy, dragged her to the door and literally throw her out of the post office with the words:
"This is an INTERNATIONAL post office and you are not welcome here."
"If you have some post business to do, I recommend you to go to the post office in the city where they may be pleased to help you out."
When I arrived at the counter, the man at the counter excused him in name of the post office for the bad experience and said that he was pleased to help me with my postal business.

[Confuscious]

The Thai neighbours/neighbors

End of 2018, I went to my country to have a very grave surgery.
3 months later, in November, I came back to Thailand but I was still recovering from the surgery.
The taxi which would drive me back from Bangkok to Korat arrived at my home (around 3pm) and the taxi driver started to unload my luggage.
My neighbour, a Thai man who had converted his pickup to sell fried pork balls on a stick saw me coming home and noticed my condition.
He came quickly out of his yard, greeted me friendly and grabbed my bags while helping me to get in my house.
He started to chat with me and asked if I was alright, if I needed something, if I had already ate lunch, etc.
I told him that I had been travelling 16 hours and only wanted have a rest now.
He went back to his house and came a few minutes later with a full Thai/Esan lunch.
In the following days, he and my other neighbors came at my house to help me with food and other things (go pay my bills, get my water meter back, bring me every 3 days to the hospital to refresh my dressings, etc.) and invited me regularly to have dinner with their family (I was living alone).
I offered them money and wanted to pay them back (I knew that my neighbor was not a rich man and he had a daughter studying at the university) but he didn't want to receive any money.
A heart-warming welcome which would never occur in my country.

[Confuscious]

3. Immigration

Begin of 2019, I was due for my Visa extension.
I prepared every document, together with 3 copies, 3 photo's of myself, etc.
A routine I had been doing the past 17 years.
Early Tuesday morning, I collected my papers, went to the bank and drove to the Immigration office.
I was still not fully recovered from the surgery and I was not sure that I would make it.
Arrived at the office, I made the queue for the pre-sorting desk.
A desk where everybody needed to show what he/she wanted Immigration to do and if he/she had all the necessary documents.
While I was in the queue, I had a blackout and my papers fall to the ground.
As I was grabbing up my papers (I had difficulty to bend my upper body), a woman behind me started to shout something in Thai.
As I turned myself, it was the head of the Immigration office who was shouting at the boy at the desk why he would not stand up and help me.
She helped me to grab my papers and told me to follow her.
In her office, I was offered a chair and she asked me what I came for.
I told her that I came for a visa extension and showed her all my papers and my passport.
5 minutes later, I was back in my car driving home with a visa extension and a selfie of me and the head of immigration.

[Confuscious]

4. Driving to the airport

February 2016, I was driving my daughter to the airport as she was having a vacation in Finland.
I started in Korat about 9pm as the flight was scheduled at 2am.
A few kilometres after the market "Save One", the main lane was blocked for a police checkpoint.
All the traffic had to go trough the side lane where the police were checking all the cars.
As I was queuing, a car behind me came at high speed and wanted to drive into the main lane.
Unfortunately, the main lane was blocked and he could not drive forward or backward anymore.
A few police officers went directly to that car and took the driver to the check post.
The driver was a young guy.
I passed the checkpoint and continued my trip to the airport.
A few minutes after the checkpoint, I saw a car coming behind me at high speed and flashing with his headlights.
It was the same car who was halted at the checkpoint.
He started to play a “cat and mouse” game.
When I slowed down to let him pass, he was slowing down too.
When I was gaining speed, he gain speed too.
All this time tailgating me and driving a few meters behind my car.
If I would push my brakes, he would have surely crashed in my car.
My daughter was in the car, she was 15 year old, and I feared that they were going to harm us.
I asked my daughter to take movie clips and pictures of this and try to get a clear picture of their tax number.
As I was approaching Saraburi, I had a plan to escape them.
I knew that at 90 degree turn from Saraburi to Bangkok, at the Military domain, the were always trucks parked and taking a night rest.
As I was approaching the curve, I turned my lights off, drove full speed and parked my car between 2 trucks.
This seemed to work as I saw the tailgating car drive slowly in direction of Bangkok, looking where I was.
After a few minutes, I didn’t see them anymore and I continued my traject.
But at Nava Nakorn, the tailgating car was waiting for me and the “cat & mouse” game resumed.
Lucky for me, a few kilometres further we approached the turn to the highway to Suwarnabhumi airport.
At the highway booth, I stopped to get a ticket and I asked my daughter to tell the lady that we were harassed by the driver in the car behind me.
The lady pushed a button on her desk and almost immediately a police officer came.
My daughter explained what was happening and showed the recordings on her phone.
The policeman went to the other car, took the driver and his passengers out of the car and told my daughter that everything was OK.
The driver was together with 2 other young guys and a young lady.
We arrived at Suvarnhabumi safely thanks to that police officer and the lady at the toll boot.

[Confuscious]

5. Thai bureaucrazy 1
In May 2002, I was at the hospital where my wife was giving birth to our daughter.
Late in the evening our daughter was born and I stayed with my wife that night.
The next day, early in the morning, the nurse came into the room and gave me a document.
I needed to go the City Hall with that document to declare the birth of our daughter.
We ate a quick breakfast and I took a tuk-tuk to the city hall of Korat.
Arrived at the city hall, I went to the booth “Births” and gave the lady the document I got from the nurse.
She looked very friendly and wished me good luck with my baby.
She gave me also a booklet (in Thai language) and a little gift box.
She started to type in something in her computer and after a few minutes she asked me how we are going to name our child.
According to the tradition of my country, the first born child shall have the name of the last member of the family that passed away.
The last member of my family was called “Carmen” and I wanted to name our child the same name.
I saw the lady at the booth going trough all shades of Gray and putting a face of despair.
Sir, she said, I am deeply sorry to tell this, but there is NO WAY to write “Carmen” in Thai language.
I was astonished and answerred her: “You are going to tell me that in a language with 74 consonants and 26 vowel groups you can not write “Carmen””?
In the meantime, a bunch of other office clerks had joined the lady and some customers had joined the discussion to find a solution.
“We can write “การ์เมน” (Camen) said a clerk”, but then everybody would call her “Camen”.
“We can write “การ์ราเมน” said somebody else, but then everybody would call her “Caramen””.
“Why don’t you write “การามน”?, said another person. But the everybody would call her “Canmen”.
After about 2 hours of doctoring how they would manage to write “Carmen” in Thai and me starting to be sorry to have started all this, I cut the discussion and said:
“It doesn’t matter how you are going to spell “Carmen” as nobody is going to call her by her name in Thailand. Everybody will use a nickname. So type the spelling you want and give her the nickname “Samui”. That is something you can type in Thai as I was there 2 weeks ago.”
So, the lady went for the real name “การ์ราเมน” and the nickname “Samui”.
Thanks to a language with 74 consonants and 26 vowel groups.

[Confuscious]

6. Thai bureaucrazy 2

In 2014, a new law came out in Thailand and children needed to get an Identity Card at the age of 12 years.
I was already divorced and a single parent.
I went with my daughter to the local city hall to apply for an ID-card for my daughter, but the guy told us that they can not take the applications and we would need to go to the main City hall in Korat.
So, the next day we went to the main city hall in Korat to apply for an ID-Card.
The lady at the booth was an old, grumpy person (and probably hating every foreigner) and rejected our application with the words:
“For the Id-Card application, your daughter needs to be with her Thai mother. Not a foreigner.”
I wanted to see her superior, but there was simply no way that I would achieve something positive with her and I left.
The next day, I went to the tourist police (I had some good connections there) and I asked them for their help with the ID-Card.
I didn’t know of the whereabouts of the mother and I didn’t want to get involved with my ex-wife anymore.
The tourist police did a few inquiries, but they could not trace my ex-wife too.
So, they suggested that one of them would go together with me and my daughter the next day and see if there was no other solution.
The next day we got in a tourist police car with 2 tourist policeman to the City Hall and tried to apply again for an ID-Card.
But the old, grumpy lady was at the booth again and she refused again.
She showed the tourist policeman the requirements for an ID-Card for children written by some high official and there was clearly marked that the ID-Card application needed to be done by a THAI national.
Back to the tourist police station, they discussed the problem, but had no direct answer of how to solution this.
They told me to go home and wait a few days to give time to look for a solution.
Days went by, but no call.
My daughter was already 12 years in the mean time and officials at the school and other places started to ask for her ID-Card.
My nerfs were cracking and I decided to join the Thai bureaucrazy.
The next day, a Wednesday, I prepared a backpack for my daughter with some clothes and other things and instead of driving to the school, I drove to the tourist police office and dropped my daughter there.
“As I am not her father for official documents, I don’t want to be her father to take only financial care of her”, I said and left.
A tourist police officer who I knew very well tried to calm me down and offered me a coffee.
Drink a coffee and I am going to solution this today.
I drink my coffee, in the mean time other police officers came in, and they decided to end this problem.
We drove first the local Police station with 2 police officers and their “big boss” and the tourist police boss went for some documents (I had totally no clue of what he was doing).
Then we drove to the main City hall again and at the booth, the tourist police boss went to the old, grumpy lady and asked her if she knew what his badge meant.
She knodded “Yes”.
“Then start to make the application for an ID-Card for this child”, he shouted to her.
The old, grumpy lady didn’t want to lose face and showed the police officer the list of requirements.
But the police officer showed her the document he had made a few hours ago.
According to that document, he would be entitled to sign all documents in name of my ex-wife as she was “Unknown address” and could not be traced.
The old, grumpy lady turned from shades of gray to black and started to mane an ID-Card for my daughter.
Before midday, we left the City Hall WITH an ID-Card for my daughter in direction of a restaurant where I offered a lunch for everybody.
 

[CharlieH]

Post with Thai script removed.

ENGLISH only please on this subforum.

[Confuscious]

Encounters of the 3rd kind

 

In 2012 I divorced my Thai wife and became "Sod" (Thai for single).

I was offically the caretaker of my daughter as my ex-wife didn't want to take care of the child.

One day, while having a meeting with other foreigners at the local restaurant, somebody proposed that I would need to look for a wife or a nanny for my child.

He was member of Thaifriendly and had already meet a few ladies through that website.

The next morning, while drinking my morning coffee, I decided to open an account at that website and test my luck.

After a few contacts (a girl of 24 years was not really my taste a woman from Khonbury send me a "Like".

According to her profile, she was 45 years; Had no children; Never was married before; Was looking for a relation/marriage and was working as an ironing lady in a laundry shop.
She looked very nice on the pictures.
She was 1,48m and 45kg, a grown up midget.

I decided to answer her and look what happen.

We started to chat regularly, send each other "Good morning" and "Good night", and talk about our future.

Her dream was to have a relation/marry with a foreigner and starting her own Thai restaurant.
A small restaurant where she would get her customers and cook for them.

One day, Thursday, my daughter was going on a "Camp trip" with the school for 5 days.

This was the right occassion to have a meeting with my "Match".

I braught my daughter to the school and returned home where I started to chat with her.

I wrote:"
"My daughter is on camp for a week, so I am alone. What do you think if we meet and have a lunch or a dinner together and chat about out future?
 
Luckely for me, she had a free weekend and accepted to come to visit me for the weekend.
But we would not sleep together.
"She was not like that", she said.

Early Saturday morning, 9am, I went to pick her up at the busstation.

We went to a restaurant to have breakfast and then we drove to my home.

I showed her the "Guest Room" where she could sleep, and that was OK for her.

We had a little chat and then I went to the garden to spray my garden while she would watch the TV and have a rest.

As I was spraying my garden, I hear a loud "BOUM" and the kitchen started to be filled with black smoke.

I went immediatly inside my house to see what was happening.

The "lady" was a little bit hungry and decided to cook 2 eggs.
She had placed 2 raw eggs in the Microwave, turned the dial to full power and put the timer on "30 (minutes)".
Result: the eggs had exploded in the microwave.

The whole kitchen was stinking as rotten eggs and a black smoke was hanging around.

I took the microwave outside and asked her nicely to pack her bags and I would bring her back to the busstation.

I hope that she will never start with her own restaurant and keep ironing clothes.

The stench of rotten eggs remained in the Microwave and my kitchen for a week.