How Wonderful Is Thai Gym Culture?

At my gym, any machine with a comfy seat quickly turns into a place to lounge and get in some added screen hypnosis time. Locals park themselves there, scroll, text, watch videos, and occasionally do a few lazy reps just to appear to be doing something. Over time, I have seen many regular gym goers actually gain more weight rather than lose any. Just by showing up, many seem to feel like they have accomplished something, and then go out afterward and gulp another 1000 calorie Frappa Sugarchino to reward themselves for their efforts.

I used to bring my own phone along, mostly as a music player, but it was too easy to get distracted. So now I leave it at home and use a smartwatch as my music source, together with a pair of Bluetooth earbuds. Much better, less temptation, more training done.

A lot of the locals will stay at the gym for an hour or even two, but a huge chunk of that time is spent staring at their phones while gently moving a machine with almost no weight loaded up on it. Usually it is something for the legs that they can do while seated and barely breaking a sweat, still leaving their hands free to check their Facebook and Instagram. The hip flexor machine is a crowd favorite for this. It is like they believe fitness can be absorbed through proximity. Just sit on the equipment long enough and maybe the muscles will get the hint.

It all used to annoy me. I would think, why TF even come if you are not there to really train? But over time, I realized many of them see the gym very differently than I do. For them, it is often more about guilt than desire. They feel better simply by showing up, regardless of what they actually do once they get there.

A lot of them also do not really know how to train to make progress. Nobody ever taught them. A bit of swinging their arms around, basically just stretching with no resistance, seems to be enough for some. Of course, a few are serious, but most seem to think a little light movement is adequate. They do not realize that real results usually involve effort, sweat, and subjecting the muscles to proper resistance to induce hypertrophy. For many who don't enjoy going, the achievement is not the workout itself, but merely being able to tell themselves they went.

I used to go to big gyms that were full of trendy looking trainers with cool, spiky haircuts, and it was almost a dark comedy. Trainers carrying clients’ handbags, holding clients’ phones, rushing over when a text comes in, even giving shoulder rubs between sets while the client sat on a machine doing next to nothing. For a lot of local people, the gym is seen as a service center, part lifestyle, part social outing, and part guilt relief. Very different from Western gym culture.

These days, it bothers me much less because I do not really pay attention to what other people are doing. I go to a small gym late in the evening, about an hour and a half before closing, when fewer of these time wasting seat warmers are hanging about. I get in, do my workout, get out, and mostly ignore what everyone else is not achieving, unless someone is camping out with their phone on a machine playing video games that I actually need to use. That's when I might... remind them it's a gym.