What Does It Take For Thai's To Listen

[roygsd]

The OP asked What it takes to get them to listen? translation; Thais don't listen, well here is a good example. my 9 yr old son and I were in the states this summer and I asked him to tell the waitress we need something. He came back and said with great surprise and excitment in his voice: Dad she lsitened to me. I asked: So, what did you expect? He replied: "At home (koh samui) they don't look at me and just blow me off when I try to talk to them" from the mouth of babes!

And speaking Thai dosent help,! i have a very good friend thats a doctor here and is fluent, its even worse for him as they DO understand him and still do it wrong !,.Reading some posters comments here i think they are in a different Thailand to some of us,.and its to be expected that some members have come galloping in as Thai defenders and to you i say you are lucky if you have never expereinced some of the problems others are discussing,.but to say it dosent exist is a joke,.

maigo6 and his likes are SEXpats.

they stay in cheap furnished studios, and only hang around bar girls, waitress and food cart vendors

They speak thais because they dont have the funds to live the life of a farang/bkk thai/ in thailand so they try to be at the level of thai farmers, who are quite happy with 4 walls, a leaky roof and some colon meat.

don't worry, most of the normal farangs, just read this post.. sigh in approval and keep going on.

Normal? <deleted> is Normal?

Guys with gals is quite normal, guys who complain about farngs hanging around with Bar girls often bat for the other side or are either jelous or just liars,

roy gsd

Jealous ? Most anybody with a few bhat in his jeans can procure a bar-lady , so what is your other excuse ?

Not sure if your question is directed at me, but just in case it was, the fact is I dont hang around with Bar girls and if I did I wouldnt need an excuse for doing so.

Who would need an excuse for normal behavior? Only a dumb plucker (or something like that) I guess.

roy gsd

[petitechevre]

The rural ,poorly educated Thai that I mix with every day of the week dont even anticipate where their next meal is coming from until they get hunger pains.

after you finish your current meal do you honestly plan your next? when hunger sets in so does the natural instinct to decide what would be best to eat next. right now i'm munching on some peanuts along with my beer, but later i have no idea what i'm going to eat. does that make me poorly educated? i'm leaning towards a pizza, but that is fattening and not so good for my diet, so maybe I should go get a salad, but at this hour I'm going to have to make it myself. I guess I'll just starve because I can't figure it out due to my poor education (and intoxication). Actually due to the intoxication I will probably just grab everything in the fridge and through it together in the pan and fry it in oil and season it with my random seasonings. Maybe I am educated after all, I've planned for my next meal.

Don't worry my friend, if you were remotely educated. you wouldn't be one of those guys that need to drink a couple beers before going to bed..

because 1) you'd know the physical consequences

2) you'd hate to know how much it affects your brain capacity

3) you'd be able to hang out with yourself without having to be drunk

4) you'd have some pasttime or money to have a past time.

I have yet to meet an educated person who doesn't think ahead on most meals. You need to defrost stuff, get some veggies/sauce from the groceri store, time to cook so have to get it ready before you get some hardcore hunger.

[F1fanatic]

Grow up the lot of you, your g/f (wife) loves you for your money (the life she would never have without you)

Why are you complaining - you knew that when you gave up Western society for a Thai wife!!

[JohnBanPrang]

So did my "western girlfriend". Love me for money.

Lost more than I can count.

Do not get black heart.

It can happend anywhere in the world.

[dumball]

So did my "western girlfriend". Love me for money.

Lost more than I can count.

Do not get black heart.

It can happend anywhere in the world.

Sorry to say this , but you sound like a soft touch , shame .

[JohnBanPrang]

All the girls say that too.

But get a lot of phone numbers.

[dumball]

All the girls say that too.

But get a lot of phone numbers.

Happy to see you have not lost your sense of humour , never lose it , it is like virtue , a blessing in diguise .

[qwertz]

A typical conversation with my wife whilst sitting right next to her in the car...

me- where do you want to go today?

me- where do you want to go today?

me- where do you want to go today?

me- where do you want to go today?

me- where do you want to go today?

me- oh why do I even bother talking to you...

wife- huh?

me- I asked where do you want to go today?

wife- oooOOHHhh...

me- Well?

wife- huh?

me- oh god, lets just go home then.

wife- huh?

She understand what I am saying, she just can't be bothered listening.

I have fixed the whole situation now by leaving. Now I am the one to ignore her

I have also seen this many times with various ladies. My advice is to keep looking for one who has some interest in communication. Not an easy job, but it's possible. I would not put up with such a low-level dialog & lack of attention either. I am sure she has no clue why you left her. Compared to this, my latest lady has a Phd in English. Good luck.

Where's the problem?

Many Thais talk to me - and they listen too.

I guess it depends a lot on what you have to say - although I wiil admit that more than half of them drift off when I mention that I'm

not filthy rich.

Funny thing, farangs do it too.

Edited August 28, 2008 by qwertz

[JohnBanPrang]

Thanks dumball.

Any women in the world likes good humour.

Am I replying to a wanting women out there?????

[JohnBanPrang]

Just a thought.

Don't treat people bad if you don't want to be

treated bad yourself.

[elkangorito]

Fear not "ranting" farangs. Thailand is slowly (ever so slowly) changing.

Digressing a little...to those whose partners seem to ignore them & visa versa, it is apparent & real that "relationship" problems exist. This situation has little to do with cultural or racial behaviour. If your partner won't talk to you & general verbal communication is not a problem, consider the possibilities that your "togetherness" is not working (for some reason).

As for Thailand changing slowly, some people here may already know that I teach at a technical college. I have had this job for almost 2 years. During this period of time, I have developed a very good "teacher-student" relationship with almost all of my students. By comparison from when I first started teaching at the college, many of my students are now more than happy to ask me questions or correct me when I am wrong. The minute "certain" Thai teachers enter the room, all of this wonderful communication ceases. All of these "certain" teachers are either old or "traditional" in their ways.

On the other hand, many of my Thai teaching colleagues have the same approach as I. Mind you, there is still a clear limit to the degree they allow a student to "break away" from moral & ethical (cultural) values. I allow my students to take charge of their own lives, which is generally frowned upon here. However, I do have their undivided attention when I require it. The long & the short of this is that my students see me as a possible equal peer, which is also culturally frowned upon here.

I am reaping what I have sowed. Treat people with a little tolerance, compassion & understanding & you will surely get it returned to you.

Overall, my observation is simple - Thai culture, like many other cultures, has transgressed from being an idealistic thing to an authoritative thing. The mindset of Thai people truly reflects the level of programming in which they choose to believe. As a result, these people have almost no idea of "responsibility" since the "laws", under which they choose to live, basically remove most of an individuals responsibility - "I violently attacked him/her because he/she made me lose face & they would not obey the rules to allow me to regain face. What else was I supposed to do?"

Hopefully, when the older generation of Thais has gone, the younger Thais will have a fairer chance at being responsible for their own actions as well as realising that there are certain things that bind ALL humans together. Self respect, trust, understanding & tolerance are NOT cultural things. These things are universal.

[ray23]

Good for you I think explains what we really see day to day better then anyhing that I seen before.

Interesting I posted a thread that basically says Thai's are really smarter then us and can manipulate us anytime they want. No one response suppose that is not a popular topic. That just may somehting about us.

[Neeranam]

Ray, did these problems begin afer you finished building the house?

[ray23]

Oh the problems has been around for a long time I just used that to illustrate a point. In all honesty when I rant I don't think through clearly. The following day I found ways to approach what was happening.

That day I needed to blow off steam in a nonharmful way. Had no idea it would provoke the thoughts I have seen here. Believe me I will think twice about doing that agian. Might be better to just go outside and yell

I thought everyone would understand we all have one of those day from time to time. I was definetly wrong.

A clear evaluation really came back to the wife and I and when you consider we have been together for five years 24/7 any relationhip is going to encounter problems. She was tuning me out everyone esle sees it and thinks it an OK thing to do, since I said very little about it. The answer was in sitting down with everybody and explaining what the clear pecking order was in the house. Will it last forever no, people are people and at some point I will need to reinforce that I live here as well and therefore deserve a happy life a much as anyone else.

I think Thai' undertand the concept of chain of command better then most. But I want the wife to run the house with as little input from me a possible. For that reason a a norm I don't tell houshold workers waht to do. If I didn't respect and trust my wife I woud not be with her. That ever changes I'll go gte those same suitcases I started with and go about living on my own again. As when it goes that far there really is no hope. We are working through problems just like any other couple does.

The other post that I don't want to recreate basically it looked at what Thai's expect and get from workers and how cultural myths are used to manipulate us. How easliy we fall for it. Wacth a Thai contractor working he could care less about the workers face. He wants work and he gets it.

So if I'm working for little pay with no hope of really improving my life. I have one guy who will worry about my feeligns all day long, I would use it to make my life easier as well. But, I have family to feed and I work for a task master I'm going to work the way he wants to keep my job. l know that guys don't believe that they make every excuse under the sun why Thai workers don't do the things the way they want or they are lazy. In the end the play us like violens .

Thai's are far from stupid, they are intelligent people who take the path eaiest to them just like we do.

It was funny on one forum I did get a few repsonses. They all keyed on the house construction, not the manipulation. Maybe we don't want to admit that to ourselves, maybe the is the path easiest followed for us.

I have tried to build a house here. Ended up in court we won the case and it is currently in appeal. What I did this time was to buy an existing house and slowly remodled the way I wanted. I have found that to be far easier.

I might try that again some day. But only if I can find a good supervisor who answers directly to me. They can do it right, but they would spend time playing the game with you then laying bricks

The illustration I used was the Neighbor across the street, showed up everyday. I actually thought he was the foreman and a good one. He got exactly waht he wanted and he had lived an worked and lived in the states for years. No once did those workers tell him this is the Thai way. They did what he they told them.

Why do they do that to us because they can.

Stupid no not hardly.

By the way folks I don't exclude myself in that one