I my experience during The Plague, those returning to the village very much turned against foreigners. They had been gone before I arrived on the scene and the were openly hostile toward me due to, for example, the then DPM and Minister for Public Health said pretty much every night during the 6PM forecast of his boss that the sole reason why SARS-2 was in Thailand was the filthy Europeans. Women with dark roots grown out from bleached hair and thigh tattoos whingeing that their [insert your own adjectives, forum rules preclude me writing them] bosses had gone bck to their countries broke as they had run out of money. This, these women were explaining to the woman serving me my breakfast, is after he had continued to pay them and provide them with accommodation during the extended off-and-on lockdowns for over a year. As literally the only foreigner here, I had mangoes thrown at me as I rode to and from the market, had several people give me the throat-cutting gesture, two used finger-guns and go "bhng! bhng!", and was threatened with a machete. Amazingly, the locals here came to my defence telling their relatives or erstwhile neighbours that I had been here years before the virus. When there was a brief reopening in July(?) of 2020, and all the foreigners along Beach Road met and hugged and shook hands for the benefit of the myriad of YouTubers that sprung up at tht time, I waited two eeks to see if it was a super-spreader event. It wasn't so I drove down for three nights. If you lived there, you'd know; the place was dead. You could walk across Beach or Second Roads without looking as there was no traffic. McDonalds had be razed to the ground. But, later that year, before the December case spike, a friend of mine retired after working in Pattaya for 34 years. While very, very quiet, places were open and the Thais were happy that we were back spending money. There were some smiles, but the stress was evident. Emotional and financial. One day, around 3PM I was stopped on the way to The Rovers (I think it's called) by two women, demanding I pay for my bar tab. 5,800 baht! At which bar, and when I had (and still have) no idea. I was on the way to a bar, not from one. I hailed down a motorcycle cop and then started explaining - in Thai - that I hadn't been to their pub and we should go to the station. Either he had heard this scam before, or the women had the wrong guy. The cop told them to go away. I changed hotels, thinking that maybe they had a dozen friends, boyfriends or relatives to get cash out of me some other way. I still haven't been into The Rovers. Covid brought out the best: foreigners providing daily meals and water to the unfortunate in Pattaya; and the worst: violence and hateful rhetoric and an increase in scams like I was subjected to, as well as an uptick in domestic/family violence. It didn't really go back to normal here in the village until July 2023 when everybody had effed off back Down South and took their ignorance and hatred with them. That was only three years ago, and I've seen the difference during my six-monthly visits down there. There are fewer smiles as @Jingthing posted and people seem to be generally grumpier, and less laid back. I can't comment specifically on Jomtien as I've only been there three times over a four year period and only stayed there for one night as I (mostly) stay in Naklua. But it is obvious that The Plague affected us all and it seems, according to many similar anecdotes to Jingthing's, that "we" aren't as welcome as we once were and are now even more of a resource to be strip-mined rather than patrons of their businesses. Of course, it'd help if anuses from across the globe didn't dine-and-dash, didn't urinate or defecate outside Sevens, and didn't have sex on the beach or in the back of baht buses and tuktuks for all to see. On the "plus" side, however, in almost every instance, the cleaners and security staff at the hotels at which I stay are the true assets to the business. The receptionists, and the Reichsmarshalls that man dining room need to remember manners.
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