Can You Leave Everything On Your Back?

[bolognamare]

It was the most riskiest and stupidest thing that I've ever done in my life. I was fortunate that it became the best thing I've ever done.

What kind of fortune changed your life? a good job? a good girl? both?

Go for several periods of 2 or 3 days without food and you'll learn alot about yourself.

I think you are right, but if you tried it, what kind of miracle saved you? lottery? parents/friends money transfers?

Sometimes touching the deepest life bottom is the beginning of your fortune climbing.

So if you want to live like a Thai in a 10' square box with a chithouse in the corner then go for it.

Was this step necessary for your experience? How long you did?

Why don't you keep coming to Thailand for holidays making each trip longer and longer to make sure that it is somewhere that you'd like to relocate to?

I'm doing that from two years, but i cannot stay more than 3-4 weaks each summer

But I think that as more as you stay in LOS and more difficults you have to accept a western life. I know people who live in LOS from several years, when they come back in UE they can resist not more than a month.

The best choice seems to be going in LOS for holidays only until I have solved my debts and saved more money (no money no honey )...

...but sometimes fortune doesn't wait our plans, we have one life only and now, i'm young (31), full of life, will I have the same power and courage after 5-10 years?

Edited September 14, 2005 by bolognamare

[samran]

Where's UE?

Ukraine? the United Arab Emirates?

[bolognamare]

The frustrations I experienced were mainly cultural but I soon learned to concentrate on the things I could influence and let the others go.

It's a very good will if what you like coincides with what you can influence.

Gonna move to Thailand (Isaan) with my wife in two years and concentrate on rice farming.

Rice farming???

You have built a new life in Hong Kong, you live with your thai wife (i presume she stay with you in HK), you have a good job abroad far from western shit and you want to leave it now for a rice farming in Thailand? Why? May be Hong Kong is far from LOS lifestyle but anyway i'd like to understand better why you want to change all you built for a farm life? Have you spent so many energies to save money only to go in Thailand to cultivate rice?

[bolognamare]

Where's UE?

Ukraine? the United Arab Emirates?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Unione Europea (European Union), Italy

[jrincon17]

LISTEN TO BOO

and the others, Thailand is a tough place to make it, much harder than home, unless you're Burmese and even then its debatable. Your 5000 Euro's will not last long, work is hard to find, even harder to get paid sometimes, even finding a pad with a phone line can be difficult in some places

LISTEN TO BOO - PLEASE

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I spent 5000 us dollars in the first month , phewwwww what a great time . 3 months total was about 9000 . you better have a plan and if you havent been here you have no idea how s.e. asia works . believe i have the same dreams i usually go for about 3 months and find out if i like the place first . you dont want to be stuck or stuck in jail for that matter . take that 5000 euro catch up on some bills , im pretty much like you . i got out of debt now im searching for my retirement home and wife

[jrincon17]

The frustrations I experienced were mainly cultural but I soon learned to concentrate on the things I could influence and let the others go.

It's a very good will if what you like coincides with what you can influence.

Gonna move to Thailand (Isaan) with my wife in two years and concentrate on rice farming.

Rice farming???

You have built a new life in Hong Kong, you live with your thai wife (i presume she stay with you in HK), you have a good job abroad far from western shit and you want to leave it now for a rice farming in Thailand? Why? May be Hong Kong is far from LOS lifestyle but anyway i'd like to understand better why you want to change all you built for a farm life? Have you spent so many energies to save money only to go in Thailand to cultivate rice?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Look out for Cobras !!!!!!!!!1 That alone makes me not go up north ! Sorry no cobras for me

[loong]

I hate it when people talk a load of Cobras

[pnustedt]

It's a very good will if what you like coincides with what you can influence.

Money can expand your sphere of influence

Rice farming??? 

You have built a new life in Hong Kong, you live with your thai wife (i presume she stay with you in HK), you have a good job abroad far from western shit and you want to leave it now for a rice farming in Thailand? Why?

Shit happens everywhere - be it western or oriental shit! Yes, my wife is with me and we want to spend more time together, and with her/our family.

Look out for Cobras !!!!!!!!!1 That alone makes me not go up north ! Sorry no cobras for me

Yes, the cobras and I have already met!

[bolognamare]

..believe i have the same dreams i usually go for about 3 months and find out if i like the place first..

I like a lot Patong and surroundings (Karon-Kata). Do you (or someone) know similar places (for beaches and nightlife) near the borders?

[Gazza]

What kind of fortune changed your life? a good job? a good girl? both? 

Yeah, both. My wife having once received her British visa then threw a spanner in the works when she changed her mind and didn't want to live in England.

Also, I had a high paid job in England in a high unemployment area that I really enjoyed doing. Packing up my job meant a bridge was burnt. So, it left me the only option of going to Thailand to live with my wife and her daughter. Even though my dream of relocating to another country ever since I was around 6 or 7 years old was going to be fulfilled, I would've preferred doing it with more warning for preparation.

, what kind of miracle saved you? lottery? parents/friends money transfers?

A bit of everything helped me in difficult times. Mostly it was the people that I borrowed money from occasionally, even the farang guys who were stealing contracts from me. Remembering what my father taught me of "Always pay back your debts to people no matter how small or large, and you'll be able to borrow from them time and time again" helped me through. Kind of ironic that he died with 80 quid in his wallet, 50 of which was mine that he didn't pay back to me.

Sometimes cheques sent in the mail wouldn't turn up. They were never a great amount of money but enough to keep one of the wolves away from my door. ie enough to pay for a visa run, payback a debt, send money to my family up in Isaan or pay for my lodgings or whatever. But still, seeing beggars on the streets with more money in their bowls than what I had in my pockets, never allowed me to make complimentary comments about the Thai Postal service.

But as time went on I slowly managed to get onto my feet to a point were money was bulging in my pockets. When your wages are work related you soon learn to get off your ass and make all your time productive.

Also, over the years I've had some phenominally strange good luck that I can't quite believe happened to me.

So if you want to live like a Thai in a 10' square box with a chithouse in the corner then go for it.

Was this step necessary for your experience? How long you did?

I've known some guys, usually teachers, trying to live like this as though they're at one with the Thai culture and all that. But it's never long before they move to a bigger and quieter apartment.

I actually stayed in a GH for about 18 months. All I needed at the time was a place to sleep and leave my meagre belongings. And the longer that I stayed there, and the staff got to know me, the more I was able to get behind in my rent.

But they knew I always paid my back rent eventually and so they never once had to ask me for it. So this allowed me to be able to juggle my money around i.e. pay a little here, pay a little there, pay some money back to so and so, keep enough for myself etc.,etc.

Eventually I was able to get my family to Bangkok were we at first rented a townhouse and later bought one when I sadly inherited some money.

I've had some low times in Thailand, maybe not enough to be able to start singin' da blues or anything, but when I read about what some people do when they're in financial difficulties, well.....I do feel fortunate that I pulled myself through.

Edited September 15, 2005 by Gazza

[Darknight]

I like a lot Patong and surroundings (Karon-Kata). Do you (or someone) know similar places (for beaches and nightlife) near the borders?

Well you sure will last long there for 4500 €

Another one born every minute

[chico]

for a while he sounded at least "half - serious" - from his last posts, I believe we can gether - just another luno! good luck, and in some time we will have another farang "jumping out the window"

[bolognamare]

..what about your family at home

I live alone in my own flat, I have been married in the past, but now I have digested the troubles.

With my parents I have never had a lovely relation, even if i see them one time a weak. I haven't brothers/sisters.

He's probably got 50 other problems and it sounds, especially by his dreaming comments, that instead of facing his problems he wants to run away.  He's hoping he can go to Thailand and escape his creditors and all his other worries and just wake up with a clean slate.  Only problem is most people who end up in these types of situations usually have a loooooooong history of poor decision making.

What to say..I'm very glad that you haven't to menage with many problems.

I have always thought that each problem has at least one solution (death apart) and talking with all of you is very helpful to paint and complete the picture i have in mind.

[bolognamare]

Also, over the years I've had some phenominally strange good luck that I can't quite believe happened to me.

Was this luck depending from being in the right place in the right moment or from something else? Can you be more clear? What's (or whate are, if many) the best opportunity that Thailand offered you?

[bolognamare]

The last thing the LOS needs is another dead beat farang.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I don't want to be a problem for my dreamland, it's my last desire of course.

I agree with all of you about clear debts first and about being enough self-dependent first to decide to live abroad.

I told you, it is a crazy dream, but I wanted to know if someone followed it and found his fortune.

May be 1 of 100 survive, and actually i don't want to be in the 99.

[Boo]

I didn't mean my advise to be negative but I have seen too many times some guy down on his luck & with no where to go & being forced to turn to something desperate to survive. What ever you decide to do, make sure you have a back up plan ( a few hundred euros in the bank for a plane ticket back at least).

[lovejoy]

i think its better to regret doing something than regret not trying

[Gazza]

Also, over the years I've had some phenominally strange good luck that I can't quite believe happened to me.

Was this luck depending from being in the right place in the right moment or from something else? Can you be more clear? What's (or whate are, if many) the best opportunity that Thailand offered you?

The first company that I worked for told me one day that if I didn't start getting some sales then I would have to leave. Later on the very same day I met the two farang guys who I suspected were stealing my contracts. They told me that they were working for a new and better company and invited me to work there. Now that, to me, was a very nice stroke of luck. Or was it just a very strange coincidence? Being told to leave one place and being able to walk straight into another?

I worked for the second company for about 18 months. Then one morning I was told by the owner that he was wrapping up the company to concentrate on his 3 or 4 other businesses. This is were it starts getting really strange. Later that same day, a friend called me to tell me that a company that he was working for, were looking for a sales rep. I later applied and got the position. So again, I was able to leave one company and go straight into another.

The third company had me on a basic wage and good commission and contracts seemed to be pouring in. Then one morning, my previous company's boss phoned to me and asked if I was interested in a sales position in his wife's company. I told him that I would give it some thought, even though I was happy where I was I didn't want to slam an open door shut by telling him no.

And this is where it starts becoming unbelievably weird. That very same day, I was told by the manager that the shareholders no longer wanted to continue with the business because of a huge rent increase for the office space.

So yet again, I was fortunate to be able to go from one job and straight into another.

This is when I starting thinking that I either had an angel on my shoulder or the Gods were playing a game with my life, like they did with Jason and his Argonauts.

Come on, what are the chances of being told 3 times to leave a company and being offered work elsewhere on the very same day? :

Sadly, things didn't seem to work out for me in the new company. I was selling a different product that was aimed for the Japanese market and I was employed to target multi national companys. I knew when my 3 month trial at the company was over, I would be out of a job. Or would the Gods/fate step in and have somebody tell me of another company to walk right into?

It was not to be though. When I only had a few weeks left before my trial finished, I came into inheritence money when my mother passed on, who had planned to arrive in Thailand 2 months later to see her grand kids and my wife for the first time.

Btw, when I went to work at the second company with the guys who I suspected were ripping me off, I later found out they were in fact doing just that. One of them I never saw again, and the other became my superior at the company who was still taking some contracts from under my nose. Not only was he doing me out of money, but he was also doing the company out making money too.

But, because jobs were hard to come by for farangs without degrees or diplomas, I had to tread carefully. I had no hard evidence against him so I couldn't say anything to the Thai and Japanese owners about what was going on, and I already knew enough not to make any waves that could come back on me.

You know, it was a strange situation being in. Knowing that a guy that I had to borrow money from occassionally, was the very same guy that was causing me to borrow money in the first place because he was stealing my contracts. Also, knowing that he'd be laughing at me behind my back about it all was a bitter pill to keep swallowing.

Anyway, I just bided my time working there and when he eventually started pissing off the Thai staff with his pompous attitude, I was asked if I was able to take over his position. I gladly said yes.

[rio666uk]

jeeeezus gazza - that is a strange story.... glad to hear everything worked out for you - not a nice situation to have found yourself in with a family to support

[Gazza]

Thanks rio, it was the family resposibilities that probably kept me from doing something stupid. I was always being offered other types of jobs by my friends, but scams and trafficking isn't my thing even though it was very good money for very little work. If I was single and strapped for cash then I could've been tempted. Who knows.

There was also a few occassions too when I had easy access to money that wasn't mine, when I was going days without food. This is why I said previously that I learned a few things about myself during the bad times i.e. I'm not a thief.

[bolognamare]

I was always being offered other types of jobs by my friends, but scams and trafficking isn't my thing even though it was very good money for very little work. If I was single and strapped for cash then I could've been tempted. Who knows.

There was also a few occassions too when I had easy access to money that wasn't mine, when I was going days without food. This is why I said previously that I learned a few things about myself during the bad times i.e. I'm not a thief.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

CORMAN

"Well, you see Willard... In this war, things get confused

out there, power, ideals, the old morality, and practical

military necessity. Out there with these natives it must be

a temptation to be god. Because there's a conflict in

every human heart between the rational and the irrational,

between good and evil. The good does not always triumph.

Sometimes the dark side overcomes what Lincoln called

the better angels of our nature. Every man has got a

breaking point. You and I have. Walter Kurtz has reached his.

And very obviously, he has gone insane."

WILLARD

"Yes sir, very much so sir. Obviously insane."

LUCAS

"Your mission is to proceed up to Nung river in a Navy

patrol boat. Pick up colonel Kurtz' path at Nu Mung Ba,

follow it, learn what you can along the way. When you find

colonel infiltrate his team by whatever means available and

terminate the colonel's command."

WILLARD

"Terminate ? The colonel ?"

CORMAN

"He's out there operating without any decent restraint.

Totally beyond the pale of any acceptable human conduct.

And he is still in the field commanding his troops."

CIVILIAN

"Terminate with extreme prejudice."

LUCAS

"You understand captain... , that this operation does

not exist, nor will it ever exist."