Expats Versus Other Farangs Living In Thailand

[Bluecat]

There was quite an interesting post on Stickman web site:

War of the classes, again.

I really am at odds with all the 'Thais hate us now' theory.  Sex tourists are looked at with curiosity and interest by Thais.  Try walking a girl out of Soi Cowboy and along Sukhumvit for a couple of hundred metres [if you can get the girl to walk that far]  from the near stationary cars and buses you will attract many curious glances that often reflect amusement, intense interest or even pity but never anger or resentment .  English teachers [and I have been one] even if somewhat underpaid, command respect and are usually appreciated as long as they behave in a professional way.  The Farangs that are despised more than any other, and usually behind their backs, are the increasing ranks of 'professional expat'.  You know, the ones who work for greedy multinational companies who come to Thailand to tap into a large population and exploit cheap labour.  These people get paid a salary in foreign currency  10 times and more than the wage of a hard working Thai doctor or university lecturer.  A wage completely out of reach of most Thais.  You know the people I am talking about.  They can be seen on the skytrain in their office clothes, clutching a briefcase and more often than not talking complete <deleted> into a mobile phone.  Other times they get chauffeur driven around.  A car in Bangkok?  Are you f**king nuts!  They send their spoilt brats to some overpriced international school where they all pick up a really nauseous American accent for some bizarre reason.  These so called expats with their huge disposable income push the prices up for all of us.  I guess the only good thing is most of them only seem to stay for 2 or 3 years, it is then time to take their greedy, futile career elsewhere.  When I first got here in '85 these people hardly existed.  Most expats seemed to be retirees, ex military, interesting people with a story to tell.  Life in the city seemed to have more of an edge, raw and gritty.

Is it what the Thais and farangs think?

[sbk]

A university educated Thai female friend of mine with a farang husband regularly meets with verbal abuse and poor treatment at the hands of Thai people who automatically assume she is a bar girl. I must add that this mainly occurs in Bangkok, obviously not in her home town where everyone knows her and knows her family. So, I guess she would disagree with at least that part of the analysis.

[Bluecat]

A university educated Thai female friend of mine with a farang husband regularly meets with verbal abuse and poor treatment at the hands of Thai people who automatically assume she is a bar girl. I must add that this mainly occurs in Bangkok, obviously not in her home town where everyone knows her and knows her family. So, I guess she would disagree with at least that part of the analysis.

I would say that this kind of "feeling" is very common in many countries but even more acute in Thailand.

Local men have difficulty accepting the fact that the local women date/marry foreigners, hence the "bar girl" theory in ALL cases

[tutsiwarrior]

jaysus...who wrote that stickman drivel? Expats come to thailand to live between jobs or to retire and enjoy sanook. The high paid dude with the 'suit' was probably sent out by his company (not his choice) as an exile and as punishment for not maximising profits at the home office. He would always prefer Cleveland, Ohio or Coventry in the UK and curses his wretched fate while living locally in absolute luxury and collecting a huge salary. His mewling little wifey complaining that she can't find malt vinegar in the local shops for the chips and trembling lest hubby loses his bottle and goes ape-shit with the local pussy.

And check it out mate...most of the brats in them high priced schools are thais who got parents that command the same salary as the expat 'suit'. I love to see them in the US with their florid English picked up in that environment not having a clue regarding local colloquialisms.

Rich thais love having rich expats around so that there are lots of restaurants and etc where they can show off their wealth (I love it, highest rooftop restaurant in the world)...beer Chang 80 baht in some dive in Soi Nana where there ain't nothing but bar girls and fat expat types, on holiday and having a good time...twice that much in some 'upmarket' shithole largely populated by rich thai locals who couldn't give a shit if the price of their drink represents the daily wage of a BKK factory worker. Then they wonder what the fuss is about when you got red banners and masses of people marching down major thoroughfares (see recent BBK Post photo re: EGAT privatisation).

Apples and oranges, mate...

[peppermint]

i asked my friend's girlfriend who is a bkk university educated girl why all thais hate falangs. she looked at me as if i were an idiot and corrected me - not ALL thais hate falangs, maybe only 80 or 90%.

[Bluecat]

And check it out mate...most of the brats in them high priced schools are thais who got parents that command the same salary as the expat 'suit'. I love to see them in the US with their florid English picked up in that environment not having a clue regarding local colloquialisms.

Rich thais love having rich expats around so that there are lots of restaurants and etc where they can show off their wealth (I love it, highest rooftop restaurant in the world)...beer Chang 80 baht in some dive in Soi Nana where there ain't nothing but bar girls and fat expat types, on holiday and having a good time...twice that much in some 'upmarket' shithole largely populated by rich thai locals who couldn't give a shit if the price of their drink represents the daily wage of a BKK factory worker. Then they wonder what the fuss is about when you got red banners and masses of people marching down major thoroughfares (see recent BBK Post photo re: EGAT privatisation).

Agree with you, Tustsi.

Some people still do not get it,...

[mrentoul]

Post withdrawn.

[Sing_Sling]

This drivel is not even worth writing too much about, so:

Complete crap.

[fatter than harry]

Sorry everyone!

It was me, I've been stalking the guy for months now - I follow him around BKK wearing a suit and tie and talk <deleted> into my mobile, usually about extending working hours in the Nakhon Nike sweatshop.

What really piszes him off is when I get my laptop out in a cafe and pretend to buy and sell shares whilst enjoying my orange mocha frappachino (Z) He hates that

[Sunbelt Asia]

It was not Stick who wrote this. http://www.stickmanbangkok.com/Weekly/weekly148.html

It was .....

FROM STICKMAN'S BAG OF EMAIL:

The West or the East?

Interesting statistics just released from Phuket Gazette - 3 murders on this small island in 22 days! 68 offences against property and 34 people arrested. An admirable 50% arrest rate. I wonder why our (UK) police don't publish statistics like this, as if I did not know. Drivers do not get hassled much by the police here, except on helmet crackdown days, but the standard of driving is atrocious and the accident rate alarming. Still where would you rather live? A country where you have to stay alert and drive carefully to avoid accidents, but your person and property are pretty safe, or a country where you have a better chance of getting back to your burgled and vandalized home with your car unscathed?

War of the classes, again.

really am at odds with all the 'Thais hate us now' theory. Sex tourists are looked at with curiosity and interest by Thais. Try walking a girl out of Soi Cowboy and along Sukhumvit for a couple of hundred metres [if you can get the girl to walk that far] from the near stationary cars and buses you will attract many curious glances that often reflect amusement, intense interest or even pity but never anger or resentment . English teachers [and I have been one] even if somewhat underpaid, command respect and are usually appreciated as long as they behave in a professional way. The Farangs that are despised more than any other, and usually behind their backs, are the increasing ranks of 'professional expat'. You know, the ones who work for greedy multinational companies who come to Thailand to tap into a large population and exploit cheap labour. These people get paid a salary in foreign currency 10 times and more than the wage of a hard working Thai doctor or university lecturer. A wage completely out of reach of most Thais. You know the people I am talking about. They can be seen on the skytrain in their office clothes, clutching a briefcase and more often than not talking complete <deleted> into a mobile phone. Other times they get chauffeur driven around. A car in Bangkok? Are you f**king nuts! They send their spoilt brats to some overpriced international school where they all pick up a really nauseous American accent for some bizarre reason. These so called expats with their huge disposable income push the prices up for all of us. I guess the only good thing is most of them only seem to stay for 2 or 3 years, it is then time to take their greedy, futile career elsewhere. When I first got here in '85 these people hardly existed. Most expats seemed to be retirees, ex military, interesting people with a story to tell. Life in the city seemed to have more of an edge, raw and gritty.

[Flummoxed]

I think Stick would take exception to being critisised for something he didn't even say.....and even more annoyed that he should be slammed for allowing people freedom of speech on his site.

In fact, on his homepage, it quite clearly states.........

'Everything on this site represents the opinions of the writers and as such, is not purported as fact!'

I agree that the article is utter crap but have you people actually bothered reading the section in question?!

[Bluecat]

I think Stick would take exception to being critisised for something he didn't even say.....and even more annoyed that he should be slammed for allowing people freedom of speech on his site.

In fact, on his homepage, it quite clearly states.........

'Everything on this site represents the opinions of the writers and as such, is not purported as fact!'

Have you people actually bothered reading the section in question?!

Stick receives lot of mails and carefully choses the ones he posts on his website.

The ones he posts does or does not reflect his opinion but in any case are chosen

because they will provoke some reactions from the readers.

So, I have to say it worked quite well.

I am sorry some people thought he wrote it,...

[fatter than harry]

I dunno Bluecat, I thought when you wrote:

There was quite an interesting post on Stickman web site:

That you meant someone had posted the post you quoted on stickman's website

Not stickman himself - who we all love

So chill out flummoxed, or read stuff properly before you slam!

[Bluecat]

I dunno Bluecat, I thought when you wrote:

There was quite an interesting post on Stickman web site:

That you meant someone had posted the post you quoted on stickman's website

Not stickman himself - who we all love

This is what I meant but maybe I should have been clearer.

Will be more careful next time,...

[Flummoxed]

It was Mrentoul's post to which I was referring.

[fatter than harry]

In that case I should read stuff properly before I slam a slammer

[mrentoul]

Actually, I did visit the website, Flummoxed, to check that it was actually posted there, as Bluecat said. Funnily enough, I almost deleted the post earlier. Normally I don't lower myself to read his site, still less comment on it.

Unfortunately I didn't open the section concerned. Bluecat forgot to mention that the piece was taken from a reader's letter.

I agree Stickman can post whatever he likes on his own site. I am not one of his fans (I disagree that ''we all love him'', as someone said above), but I am not going to criticise the guy because of what someone else says on his site. I have deleted the post.

I think Stick would take exception to being critisised for something he didn't even say.....and even more annoyed that he should be slammed for allowing people freedom of speech on his site.

You don't say.

As for you, Bluecat, thanks once again for pointing out to me the futility of posting on webboards.

Why should we have to check everything half a dozen times because some poster hasn't bothered attributing something correctly, or can't express himself coherently?

Yet we must, because more often than not people on these boards are using only half their brain when they post.

There is a simple solution: ignore the lot of you (and delete your objectionable posts).

[NedKelly]

Well it's perfect publicity....just post or say something controversial and yo uwill get your reactions and attention that you want. But really the article is a generalised piece of <deleted>.

I wear a tie and shirt to work and often use my mobile phone but I work for a Thai company and am employed locally at local rates because of my knowledge and expereince and of course english language skills. I take a motorcycle taxit to work and a tuk tuk home. I buy dinner for 20 baht at night and use the local bus sometimes. Why.....because I am not paid a huge salary and dont need to pretend I am a rich farang. So not all 'expats' are the same. The article is dribble. But hey it got the desired result did it not.

[stickman]

As has been mentioned already, this particular piece was from a reader’s email. Such provocative pieces are chosen for exactly what has happened here – to generate discussion on the topic. The said piece generated some very strong email responses this week.

Thanks to those people who pointed out that the captioned piece was from a reader.

Stick

[Bluecat]

Unfortunately I didn't open the section concerned. Bluecat forgot to mention that the piece was taken from a reader's letter.

I agree Stickman can post whatever he likes on his own site. I am not one of his fans (I disagree that ''we all love him'', as someone said above), but I am not going to criticise the guy because of what someone else says on his site. I have deleted the post.

As for you, Bluecat, thanks once again for pointing out to me the futility of posting on webboards.

Why should we have to check everything half a dozen times because some poster hasn't bothered attributing something correctly, or can't express himself coherently?

Yet we must, because more often than not people on these boards are using only half their brain when they post.

There is a simple solution: ignore the lot of you (and delete your objectionable posts).

My half brain comments.

The purpose of this forum was to get the people comments on, as Stick said, quite a provocative piece.

It worked, especially with you.

Your comments were quite good and I think you should not have deleted them.

But of course, I do not know whether the fact that you thought Stick wrote the piece influenced them,...

Anyway, your full brain choice,...

[Yohan]

I am an European man, married to a Japanese woman, living in Tokyo and visiting very regularly Thailand since about 30 years....

Who is hating me: My listing is made through my personal experience:

1) Americans of any color and gender: They do not understand, that other people have another opinion, and that other people do not like the American way of life.

Discussion with an American, who was always living in America and does not know anything else, is very difficult for me. They want to FORCE me to live in the way they like. If you do not accept that as a beginning of any discussion, you will receive some abusive words as you are a pervert idiot in their eyes.

I am not into American bashing, but this is not always easy to stay polite.

2) Feminists (this includes not only women, but very weak men, too, who are totally depending on their wives and have nothing to say at all - They consider me as pedophile, and my wife as a sold misused sex-slave.

3) American Chinese: These people have lost their Asian way of life, and hate any white man, who has an Asian wife.

-------

I do not have any experience about that Thai are disliking foreigners:

My wife is Japanese, and is often mistaken for a Thai woman, and my daughter is mixed blood and often mistaken as my Thai wife.....

I never found however any feeling of hate from Thai people, who saw us (they were however very curious in the province), and after some kind words to them they noticed, we all are not related to Thai people anyway....

I never met any Thai, who showed up any hate, because foreigners have more money.....

Anyway this argument is not true, as there are a good number of Thai people, who are very very rich......

I say it again - not all Thai are poor.......... and many of them have more money than I or other foreigners.... If we, the foreigners would be really sooooo rich, we would settle down somewhere else, but not in Thailand.

WE FOREIGNERS ARE COMING OFTEN TO THAILAND BECAUSE WE ARE NOT RICH!

About Thai girls: Many Thai girls are NOT into marriage with foreigners, just see the figures yourself.... Thailand has over 60 million people, how many women out of the whole are married to a foreigner?? Still a small group out of the total sum of marriages!

How many Thais are married to a foreigner? Any idea? Any statistics?

Johann

[mrvietnam2001]

And check it out mate...most of the brats in them high priced schools are thais who got parents that command the same salary as the expat 'suit'. I love to see them in the US with their florid English picked up in that environment not having a clue regarding local colloquialisms.

Badda bing!

Mr Vietnam

[mrvietnam2001]

Badda Boom!

Fogettabout it!

Mr Vietnam

[elsie]

FROM STICKMAN'S BAG OF EMAIL: (14-Mar-04)

War of the classes, continued.

As for those expats with "huge" disposable income pushing up the prices 'for the rest of us', well to quote the author from last week's piece - that is complete <deleted>. Unless the author is sending his kids to international schools, shopping at Emporium or eating at The Oriental, I doubt they have any effect on his lifestyle or his cost of living. Most of the professional expats who are obviously despised by the author are just regular blokes doing jobs for their foreign based companies. They are paid what they would earn in their home countries plus allowances for differences in the cost of living and for the fact that they have to uproot themselves and sometimes their entire households to live in Thailand. For some of them, this is not a lifestyle choice! Without these incentives they wouldn't come. Since the author of the letter is happy with gross generalisations, here's one of my own: A lot of the 'interesting' retired, ex-military types I've met since I've been here have been the worst kind of expats...hard core sexpats who have treated the locals with absolute contempt and done bugger all to raise the lot of the locals they come into contact with. They are drop-out leaches, here only because their pension cheques stretch further and they can happily blow it all on the local ladies and booze, no questions asked.

On behalf of the professional expats.

I was pretty pissed off with the article ‘war of the classes, again’ in you column last week. It seemed to be a savage attack on us ‘professional expats’. I have a great affection for Thailand and its people. I go out of my way to help them when I can and I treat them with respect. I have made a promise to myself that when I leave Thailand I will not be leaving with more money than I arrived with. Any profits will be put back into the country probably in the form of a donation to a worthy cause. We are not all ‘fat cat business bastards’. There seems to be a them and us culture between most teachers and other expats. I believe this stems from those who call themselves teachers but are no more than English speakers. I am getting tired of people saying in a surprised manner, “oh, you have a proper job,” when they find out I am not a teacher. Surely the good teachers are also ‘professional expats’ and have a proper job. I feel sorry for the good teachers who are having there professional status dragged down by the lesser skilled individuals.

[Boon Mee]

i asked my friend's girlfriend who is a bkk university educated girl why all thais hate falangs.  she looked at me as if i were an idiot and corrected me - not ALL thais hate falangs, maybe only 80 or 90%.

Mr/Ms. Peppermint,

Don't know who your friend's girlfriend has for pals but I've lived in Thailand off & on for 25 years now and I ain't met ONE Thai who has demonstrated any hatred to this farang or any others I'm aware of.

You gotta be a troller...

[Richard Hall]

i asked my friend's girlfriend who is a bkk university educated girl why all thais hate falangs. she looked at me as if i were an idiot and corrected me - not ALL thais hate falangs, maybe only 80 or 90%.

If Thai

- students making their path by diligence, devotion and hard work, knowing a ro ruea from a lo ling, showing more knowledge of the Thai language than "au" and "mai rooh" rather than cheating on exams and/or passing just because of bribery

- people preferring a good book, knowledge and education, the beauty of nature, honesty, generosity, good manners and tolerance over dull soap operas, karaoke bars, materialism, greed, lying, corruption and eny

- people that are more concerned about the on-goings and development in Thailand and its people than their sole own personal benefits

start to hate foreigners this should be indeed a major concern but it is somehow very unlikely that this is ever going to occur.

As far as the supposed hatred of the remaining crowd is concerned independant from how large that number seems or is assumed to be well, WHO actually cares what those individuals "think", believe and say.

Going to an university does not necessarily mean someone is educated or actually possesses brain and intelligence but just proves physical presence there at a certain time.

Possibly, we are just talking different Thais or a different Thailand here because in terms of the Thais I personally know (these are actually hundreds and I'm living in an area where 99.5% are Thai) the ratio appears to be the other way around at the very best or if at all.

Guess somehow you or that friend's girlfriend have got that story mixed up a little bit. Probably it should have read: "When my friend's girlfriend said that maybe 80 or 90% of the Thais hated foreigners the average Thai looked at her as if she was an idiot". Or possibly all of a sudden 80 - 90% of the Thais have become allergic to a specific type of tropical fruit over night (guavas = proper pronunciation in Thai is farang) over night and therefore have developed a dislike for this fruit.

After all a very doubtful story but there is hope because Thai government is already on the right track by striving to bring up the educational standard at Thailand's schools and universities which will eventually end similar misunderstandings in the future for once and for all.

[OldAsiaHand]

I am a long-time resident of Bangkok, and while I enjoy reading this forum, I don't post. Still this time, I just can't resist.

From my point of view, there was a really wonderful slant on this whole discussion in the best of Jake Needham's Bangkok-set novels, KILLING PLATO, which was published last year in Hong Kong.

Please forgive me the inevitable typing errors, but here's the way Needham put it....

"The Thai press generally uses phrases such as ‘the foreign community’ to refer collectively to Bangkok’s non-Thai residents, but the truth is that there is neither anything particularly collective nor community-like about foreigners in Bangkok. On the contrary, most foreigners in Bangkok hate most other foreigners in Bangkok, and many of them go out of their way to inflict whatever harm they can on each other."

"My own residency was only a couple of weeks along when I started noticing the phenomenon. I began calling it the Jungle Jim syndrome, since the whole business rekindled childhood memories of a television series I used to watch every Saturday morning when I was about ten years old."

"The series told the tale of a suitably strong and naturally quite handsome white guy whose name was Jungle Jim. He lived in some nameless country in Africa, and he spent his weekend mornings having adventures in the jungle and rescuing people in distress, frequently damsels with quite amazing hooters straining against their tight blouses. The natives whom Jungle Jim encountered in the course of all these adventures respected him because he was a decent and honorable guy, and in return, he treated the natives he met with an equal degree of respect."

"But that was not to say that Jungle Jim had no human enemies. A frequently recurring plot line was Jungle Jim’s arrival in some isolated village where he would find a couple of old European traders already living happily among the locals. They were usually Dutch, for some reason, perhaps because they had funny accents. Regardless, these traders were inevitably grizzled old drunks who were working on all kinds of evil schemes for swindling the natives, but they were still living among them like kings and pulling all the babes since the locals didn’t know what pathetic losers they actually were."

"When Jungle Jim arrived on the scene, of course, all that changed. The attention and loyalty of the natives shifted instantly from the old traders to Jungle Jim, not only because he was clean-cut and handsome and decent, but also because he was . . . well, new."

"At first, the old traders inevitably claimed to want to make some kind of common cause with Jungle Jim, but by the end of the show you always discovered that it was these jokers, not the locals, who were Jungle Jim’s real enemies. His arrival in the village had put the continuation of their little scam at risk. The original white guys on the scene had to get rid of Jungle Jim somehow or they’d never get back to being the big cheeses, or more important, ever have all those babes to themselves again."

"Bangkok is exactly like that. "

...And that's the name of that tune.