Thais and cars
For the most part, Thais behave very calmly on the roads, they don’t honk, they don’t cut, they just stand and wait in a traffic jam.
The flip side of this exposure is stupidity. It's okay to spread out like a flock of sheep
on a 4-lane road and drive at a speed of 40-60 km per hour, ignoring the dedicated lane for fast cars (In Thailand, the right side)
Also, fearless Thai motorists park like a buddha puts on their souls, since the “stop ham” movement does not exist, but to get a hole in the wheel
or a car lined with a key is unrealistic here.
In the same way, everyone leaves cars anywhere without fear, radio tape recorders are not stolen here, windows are not beaten.
In general, they say that cars are stolen, mopeds too. For such cases, there is insurance.
The Thais have clean cars, wash them often, decorate the inside and take care of the car. It is very possible to buy a used car here.
Thais and food
It is really customary here for the entire collective farm to eat a hundred times a day.
No one really needs a kitchen in an apartment, the morning of a Thai or a Thai begins with a sleepy crawl out to a passing
past the house of a cart in which every morning they sell all sorts of "goodies"
If in our cafe mainly wealthy people eat, then there is no such division here.
Any Burmese builder can afford to eat from macarons.
food in Thailand is sacred
I heard that Thai girls are very body conscious, dieting and making fun of fat women.
Everyone who is over 50 kg is fat.
In reality, I didn't notice anything of the sort. Young girls, women, eat constantly.
And God forbid you need something between 12 and 13 days. Dinner time is a sacred concept. All Pattaya at this time goes to dinner.
Tiny-miniature taeks with children's clothing size will still have a lot of rather well-fed compatriots.
Eating is a favorite activity in Thailand
Take, for example, female athletes who play tennis and whom we often see at tournaments.
They don't eat my way only when they play on the court. And then, during the breaks, they manage to gobble up some muck.
I also remembered food licentiousness.
In Thailand, carbonated drinks are drunk from childhood. For example, at a children's birthday party, children drink Fanta, Cola, Sprite,
other drinks are simply not provided. Nobody looks askance. A child at 2 years old gushing Pepsi-Cola is the norm.
And this happens in all segments of the population.
Similarly, fast food has cheerfully joined the Thai diet. And if McDonald's is sometimes empty, then KFC enjoys
hyper popular. It is customary to come here with the whole family, on holidays and weekends, and at the same time walk the children in the nearest children's room.
That is, leisure is very similar in content to Russian. Go to the mall on the weekend, eat there, buy something and go to the children's room.
Culture and education
It is not customary to read here. From the word at all. Nobody reads books here, and there are practically no bookstores.
The most famous bookstore - B2S or Asia Books - is so modest in assortment that it is difficult to call them bookstores.
It mainly sells reference literature, biographies of the king and family, culinary recipes, travel guides,
children's literature. Children's books stand like a cast-iron bridge. They are not cheap here either, but here it’s just a plague, not prices.
The bookstores also sell stationery, music, sweets, and so on.
And until recently, I thought that maybe this applies only to Pattaya? But no. Same song in Bangkok.
In the Bangkok subway, for example, no one reads, they just sit, chat, stare at the phone.
Teenagers are much more uncomplexed than ours. They say about such people “did he fall out of the forest yesterday?”
I don't know how else to explain it to you, but somehow.
For example, there was a reception in honor of the final tournament, which brought together the best tennis players, by age.
Tennis Association pays for everything, cool hotel, food and drinks, everything is top class.
There were participants and their parents. Everything is very decorous, decently, long speeches, diplomas, cups.
And you just had to give the go-ahead that the buffet is open - you should have seen these queues. As if for the last
time for rice.
Also songs and dances. Karaoke is a favorite Thai entertainment. It doesn't matter that you have neither hearing nor voice,
every Thai considers it his duty to yell into the microphone.
I was a bit shocked when the girls from the Mashinoy age group jokingly tumbled onto the stage and started
wobbling his hips to howl some utter nonsense in bad voices.
It was not a prepared number, but an improvisation. Uh, terrible improvisation.
After that, one of the mothers came out to the stage and gave the girls a tip of 100 baht.
Appearance attitude
For some reason, there is an opinion that Thais are some incredible cleanliness, tourists are fed with tales, that Thais wash themselves a hundred times a day.
Of course, I didn’t sniff, but watching a lot of familiar Thais, I didn’t notice that they generally tried to wash themselves and were familiar with the comb.
One of our acquaintances solved the problem of hair tangled in a tangle radically - he took scissors and with a slight movement of his hand turned from Mulan
to Anna Wintour. It's about a man, yes.
And I repeat, I’m not telling you about Cambodian guest workers, but about people who drive jeeps, take their children to sports,
not homeless, in short.
I can't get used to the fact that at tennis tournaments, girls often have shoes 2-3 oversized.
As if they are wearing out after their brother (although this is not so), a girl is walking, and sneakers, like a little flour, are clapping. And how are they in this
kind of manage to play without stumbling constantly?
Same thing with clothes. In my opinion, only my Masha selects outfits and everything she has is laid out according to styles, colors, style and other feng shui.
This don't care. Did you get a synthetic jersey for participating in a tournament? OK! Let's play it!
In 90 percent, it all looks strange and sloppy. So I can’t agree about the multi-stage approach to my appearance.
Maybe it's about the madam, who lower hundreds of thousands per hour in Siam Paragon?
Business, competition, customer relationship
The Thais have a very strange approach to business, trade, transactions and everything related to finance.
If you are used to trading in Turkey or Egypt, they will talk to you, run after you offering better prices
and better, there is no such thing in Thailand.
I don’t know who started the rumor that you need to bargain everywhere here, to be honest, I don’t even know where you can bargain here.
On the market? Well, perhaps, on a tourist one, if the price is too high at times, and even then, it’s not a fact that you will be thrown off the price.
In shops? Forget it.
I most often go to the Thai market for Thais, buy fruits and vegetables. Nobody trades there.
At the same time, on a tiny piece (in the market), the price, for example, for a mango can range from 50 to 80 baht, no one
it doesn't bother.
Just yesterday I bought a watermelon from an aunt for 30 baht a piece, her neighbor sold the same one for 80.
Skillful tourists can bring down the price of housing when concluding a contract, but this scenario is also not common.
If an agency rents an apartment to you, then Thai agents are generally indifferent to renting - if you want, rent it, if you don’t want it, leave it.
They have a cheat from the apartment and they are in no hurry to reduce it. If you come directly to the condo and communicate with local Thais
in the office, here in 90 percent of cases you will stumble upon complete indifference, and sometimes even aggression.
They are even too lazy to show apartments, not to mention talking about the price.
I will give an example of my friends who wanted to rent an office, agreed on a price, but they were not satisfied that
the entrance fee must be paid immediately, they asked him not to even reduce it, but to break it up monthly.
The Thais did not like this option. This office has been empty for four years now. Here is such a business.
No plasticity or desire to solve a problem, to make money with a little effort. No.
At the same time, I cannot call Thais lazy. Many get up early, sweep, clean, roll their carts,
they trade from morning to night, trying and trying to somehow rake out in this life.
There are few beggars here. But there are professional beggars. From year to year, you can meet some
and the same cripple with injuries who sit right on the floor in the rows in the night market and beg.
They are served.
A girl plays the violin, a blind man strums on some kind of guitar, no one is chasing them.
Many disabled people sell something. Lottery tickets, homemade dolls, whoever can.
face loss
I wrote about losing face. Yes, this is an important point. You should not convict the Thais of something shameful, sarcasm, irony, such concepts are not in use here.
They will weave any fables, deny the obvious, turn on the fool and contradict
reality, if only not to admit their mistakes, because this is not comme il faut.
If you don't like a Thai employee, cleaner, assistant, salesperson, it's easier to fire and hire
new than to teach something or tap into the common sense of someone whose job you don't like.
Visitors often notice that Thai children behave more calmly, less capriciously, they are not beaten, they are not yelled at.
I think the flip side of this coin lies in the fact that children, in principle, are not particularly involved.
They grow like grass. No developmental activities are provided, many do not know how to read and write at all.
In Thai kindergartens there are not as many classes as in ours. The level of development here is certainly lower, no doubt.
The school curriculum is also lame. The student may not be respected by the teacher, the teacher cannot directly scold the student,
convict him of lying, cheating.
But they can publicly humiliate, hit on the hands and even on the head.
Of course, there are international schools, but sometimes the devil is going on in them too; I heard complaints from many parents.
You can’t just scold everyone, but it’s hard to find a good school, kindergarten, with an adequate program and attitude towards the child.
And if you think that Thai parents don't scold and beat their children? They beat, scold, but not in public.
Our friends complained that during a trip to America, dad could not weigh the children with cradles, and those bastards blossomed
at all. And all because you can’t shoot a bottle in the head there, good neighbors will knock on the social service, and hello!
Relations between men and women
I don’t remember if I wrote about it or not, but lesbian relationships are considered the norm among Thai women. Can often be found
a couple - a feminine girl, with a masculine girl, short-haired, under the arm and in an embrace. It's possible.
But hugging a guy or, God forbid, kissing in public! Nooo. This is a complete taboo.
In mixed marriages, a Thai-European, in most cases a girl from those same ones. And no one cares.
No one will whisper behind your back and stigmatize you as a "prostitute".
They generally have no concept of grandmas on the benches. As well as the shops themselves, however.
External influence on culture
Of course, both music and films are sold, they go to the cinema, but apart from Star Wars, which, by the way, they go to
some farangs or taechki with farangs, removed in Thailand great amount local films.
They are terrible in their primitiveness, antics and on a level somewhere between "Just Maria" and "The rich also cry."
Thais love "their" sports, appreciate domestic tourism and rarely travel abroad.
Most Thais (up to 80 percent) choose resorts within Thailand for recreation. And of course it's not from lack of money.
The poor Thais are also another myth. Guys, this is the fourth most developed economy in Asia, and unlike some,
considered to be developing.
Apart from tourism, which in Thailand is an unfortunate few percent, and rice, (these two things come to mind first),
Thais have a well-developed industry. They successfully produce cars under Japanese licenses, they have a developed light, agricultural industry,
and so on.
So even if all Russian tourists put together spit on Thailand and stop coming here, no one will cry.
Remember last year's situation, all of us were easily replaced by the Chinese.
Yes, the Thais do not like the Chinese, they do not respect them, and in some places they even despise them. Surprisingly, among the Thais there are many ethnic
Chinese.
Those Chinese who arrive in Pattaya are noisy, ill-mannered, overweight.
If the Chinese fill up on 7/11, as usual, with a modest company of 30 people, then after 10 minutes, as if
the typhoon and the locust swarm have passed. They spit, grab from shelves, violate your personal space, push and behave inappropriately.
Even the women stink of fumes and garlic.
It is for the Chinese that warning signs are hung in the latrines so that they do not wash their feet in the sinks and observe
cleanliness in the toilets, but in vain. Wash, do not comply.
How to save money on a hotel or apartment on vacation?
I'm looking on the Rumguru website. It contains absolutely all discounts on hotels and apartments from 30 booking systems, including booking. Often I find very profitable options, it turns out to save from 30 to 80%
How to save on insurance?
You need insurance abroad. Any admission is very expensive and the only way not to pay out of pocket is to choose an insurance policy in advance. For many years we have been making out on the site, which give the best prices for insurance and selection, along with registration, takes only a couple of minutes.
If somewhere I have already repeated - I beg your pardon. I must have forgotten something, if I remember, I'll add it.
See you later!
I'll try to tell you about what surprised me in the life of the Thais, not at all what it seems to us to many!
For example, I can tell you why Thais with narrow eyes live in Thailand at all, and not Russians, for example.
Here are some unusual things from the life of an ordinary Thai:
It is not customary for Thais to call anyone by name, but why is that?, but everything is simple, if you called a Thai by his real name (and you are not his friend at all), then all the spirits protecting him immediately lose their power, like this. Therefore, in the passport, the Thai will also not have his real name (and the Cambodian), but the nickname by which he wants to be called, well, let's say, like our guide to Angkor Wat, Mr. Bunny, that is, a rabbit. And all Thais call about the same, let's say Piglet. And so they can call some minister. And this nickname, if suddenly a Thai decided that something went wrong in his life, he changes it to any other without any problems. By the way, they are very fond of all sorts of European sonorous names (for nicknames), let's say the Thai guide, Sarah, followed the whole path with us. Even the cities in Thailand have nicknames, most people know it, for the same reason above. That is, Bangkok is a nickname, it is not Bangkok at all, but a city from a long word, which the Thai will say in a chant for about 10 minutes.
The Thai day is not divided into 24 hours at all, but is divided into several parts that are completely incomprehensible to a European, well, something like until the midday sun and so on.
Many people think that the usual Thai food is this, and they crack it on both cheeks as much as their ears are wrapped-
This is of course not true, all these cockroaches, larvae and other living creatures are food for crazy tourists who think that the Thais eat it.
And here's what Thais eat - True, in remote cities they can eat frogs, for example (I ate on Samet, where they are simply sold in bundles alive in the usual market).
Thais, by the way, for the most part, do not know how to cook at all, well, absolutely, they won’t even fry eggs, and I’ll tell you why. In Tai, apartments do not have a kitchen at all, they don’t have such a corner, no stove, no kettle there. This is their standard of living. And all Thais eat only in eateries, restaurants, cafes, of which there are plenty of darkness in Thailand.
The Thais have a cult of white skin, even a deodorant bought in any store and it will be in Thailand with a whitening effect. Thais go to beauty salons just for whitening and spend a lot of money on it. And if you tell a Thai that you went, for example, to a spa and specially sunbathed there under the lamps, then they will take you for a crazy person, a fact.
The average Thai has 3 cars per family, does not clean the apartment, does not cook food at all, and his earnings are approximately 90-100 thousand on average. So all Thais spend money mainly on hobbies.
Surely you ask, who then cleans the streets for them, waits, irons their linen and cleans the apartments. Yes, here are the same emigrants, who are a dime a dozen in neighboring countries, and who simply burst into Tai, this beautiful country. On the borders with all the poor states, if you go you will surely see their huge settlements in small houses. Well, the resort towns are all completely populated by emigrants.
About massage, the massage that we call Thai, in fact, is not Thai at all. He came from India, and to India from the same Aryans. All elements of this massage originate from pictures carved on stone and stored in the temple of Bangkok. This is the same temple where the reclining Buddha is located. This massage itself is essentially lymphatic drainage, and if you do it and you don’t feel pain, then you should know that this is bullshit, not massage. It must hurt! This is not kneading the muscles, but washing out dirty lymph from the body. Clamping the joints in certain positions, the masseuse creates lymph pressure (like a dam), and releasing it, this lymph washes out the turbidity that has stagnated in the lymphatic system. You need to do at least 8 such sessions, otherwise there will be little sense. But the effect of the massage will not be at all immediately, you will feel it rather even at home, in the form of good health, vivacity in the morning, and overall vitality will increase.
Beautiful, is not it?!!! 
- And this is what this puddle looks like next to me! It is the reflection in this puddle that is the most famous photo of Angkor! 
About a strong Thai family. Their families are really strong, but their fortress is peculiar. For example, you are Thai, and you live with your wife, well, let's say for a year, you have cooled off towards her a little, so it will be quite normal when your wife comes to you and says, - "I see, hubby, that your feelings for me are not so bright, I think it's time for you to go to my girlfriend, she is a good, kind and beautiful woman, you'll get along, "and the husband is quite legally friends with his wife's friend for some time, everyone is happy, relations are getting better.
I’ll tell you more about trances, which, as many people think, there are so many in Thailand that it’s easier to meet a transvestite than a pretty girl. All this is complete heresy, there really are a lot of trances, this is again because of Buddhism, people are simply more tolerant of them and on the day of the Airborne Forces no one would beat anyone there. Many of them came from India and other countries. These people are not poor at all, because an operation that turns a boy into a girl costs at least $100,000. In most cities in Thailand, there are either no trances, or they are not visible at all, this is only the property of Pattaya, Phuket .. other resorts and a little Bangkok. As strange as it may seem, the percentage of gay people among Thais is no more than among Russians, this is a fact. All other manifestations are the property of peace-loving Buddhism.
What is and where did the Thai erotic show (the so-called Go-go) come from. Well, everything is simple here, genetically Thai women have problems with the guests of the thighs during childbirth, they are, let's say, narrow and the child does not come out well. So, in some remote village, they came up with a massage that strengthens the walls of the female century. now this wonderful massage has turned into no less beautiful javelins with these trained darts, in general, that only they don’t do it, but all the same village women of Tai do it, so you are unlikely to meet beauties in Go-Go.
Oh HBB Thai! Their traffic police can stop the violator no more than 1 time per day and the fine is real there is a penny, let's say baht 100. 80 percent of Thais have no rights at all, no. That is, you ride a bike without a helmet, call in the traffic police, pay 100 baht for it and leave from there at a speed of 200 km / h, violating all speed limits - you no longer have the right to stop! - THIS is a fact without ideas.
The most important thing...tourism in Thailand is almost the last line in the country's income. And Tai is not a poor state. Tai-3rd in the production of high-class cars in Asia, after Japan and Korea (And they are high-class because it is a Toyota brand and not only, it is locally developed, they also sell a lot of engines for well-known automakers in other countries), 1st for the production of hard drives, and produces a lot of all kinds of electronics, it produces so many products that there is enough for the whole of Asia. But the wires on the street - this is only at the behest of the people. They had a referendum, in which the king asked, Either you have beauty and without wires, or wires and taxes of others will not be added, they chose the 2nd, so the wires !!
If you have seen a Buddha image. Let's say this-
Have you ever wondered how the Thai people live in reality? Today we will not talk about the tourist Thailand in which you arrive to rest. I will tell you, only a hundredth of the truth, how the Thais really live. To understand this, you need to experience such a life yourself. In all provinces of Thailand there is poverty, but there are such remote areas where no tourist or farang has set foot. In such places, people simply survive and are very dependent on their crops. These Thais do not have the luxury that we have. They have no internet, TV, cell phone. They are simply cut off from civilization and this applies to most of the elderly Thais who live in remote poor areas of Thailand.
When I was just starting to live in Thailand, I was interested in how ordinary Thais live - it's like sinking into the abyss for a moment. Once, a Ukrainian who has lived in Thailand for a long time told me: “You are not allowed to know how poor Thais live. You don’t even know what they have in the fridge for breakfast.” Years later, I understand what he meant. Do these people even have a fridge? And if there is, then this is a great happiness for such a family. You may find it funny, but such people do not. In such families, other values, yes, they are cut off from the world, but they hold on to each other. In poor families, parents are honored until old age, for giving children at least some shelter and life. To this day, in our time, children from such families leave to work, send money to their parents. Someone even takes an advance as soon as possible to send it to their old people. Fates are very different, but they are so similar. On a social network, I met an Asian woman who is originally from Laos, but her relatives live in the North-East of Thailand in Isaan. Her name is Hongmalai Sanhaopahorn, as it turned out, she knows Russian well and lives in Russia.
I was very surprised that she lives in Russia and not in Thailand. She spent almost all of her childhood in the poor neighborhoods of Isaan. Her life would have continued like this and it is not known how fate would have developed. When she was 14 years old, her father took her to him. Her father lives in the Amur Region, many years ago he met her mother in Thailand. At one time they lived together, but then parted. Her father went to live in Russia, and after a while she gave birth to a daughter. He found out about the existence of his daughter many years later, when he again flew to Thailand. He took the little girl to his homeland, educated her, clothed and fed her, and showed her fatherly love. I asked her, "Why don't you live in Thailand?" Without thinking twice, she answered me: “I don’t want to eat insects anymore! It is very good for me to live in Russia, and I fly to Thailand to visit.” The answer was obvious and understandable. Well, what can I say, the child had a difficult childhood, and now living in Russia, she feels happy. In time, she will find a husband and have children. Another happy family will live in Russia. But not all Thais have such successful circumstances in life. People live in such slums that it's scary to look at.
Their houses are cardboard houses made from improvised material.
If winter broke out in Thailand, then many Thais would simply die, but life is not very easy anyway. How do such people live in their homes when heavy tropical rain is pouring?
To be honest, nobody cares. The government practically does not help such people, they survive as best they can. Not even basic electricity!
So, how do you prepare food for children here ?! How to wash in such conditions ?! It turns out that Thailand is not Paradise - it is a real Hell!
An artificially created Paradise is only for tourists, but no one cares how people actually live. Everyone flew in just to relax and almost every tourist, for his money, wants maximum pleasure and relaxation. The sea, islands, excursions, cold beer, cheap food and prostitutes, that's the whole ultimate dream of any tourist! The police don't treat the poor either. Raids are constantly carried out to identify stolen bikes and stolen items.
Many Thais go to extremes, which is why crime in Thailand. People from hopelessness slide into the abyss. After all, it is from the poor quarters that criminal elements appear, who trade in thefts, robberies, and drug addiction. But not all Thais fall that low. Many boys have been trying to build a career in Muay Thai since childhood.
Thai boxing is practiced by a large part of the population of Thailand. While he is small, he learns techniques, the coach yells at him, but in the future he grows out of a fighter who will feed his family and earn money.
Thai boxing is practiced not only by boys, but also by girls.
Thais know how to fight no worse than men and can easily knock on a tambourine to any farang. Not everyone, of course, manages to build a career, but it's better than stealing and drug addiction. The Thai government is focusing on such boxing schools, this is where the future generation should develop. Quite recently, I was asked on one forum something like this: “It would be better if a nice person told me than ordinary Thais live, where they work, how much they earn, where they rest.” So I answer that ordinary Thais plow from dusk to dawn and practically do not rest. Even newly-made mothers who have gone on maternity leave are allowed to rest for no more than 6 months, who work in public institutions. Such Thais rest only with their families. In general, the concept of rest is much different from ours. The poor in Thailand don't hang out in nightclubs, even if admission is free. There are a lot of clubs in Pattaya and I have never seen poor Thais rocking there. And in general, where did the club come from in a dead hole ?! There are no clubs or restaurants there! Spend one night with mosquitoes and you will realize that this is not a resort. Thais and Thais earn as they can. Many families depend on the harvest. They grow rice and fruits and vegetables. If there is a sea or a river nearby, they fish. Unemployment in Thailand is very high, not everyone works in commercial and government structures. In tourist cities, such Thais try to make money on tourists. People come here to work from Cambodia and Laos. I know one Laotian who lives in Pattaya. His name is Long. He works as a tour guide for a travel company. Has been working for a long time. When we had the Soviet Union, he flew from Laos to work and study in Ukraine as a translator. He lived in Kyiv for 25 years. Knows Russian, Ukrainian, Thai, Lao languages. You will meet such people very rarely. We met him on the border with Cambodia. As I remember now, it was 2011. We went to the vizaran, and when there was a stop, I went out for a smoke. I sat down at his table and after a two-minute silence, he asked me how you were doing! I asked in Russian, I was very surprised that a Thai knows Russian so well! It turned out he was from Laos. That's how we met. Long helped me more than once in a difficult situation when I needed an interpreter. Helped with a driver's license, told about the school. He is a very understanding and kind person! But his fate is also not easy, I will not go into details. Let me just say one thing, a person works almost every day to feed himself and he has no time for entertainment. In order to somehow help him, I bought through him an excursion to the Khao Kheow Open Zoo. We liked Long's tour very much then.
I still keep in touch with him and do not forget him. For all Thais, of course, I will not tell you, but I briefly told you how people live. What is there to say! I myself live in the neighborhood with such people, and I am in no way afraid of such a neighborhood!
The people here are sincere and understanding, and they survive as best they can, but how they live is not for us to judge, because they live at home, in their country, and we are just guests here!
Do good for the good of others!
Sex in Thailand
What are the adventures of a drunk tourist in Thailand?
Longboat racing in Pattaya
Thailand for the rich
The Rymarev family in Thailand
Oddly enough, I find it difficult to answer this question, which I get asked quite often. Why is it difficult? - after all, it would seem that the Thais are very friendly and simple people ... But they are completely different and their attitude .. has completely different characteristics, if at all it can have any.
Thais are just different
They do everything in groups. They live in several families in one house, share rooms with several people, they group for any reason. Their cult of food is not a cult of food at all - it is a desire to be in a group. They go out in the morning to eat among others. I can't imagine a Thai man having breakfast alone in his apartment in the morning.
We - farangs - are not part of their pack, so it is difficult for us to become a leader or ally in dealing with them - we are generally outside of their society.
They are very good, very disciplined, restrained and patient, they are Buddhists and they are calm about ants, dogs, cats, bad weather, Russians, foreigners ... Because sabai-sabai is the main thing in life: peace and tranquility. Nothing should bring a person out of balance.
Thais express their attitude to the interlocutor differently than we do. It is difficult for us to understand how they really treat us, even if we communicate with them every day. We will perceive their reactions in our own way and may not even understand their true motives and feelings at all.
In Thailand, it is not customary to say “on the forehead” what you think about a person, and even more so to say that he is wrong in something - this is tantamount to an insult. I would even say that it is not customary to somehow treat the interlocutor in general.
To understand Thais as well as it is possible for you personally, I recommend reading a few books, you can download them in my group about Thailand: https://vk.com/thailive
"Those amazing Thais" (Rainer Krak) - very detailed description Thai culture and psychology and very easy to read!
The Personal Dancer (Leater Steven) is a book that will help you understand the psychology of girls in prostitution.
"Bangkok-8" (John Burdett) is a book with an interesting plot and helps to understand some of the behavior of Thais.
You will be smiled at for any reason and turn a blind eye to your antics for a long time, because you - with all your antics - are a temporary phenomenon that will soon end. A smile is just a mask behind which any emotions can be.
Russians in Thailand are primarily tourists. Even if they live here for years, most often they remain "tourists", live in tourist places, are dumb and even can't speak (Thai). In general, tourists come and go - why treat them somehow other than being polite and patient with them? In addition, these tourists do not always behave perfectly.
Loss of face, southern and northern Thais
Losing face - losing your temper, yelling at someone - this is not acceptable for Thais. But it CAN happen and in no case should they be brought to this. Just the other day I read the news, which confirms this very well - one Thai shot another because he did not want to put him an addition of chicken sauce in a cafe. By not making others lose face, you will be more whole and gain respect in the eyes of others.
In general, in a critical situation it is better to just leave and forget. You won't get anything from them anyway. Getting something from a Thai is not realistic. They say that business with Thais is a bad business. By the way, Thais say the same thing about farangs).
Of course, Thais, like all people, are different. It also depends to some extent on where they live.
For example, Thais from the northern regions work in Pattaya (as well as many Burmese, Laotians, etc.). If you look closely, they are very loyal to tourists. Because tourists in Pattaya are just darkness. I honestly don't understand how they tolerate us at all. And if in relation to tourists here someone can flare up at times, then this is a rather harmless outburst of emotions. In addition, it is not customary to seriously lose one's temper in Thailand - a fiery person “loses face” and instantly loses respect and interest in the eyes of the interlocutor. The term "losing face" is very important in Thailand.
In the South of Thailand, everything is a little different than in the North and in the Central part. Here, tourism has become an important source of income quite recently, and before that, southern Thais have always supported themselves at the expense of natural resources. Now it has become worse, but they still have an inner sense of independence and pride. Southern Thais seem to me to be more vindictive. Their aggression is more noticeable.
For example, if you start speaking Thai in the northern regions or in Pattaya and Bangkok, then the Thais will surely be happy about it. And if you speak somewhere in Phuket, you can feel or even hear discontent and anger and feel like a stranger to these people.
But in general, in all tourist places, it is unlikely that someone will offend you, unless you yourself “run into”. And of course, sometimes there are problems in the service sector - after all, a tourist is a source of income and you need to squeeze the maximum amount of money out of it. And this fad is held in high esteem by the Thais.
But there is a war going on in the villages on the border with Malaysia and it is better not to go there. Most of the Thai army is concentrated here, a rebel Muslim group is based here, and here you can simply be killed. And no one will know about it. All of Thailand, except for the southern border, is good. Southern border - it is better not to get here. It is really far from all the tourist places. More than 5,000 people have died in southern Thailand since 2004.
These are the provinces of Yala and Narathiwat (the southernmost provinces of Thailand, bordering the Malaysian state of Kelantan). If we go to Malaysia by land, then we go through Sadao, and these provinces remain on our right.
About Thai smiles
There are many different qualifications: some have 70 different types of Thai smiles, some of them denote joy, some of them are complete contempt, and so on. This is what farang culture means, which seeks to hang its labels everywhere). People, until you completely do not care - whether the Thai is currently thinking about you or about his crocodiles - you will not be able to communicate normally in this country.
Everything is very simple here.
You just walk down the street, make eye contact with a Thai and in a split second you can choose what to do next - you can look away, or you can smile at him - and then he will definitely smile at you too and then it doesn’t matter! Whether it's a mask or not, whether it's a different culture or not, whether this person thinks about you or not, it's just a SMILE and it's nice.
The same thing happens in an awkward situation. You may frown - as our culture and upbringing have taught us. And you can do it in Thai - smile, laugh. And then the situation itself no longer seems so complicated and it is easier to find a way out of it and you do not put a person in an even more awkward position.
Anyway, Bob Marley rules, nothing matters - sabai sabai and smiles all over the world! What difference does it make if the 56th is a kind of Thai loss or the 13th. It could just be a smile.
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(c) Olga Saliy. Copy material
Living for today is living the Thai way.
The Thai way of life is often compared to the gait of an elephant, the national symbol of Thailand. The same regularity, slowness and absolute acceptance of life. The locals of this country are carefree, cheerful, friendly and very hospitable people.
Like all Buddhists, Thais are tolerant and supportive of people and unassuming in regard to everything that concerns everyday life. They just live, work, rejoice like children - their every day is filled with real happiness!
Thai occupations
And how else, because Thailand is a land with an excellent climate and unusually rich natural resources. It is simply impossible to die of hunger here: the rivers are teeming with fish, the ocean with seafood, and local trees are hung with many fragrant and juicy fruits. It is simply impossible not to enjoy life in such favorable living conditions!
And the Thais rejoice. Their attitude to life fits into three words: sanuk - pleasure, sabai - pleasant, and suai - everything is fine.
The main occupation of the Thais is the cultivation of rice, vegetables, cereals, tea. The orchards harvest bananas, rambutans, peaches, citrus fruits, apples, mangoes and other fruits. They breed ducks, chickens, buffaloes, cows, goats, pigs. Of course, the Thais fish. They catch trout, flounder, lampreys, carp, catfish, collect seaweed and shrimps.
Thai men are engaged in artistic wood carving, processing of precious stones. Thai handicraft women prefer pottery and weaving.
Thai clothes
Thais dress plainly - in panung (pants and skirts in the form of pieces of fabric wound around the hips), shirts and sweaters. Bare feet are normal for a Thai, but sometimes light sandals can be seen on them. The people of Thailand protect their heads from the scorching sun under a hat made of palm leaves.
Thai dwellings
Thais live in one-story houses on stilts, which help save property and the residents themselves in the event of a flood. A couple of rooms, a kitchen and a veranda - what else does a Thai need for a happy life!
By the way, in Thailand it is not customary to receive guests at home, so only a few manage to inspect the home with their own eyes and get acquainted with the life of the Thais. But if you received an invitation from a Thai to visit his house, consider that you have become a true friend for him!
The dishes in the house are pumpkin, coconut, bamboo and ceramic. From it they eat the main food: rice, fish and vegetables. Sometimes, on holidays, duck meat, chicken or pork are served on the table. The meal takes place in the family circle in the kitchen or on the veranda. Mats lie around a tray or a low table on a bamboo floor - family members are placed on them.
Beautiful Thai life
Beauty means a lot to a Thai. They try to see the beauty in everything, and therefore only the most beautiful things surround them in everyday life. It must be said that the Thais have always been famous for their ability to make beautiful little things: whether it be a figurine carved from wood, or a jug hollowed out of a bottle gourd, or an attractive dish served at the table.
Women, trying to always look beautiful, adorn themselves with numerous and varied jewelry. Any purchase for the household is tested for beauty and attractiveness, and then for the need and usefulness. Even Thai men acquire weapons according to such criteria.
Thais are gamers?!
Thais are big hunters for entertainment, fun and joy. This is their understanding of the meaning of life. Therefore, the locals fell in love with different games. There are gambling establishments in every village of the country, where the Thais easily squander their earned money, philosophically referring to the very concept of monetary units. It will be necessary - we will earn! Well, if you want to have fun, then you need to spend money without regret.
Such are they - Thais: an unusually cheerful, simple and at the same time spiritually rich people.
