The Thai Pirate - Thai Blog and Travel Stories

Opportunity Knocks in Thailand? I'd tell them to get lost..

I'm currently down in Hua Hin / Pranburi, and have been staying at the same place for a few months. i was at home minding my own on a peaceful Saturday morning, little 'un playing with his little mate, telly on, nice weather etc.

I look over to one of the houses opposite, owned by a Danish fella who had a bad accident back in Denmark and is currently wheelchair bound. Notice two Thai guys in his front room, talking to him. I think nothing of it and carry on pottering.

About 5 minutes later a knock knock on the door. I get up to see the same two guys through the window. A bit surprised, as I open the door I'm greeted by wide grins and 'pleased to meet you', hand shakes instead of wai's....Before I've opened my mouth they are in the front room, and I'm on the back foot.

They are both dressed fairly sharp. The shorter one has a bit of a nasty look about him, pointy features... definitely a bruiser, wide smile but glinty eyes and a teeth or two missing. The other one looks a lot more innocent, taller. 'Good cop bad cop' I thought.

They are busy talking to me, I haven't managed to say anything or ask who they are... What do these guys want?

Pointy sticks a brochure in front of me and fingers at his own face, sitting in a crowd of uniformed Thai's at some photo shoot. He's telling me he's an ever-so important guy, and then pulls out one of those face diagrams with the head honcho at the top.... He's ranking about three quarters up to the right... I notice he's got a picture of a gun and bullets stitched into his t-shirt... not keen on this one.

'Where you from?' Pointy says. England, I say. 'Ooooh, very good, you're a very good man' he says.. Hmmm.

'What do you want?'

'We are from the police and army', says Pointy. 'We are collecting for the officers injured'. He shows me a black and white photo of some guy in a wheelchair.

Police and Army?

He shows me more photos. And then pulls out a little receipt book. Pointing out of the window to a house across the estate he flicks through the pages with various sums of thousands of baht... saying 'man over there give me 8,000 Baht. The guy over there, he gave me 5000 Baht.

'you know, just a small amount' pipes up good cop...

I was surprised at the speed my own anger took hold. Opening the door, I told them to bugger off, and sharpish.... They both looked somewhat aghast, and shuffled out the door, which was quickly shut, and locked behind them.

Pacing around the house walking off the adrenaline, I tried to locate the reason as to why I reacted in such a hostile way.....

Maybe i got angry because I took these two for a couple of tricksters... I certainly didn't like the little one.... Anyone over 12 who walks around with guns and such stitched into their shirt has issues.

Maybe I got angry because I don't feel like i need to give the police more money, as they regularly fleece me and colleagues for what they can get, when they can get it.

But I think mainly, the reason I got so upset was the comment of '5000 baht, you know, small amount'.... To anyone who has lived and worked with Thai's, 5000 Baht is not such a small amount.

There are quite a few occasions in Thailand when you get up close and personal with poverty... Pretty disturbing poverty... The needy in Thailand are not too hard to find.. I would much rather give money to one of the poor souls sprawled out on the baking concrete floor on a Bangkok footpath, or to one of the 5 year old kids dodging traffic selling lucky necklaces.. i'd like one of these two jokers to convince these guys that 5000 baht is 'just a small amount'.

But maybe it is a worthy cause, and I'm just being a mean farang...

Has anyone had a experience when a Thai has knocked at the door, and it is a genuinely worthy cause? Or are these things generally just cheap and nasty scams?

5 things I didn't like about Thailand, but now can't live without

1. unnecessary car park attendents - these guys really used to tick me off. Even THE assumption that I need help parking was enough to annoy me... and the fact that they stood in the way of the reversing car whilst blowing their whistle and waving their hands about made them fair game as roadkill.

Now: I love these people. If they are not there when I pull up I get nervous.

2. M150 - just an insane amount of sugar... Knocks redbull into a hat... ... I drink this stuff everyday now, to such an extent, it's worrying.

3. toilet bum gun - I thought this thing was just absolutely awful on first experience... three years down the line... I can't live without them. Toilet roll is for dirty people.

4. real Thai restaurants - Dirty grey buildings, breeze blocks, metal tables and plastic chairs, who could possibly enjoy eating in one of these places...! You'd surely die?? Wrong. Great food, unbeatable value.

5. Chang beer - Never liked this when I first arrived.. I remember thinking the taste wasn't a patch on a pint of stella or kronenberg.. How times have changed. It' gorgeous.

Surviving diarrhea in a nasty hong nam

No matter how long you have been in Thailand, getting caught with a sudden and overpowering need to visit the toilet can effect anyone, from the hardiest expat to the newbiest newcomer.. And it can happen at anytime and anywhere. I've been in Thailand for two and half years now, I thought I was pretty immune to most of the bugs, I've had no toilet drama for ages... But on a trip to BKK last week I once again experienced that sudden and overpowering volcano in the pit of my stomoch, and had to swerve into the nearest garage to let go.

So, for ground-in expats, tourists, and visitors to Thailand, here is the Thai Pirate's guide to surviving diahorrea in a nasty (hole in the ground) pong nam.

1. Survey the vicinity for the best 'hole in the floor'.

2. Enter the toilet location.

3. Remove all clothes, including socks, pants, trousers, shoes, t-shirts etc.

Best to hang clothes, including socks, as the toilet floor will be sopping wet. If there is nothing to hang them on, look for the usual suspects i.e a door knob / old nail etc. If none, pile your clothes on top of your shoes.

4. Now you're naked, you can move around the toilet freely, without ruining your Sunday best. This is important, because the last thing you need after dealing with diarrhea in a pong nam is to have to walk around for the rest of the day with cack on your kecks.....

5. Survey the hole, and prepare to mount. With Thai 'hole in the floor' toilets, they usually have foot markers on the sides of the 'bowl' to show where your feet go ... Most 'holes' are raised up on some kind of plinth, so whilst navigating the sopping wet floor, try to balance yourself competently whilst finding the foot markers.

6. You are now in an extremely bizarre position I call the 'preying mantis'. As you squat, you can tilt yourself to accurately align the bomb doors. It can be gruesome, but, no matter how hard you try not too look, you actually have to... Bombs away!

7. When finished, hopefully over to your side will be a trough of water. If you are lucky, there will be a dish or bucket available, to scoop up some of the water. If you are exceptionally lucky, one of these will have some type of handle, allowing you to lift the receptical up and under with one hand, whilst the other scoops and washes 'the other hole' with the cold stuff.....

8. Now you're pretty much all done, carefully, stepping down from the hole, back down to the floor..... Your clothes are all still nice and dry (not so had you attempted to do this whilst wearing them) and can be donned accordingly, and you can leave, relieved.

Hopefully there will be soap in the sinks outside, if not, best not to shake anyones hand for a bit..

Well done. You survived the trots in the Thai pong nam...

A quick glance at Bangkok architecture

Just browsing through some snaps when I came across this little gem. If you glance at the many different types of buildings, you can see that Bangkok really does have a rather confused personality..

In the background, you have all manner of modern shapes and colours among the taller buildings (note the funky pink one on the right hand side).

To the left of the shot, you have a rather strangely shaped, colonial style block, with the Thai style green awning just above the doorway at pavement level (forget fusion cooking, this is fusion architecture).

In the foreground, the seemingly 'burnt out' square shell, with old roof tops that look like they've taken a real battering over the last 20 or so years... the patchy paintwork and black holes for windows really make it look as though a bomb has gone off inside and left the whole thing derelict... Interestingly, I've heard that the black stuff you often see on the walls of Bangkok buildings is not in fact soot or dirt, but algae....  Several International companies are planning to make a lot of money by distributing paint that guarantees the algae cannot survive, so I'm told.

And last but not least, in the middle, that lovely sea of green....

Depending on how you look at it, it is as if the urban landscape has crushed this vegetation into one tiny area; slowly, but gradually, reducing it... Or perhaps the greenery is growing back, pushing itself outwards, amongst the buildings, and once again into the city.

Sam Moo-un

Some of you may know that myself, wife and son were involved in a collision a while back. It was quite bad, a motorcycle pulled out in front of my car whilst he was doing a U turn (we were doing around 90km in the middle lane of 3 lane highway, 4 lanes if you count the U turn lane). He was in his sixties and wearing no helmet. He swears the whole thing was my fault, although I'm pretty confident all he can really remember is waking up a week or so later..

He was badly hurt. My family nor I were, thank god (...no thanks to him).

After several visits to the police station, and despite the advice of some, it was clear that to end the matter it was best to pay over some money to the injured party.

The amount was the key to the whole thing, they initially wanted 80k, I told them I'd pay 10k (insert holy grail quote - 10 sheckles for that, you must be mad etc).

Long story short, we agreed some while back to pay 'sam moo-un' (30k).

I'm not a rich man, to me, 30k is 30k (around 600 quid) and it's more difficult to swallow when you come from the UK, where this matter would be open and shut (mate, you weren't wearing a helmet, you drove across me, on a motorway, end of, goodbye).

But, when in Rome, and having to sit opposite his wife in the final meeting (who was always OK with me, despite clearly difficult circumstances) I said no problem to 30k let it be an end to the whole damn thing (which had dragged on, albeit in the background, for too long).

Some may think I should pay more... some may think I should not have paid at all.

To be frank, the father and son involved were difficult people. I was threatened by the son in front of the cops, and called alot of names by the father (he refused any responsibility). I'm aware some of it is 'heat of the moment' stuff, but it left a bad taste, and a reluctance on my part to give anything, especially as I was the only one down on hands and knees in the road trying to keep the bugger alive, whilst all the other onlookers ignored any pleas to lend a hand..

(If somebody can offer any explanation why all the bystanders were so reluctant to help out, please let me know, because I am still having trouble understanding this part of thai culture).

Anyways, it's over now, thank Christ.

(side note: even though we settled, I hear from the law guy they are still unhappy, refusing to pay the cops 3k admin fee, stomping their feet saying I should pay it). Some people are just never satisfied, after all, it's a miracle this guy is still breathing....

Is there any sort of moral to the story?

Not really. It was horrible. In hindsight I feel better for paying some money, not sure how I'd feel now if I just walked away and ignored it all.

I'm very glad he survived, and wish him all the best... I suppose if he'd of been more passive 'post-accident', he may have got less money, so I guess that makes some sense?

The REAL moral of the story? Watch those ROADS in THAILAND folks. Accidents are very much dealt with between the parties involved, 'mediated' over by the police.

By all means, if you are involved in an accident and feel like it wasn't your fault say so and stand your ground... depending on the circumstances it may possibly blow over... At some points during this mess, I was up for seeing it through to court, looking back the thought seems absurd now, and it would probably have never happened... I could have probably dug my heels in, but in hindsight I'm glad I didn't.

Sometimes it better to pay up and move on... Mai pen arai and all that... Watch out for those motorcyclists, especially the ones without helmets, or 'Sam Moo-un's', as I now call them.