Bangkok Beckons
By Michael David C. Tan

PHOTO DETAIL, COURTESY OF THE TOURISM AUTHORITY OF THAILAND

Outside Bangkok, the attractions multiply.  Pattaya, which is two hours from capital Bangkok, for example, is as wicked as Bangkok (it has strips after strips of go-go bars), though it is also a jump-off point for many wanting to discover Thailand’s underwater worlds.  Further in the south, in Phuket, which is also as “sinful” as Bangkok (it has, as of last count, 56 homosexual bars, over 120 girlie bars, and over 130 massage parlors that are often fronts for prostitution), there are attractions to discover, too, such as the deserted beaches, uninhabited islands, ancient temples, and the hill tribes that manage to retain their cultural heritage despite the creeping arrival of commercialization in their areas.

And there are more.

Thus, for all its misgivings, said Alberto, “Thailand is a place one can learn to love.”

HOME IS WHERE THE BAHT IS

And love it, many do.

Compared to the Philippines, Thailand counts over 10 million tourists flocking to the country annually.  In fact, according to What’s On Pattaya, over a million visit Pattaya alone very year, and of that, thousands make it their home – additions to those who already did before them.  There are the likes of Murray Hertz, publisher of What’s On (Las Vegas) and What’s On in Manila, who also has a restaurant in Pattaya.  The picture is similar everywhere, too, with even football star David Beckham supposedly buying a Bt7 million property on Koh Samui in July to build his “Asian dreamhouse.”

This is also how the non-Thai business savvy open businesses in Thailand (not just Bangkok) – to service the needs of their fellow farangs.  On Koh Samui, for example, three Britons – Rachel Anderson, Rozalind Thomson, and Emma Dyas – opened Samui Learning Center (SLC) in January 2004.  They now have 75 students paying fees starting from Bt6,000 to Bt7,500.  

“We never thought expected we’d grow this big,” says Anderson, who is SCL’s administration – though they are now one of the preferred schools for children of farangs and non-farangs who want farang education.

In downtown Bangkok, there are the likes of Filipinos Zandro Ontengco, general manager of Wealthship International Cargo Trading Company (WICTC), and Cristina Franco Talens, GM of VGO Cargo.  They, too, found success in offering much needed services not to Thais (though, as Talens says, they’re welcome, too), but to farangs who happened to fall in love with Thailand.  And there are many of them.  Like AJCL’s Ogan, or Samui Express’ Alberto, or What’s On’s Hertz, or SCL’s Anderson, Thomson and Dyas – people who made a home in a beautiful country, also because it’s where, for them, the baht is much, much better.

GLOBAL AWAKENING

Interestingly, even while going to a tourist hot spot like, say, Pattaya is almost like leaving Thailand to go to a mini-country run by farangs, Thais are not as globalized as most other countries with the same level of exposure to expatriates.
For one, there are seemingly outdated practices that continue to be pervasive in Thai life.  Every morning, an old Thai man visits AJCL to bring two roast chickens to feed to the stray dogs that happen to be everywhere in Bangkok (much like the beggars, who, curiously, no one feeds). 

“They could have been my ancestors,” he said to me, proving the saying that “As cows are in India, dogs are in Thailand.” 

Then there are the amulets, said to protect the wearer.  While the Philippines, too, has the anting-anting, in Thailand, the use of the amulet is bordering on fanatical – newborn babies are made to wear chokers with pendants bigger than their fists, many of these amulets bearing images of deities who, curiously, bear resemblance to the present king. 

And then there is the seeming disregard of women, at least when it comes to dealing with them in the presence of monks.  Once o the bus, I saw an old female tourist, who must have been over 50, yelled at (by a woman, too) for not offering her seat to a novice monk, who must have been under 20.  There are worse cases, with pregnant women already in their last trimester, among others,made to stand up for monks, who are not allowed to touch or be touched by women (similar to tattooing, where prayers are tattooed by monks on men – women can’t have them since monks won’t touch them).

It is, indeed, a clashing of the past with the future.

Back at AJCL, Nidnoy W. (tiny in Thai, though Nidnoy was called Tiny for its opposite), the editorial coordinator cum secretary, was, arguably, one of the more cosmopolitan Thais.  Listening to Linkin Park, she “abhors, absolutely abhors pop culture, so Christina Aguilera, Mariah Carey and their ilk are out for me,” she said, as she provides a Thai translation of seafood noodle to me, a visiting Filipino in need of help.  But like many Thais, Nidnoy wears a golden yellow shirt on Mondays – somewhat popularized as a way of paying tribute to the monarchy (an enterprising Thai became a millionaire selling these shirts). 

So while tuning in on 107 FM, one of only three English radio stations in Bangkok (playing the same group of English songs over, and over, and over again for a week, at least, so that, by week’s end, I’ve memorized the words of Michael Bublé’s Everything, Rihanna’s Umbrella, Pussycat Dolls’ Buttons, and Enrique Iglesias’ Pingpong Song), Nidnoy, too, was big on giving abloy – the Buddhist practice of open giving to “pay” for good karma.  Across her desk at AJCL is a spot where the Thai staff put food for everyone to eat.

AJCL is already going into the next stage of publication – braving the information superhighway to adapt to the changing landscape of publication.  The company, said its publisher, is “ready to get bigger.”

Yet again, the company seemed not to wants to take any chances.  In front of the company’s office, jugs of water were placed, the floating water lilies in it hiding the happily swimming guppies.  Harbingers of good luck, said Nidnoy.

Materialism and spiritualism rolled in one. 

Incongruous maybe.