I thought I would write about what it’s actually like to live in Thailand, and in a small provincial town like Prachinburi.
It probably seems really exciting to you! It can get to be just the norm for us, though. We get up, go to work….just like everyone else. It can be hard to remember that we’re in a less-than-normal situation!
The people here in Prachin are curious about us, endlessly. They are really fascinated to find out whether we can eat spicy food! It causes much oohing and aahing if we tell them that we can. Thais are fascinated by the whole issue of food and eating, anyway. Instead of “How are you?”, they will commonly say “Have you eaten yet?”. There is one word for “eat”, (“kin”) in Thai, but more usually people say “kin kow” which literally means “eat rice” – rice is a cultural icon.
If I speak Thai, it goes down very well. People are amazed if you can, and it’s great knowing the general words surrounding the subject of whether I can, like “Poot Thai dai!” (“She can speak Thai!”), because then I can listen to people’s reaction to my speaking Thai. If I speak some Thai to someone, it’s fun to be able to hear that person then exclaim to their friend that I can do it! If you know even the smallest amount, just a few words, then it’s really appreciated and breaks down so many barriers, because the people I do business with don’t generally speak English (stall-holders in the market, people in shops). It relaxes everyone. But then I can go to the market and ask for specific things, and do the whole transaction in Thai, and that’s when it really gets good. I really enjoy it, and so do they.
It can be frustrating being a woman in Asia sometimes! If I’m with Rob, many people will talk to him and not to me, as if he is the one who takes care of business. (Not half as bad as India, though, I must say.) There are things I know how to say in Thai, though, that Rob doesn’t, such as in the market situation; I’m the one who generally goes shopping for ingredients, so I know how to ask for almost all of the things I ever buy, so if Rob and I go to the market then I still do the asking!
The weather is always warm, apart from evenings and early mornings at the moment. The temperature has been dropping to 16 or 18 degrees C (a drop of about 12-15 degrees), so it really does feel cold. Time for socks, woolly cardies, and - ! – sleeping under a cotton sheet! Extreme measures. When I hear that it’s -5 in England and -12 in Boston, Massachusetts, I just cannot imagine how cold that must feel. I honestly have forgotten how it feels to be freezing cold. It’s NOT fun having no hot water and a tiled bathroom when it’s cold outside! When I want a warm shower, I have to boil the kettle, pour it into a bucket, top it up with cold water, and then scoop it over myself with a plastic bowl. It’s not as rustic as it might sound, but it’s far removed from a nice comfy bathroom! And when I get cold, I get the strong desire for a nice hot bath, and every time I want one I have to tell myself that I can’t. Boo! And then, of course, most of the time it’s warm/hot, and a cold shower is really nice! So the bucket method is almost alright for when it’s so cold. Almost…
Riding your bike in town is often pretty hair-raising. People here drive with their faith in the Lord Buddha: this means that a lot of the basic road-safety concepts are cast aside. The main roads in Prachin are wide, with both lanes wide enough for 2 vehicles. Last week I was riding along and almost got flattened by a pick-up truck. I was coming up to a T-junction, waiting to turn left into the main road, and the truck turned right off that main road. But it drove into the wrong lane and straight at me.
Just one example.
I do love having a bike to ride around, though- such freedom to just jump on it and go. When we move back to Bangkok, we will still be able to have bikes – the area we’re moving to is actually quite similar to Prachinburi, so we’ll be able to ride around and go to the local shops, etc.
In Prachin, you often see whole families on a single motorcycle! I have seen families of 4 on one. A child in front, a parent sitting behind and driving, another child standing on the seat behind that parent, and then the other parent at the back. Sometimes it’s a child in front, then mum driving, then 2 more kids behind her. Or last week I saw 4 teenage girls on one. In Trat I saw a woman with her little baby – but she was riding the motorbike and the baby was in the basket……I don’t even want to think about that. Lots of people let their small dog ride in the basket – that’s very common to see.
And on Saturday, I saw the best yet – a pig in a tuk-tuk! A huge hog, on its way to market, I assume.
If I ride along on my bike in shorts and a vest, as a lot of Thai girls do, I will very often get shouts of “beautiful”! That’s to do with the Thai obsession with white skin. If you try to buy some facial moisturiser, it is almost impossible to get any that is not “whitening”. Everything is “whitening” this or that. Roll-on deodorants included – because of course you must have white armpits! I needed a bit of moisturiser for my face in the cold, windy weather, so I bought a little sachet of it, and it was a whitening one. I used it the other day, and later on I noticed that there was a white mark down the side of my face, like a residue of soap. I realised after a minute – it was the whitening stuff in the cream! It had left a film of whiteness on my skin. It rubbed off, and was almost like a minutely thin layer of plastic. It sounds so weird, but it’s true. And there is barely a Thai woman who doesn’t aspire to being fair-skinned. If you have pale skin you are automatically more beautiful than a darker-skinned person (and I say ‘person’ because you can get whitening products for men, too), and it has been said that if you are beautiful in Thailand then life is much easier. So there’s this huge market for whitening products, and recently some Thai trading-standards body banned 55 or so skincare products because they were actually unsafe to use!
I’ll post an article about the whitening phenomenon in another blog entry.
Well, that was part 1 of these musings about my life in Thailand. If there’s anything you want to know about, ask me!
