Monthly Archives: December 2004

Thoughts about the Old Year

Almost New Year’s Eve! Are you guys excited? What will you do to celebrate the end of 2004?

My celebrations will be very simple. I usually use this time to reflect on the events of the year, personal and general. I think of the things I wanted to achieve and how far I went to actually make them true. I will think of my life-long dream, in which every year is just a small step.

This year I will also think of my family – my mother and my sister whom I haven’t seen for more than five years, and Grandma, whom I last saw this April. The future, of course, is another thing that I will be thinking more often around this time of the year. All the things I want to achieve by the end of next year; my hopes and dreams.

As you can see, I will do lots of thinking 🙂 . I will have plenty of time for that. All my friends are going home to spend this time with their families, so I’ll be left alone. Also, around that time I planned to go to Burma. We will see.

Dos and don’ts of dating a ‘proper’ Thai girl

DON’TS:

Don’t arrive at you meeting place after her on the first date.
Don’t invite her to a bar/disco on your first date and certainly….
Don’t ask her to bed after your first date.
Don’t misunderstand if she takes her friend along on your first couple of dates, she’s still a little afraid of you.
Don’t sweet-talk too much with “Oooh, I love your..” etc, or she’ll think you’re a playboy.
Don’t visit her parents’ home if you dont want to take the relationship too seriously, she doesn’t want to lose face if you leave her.
Don’t buy her chocolates, she doesn’t want to be overweight for you!! and…
Don’t invite her for a romantic walk along the beach, she doesn’t want to be too darkened for you too!!
Don’t complain about this and that all the time, she wants you to be happy.
Don’t go complaing about all things Thai, or she won’t understand why you chose to live here.
Don’t dress like you stay along Khao Sarn Road, she wants to feel proud of you.
Don’t tell her about any naughty past adventures in Pattaya, or she’ll worry that you will be getting up to some more naughty tricks again soon.
Don’t tell dirty jokes and swear out loud, she likes a polite man.
Don’t shout at the waitress when she gets your order wrong, she doesn’t want you to get all serious!!
Don’t boast that you have this and that, she’s heard it all before.

DOS:

Do realise that if she calls you she likes you.
Do invite her for lunch and a movie on your first date.
Do buy her small inexpensive gifts from time to time, she’ll know that you are thinking about her.
Do be clean and dress neatly, she wants you to smell and look nice.
Do ask her about her mom and dad, she wants you to care about them too.
Do ask to carry her bag for her, she likes a gentleman.
Do speak well about the Thais and her country, she’s proud of her country.
Do invite her to make merit at the temple, she’ll certainly love that.
Do try and not smoke or drink too much, she cares about you health.
Do realise that Thai girls are very close to their family and…..
Do realise that to get into a serious relationship with a Thai means getting into a serious relationship with the whole of her family, she wants them to love you too.
Do realise that date with you is a serious thing for her.
Do realise when you become her boyfriend she will be thinking about getting married one day, and…
Do realise that if she sleeps with you, she will certainly be thinking about getting married one day.
Do realise that if she takes you to meet her parents, she knows that’s the first step to getting married in Thailand.
Do realise that she enjoys doing your washing/cleaning etc.., she wants you to know she would make a good wife.
Do realise that if she asks and cares about your health, she likes you.
Do realise that most Thai girls would prefer a guy that seriously loved her to an unfaithful guy with loads of cash, she wants you to understand that.

Visit Steve’s main page at Steve’s Weblog

A Matter of a Telephone

Can you believe it? How many months have now passed and we still don’t have a telephone at the house! It is extremely difficult to conduct an Internet business without a telephone line. I can check e-mail and upload files at school but Gor has to visit the local Internet cafe. At least these are a lot cheaper than Bangkok. Here it costs 20 baht an hour to play on the Interet while in the city I think it is more like 1 baht per minute. In Thailand there are two telephone companies we can use. TA and TOT. Neither of them have any lines available. How long is it, three months now? Maybe we should try and bribe someone to get things moving. Anyway, once we get a telephone line we have to decide which internet company to use. There is no way I am going back to dial-up. We use broadband at school and everything is so much faster. I had already done a lot of research but that was such a long time ago now. I cannot be bothered to find out the latest until we get a line connected.

Menace of the streets

Yep, another misleading title! If you expected this to be about thieves, burglars and hooligans, sorry. This diary entry is about the four-legged menace of the sois: stray dogs.

I think of them as the Thai equivalent of rats in Western cities in the Dark Middle Ages. They are aggressive, filthy carriers of parasites and disease. Once I saw something that looked like a dog carcass, with huge gaping wounds on its side, rotting. Then, to my shock, it got up and walked away as I got closer.

There are about a dozen stray dogs in the soi I live now. The noise of their constant fighting doesn’t bother me much – in fact, I hear them now as I’m writing. In BKK one becomes oblivious to noises. However, what bothers me is the constant danger they pose to passers-by. Not just to me, the Farang, but to the Thai as well. Luckily, most of their half-hearted attacks are easily fended off.

That’s not the case when I’m on my rollerblades though. A thundering 18-wheeler could not cause as much disturbance as when I’m whizzing by on the streets. They really become aggravated, running after me and barking. I found that if I jump and turn around, landing in reverse direction, they stop immediately. The surprised look in their eyes is priceless. This works with all of them – well, almost. For the really persistent, I actually have to stop and run towards them, making big noise. That makes even the fiercest dog run away. But it is a hassle nevertheless.

Sometimes I think that it is only a matter of time until I meet a dog that bit humans already and got away with it. Then I will be in a big trouble! At one time I considered having a pepper spray with me, but then I knew myself “pre-emptive” is only in the vocab of Dubya Bush and his cohorts. I’d only use it after the attack, and then it wouldn’t accomplish anything other than revenge. So, I have nothing but my wits to deal with this menace of the streets. It worked so far…

The electricity bill – part 2

The bill just came through the post. A little cheaper this time. It was about 1000 baht cheaper at 3199 baht. Some of that would have a lot to do with the homestay guest who has now gone home. He didn’t go out too much and so had the air turned on day and night. I think we will have to rethink the homestay idea.

The bill at the school townhouse was a lot more than mine. What happens there is that the school gives the teachers free accommodation. However, each room has a meter that measures just the use of the air-conditioning units. If they decided to turn on the electric fans then it wouldn’t cost them anything. However, if they used the air then they would get a bill at the end of the month. This may sound harsh but it does work out alright in the long run.

Most Westerners don’t understand how the air-conditioning works. They think it is OK to keep it turned on all the time and that it doesn’t cost much money. We had guests staying at the school before and most of them not only left the air on all day but they often left the door open too. If they were paying for it then the school owners couldn’t get angry they were wasting electricity. We did a few tests at the school townhouse and we worked out that it cost an average of 50 baht a night to use the air-conditioning. Now they have to decide whether it is worth paying that amount each night.