Why I Decided Not to Retire in Thailand After My First Visit
I think the first thing I need to say is that I really did like Thailand. I enjoyed visiting and spending my time there and I thought I would want to go again until I could finally retire. I’ve not yet made my mind up if I want to retire to Thailand or if I will retire somewhere else. I’ll get to that later.
But I wanted to share some feelings that I have about Thailand that I think many people overlook. Maybe that way you can help some people make more informed decisions on whether they want to visit or retire to Thailand. My first time to Thailand, I was excited to finally see what all the fuss was about. Seems to be a common occurrence. People watching videos on YouTube of other people’s lives, living fantastic lives in Thailand, and getting sucked into the idea that hang on, I can do that as well. So based on how great Thailand looked as shown by YouTubers, I decided to go and visit. The first time was after COVID. many YouTubers helped me through being stuck at home and I felt like as soon as I could go to Thailand without having to do any of that quarantine stuff, I would.
First Impressions of Bangkok
My first impressions of Thailand were distinctly positive. Arriving in Bangkok is like arriving nowhere else. I don’t really spend time anywhere apart from Europe and had never been to Asia or the Americas or Africa. So, I didn’t really know what to expect. I knew it was going to be wild, potentially crazy, and that it was very different to Europe. In Thailand, at least, that’s what some of the guys on YouTube said. They didn’t have all this health and safety nonsense that we do back in the West. And in the West, I feel like things have been taken away and taken out of proportion. And in Thailand, it’s not like that. You can still make your own decisions, even if that could lead to something negative happening to yourself.
I’ve always believed in personal freedom. And that’s one of the things that I thought I would be attracted to in Thailand. I stayed in a hotel in Patpong in Bangkok. It was about 500 m from the BTS Skytrain. And in hindsight, I regret not booking something a bit closer to the BTS. Every time I went somewhere, it was a long walk to the station. By the time you’ve made it there, you’re already wet through. I never got used to how hot and humid it was in Thailand, completely different to where I came from, where it’s usually raining and miserable and gray. If I was to do Thailand again, I’d make sure I’d stayed right on the doorstep of a BTS station, and it would be a lot more convenient. And that’s what I’d recommend anybody else doing if they’re thinking about going to Thailand and haven’t been before.
The hotel itself was good, a decent pool, and the breakfast wasn’t bad, although I found myself missing it on many days because I wasn’t waking up before 10:00, thanks to the legendary Bangkok nightlife.
Feeling Unwelcome: A Tolerated Guest
The thing that struck out to me though was that I didn’t feel like a welcome tourist. That might have just been my own personal experience, but I have to tell it like it is. And I have to be truthful and honest. I didn’t feel like I was welcome with open arms. It felt like I was a tolerated guest. All the better when I am to leave. I’ve got a few examples that I wanted to share and I don’t know if anybody else has experienced similar things in Thailand. So, please understand that these are just my own personal observations and feelings. It doesn’t mean they’re right or wrong. It’s just how I personally felt.
I’ll get into the first incident very soon, but it would be interesting to know if other people feel the same way or is it just me thinking too much about certain events that I overplayed in my own mind. It would be interesting to understand what other people think. So, I’ll be watching the comments of the video if you choose to put it up on your channel, and I’m excited to see if it’s only me.
Soi 22: The First Bar Experience
So, I’ll take you to the first example. It was my second night in Bangkok, and I walked from my hotel all the way to Soi 22. I’d heard there were some bars on the street, and I wanted to go and see them firsthand. The previous night when I arrived, I just stayed close to my hotel, went to get some street food, and then relaxed trying to get over the long flight. I wanted to save my second night to go and check out the nightlife.
So, I’m walking from my hotel. I walked past the BTS station and crossed the road to where that park is. I don’t know the name of the park, but it’s the one next to the Emporium Mall. The park is on my left and I’m walking towards the side I wanted to be on. My plan was to spend a couple of hours there before going further down to some of the streets I hear talked about more often on videos about Thailand. No real plans though, and I couldn’t wait to finally get a taste of what it was all about. So many people talk about it in their videos and so many people talk about it on the forums and I’d already been told and I’d seen it all now. It was my time to finally be the one living it.
When I made it to the street, there were some bars right on the corner next to the main road and I went in the first one that I saw. I think it was called Connection or something like that. I can’t remember. But I walked in and I ordered a beer. It was still early evening and there weren’t many people there. A lot of girls in the bar, but I think I was the only customer at that point. No idea what to expect. This was my first time experiencing a bar in Bangkok or even in Thailand. And I knew what the game was. I could buy a drink for the girls or one of the girls or some of the girls and we could see if we wanted to take things any further.
So, I’m there with a beer in my hand, a Leo, and lots of girls kept coming up and asking if they wanted me to sit next to them. I’m being truthful here. I didn’t really feel it from any of the girls that were there, so I politely declined and finished my beer and paid the bill. No problem so far. I felt when you said no to one of the girls that approached you, she quickly walked away and wasn’t overly pushy and wasn’t trying to get anything out of you when it was clear you weren’t interested.
The Whiskey Drink and the Pool Game
Move on to the next bar further down the street. At a guess I would say it was 200 m into the street and I walked in as I did with the last one and ordered a Leo. This time there were quite a few girls that I fancied and when one of them walked over and asked if she could have a drink, I told her yes and she ordered herself a drink. This is one of the things that turned me off and I would see it becoming a regular occurrence on my time visiting the bars. The thing was when she ordered a drink, she ordered a very small glass of whiskey, soda water, and Coke. Apparently, the whiskey was called Sang Som, the really cheap Thai brand. That in itself wasn’t much of a concern to me, but the drink was so tiny that she had and two swigs in would have been finished, and I had a beer in my hand that would have taken longer to drink. I expected her to get a beer as well, but it didn’t really matter. But I do think that’s a bit of a turnoff when you’re drinking these really cheap whiskey drinks that are so small in comparison to your drink, and it doesn’t last very long. I didn’t find one girl on my whole trip that wanted to drink beer with me. Apparently, they weren’t allowed in some places, but it wasn’t much of a problem, but it would have been more fun if we were drinking beers together and cheersing the beers.
So, I’m drinking my beer and she’s delicately sipping on whatever it was. And there was a pool table and she asked if I wanted to play. I wasn’t much of a pool player. The pool in Thailand is very different to how it was at home. I think the pool in Thailand is more the American kind. In England, we have the red and yellow balls and the black ball, and the tables are a lot smaller. So, I was struggling to play the game with her because I wasn’t used to the size of the table, and because I didn’t really play, but that was fine. It was still fun, and I was able to chat with her while we were playing.
She quickly finished her drink, and I asked if she wanted one more, and she got that, but I was still only halfway through my beer. Then she asked if I wanted to put a wager on the game of pool. Now I knew I was going to lose, but I thought that’s fair enough. And we agreed to 100 baht per game. I lost and gave her 100 baht. I lost again and gave her another 100 baht. And then I won because she potted the black ball by accident, but she didn’t give me 100 baht. She just looked at me and smiled and said, “I will give you a kiss instead.” I didn’t really mind, but a deal is a deal, I thought. and I wasn’t going to take the money from her, but I expected her to hand it over and I would have said, “No, don’t worry about it.” But it didn’t happen like that.
I ordered myself another beer and her another drink, and we stopped playing pool and just chatted for a while. She downed the drink very quickly, but she didn’t ask for another one until she saw my beer was nearly empty. But I said, “When my beer was empty, I’ll just get a beer for myself and maybe order one more for you soon.” She said okay with a smile on her face and just stood up and walked away. I felt that was really disrespectful. It was not like there was anyone else in the bar. It was just me. I was the only customer in there and she had no one else to talk to to get any drinks from. I was even thinking about going with her out of the bar. But when she did that, it was clearly obvious that she was extremely good at acting because when I didn’t buy her that last drink, I just felt it was so obvious what game she was playing. So I paid the bill and left.
Now, that experience to people who have been in Thailand for a long time, and I’ve seen it and been told by people is quite common, and it’s nothing shocking, but I felt really hurt in that moment. I’d given her some money when she won the pool. I bought her two drinks, and I wanted to talk with her more to see if we could take things further. But her complete lack of respect and her complete lack of willingness to act without a drink by her side turned me off that day and made me feel like I was nothing short of a walking ATM. As long as money is coming out, things are good. When the money stops, no, you’ve got no chance. That was the first example of that happening, and it was only the smallest of the things.
I do know that I was in a bar, but I do believe that she should have still sat down with me and talked to me to see if we could have come to any arrangements, but she clearly showed her interest was only money, and that wasn’t with me, and potentially maybe it was a blessing. I did go to some of the other bars. Soi 4 was my next stop, but like a lot of people say, I found it too busy. You couldn’t have an intimate experience because there were just so many people all crowded around. Some went into the bars and had drinks like I did and then just left because it was too busy. But I didn’t have any interactions with any of the girls, but I didn’t want to and I went back to my hotel and called it a night.
I had a bit of a sour taste in my mouth just thinking about how upfront and blatant the money grabbing was. I knew that in Thailand people wanted money from you for doing things, but the way they did it made it look so obvious and blatant. I did find it to be hurtful. I have to tell you the truth, and I really do.
Back at the hotel, I was going to go for a swim only to find out that the pool closed at 8:00 p.m. I thought that was a joke when they told me that. People there on holiday, surely the pool should be open 24 hours a day. You’re busy in the daytime doing things. You go out at night, have some drinks and a meal, and you come back and it’s after the time you can swim and you can’t go. I wondered what sort of halfwit would come up with an idea like that. But I had to put up with the fact that I had a hotel with a pool and I couldn’t use it because the time I wanted to swim, they closed the damn thing.
The Longtail Boat Incident
I spent another 3 days in Bangkok and I had another incident that made me feel like I was simply a walking ATM yet again. As soon as it has money in it, it’s great. You’re able to function and get some level of respect from people, but as soon as the ATM is broken, well, just forget it. It’s over.
I wanted to go for a boat ride on the Chao Phraya River. I went into a tour shop close to where my hotel was and what they were quoting I found to be very overinflated based on what I understood. I wanted to go by myself on one of those longtail boats, go around the river and then into some of the back canals, look at the real Bangkok to see what it was like. But the prices that the tour companies quoted, some of them in excess of 5,000 baht, seemed to be crazy.
So after doing a bit of Googling, I went to Saphan Taksin BTS station and walked to the river close by. It’s the same location as you get on the boat to go to Icon Siam Mall and they had a little stall there selling boat trips. I told them what I wanted and they said that’s not a problem at all. It would be 3,000 baht. I can’t even remember if it was for 1 hour or 2 hours, most likely one. and that sounded fair to me and I paid the money and waited on the dock for the boat to arrive.
15 minutes later, this longtail boat pulled up and the driver appeared friendly enough. He didn’t speak much English, but that wasn’t a problem and we set off on our way. I was extremely disappointed to learn that they forced me to wear a life vest. No, I’m thinking I’d left England to get away from this health and safety crap. Don’t tell me Thailand’s falling for it as well. I’m the type of person that would rather fall in the river and drown than be told to wear a life vest. Maybe that’s an extreme and not actually true, but I tried to explain that the boat driver wasn’t wearing a life vest. So why do I have to put up with it and ended up wearing it? I wasn’t going to let it ruin the trip I’d already paid for. Would I have paid them the money if I’d have known I would have to have worn a life vest? I probably wouldn’t if I’m being honest. But there you go.
So, we set off down river. The scenery around Bangkok was spectacular. I wondered what it would be like to live in some of the condominiums dotted along the river. But seeing the hotels and the old sites and hearing the sounds was remarkable, although it was quite difficult to listen to Bangkok with the noise of the engine.
About 5 minutes into the trip, we turned right off the river down into some canals. You could tell they had gate systems in place. It looked like a sophisticated affair. Then we go down 10 more minutes, and I was having a good time, really enjoying myself, thinking this was definitely worth the money. I’m really happy I came. That was until the boat driver turned the engine off and three people on small canoes. And on those canoes, they had all kinds of tourist tat that nobody could possibly want. Small wooden elephants, drinks that were far more expensive than in the local shops. And that in itself I didn’t see to be a problem. But it was the attitude of the boat driver that upset me.
“You buy something from them,” he said. “They poor.” All this stuff that he was saying as though he was pressuring me to buy something from these people. I didn’t want anything. I tried to make it abundantly clear that I didn’t want anything. I’ve just paid you 3,000 baht for this trip. Now, if you were taking me for free, I’d happily let you stop off at these places, but I was paying you for a trip, and you had no right to stop next to these people and try to get me to buy overinflated tourist tat. I bet he would be getting a commission on everything that they sold, which is why he was so incredibly pushy. He didn’t just say one time, “Would you like to buy anything from them?” If you don’t, it’s fine. He was on it and on it and on it and by by by by by. And I started feeling a bit of pressure, like maybe I should buy something.
But I stood my ground and said, “I don’t want to buy anything.” I could see the behavior of the driver change when he found out I wasn’t going to buy. He wasn’t smiling anymore. He wasn’t pointing out the monitor lizards in the water anymore. He wasn’t telling me the names of the temples that we drove past or sailed past. He was just driving with a sulky look on his face. The rest of the trip wasn’t as fun. I felt a bit on edge, but it was great to see that part of Bangkok. And it’s not what everyone gets to see.
We did like a full circle and made it back to the Chao Phraya River about 40 minutes later and we returned to the same dock. I got off the boat and thanked him and he still had a sulky look on his face and he held out his hand saying “tip, tip.” Now I’m from England. I know in America there is an insane tipping culture, but in England there’s not. And I didn’t see why I would have to give this guy a tip for giving me a boat trip that we’d already been paid for. If he’d not taken me to see those people selling stuff I didn’t want and trying to force me to buy things for 10 minutes. If he didn’t sulk for the rest of the trip, I may have given him a tip, but he didn’t do anything that warranted me giving a tip. And again, I just felt like I was a walking ATM. Another really sour taste left in my mouth. And I went on that trip. I went back to the hotel wondering if everyone just saw me as an ATM. That was my time in Bangkok.
Chiang Mai: More of the Same
Next, I was going to Chiang Mai. So, of course, you get the first taxi meter that you see, tell him you want to go to Don Mueang airport. He says, “Okay.” You put your bag in the car and sit down and close the door. Then he says, “500 baht.” And you just look at him like, “Don’t do this. I can’t be bothered. Stop trying to scam me.” I just looked at him with disgrace. It’s a meter taxi. I tried to explain to him. Put the meter on. Then he said 400 baht. I’m starting to get really upset now because everything is about trying to get money out of you, more money than is the actual amount. And I told him to turn the effing meter on. I’m not proud that I used that word, but I couldn’t understand why he just didn’t want to put the meter on because I wasn’t Thai. He refused, so I got out. I hadn’t yet downloaded the Grab app, which I did later on.
So, I got in another taxi and I said meter before I stepped in. And all credit to the guy, he said, “Of course,” and put the meter on. And he didn’t try to scam me. But that happened so many times when I’ve been in a taxi, always wanting to rip you off. Turn the meter on. But lots of them around the tourist areas don’t want to. All they want is your money.
I flew to Chiang Mai, went to my hotel. I didn’t really know what to make of Chiang Mai. To me personally, it didn’t live up to all the hype that many people put on it. But I suppose it was a quiet, peaceful place. I put my stuff in the hotel and went outside. I was staying in the old city and there were some things I wanted to do there based on videos I’d seen before I went out for a drink.
One of those was to go up Doi Suthep, the famous mountain that overlooks the city. There were lots of those red cars close to my hotel, and when you walk past, they call out to you to see if you want to ride. I said I wanted to go to Doi Suthep and the guy said he’d take me and wait for me and bring me back. He wanted 1,000 baht. That sounded extortionate, but he told me he wouldn’t pick up anybody else along the way. I didn’t know what the real price was, but I could see the mountain in the distance from where we were standing, and it did look like a long way. And if you have to wait for me as well, I thought maybe it’s not too bad. I got him down to 800, and I thought it was fair. In hindsight, I should have just hired a motorcycle for 200 baht, but I didn’t know that for a few days.
So, we set off on the way and I can see the mountain in the distance and we’re getting closer to it. Then the guy pulls over and somebody looks in the cab at the front to talk to him. And then they jumped in the back of the truck as well. I thought I was paying for a private ride. Now, I don’t mind sharing, but I was paying for a private ride. Yet, he picked up four people along the route and stopped and dropped them off along the road. I was the only one going up the mountain with him, but I felt it was a bit of a cheat to tell me one thing and then do something else. But that not the problem at the end of the day.
So we get up the mountain to the top. I choose to walk up the steps instead of going on whatever it calls that pulls you up. Funicular railway is it? I can’t remember. Can’t be bothered to Google it. So I walk to the top and there’s a big sign saying foreigners 50 baht. Talk about leaving another sour taste in your mouth. Foreigners are not ATMs. But that’s how it made me feel. I’ve never heard of dual pricing before, but I thought the practice was disgusting. Imagine having dual pricing in England, charging people from somewhere else more money to go on the London Eye, for example. It just wouldn’t happen. But the views from the top are great, and I had a great time having a look, and I walked down again.
Then you’re accosted by all the shop owners trying to sell you more tourist tat. Some of them are friendly and nice, but it’s the odd one that is so pushy and has the look on your face like it’s your job to open up your wallet and buy stuff from them, even if you don’t want to. I have to stress that it’s not all the sellers that acted like this. But when one of them does it, it paints all of them with the same brush. And I left back onto the red car feeling again like I was just seen as a walking ATM. When you go to places like Spain or France or Greece, you don’t have people that are looking at you like you’re a walking ATM. But in Thailand, that’s exactly how I was feeling.
So the guy takes me back to my hotel and drops me off again. He says, “Tip, tip.” We’d agreed on a price. You hadn’t actually done anything other than drive me to where we agreed, but I ended up giving him an extra 100 baht. It’s not like he was above and beyond what his job was providing and the best experience I’d ever had. If he had, then I probably would have given him a large tip. But he simply driven me there and waited and taken me back for an agreed price. Then he wanted a tip. My time in Thailand is going on, but I’m becoming more and more disappointed because everywhere I go, apart from a few exceptions, I was just feeling like everybody around me wants to get things out of me and that’s all they wanted and nothing else. They can’t get anything out of me. they lose interest.
Loi Kroh Road and the Boxing Stadium
I decided to go to a bar that evening on Loi Kroh Road, the bar right on the corner next to the moat. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the drinks in Chiang Mai were a lot cheaper than they were in Bangkok. In some places, a large beer was cheaper than a small beer in Bangkok. And that makes a big difference, especially to guys on a budget. So, I had a beer in there. Then, I walked a bit further down and had a beer somewhere else. And a pork chop. Can’t remember the name of the restaurant, but it was decent.
Then I walked down to the boxing stadium and there was a fight going on when I was there. And I walked in and they tried to get me to pay to watch, but I didn’t want to. There was another guy there who was with his Thai partner. Not sure if it was his girlfriend or wife or he’d just met her, but he wanted to go and watch the boxing. 500 baht for him, free for his Thai partner. Talk about dual pricing right in front of you. Again, it’s really upsetting to see things like that. Why should a foreigner pay 500 baht and a Thai person pay nothing? At least that’s what he told me was going on and he was shaking his head in disgust.
I walked down approaching the boxing ring and picked a bar on the left walking side and just ordered a drink. And these bars were more similar to the ones I’d been to in Bangkok. It was quite busy in there and I was speaking to one girl and she looked nice, buying drinks for her and we were playing pool. I’d guess I’d been there for about an hour and I’d bought her four drinks and I’d had four small beers. Things are looking fun. I’m smiling with her and joking with each other and I’m thinking perhaps I want to take things further. Then somebody else walks in, another customer, and sits down at the bar. Immediately she stopped talking to me, went over and sat down next to him. Then another girl approached me instead. Oh, that’s her boyfriend or something like that. I doubt it was her actual boyfriend. Maybe just a guy who’d been in before I had.
And everything I had up until that point, I still had to pay full price for even though she just left. I thought that was disrespectful because I already had her in my company. He should have had to wait. And again, it left me with a bitter taste in my mouth or sour, should I say. No customer service. No customer is always right. Nothing. just thank you for the four drinks, but I’m going to go now. At the very least, she should have forfeited her commission on those drinks if she chose to leave. But when I wasn’t ready, but I suppose that’s part of her game and her life, and she has to do what’s best for her, even though it makes a customer feel like crap. Just went back to my hotel.
I had a few good days in Chiang Mai. always little incidents cropping up every now and then that kept repeating and making me feel nothing more than I was just there to give people money.
Pattaya: The Final Straw
I had one place left to visit and that was Pattaya. I flew from Chiang Mai back down to Bangkok. This time I had already the Grab app that I’d used a few times since I’d been in Chiang Mai. It was so much better than having to negotiate with taxis and tuk tuk drivers because the price was the price. Highly recommended. But in Bangkok, I arrived at Don Mueang airport, which I had to use a taxi from. And in hindsight, I should have flown to the other airport instead because it was closer to Pattaya, but only a small error. And I went to the taxi area and told them I wanted to go to Pattaya. Everything was agreed and I arranged and I jumped in the taxi and we set off.
No problems so far, but the driver had to pull over to put some fuel inside. I find it quite weird that he had a huge gas tank in the boot of the car, but I suppose LPG is cheaper. The place we stopped, I don’t know how to describe it. You’re driving on the highway and then all of a sudden you got rows and rows and rows of restaurants and things where you can buy things like McDonald’s, Burger King, Subway, so many different Western chains all in this, I suppose you’d call it a service station.
I decide I’m hungry and I want something to eat. a good old McDonald’s. Can’t go wrong with a double cheeseburger. So, I ordered it and was eating it outside the guy’s taxi and he was just standing relaxing and he looked over at some of the things that were for sale in the open fronted shops. Don’t know how else you could describe them, like little jars of what looked like sauce and crispy pork that you dipped into it. The taxi driver just looked at me and say, “You buy for me.” I thought he was joking, but he wasn’t. I felt so uncomfortable and I ended up giving him the 200 baht to buy it. But again, another incident of being treated like an ATM. We’d agreed on the price of the taxi. I was happy to pay what we agreed, but he asked for something extra on top of that. Some crispy pork and some green colored thick sauce, whatever it was.
I need to stress that all these small incidents weren’t making me extremely worked up. I wasn’t getting angry because of them. I was just feeling that is this what Thailand is all about? When you’re living in Thailand and everybody’s out to get something from you, that makes you feel like that’s what you’re there for. I wonder if there’s a portion of the population in Thailand that looks at foreigners and thinks that the only reason they’re there is to bring money into the country. I don’t believe that is how people should be looked at. I think it’s disrespectful, but again, that sour or bitter taste in your mouth. But we headed to Pattaya. He didn’t ask for a tip when he dropped me off at the hotel, but I got there, checked in, and dropped off my things in the room and went out.
I’m going to have to be a contrarian to most of the guys that send their stories in because I didn’t really like Pattaya. I liked what you could do in Pattaya, but I found it was too busy and I didn’t want to let that put me off and I just overlooked how busy it was. Realizing I was also contributing to the busyness of it, I left the hotel and went for a walk around. I just felt like a tourist when I was there. I know I was a tourist, but I didn’t feel like a tourist in Bangkok. I didn’t feel like a tourist in Chiang Mai. But in Pattaya, I felt like I was nothing more than a tourist. That didn’t itself, I suppose, become an issue because I was a tourist. But I didn’t want to feel like that. After all, I was here seeing if Thailand was going to be somewhere I wanted to retire.
So, I’m walking down the street and every massage shop that you walk past tries to call you in. Some of them grab onto you and try to pull you into their shops. And it makes me think when they’re calling at you and trying to get you into their massage shops, do they see you as a person or do they see you as a body carrying a wallet with money inside that they want? Although some of the girls were playful and amusing, to me it just felt like they would have preferred it if it was a wallet levitating past their shop and they could hold it and take the money out. Forget about the human being attached to the wallet. Forget that they have feelings and are a person. All they want is the money in Pattaya and I felt like I was a walking ATM anywhere I went. You even walk past some restaurants and guys that didn’t look anything like a Thai. I don’t know how they were legally working on the streets, but that really disappointed me seeing people like that touting. Wouldn’t have been as bad if they were Thai, but these guys tried to get you into these restaurants and that was upsetting to see. And again, you were treated like an ATM.
I was quite shocked with the prices in Pattaya after just being in Chiang Mai. I thought it was going to be similar, but Pattaya was actually a lot more expensive and I didn’t think it was justified how much extra things cost. You could go in some bars and the drinks were cheap, at least cheaper than Bangkok, but it wasn’t as affordable as I thought it was going to be. Chiang Mai was cheaper and that’s a valid point for anyone interested in going to Thailand. Again, another thing I liked about Chiang Mai, most of the tourists that were there were similar to me. In Pattaya, there were people from tourist destinations there, and that’s something I’d never seen before when visiting countries in Europe. It was interesting, and I didn’t have a problem with it, but it didn’t really do anything for me.
The Motorbike Accident
A few days are going by and I’m having a reasonable time until one more incident happened. This is the last incident, but it was the biggest of them all. And again, it left me feeling awful. I decided to rent a motorbike. I had a license from England. I do ride bikes there. And as I said before, I wish I’d known in Chiang Mai because I would have done it there. But I took it for 3 days. Just a small scooter, nothing big. But it was fun. The first day was great, going around to lots of different places, seeing things that I wouldn’t have otherwise been able to see. It was only 250 baht a day to rent the bike and I had to put fuel in as well, but that was a negligible amount.
On the second day is when it happened. I was driving about 20 minutes from downtown Pattaya. I was only going slowly and being careful because I knew how dangerous the roads in Thailand were. And I was run into by a guy in a pickup truck. He hit the back of the bike when he was coming out of a side road. He obviously didn’t look where he was going, and he was only inches away from hitting my leg. The bike had been spun around and fell to the ground. But thankfully, I was unscathed apart from a few bruises. I was a bit shaken up, but it was clearly and undeniably his fault.
But what happened? He jumps out of the truck, shouting at me, saying it was my fault, trying to pin the blame on me, asking me to pay for the damage to his stupid truck. Now, I’m quite a placid guy. I wasn’t going to get into an argument with him, but I just looked at him with scorn. In his mind, I’m thinking, “Oh, I’ve just crashed into Whitey, so let’s get his money. We crashed into Mr. ATM.” I was very fortunate that there were a few people on the scene who could corroborate what actually happened. And they were honest enough to say it was his fault. He had just driven straight out of the side road into the bike and knocked me off. Undeniably, it was his fault. And I’m very grateful to those honest Thai people for telling the police exactly how it was because without them they would have definitely believed him and not me.
The bike was damaged, but we all went to the police station, including the owner of the bike, and everything there was so much evidence that it was his fault. He had to pay, but he kept shouting and screaming at me, saying it was my fault, and it looked like he wanted to attack me. I wonder if he would have acted in that way if he crashed into a Thai person. I would have highly doubted that he saw me and thought it was an excuse to get some money. I was even leaning towards believing that he did it on purpose. Maybe he saw me and thought, “Oh my god, there’s an ATM on a bike. Let’s knock him off and take his money and send him back home.” But I don’t know.
Final Thoughts: A Great Country But Not for Retirement
Apart from all these little incidents that happened, I did think Thailand was a great country. I loved my time there, but all these things that happened really put me off Thailand as being somewhere I could retire. I wanted to be treated with respect wherever I go. And the best way to treat someone with respect is by not wanting and expecting money from them just because they’re a foreigner. But that’s how I feel. I have to tell you how I feel because this is my own story.
So many times I was just having a good time and then I was reminded that deep down I’m not actually welcome there. I’m only welcome because I’m bringing money here. Without that I’m good for nothing. That’s not how I want to feel and that’s not how I want to be treated. And although I had a good time in Thailand for the most part, these little things led me to believe the type of country Thailand actually is. And while some people will be able to put up with this and accept it, I think I will be taking my hard-earned retirement money somewhere else.
