Solo Bangkok Trip at 73

Story 1 Meeting a Thai Taxi Driver After a Late Flight

I came to Thailand last year for a month-long holiday. I saw an advertisement for a taxi on Facebook. So, I decided to take it from the airport in Bangkok to my destination about 3 hours away. My flight, which was originally supposed to land at 6:00 p.m., was delayed a few times. So, I messaged the taxi lady and she told me not to worry that she would still pick me up.

In the end, it was midnight before I got off the flight and through immigration and my taxi was still waiting for me. The next day, I booked the taxi again for some things I needed to do. On the way, we got talking about our lives and seemed to hit it off really well together. So, on returning to my apartment, I asked her if she wanted to come up and hang out for a while. She did.

We talked a lot more and at one stage she said if I wanted company while on holiday to go out for dinner, drinks, trips, etc., she would be happy to do that. So, I said, “Yes, that would be good.” Everything was good. We would go out for meals, go on day trips, etc.

I paid her for the trips and stuff. We were getting on really well and we went out for dinner and drinks with her friends, too, which was nice. We were also messaging each other all the time. We started talking about the future and what plans I had.

So, I said I would like to live in Thailand in the future, maybe in another 10 years’ time. She started asking me about my financial situation a lot, and I explained it all to her. She would come and go every few days or so, and I gave her a key to get in whenever she wanted. I was still a bit suspicious about whether she was actually with someone else, even though she told me she had been separated from her husband for 2 years.

She told me she had a house in Bangkok, and also said she had something to do with a hotel here, too. I didn’t ask any more questions about that, but I probably should have. Maybe a lot was just lost in translation. Maybe I was being paranoid, or maybe it was genuinely just that she was busy driving the taxi to and from Bangkok.

The Taxi Driver Loan Request

Anyway, with about a week before I was due to go back home, she asked me if I could give her around 800 euros for a loan she had to pay off. I told her I didn’t have that kind of money to give away, but I would try to help out as much as I could. That made me suspicious that she was just out to get as much money out of me as she could.

I didn’t say anything about it, but I started being more cautious and hiding my bank cards, etc. Maybe I was being paranoid in that way. At the time, I wasn’t sure, but looking back, I don’t believe she would have stolen from me or anything like that.

An Island Trip and Sudden Silence

I suggested a trip to one of the islands and booked it for 2 nights for the weekend before I was due to leave for home the following Tuesday. I told her I would pay for the days off work that she would lose out on while being away, too. So, she was happy with that. The trip was nice, and we had a good time. To be honest, sometimes she seemed a bit distant from me, and she was on her phone a lot of the time we were together.

I just put that down to her being a taxi driver and it being part of her job, being on the phone looking for jobs, but I still had my suspicions. She did say that’s what she was doing. Maybe I was just being paranoid, but she was kind of vague with me when I would ask questions about her life, or maybe that was just my perception of it. My flight back was at 6:00 a.m. the following Tuesday, so she said she would take me, and we left at 1:00 a.m. She actually nearly crashed the car into the barrier on the motorway that night because she was looking at TikTok on her phone.

When I got home, we kept in contact through messages for a month, and everything seemed fine, but then out of the blue, the messages just stopped with no explanation. It kind of dumbfounded me, really, and I didn’t understand why because I thought we genuinely liked each other as we both had said that in our messages. I completely understand that a lot of relationships are transactional, and that’s just the way it is in Thailand. Maybe I was just a bit naive in the situation. I don’t know, but it is what it is.

It’s a learning experience. But tonight, as I was looking back through our messages, it reminded me that it was a good time, and I thought we got on really well together, which makes it all the more strange that the messages just stopped out of the blue. Life can be complicated, and maybe there was a genuine reason for it at the end of the day, but not knowing is the hardest part. Maybe she is wondering why I stopped messaging her.

I don’t know. Anyway, I do intend to return to the same place again in the near future, and maybe we will run into each other again. Who knows? Maybe there will be more to this story yet.

Story 2 Solo Bangkok Trip at 73

I’ve heard many stories of bad decisions and regrets, many of which I feel are self-inflicted. I visited Bangkok in the ’90s with my then girlfriend and always wanted to visit alone. I’m now 73, and I live in Perth, Australia. I would like to pass on my very recent experience. I booked online for a week in Bangkok, which included accommodation in the Sukhumvit area.

After watching many YouTube videos, mostly full of doom and gloom, with warnings about various cons and how to avoid them, with special warnings about taxi price rip-offs, a lot of the information was very helpful to me, especially where to change money at the airport, get a SIM card, and how to get a taxi to the hotel. I didn’t bother to ask the driver to put on the meter, but agreed to a fixed fee of 600 baht, about $26 Australian, including the tolls which I thought was quite reasonable for the travel time of about 40 minutes and the distance. I have to pay twice that for a cab from the airport to my home in Perth, and it is about a third of the distance, with no negotiation allowed.

Being 73 and traveling alone with all the aforementioned warnings in mind, I was very apprehensive. Surprise, surprise, I had a wonderful time with a massage or an aerobic session every day, 6 days out of 7 with four different instructors, all around half my age courtesy of Tinder, which I highly recommend.

I’m still quite fit for my age. I did a lot of walking both during the day and at night and never once felt unsafe, but I probably will not go on a motorbike taxi. In my experience, you should always treat people the way you would like to be treated. I found the Thais to be always smiling and very friendly and I tried to be the same.

Consider and respect their culture. They always seem to be nicely dressed unlike Westerners. Why do they dress down and look so untidy? If you feel ripped off, it is probably your own fault for not asking the price first.

I’m not a drinker, so my experience may be different from others, but I would highly recommend giving it a go at any age if you are still reasonably fit. I spent a week in Bangkok, but I’m going again next year and will visit Pattaya as well. You only live once and life is for living. I’m not an expert on Thailand or anywhere else for that matter, but if you only think the worst of a place or its people, it will be so.

Story 3 Meeting Dao in Hua Hin

I’ve heard enough stories about relationships in Thailand to know most of the warning signs. That makes what happened to me slightly embarrassing because I can’t even use the excuse that nobody warned me. My name is Graham. I’m 58 and originally from Glasgow, although I’ve lived in the south of England for most of my working life. I’m divorced, my children are grown up and I’m fortunate enough to be in a position where I can spend three or four months of the year traveling. I first visited Thailand about eight years ago and have been back several times since. Last November, I came over for 10 weeks spending the first few days in Bangkok before heading down to Hua Hin.

I’d been to Hua Hin before and I liked it because it was a bit quieter than Bangkok or Pattaya, but still had enough going on to stop me getting bored. About a week after arriving, I met a Thai woman called Dao. She was 39, attractive looking as though she had spent three hours getting ready and had a wicked sense of humor once you got to know her. I met her in a small bar, although she wasn’t working there. She was sitting with two Thai women who apparently knew the owner. I was at the next table and somehow we ended up talking.

Her English was pretty good, certainly better than my Thai and after about an hour her friends left while Dao stayed behind. We had another drink and I asked if she fancied getting something to eat. We ended up in a little Thai restaurant, nowhere near the tourist area, and I remember thinking that this was exactly the sort of evening I enjoyed in Thailand. Nothing fancy, plastic chairs, cheap food, and a few beers, and good company with this lady. She had been married to a Thai man, but had been divorced for several years, and had a 14-year-old daughter who lived mainly with her grandmother in Phetchabun. There was no sob story, no sick buffalo, no request for money, and no suggestion that she was looking for a foreign husband.

In fact, she seemed almost uninterested in what I owned or how much I had, which probably made me drop my guard more than I should have. We exchanged LINE details, and I expected that to be the end of it. The following afternoon, she messaged me asking what I was doing. I said nothing much, so she suggested meeting for a coffee. That coffee turned into dinner and a few drinks, and eventually she came back to my condo. Let’s just say neither of us got much sleep.

After that, we started seeing each other regularly. Not every day, which I actually liked. She had her life, and I had mine. Sometimes she would disappear for a couple of days, and then message me as if we had spoken 5 minutes earlier. At first, I didn’t question it. We weren’t married, and I had only known her for a few weeks.

I also wasn’t stupid enough to think an attractive 39-year-old Thai woman had been sitting at home for years waiting for a 58-year-old Scotsman to walk through the door. We went to restaurants, markets, and a couple of places outside Hua Hin that I would never have found by myself. She refused to let me pay for everything. If I paid for dinner, she might buy breakfast the next morning. Once when we stopped for fuel, she actually pushed my hand away and paid for it herself. It wasn’t much money, but psychologically, it made a difference because it didn’t feel like I was hiring somebody to spend time with me.

Meeting Dao’s Family in Phetchabun

After about 3 weeks, she asked if I wanted to go with her to Phetchabun for a few days. Her mother was having a birthday and Dao wanted to see her daughter. That immediately got my attention because rightly or wrongly, I assumed that being taken to her home to meet the family meant something. We drove up in a rented car and stayed at her mother’s house for three nights.

Her family were incredibly welcoming. Her mother spoke virtually no English. Her daughter was shy around me at first, and various neighbors and people whose relationship to Dao I never quite understood appeared throughout the day. Nobody asked me for money.

I remember lying in bed that first night thinking, maybe I’ve actually found a normal one here. That sentence should probably have been my first warning. On the second evening after a few beers, Dao’s cousin asked me how long I had known her. I told him about a month.

He looked slightly surprised and said something in Thai to Dao. She immediately answered him and then the conversation moved on. I asked her later what he had said and she told me it was nothing important. I didn’t push it, but I remembered it.

The Second Phone and Bangkok Trip

When we returned to Hua Hin, things carried on much as before, although I began noticing little things. Dao had two phones. I’d seen the second one before but assumed one was for work. One evening we were sitting outside a restaurant when the second phone rang. She looked at the screen, canceled the call and put the phone face down. 10 minutes later it rang again.

Same thing. I jokingly asked her if her secret boyfriend was checking up on her. She laughed and said, “Maybe I have five boyfriends.” I laughed as well, but there was something about the way she said it that stayed with me. A few days later, she told me she needed to go to Bangkok for work and would be away for two nights.

No problem. I had friends coming down from Pattaya anyway, so I spent a couple of evenings with them. On the second night, one of them suggested going to a bar in Soi 94. We were sitting there when I saw one of Dao’s friends, a woman I had met several times.

She came over and said hello and asked where Dao was. I said Bangkok. She looked confused and said, “Bangkok?” Then there was that little pause people make when they realize they’ve said something they shouldn’t have.

She quickly changed the subject. I didn’t interrogate her, but obviously my mind started working overtime. Dao came back the following afternoon. I didn’t mention the conversation with her friend.

I simply asked how Bangkok had been. She said busy, lots of traffic, and that she was glad to be back. Maybe she had been in Bangkok, maybe her friend simply didn’t know. There could have been a perfectly innocent explanation, but from that point on I started paying more attention.

The Laptop Request and Hotel Message

Then came the first money issue. Dao told me her daughter needed a new laptop for school. She didn’t actually ask me to buy one, she just mentioned it several times over the course of a week and showed me the model she wanted. It was about 25,000 baht. Eventually I asked her directly, “Are you asking me to buy this?” She smiled and said, “Up to you.” Now, anybody who has spent time in Thailand knows those three words can cover an enormous amount of territory. I told her I wasn’t comfortable spending that sort of money on someone I had only known for a few weeks.

She didn’t argue, didn’t sulk, and never mentioned the laptop again. In a strange way that made me feel guilty, and a few days later I gave her 10,000 baht towards it. She thanked me, kissed me, and that was that. Whether a laptop was ever purchased I’ve absolutely no idea. By now I had about 3 weeks left in Thailand. Despite my suspicions, I genuinely enjoyed being with her. She was funny, affectionate, and incredibly easy company. She never tried to stop me seeing my friends, and she didn’t constantly message me asking where I was.

The problem was that I increasingly realized I knew almost nothing about what she did when she wasn’t with me. One Sunday morning, we were having breakfast when a message appeared on her phone. I wasn’t snooping. The phone was sitting on the table between us, and the notification appeared on the screen. The message was in English and simply said, “I’m arriving Thursday. Same hotel as before.” Dao picked the phone up almost immediately. She must have seen that I had read it; her expression changed.

I asked who it was. She said it was an old customer from her cosmetics business. I said I didn’t realize that customers stayed in hotels with her. That didn’t go down particularly well. For the first time since meeting her, we had a proper argument. She accused me of not trusting her. I pointed out that trust usually comes after you know somebody, not before.

She left my condo, and I didn’t hear from her for 2 days. I assumed that was the end of it. Then at about 11:00 p.m. on the third night, there was a knock on my door. Dao was standing there holding a bag of food as though nothing had happened. She walked in, put everything on the table, and asked if I was hungry. I should probably have demanded an explanation. Instead, I ate fried rice with her at midnight, and we ended up back together.

Pathetic, perhaps, but I’m being honest. A couple of days later, she finally admitted that she had previously had foreign men who helped her financially. She insisted she wasn’t in a relationship with any of them, but said one or two still contacted her when they came to Thailand. I asked if the man arriving on Thursday was one of them. She wouldn’t give me a straight answer. She just kept saying, “He is a friend long time.” That told me everything I needed to know without actually telling me anything.

Accepting an Undefined Relationship

I had two choices. I could walk away and spend my final couple of weeks angry about a relationship that had never really been defined, or I could accept the situation for what it was. I chose the second option and told Dao I wasn’t going to tell her who she could and couldn’t see, and in return, I wasn’t going to pretend we were boyfriend and girlfriend or start financing her life.

If we enjoyed spending time together, fine. If either of us met somebody else, also fine. She seemed completely comfortable with that arrangement, probably more comfortable than I was if I was honest.

Pranburi and the Goodbye

During my final week, we took a 3-day trip down to Pranburi. It was probably the best few days we spent together. There was no talk about money, no mysterious second phone, and no arguments. We ate seafood, walked along the beach, visited a temple, and spent far too much time doing absolutely nothing. On our last night there, she asked when I was coming back to Thailand.

I said probably 6 months. She replied, “Don’t tell me 6 month. Tell me when you buy ticket.” I asked why. She smiled and said, “6 month very long time. Anything can happen.”

At least that was honest. The day before I flew home, she came to my condo and helped me pack. She gave me a small Buddha, which she said was for safe travel. I still have it.

At the airport, she hugged me, told me to message her when I landed, and said she would miss me. For about the first month after I got home, we spoke almost every day. Then it became every few days, then perhaps once a week. I noticed that if I didn’t start the conversation, quite often there wasn’t one.

I deliberately stopped messaging for 10 days just to see what would happen. On day 11, she sent me a selfie of her eating noodles with a message, “You forgot me already?” I laughed when I saw it because I suppose the answer was no. I hadn’t forgotten her, and apparently she hadn’t completely forgotten me, either.

Returning to Thailand with Open Eyes

I’m returning to Thailand later this year. My flight is booked, but I haven’t told Dao the exact date. We still speak occasionally, and she still calls me handsome. although I’m realistic enough to know I’m no more handsome now than I was before I met her. Do I think she has other foreign men in her life?

Almost certainly. Do I think some of them send her money? Probably. Do I believe everything she has told me? No.

But, here is a strange part. I don’t actually dislike her because of any of that. I think she likes me in her own way, and I certainly like her. Perhaps the mistake men make is assuming that liking somebody automatically means the relationship has to fit the Western version of boyfriend and girlfriend. I’m not planning to buy her a house, and I’m not sending a monthly allowance, and I’m certainly not arriving in Thailand with an engagement ring.

I’ll message her when I’m back, and if she wants to see me, I’ll see her. If she’s busy with somebody else, I’ll get on with my holiday. Maybe that sounds cold, but I think it’s better than convincing myself that I’m the one special foreigner who has completely changed her life. The biggest lesson I’ve taken from it is that sometimes the warning signs aren’t really warning signs at all.

They’re simply information. What you do with that information is what matters. I knew Dao’s situation wasn’t straightforward, and I chose to continue seeing her anyway. So, if it eventually goes wrong, I can hardly claim I wasn’t warned.

I’ll be interested to see what happens when I get back. Perhaps she’ll be waiting for me. Perhaps she’ll have a new boyfriend. Whatever happens, at least this time I’m going back with my eyes open.

Story 4 Martin’s Search for a Thai Partner

My name is Martin. I’m 56, originally from Manchester, although I’ve lived near Bristol for the last 20 years. I’ve been divorced for nearly 7 years and have two grown-up children who have their own lives now. I first came to Thailand about 4 years ago after a friend had been telling me for years that I should give it a try.

Since then, I’ve been back several times and I’m now hoping to retire there within the next three or four years. Like most single men, I enjoy going out, having a few beers and meeting women, but I’m at the stage now where I’d also like to find someone for a proper relationship. I’m not desperate to get married again, but it would be nice to have someone to share my life with when I eventually move to Thailand. I’ve tried a few times without much success.

Fon Asked for a Monthly Allowance

On one trip, I met a woman called Fon, who I’d been talking to online for about 3 months. She was 42, worked in an office near Bangkok and seemed great during our video calls. When we finally met, we got on really well. She was attractive, funny and easy to talk to and we spent the next few days together.

I started thinking this might actually go somewhere until one evening, she brought up the subject of money. We were having dinner when she told me that if we become boyfriend and girlfriend, she would expect me to give her 30,000 baht every month. She said that if she had a foreign boyfriend, she shouldn’t need to work anymore. I actually thought she was joking at first, but she was completely serious.

I told her I wasn’t looking to pay somebody to be my girlfriend and certainly wasn’t going to support somebody I’d only known in person for a few days. The atmosphere changed pretty quickly after that and she went home the following morning. That was the end of that one.

Communication Problems with Lek

On another trip, I met a woman called Lek, who lived outside Ubon Thani and ran a small food shop. She was 45, divorced, and had one grown-up daughter. She was completely different from Fon. She worked long hours, never asked me for anything, and sometimes I had trouble getting her to take time off so we could actually go somewhere together. I spent about a week with her and really liked her.

The problem was that she spoke almost no English and my Thai is terrible. When we were physically together, we managed with Google Translate, hand signals, and plenty of laughing. But once I returned to England, it became very difficult. We tried video calls, but most of the time we just sat there smiling at each other because neither of us understood what the other was saying. After a couple of months, we gradually stopped contacting each other.

Nobody had done anything wrong. It simply wasn’t going to work. On my recent trip, I decided to approach things differently. Instead of flying to Thailand with one particular woman already in my head as a possible future partner, I planned to travel around, meet a few people, and see what happened. I was starting in Chiang Mai, then going to Bangkok, and finishing with a couple of weeks in Jomtien.

I joined Thai Friendly before leaving England and had been talking to several women. Once you join one of those sites, the messages can come thick and fast. I’m a reasonably presentable 56-year-old man, but I’m not stupid enough to believe that hundreds of beautiful women, half my age, suddenly find me irresistible. After a while, you get fairly good at working out which conversations are likely to turn into requests for money, and which women might genuinely want to meet you.

Meeting Mam in Chiang Mai

One of the women I’d been speaking to was called Mam. She was 57, so actually a year older than me. Normally, I probably wouldn’t even have contacted her because I’d always imagined meeting somebody perhaps 10 or 15 years younger than myself. Mam had messaged me first though, and there was something about her I liked. Her photographs were just normal photographs, no ridiculous filters, and no pictures that looked as though they had been taken 20 years ago.

She worked in administration at a university, owned a small house, and had an adult son working in Bangkok. We agreed to meet for a coffee on my third day in Chiang Mai. We met at about 2:00 p.m. and we were still together at 8:00 p.m. It was probably the easiest first date I’ve ever had. Her English was very good.

We had a similar sense of humor, and there were none of those uncomfortable silences where you desperately try to think of something else to talk about. The following morning she messaged asking if I wanted to go for a drive into the mountains and have lunch somewhere. She picked me up in her car and we ended up spending the whole day together. After that we were together virtually every day.

After a few days she stayed at my hotel and the aerobics were great. What I particularly liked about Mam was that she didn’t expect me to pay for everything. If I bought dinner, she might buy breakfast or lunch the following day. When we went somewhere in her car, she would sometimes pay for the petrol.

Once when I tried to pay, she pushed my hand away. I laughed but it actually meant quite a lot because I’d become so used to automatically paying for everything in Thailand. There was never any mention of an allowance, buying her a house, or helping her family. On my last evening in Chiang Mai, she invited me to her home.

It was a perfectly normal two-bedroom house and obviously somewhere she had lived for years. We bought some food, cooked it together, and sat outside drinking until quite late. I remember thinking how comfortable I felt with her. Nothing felt forced.

Other Dates in Bangkok and Jomtien

The next morning she drove me to the airport because I was flying to Bangkok. I already had plans to meet another woman there who I’d been talking to online. She was 39 and physically she was exactly the type of woman I would normally go for. Very attractive, slim, long hair, and she looked even better in person than in her photographs. We went out twice and she was perfectly nice, but there was just nothing there.

The conversation felt like hard work and I found myself sitting opposite this beautiful younger woman thinking about Mam. I then went down to Jomtien where I met another woman in her early 40s. Again, she was attractive and we had a couple of enjoyable evenings together, but I didn’t feel any real connection with her either. Meanwhile, Mam and I were messaging every day. She never asked where I was or who I was with.

She just told me to enjoy my holiday. One evening, I even told her I’d been out with another woman and she simply replied, “Up to you.” I wasn’t sure whether she genuinely didn’t care or was just confident enough to not make an issue of it. Either way, I found myself wanting to see her again.

Returning to Chiang Mai for Mam

In the end, I changed my plans and flew back to Chiang Mai 3 days earlier than I had intended. I didn’t tell Mam I was coming. When I arrived, I checked into a hotel and I sent her a photograph from outside a restaurant we had been to together. About 5 seconds later, my phone rang. She was laughing and shouting, “You come back?”

Half an hour later, she arrived at the hotel and the look on her face told me she was genuinely pleased to see me. We spent my final few days in Thailand together. She introduced me to a couple of her close friends and her son happened to be visiting from Bangkok, so I met him as well. That was slightly strange at first because he isn’t that much younger than me, but again, after a couple of beers, we got on fine. Everything just felt normal.

There was no talk about marriage, no questions about my pension, and nobody wanted to know how much money I had in the bank. And that is where my problem starts. Mam is almost exactly what I’ve been saying I want. She has her own job, house and car.

She doesn’t need rescuing and doesn’t need my money. We can talk for hours. We laugh at the same things. I’m attracted to her and the chemistry between us is excellent.

Worrying About Mam’s Age

There is only one thing bothering me and I know how stupid it sounds. She is 57 and I’m 56. If I met Mam in England, I probably wouldn’t give her age a second thought, but Thailand does something strange to your thinking. Everywhere you look, there seem to be foreign men my age walking around with Thai women who are 35 or 40. Part of me keeps wondering whether I’ll eventually regret settling down with somebody older than myself when I could potentially be with someone 15 or 20 years younger. The ridiculous thing is Mam doesn’t even look 57.

She takes care of herself, keeps fit, and I would have guessed she was somewhere in her late 40s when we first met, so it isn’t really about what she looks like now. I suppose I’m thinking about what happens 10 or 15 years down the road. Then I have to remind myself that in 15 years I’ll be 71. So it’s not as though I’m going to be getting any younger, either. Since coming back to England, Mam and I video call almost every evening. Sometimes we talk for an hour and sometimes only for 10 minutes.

There is never any pressure. If she’s busy, she tells me and calls me later. If I’m going out with friends, she tells me to have a good time. Most importantly, she has never once asked me to send her money. I’ve booked another trip to Thailand for January and when I told her, she simply said, “Good. I will pick you up.”

I was talking about all this with a friend recently and showed him a photograph of Mam. He said she was very attractive and asked what the problem was. I told him she was a year older than me. He looked at me as though I was an idiot and said, “Martin, you’re 56. What exactly are you expecting?” I had to laugh because maybe he has a point.

I spent the last few years saying I want to meet an independent Thai woman with good English, someone I’m attracted to who doesn’t play games and doesn’t constantly ask for money. I finally met exactly that woman and I’m hesitating because she happens to be 1 year older than me. Maybe Thailand has given me unrealistic expectations simply because there are so many younger women available. Just because I might be able to find somebody 20 years younger doesn’t mean she would be a better partner. I’ve already met younger women who were absolute stunners but with whom I’ve had virtually nothing to talk about.

With Mam, I can spend an entire day doing nothing particularly exciting and still enjoy being with her. I’m going back in January and I’m not going to make any big decisions before then. I’ll spend more time with her and see how things develop naturally. Am I being stupid worrying about her age or is it something I should genuinely consider if I’m thinking about spending the rest of my life with somebody? Because of all the women I’ve met in Thailand, the one I can’t stop thinking about is the one woman I nearly didn’t meet because I thought she was too old.