Bored of Life in England

I was 39 living in England and bored of life. I desperately wanted to do something different, to have a change, and that’s when I started looking at the possibility of working overseas. I had quite a good job in England. I was fortunate enough that my job was paid well enough that I could get on the property ladder at a young age, and I’d already paid off half of the mortgage on the house I bought.

My income afforded me a good lifestyle, overseas trips once or twice a year, and I had the ability to save money, which made things even better. Even with all that going on, I did feel like I was missing out on something some kind of adventure that I felt like I wanted to lead before it was too late.

And after lots of investigating, I felt like I wanted to move to Dubai.

The Dubai Opportunity

As a foreigner, there were jobs available in my industry commission only but the commission was very high, and I had success in my role in England. I had never been married, but was in a serious relationship for 3 years that ended one year prior to my idea of trying something completely different. Being single meant I could upsticks and leave at the drop of a hat, and I started to apply for jobs in Dubai.

The jobs I was applying for were as an estate agent. I’d had great success working as an estate agent in England, and I felt like that helped me because I was interviewed by more than a few companies that I applied for, and all of them offered me positions. One of them even offered me a £5,000 relocation package that should get me to Dubai, set up with a place to live and a bit of spending money until I got my first sale. At least that’s what they told me.

It gave me a lot to think about. Should I play it safe, stay at home, and continue paying off the mortgage? Or should I take a risk that has the potential to make a lot more money, rent out my property in England, and the rent should cover the mortgage and have something left over? I decided that I was going to go for it and take the risk.

This was approximately 10, 11, 12 years ago at this point. I can’t remember exactly off the top of my head. And the property market in Dubai was booming and the commissions were high.

Renting Out My House

Luckily, it was very easy to find somebody to rent my house in England to. It wasn’t a huge house, just a small semi detached property. But the fact that my mortgage was being paid for by the person renting it, and there was some left over, gave me confidence that I was doing the right thing.

I’d been to Dubai once before, so I knew what to expect. I had done a lot of traveling, mainly throughout Europe, a few times to Africa. And it was my hope that if the job went well in Dubai, I would be able to travel extensively throughout Asia a continent that I’d never really been to, apart from Dubai, which never really felt like it was in Asia proper in my opinion, but I suppose technically it is.

I gave my notice at my job in England after accepting the role with a company in Dubai, and I had a month left in England in search of something a bit more exciting. I finished up successfully. Managed to get two sales in before the end of the role, which gave me a bit of extra commission. But the commission I earned in England was nothing like the commission on offer in Dubai.

If I could be successful there and sell some expensive properties, there was a chance I could make a lot more than I made in England. On the flip side, there was no base salary, so I would not be paid until I started to make sales. But I did have the £5,000 relocation package, which was a big help.

Hitting the Ground Running

I was going into the sales side of things as opposed to the rental side because that was where my expertise was. But it was made clear to me that usually people went into the rental side first who were not as experienced. I had that option, but I didn’t feel like I needed it. And I was financially stable enough to be able to go without a sale for 6 months to a year. So I wasn’t too concerned about that because it was commission only.

That also meant I got a lot of holidays if I wanted to take them and if I was hitting targets. And that was something I was very interested in because I wanted to do a lot of traveling.

Arriving in Dubai this time not as a tourist, but as someone ready to work was a bit nerve-wracking. I never worked outside of England before. And the day that I arrived, I was already in the office having a briefing and getting to know the market in Dubai. I had to sort out all the formalities and legalities to be able to work in Dubai, but that was all sorted by the employer. And I did have to go for the mandatory tests and things like that to make sure I was fit and healthy. But that all went fine.

And just like that, I found myself working in sales. As I had done this before in England and as this was my profession, I really hit the ground running and felt like I was a natural at it. Many guys seem to come into the industry in Dubai without any experience, and it takes them a long time to get up to speed. Many of them would be unsuccessful as well.

But in my first month, I managed a sale that paid me more than I earned with my base salary and commission in England. Plus, there was no tax whatsoever on anything I made on the sale. So, I made a good amount of money. I got more sales in the second and third month, and at this point, I’m delighted with the decision I made to move to Dubai and try something new. I was making more money than I was in England, and it was tax free. What more could I want?

First Trip to Thailand

But after the third month of working extremely hard every single day with hardly any days off, I wanted to take a break and do a bit of traveling with some of the money I’d saved up. I did use some of the money to pay extra off my mortgage for my property back in England, but I decided to take two weeks and go to Thailand.

Why Thailand? I’m not sure why I wanted to go there, but I’d heard from a few of the other agents that worked there how great Thailand was. Being in Dubai, of course, to get to Thailand, it’s not as far as it is from England. And this was a place that many of the guys went when they had time off.

So, I bought the ticket and flew on Emirates to Bangkok and arrived in the country and immediately felt like I’d found a country that ticks all the boxes of what a country should be. I love Dubai and some people say you can party there, but it’s not the same, is it? They do sort of turn a blind eye to tourists in certain places, but the alcohol is so expensive there, and it’s not really a place you would go to party. I wasn’t in Dubai to party. But when I got to Bangkok, it was a place where you could really let your hair down and have a good time, and it was an accepted part of Thai culture.

I was quite burned out from three months of solid hard work every single day. And I had planned to spend some time by the beach just lie on the beach for a few days with some cocktails and a good book and relax. But the three days I spent in Bangkok before I went to Phi Phi Island were some of the best days and nights I’d ever lived and experienced.

The time on the island was fantastic, and I spent a whole week purely relaxing and getting myself ready for more hard work. I did have another three nights in Bangkok before I left, and that was again a fantastic experience. I left Thailand thinking: this is where I want to come again.

All I Wanted Was Thailand

I did have plans to travel all over Asia. I wanted to go to Japan, South Korea, and more of Southeast Asia. But all of a sudden, all I wanted to do was go back to Thailand. I couldn’t describe it. I’d been to over 15 countries in my life, and nowhere came close to offering the same kind of exhilaration and excitement that Thailand did.

My hope was another 3 months in Dubai, working as hard as I could, being able to pay extra off my mortgage in England again, save a bit of money on the side, and have enough money for another break to Thailand. And luckily, I did make some sales and made enough money to do what I wanted.

I’d done a lot of research into Thailand this time. The first time I just went because some of the guys in the office said it was great and they loved going. But I didn’t do any research on my own for the first trip. But for the second trip, I started to research where the best town was to party, where the best beaches were, so I could be a typical expert on the matter. That’s what I thought.

Discovering Pattaya

So my second trip to Thailand, I spent another 3 days in Bangkok. But this time I wasn’t in the mood for relaxation. I was in the mood for partying. And because of that, I went to Pattaya. Pattaya was a shock on the senses after being in Dubai, but it was a great shock and a wonderful town, and you could really let loose and start enjoying yourself without any inhibitions.

It was on my first week in Pattaya that I met a Thai girl. She did not work in a bar. I want to make that clear. But she worked as a server in a restaurant. She was 28 years old, two kids, and she’d been working in Pattaya for 2 years since her relationship ended with her ex.

How We Met

How I came to be with her kind of just happened. I was in the restaurant eating some amazing green curry with that purple colored rice. You don’t see it everywhere, but it really is better than white rice. I think it’s called riceberry. And I can just picture being there eating this and speaking to her when she brought me the food. I kept ordering more drinks so she could keep coming back to the table.

And I asked her when she came off work and if she’d like to go for a drink with me. And she said she would. And that’s how it happened. She spent the rest of the time with me when she wasn’t at work. And I was due to go to Koh Samui for 5 days before the end of the holiday. But when I asked her to go with me, she couldn’t get the time off work. So I decided to stay in Pattaya.

Hers was the typical story. Her kids lived with her parents in Isan, and she worked and sent money to support them. A very typical Thailand situation. And we promised that we would keep in touch when I left.

A Different Kind of Goodbye

I’ve heard stories where people say the feeling when you leave Thailand after you’ve met a girl that you like and you have to return home is one of the worst feelings you ever have to experience. But I didn’t feel like I had it as bad as that. I wasn’t flying back to England. I was flying to Dubai a place I was really happy to be working in. So I didn’t feel like I was losing when I left Thailand like many of the stories seem to imply. I just felt like I was going somewhere I wanted to be. So that didn’t really hurt as much.

But we kept in touch every day when I was in Dubai. It was my hope again to come back in three months as long as I could hit my targets and pay off a bit of the mortgage and save a bit and enjoy another couple of weeks in Thailand. But as we were keeping in touch, I’m finding myself spending more and more time together on the phone, video calls, and things like that. And I feel like we’re developing a really strong connection, and I can’t wait to go back to Thailand to see her again.

She was still working at the same restaurant when I got back 3 months later. And I was fortunate enough to have the best 3 months I ever had, so I was able to stay in some really nice hotels. I went straight to Pattaya when I got to Thailand and went to her restaurant, and she was still there. She was a bit too shy to hug me, but you could tell she wanted to. And when she got off work, we caught up on the past 3 months and seemed to be really serious with each other.

And I was liking that I had someone in my life. Up until this point, I never had anyone in my life apart from that relationship that didn’t succeed in England a few years ago.

Falling in Love

I was only in Thailand for two weeks, but because we knew when I was going back, she had arranged well in advance to have some holiday time when I was there, so I could spend more time with her. She had to work for the first two days when I was there, but after that, we left Pattaya and went to Phuket. The first time I’d ever been there, and I felt it was a beautiful island, and I could see myself spending even more time there. We also went to Koh Samui which I didn’t manage on the last trip and again loved it there.

I’m falling more in love with Thailand and with this girl. For this story, I’m going to call her O but that’s not her real name.

Those two weeks in Thailand flew by, and I found myself wishing that I didn’t need to leave Thailand to go back to Dubai. I wanted to spend more time with O. We had a wonderful time, and when we got back to Pattaya, I dropped her off and left.

The Idea of Moving Her to Dubai

I’m thinking to myself: maybe I should try to get O to move to Dubai with me. She wasn’t making a lot of money where she worked, and it would give her a chance to see a different part of the world. I didn’t mention it to her when I left. I wanted to see how things went over the next 3 months if I could still make the sales, and if we could still keep in touch regularly, and if she seemed keen.

The next 3 months went by, and luckily I did even better than before, and we kept in touch every single day. After I’d been back for approximately 2 months, and when I told her I’m coming back again as normal in a month’s time, I asked her what she felt about moving to Dubai with me.

I had already asked my work about them assisting to get a visa for her, but they said they would need to be married to make it easier. She said she would like to do that. She was missing me a lot, and I was missing her as well. But it was talked about that that’s what we thought we could do. At this point, we’d known each other for over 6 months, and I felt like I’d already fallen in love with her, and I thought that’s how she felt about me.

The Proposal

When I got back to Thailand, I went to see her at work, and again, she booked the time off to be with me. And on our second night, I asked her to marry me. I’m a little bit embarrassed to say I did everything the old fashioned way. Call me an old romantic, but I took her to a really nice rooftop bar and restaurant great views over the city. And while we were looking at the view, I got down on one knee and pulled out a ring.

Some guys say you shouldn’t do that anymore. It’s outdated. But I’m just telling you the truth because how I did it even makes me look like a fool. I don’t care. Luckily though, she said yes and seemed very excited. And just like that, we found ourselves engaged.

The next stage was actually getting married and then trying to get her to Dubai with me. I’d already investigated how to go about getting married in Thailand, and it didn’t seem to be too difficult. All I would need would be to get a letter from the British Embassy saying that I was free to marry. It would then need to be translated and certified by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Then we could take that, as well as her paperwork, to a district office with two witnesses. Then we could register the marriage. It really was as easy as that.

Meeting Her Family

Before we did that though, as is customary, we went up to her hometown, and that was the first time I saw where she came from. I think primitive would be the best word to describe it. Her mother and father were living together with her sister and her two kids. But they were very friendly and nice and wonderful people, and we told them we were going to get married. But we had to put off the actual party ceremony for the next time we would be in Thailand which would be in 3 months. We didn’t have time to arrange it then, but we could arrange it for when we went next time.

We only spent a few days there, but it was an eye opening experience. There’s something about that part of Thailand. It screamed retirement at me. Like when you settle down, when you finish working, when you’re ready to just relax and enjoy the fruits of your labor here will be the perfect place to do it.

We registered the marriage at a district office in Bangkok. And I found myself married for the first time to the girl of my dreams.

Getting Her to Dubai

The next step was to get her to Dubai. I knew it was going to be a lot easier than taking her to England which is virtually impossible unless you tick all the boxes and are willing to wait months through a degrading visa process. Because she was from Thailand, she did need a visa to Dubai a UAE visa and we decided to get her a tourist visa. Luckily, it was approved in only a few days. And I think I was worrying too much that it might have been more difficult than it was. It was only valid for 30 days, but I thought we could sort that out when we were there.

We left Thailand and made it to Dubai. Went to my place, which I was renting, and I could tell immediately that she didn’t really like it. She said she liked it, but I don’t think it was anything like she was expecting it to be. But she didn’t complain. She didn’t say anything negative. She was happy to be there.

And I asked my work to help sort out something so she could stay for 3 months, which they did. It was great having her in Dubai with me. I was still working just as hard as ever, but to come home for her to be there and then to be able to go out with her in the evening it was fantastic. And if anything, I was able to work harder and make more money because I was happier in my situation.

I was so happy that I got married to her, and she seemed to be very happy as well. She wasn’t working at the restaurant anymore, and I was replacing her income, so she was able to send money to her children and parents.

Three Great Years

We’re in about early 2017 at this point. And for the next three years, we spent three months in Dubai and two weeks in Thailand. And I was lucky enough during that time to be able to fully pay off the mortgage on my house in England. I never told my wife about my house in England. That was a security pot that was separate to everything else. But I was able to rent it out for £600 a month. Being able to pay that off felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I was now mortgage free, and that meant I had more money left to be able to do other things.

2018 I had another good year. We’re going to Thailand every 3 months, and this is when we start thinking about the future. It was my plan to continue this job for another 3 years and then move to Thailand around 2022. And that would give us an idea that if we were going to semi retire, maybe we could live in her hometown. I remember the retirement vibes it gave me when I was there. And the thought of having a really nice house surrounded by a lovely garden maybe even a pool and a barbecue area and a bar. Everything you dream of in a house that you couldn’t afford in England you could have it there.

So, we decided that on the next trip to Thailand, we’d go up and have a look for some land.

Buying Land and Building a House

Halfway through 2018, we’re in Thailand researching land in her village and looking for the ideal plot where we could have our house. I think it might be relevant to the story, but I always treated my wife to little gifts and little bits of money whenever I could. It was only a very small fraction of what I was earning, but for her it seemed like a lot of money, and she was happy with it. She never asked for anything, but I loved surprising her with a small gold bracelet or a couple of thousand baht here or when we’re in Dubai a couple of dirhams there. All things like that that I wanted to do for her.

But we’re looking for some land, and we did find a nice plot just on the outskirts of the village. It had electric running past, and you could get an internet connection in the location. So, we decided to buy it. It was 400,000 baht which was approximately £11,000 or £12,000.

Next, we’d need to build a house. I knew kind of what I wanted the house to be like after looking at other people’s houses, and we found a company that was able to build a house for a budget of 3.5 million baht. This included a concrete wall all around the perimeter of the land and everything apart from the furniture. We paid them a deposit for the next 3 months’ work, and in 3 months’ time we could go and choose the tiles and everything we wanted for the interior.

We head back to Dubai and I’m working hard. Things are going well as ever, and 3 months later we’re back in Thailand picking out tiles for our house, as well as paint colors and other things we need. This was roughly at the end of 2018, and it was during that trip that I was starting to think about retirement and being able to afford to live the life in Thailand I wanted.

I had £600 a month income from my house. And although I wouldn’t have much money left after building this house, another three years should be enough if things went well to be able to invest in another property in England. That would give me another £600 a month and enough money to be able to buy a small condo in Bangkok that we could rent out most of the time and spend some time there when we wanted to. That was the goal over the next 3 years.

And at this moment in time, I think getting married is the best decision I made. My wife is the most loving and caring person I’d ever met up until that moment. And it was great. In return, I was very generous. I didn’t think there was anything wrong with being generous with your wife when times were good. I always expected times to be good.

Settling Into Married Life

Throughout 2019, we’re carrying on as normal, and I’m saving good money and returning to Thailand every 3 months. We spend a week traveling around Thailand and a week in our now ready house, and I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.

Then COVID Happened

We all know what happened next. Goodbye to my job and goodbye to our plans.

It was very early 2020, and everyone felt like something was going on, and we needed to come to a decision about what we were going to do. Some of the guys who worked in the office said there’s nothing to worry about and things are going to return back to normal in a few weeks or days even. But other guys were thinking that they wanted to get out while they could.

We decided to go to Thailand and wait it out. We got there just in time before they closed everything down. And we found ourselves in our house during COVID. The only problem was I was expecting to be doing this in a few years’ time when I had a lot more money saved up and more investments. At this moment, I had my UK property that I rented out and about $80,000 in cash and that was it. That wasn’t enough to buy another property in England, and I didn’t want to buy the Bangkok condo until I had the house in England. All our best laid plans were ruined.

I know this happened for so many people around the world, and I still get shudders thinking about how things were closed down when they should have been left open for people to take their own risks in life. But we had to make the best of the situation.

Cutting Spending During COVID

The first thing I did, which I thought was very obvious, was to curtail my spending as much as possible, ride out the storm, and then when things get back to normal, go back to the job I had and make some more money.

One problem I found, however, was when you take those two words curtail and spending and use them together with your Thai wife, that is not something she is going to be happy with. She’d grown very accustomed to me giving her money and gold and treats all the time. When I told her that we’re not going to be able to do that, and we need to cut back, I saw her change remarkably overnight.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with spoiling your wife. But in return, your wife has to be able to accept changes that happen especially ones that are fully out of your control. But when you’re earning good money I mean, I was only really earning good money I didn’t think anything of buying her mom a gold chain. And at this point, her mom is dripping in gold. My wife doesn’t really like wearing gold herself, but she likes to have gold.

Once in a Lifetime Travel

We were a few months into the shutdown at this point, and Thailand didn’t really have it as bad as many places and wasn’t as restrictive as other places. So, we were able to do some traveling when we could. Seeing places in Thailand that I’d been to before now with no people there was a once in a lifetime experience. Not to mention the fact that it was far cheaper than it used to be during COVID and that was just one of the best times I had.

But to add to that, it was one of the worst times I had because my wife was somehow not happy anymore because the money wasn’t forthcoming like it used to be. I really don’t understand her at all at this point. So many people were struggling because of COVID, but she didn’t seem to think that mattered and felt like she should be getting the same as she was before.

She said because I should have saved money for emergencies. Then we get into an argument. Her definition of an emergency means still being given money at the drop of a hat. That’s not an emergency. An emergency is having enough money to pay for food, drink, and shelter. But she didn’t see it that way.

Spending to Keep the Peace

I’m not spending much money at all apart from the trips that we went on. And mainly these were supposed to keep the peace with my wife. And it was not as much as normal because nobody else was going on these trips, and you could get really affordable luxury hotels and things like that. So, it was a bit of a bonus. But I’m spending more than my £600 a month, which at this point is my only income. I could say I was averaging double that, including the trips we went on which wasn’t a fortune and we had enough saved up to weather the storm. But she didn’t see it that way.

She saw it as me being cheap and not being like I used to be around her. I will admit to always treating my wife. That made me feel good to be able to do it. I wanted to give her everything she wanted. But the fact that she expected that when I’d lost my job due to situations and circumstances far beyond my own control I felt like I didn’t really know her at that moment in time.

At this moment, all the news from throughout the world is so bleak, there doesn’t seem to be any end in sight. There’s nothing I can do to make any money at this point. Going back to England would be a very bad idea. Not only would I not be able to remove the tenant from my property and move back in because of the rules at the time, I probably wouldn’t be able to find another job.

I had no problem with getting another job and working, and that’s the only thing I really had. Two or three years left of work at the same level as before, and that would have been enough to retire. But in a way, it might not have been because my wife may not have accepted a reduction in spending. When I was retired, it was my intention to spend 50 to 60,000 baht every month, just puttering around the house with the occasional trip to the beach. That was good enough for me. But thinking about it, it might not have been good enough for her.

It’s amazing how little you actually know people even the people you spend all your time with.

A Different Person in the Village

But at this moment, I’m starting to get a bit concerned that this is dragging on for longer than it should have been, and my wife may not have been exactly who I thought she was. I’m not ready to be retired yet. I’m liking living in the house that we built. We haven’t got the pool ready yet or the barbecue area or anything ready yet. So, I wasn’t enjoying it like I expected to be in retirement. But I’m not ready to spend the money on that yet because I need to work more.

And I felt like time is just dragging on, and I can’t get to where I need to be because of restrictions placed on me by other people. And that was really starting to aggravate me and make me feel like the whole system was rigged against people simply trying to get to retirement.

There was nothing I could do to make more money. Nothing I could do in Thailand. And when I did look about work online and look at different things like that nothing to do with my line of work. And I didn’t want to do anything else.

As time goes by, I found myself in the house, usually by myself. My wife is with her family, chatting to them, and really behaving in a different way than she did when she wasn’t in the village. That was one of the biggest things I learned when we were forced to move there quicker than we expected. When I met my wife in Pattaya and when we went together all over Thailand and Dubai and everywhere, she was like one person. But take her to the village close to her family and other people in the village, and all of a sudden she’s like a very different person and she doesn’t act the same way around me anymore when we’re there.

I wasn’t expecting this to happen in the slightest. And the fact that she’s getting upset when I’m not spending lavishly on her anymore is something that I’m struggling to come to terms with. I will admit to spending lavishly on her before, but it was only a small portion of my income and I could afford it. I don’t get why she didn’t realize that I didn’t have a job anymore and it wasn’t my fault. Why didn’t she understand this? It was so blatantly obvious to anybody but not to her.

The Arguments Begin

We started getting into a lot more arguments. We never argued up until this happened. She started saying that I didn’t care about her anymore. I didn’t care about her family. And started saying all these things that made no sense to me. When I kept telling her the whole world is shut down and we can’t do anything about it, she just looks blankly at me like she doesn’t understand the gravity of the situation. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps she just didn’t see the severity of how things were.

But things between us were going downhill fast.

Her children had already moved into the house with us. This was fair enough, although I didn’t really enjoy having children in the house. But when we finally did retire, the idea was that they would be old enough to be doing their own things. Maybe they’d have left the village seeking their own way in life. But because we were here earlier than expected, and they were younger than expected, I felt it was only right that they could move in.

The problem was though, I always felt it was my house, my rules. But they didn’t want to do what I asked them to. They were happy to lounge around all day. Air conditioning turned up to the max when the place they stayed before didn’t even have air conditioning. And they weren’t prepared to do any of the household chores like children of that age should do. They’d go and help themselves to some food and leave dirty plates on the table or on the floor in the living room. And they expected to be cleaned up after. There was no way I was going to be doing that.

But when my wife started having problems with me because I wasn’t cleaning up after her children, it was just dragging on the situation and making it worse. Then I started to think: I’ve got nearly a hundred grand in this property. This was meant to be my retirement property, and my wife was meant to continue to be my wife. And it was really difficult to understand what was actually going on at this moment. Why is everything going so wrong?

She Wasn’t Behaving Herself

And the worst part of it all my wife was not behaving herself anymore. And I will use the term “behaving herself” because as a husband, I had to behave myself. So why can’t a wife behave herself as well? I couldn’t believe she was so oblivious to what was going on in the world. But she still expected things for her to continue to be the same when I couldn’t work. It made no sense to me and people I spoke to.

But what could I do? Our relationship just went downhill from there throughout COVID. And no matter what I told her, she wasn’t having any of it. It was like she had bigged herself up in the village. And the fact that she was no longer able to show off in the same way as before meant that she wasn’t able to be the same person she thought she was. You can never actually go into somebody else’s mind to see what’s going on. But that’s what it felt like.

Looking back, we were approximately six months away from things returning to some sort of normality. We didn’t know that at the time, of course. But it got to the point where I started to get really angry with how she was being. I was really furious with the situation, and we started having shouting matches. Unfortunately, in plain view of her children. But it wasn’t my fault they were there, so it is what it was.

No matter how hard I asked her to calm down and just be yourself again, she didn’t want to. And I think it got to a point where I realized that even if I got that job back in Dubai even if I started to make more money, then I started to spend lavishly on her again if she changed back to how she was before, that made me think that this is not somebody I would want to stay with anyway. I’m not going to stay with someone who’s there only for what I can give them.

And it didn’t seem that way early on in our relationship, but she kind of showed who she was. And I started to think that getting out of the relationship was going to be my best option.

Legal Rights

The problem was the house belonged to her. I had no say in the house. But I had heard of guys taking their wives or ex wives to court and getting half of the house for it then to be sold. But that was a very difficult process.

I contacted a good lawyer and told him of the situation. I also mentioned that over the years I had bought a lot of gold for her. I would guess approximately 1 million baht of gold. So about 25% of the value of the house I had spent on gold for her. And I told the lawyer, “Is there any way I can get the gold and she can keep the house, and then we conduct a divorce?”

The lawyer told me that everything since you were together and since you’ve been married should be split 50/50. But because the house belonged to her, while technically you could take her to court for half of it, it would have to be sold and then it might be hard to sell but you should get half. But if you were prepared to accept the gold, then technically she should accept that as opposed to going to court. That’s what he said. And I thought I could use that.

The Final Straw

Before I got to that point, I tried my level best to understand what my wife’s problem was. She just said that she didn’t understand why I changed. What did she expect? I had no idea. But of course, I changed. The whole world was shut down, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I tried to explain it to her, but it was like explaining to a young child. She just couldn’t get it into her mind what the problem was.

And at that point, I said, “Well, I’m never going to be able to do that again. Do you want to stay with me anymore?” And she told me she didn’t want to. She said I was no good anymore because I don’t care about her anymore and I don’t care about her family. I couldn’t make this stuff up. The stuff she was saying to me was like she had some kind of mental inefficiency. And I got to the understanding that you simply cannot fix stupid.

I tried for another few weeks as best as I could, but it was clear that she’d already made her mind up and she thought she had the house so that’s what she got.

The Negotiation

It was a couple of days later, and she’s starting to get angry at me. And I just said, “Okay, I think we need to get a divorce. It’s not going to work.” And she told me to leave. And then I told her the situation and said I would be taking her to court for half the house, and she’ll be forced to sell it, and I’m coming for half of everything that I’ve given you that you still have.

And she said, “No, it’s Thailand. It’s mine.” And I can understand why she thought that because most guys don’t know what their legal rights are. I had legal rights. And although I was a foreigner in Thailand, the law was the law. I told her that she was wrong and I’ve got a lawyer already lined up to help me, and this is his number so you can give him a call.

She then got into a shouting match with this lawyer telling him that he was wrong. But I think she sort of understood that perhaps he was right. And it made it very easy for her. We’ll go and get divorced amicably. You can have the house, but I want the gold back. Or I take you to court and have half of everything.

I’d never seen someone so angry yet so defeated. Based on what she spoke to the lawyer about, she knew I was the type of person who would lose more money to make it bad for her. So, she agreed.

Getting the Gold

Funny how a couple hundred thousand baht worth of gold was no longer there anymore. She said she’d given it to her mom. But I got 800,000 baht of gold. So I recouped a little bit of money.

It was very easy to get the divorce. We just had to go with witnesses to get it done. And the last thing she said to me after we got the divorce was, “How could you ruin my life? I gave everything to you, and you’ve stopped giving things to me.” That’s what she said.

You can’t fix stupid. That’s all I can say. But I gladly left and took it as a lesson learned.

Life After Divorce

It was then: what was I going to do now? I decided to stay in Thailand and look into my options. And 6 months later, I got an email from the company I used to work for in Dubai saying they’re going to be starting up operations again soon. I mean, they never really closed down, but the vast majority of staff weren’t working. But they were now opening up, and they wanted me back.

I’ve been working there since, and I am close to retirement now because I’ve done quite well. I kept all that gold as part of our divorce, and now it’s worth more than double what it was when I got it. And my plan is to go to Bangkok and buy myself a condo there with the money from the gold and half of my own money sometime in the next few months.

I want to live in Thailand in retirement, and I want my own condo. So whether it’s a bad idea or not, I don’t care. I want that.

What I Learned

That was my involvement with a Thai girl. I loved her. I mean, I really did love her. And I felt at least until COVID came around that she loved me. But when COVID did come around, part of me is actually glad it did because it made me understand who she really was.

I got some money back that nearly doubled in value, which I suppose is down to luck more than anything. But it did mean I’m close to retirement at this point.

Will I get married again? Definitely not. I don’t think I would trust a girl after this happened. Or perhaps she was just the most stupid person the world has ever seen. We’ll never actually know because I’ve never been in touch with her since.

I often wonder what the state of that house will be like in 10 years’ time. Will she have the money to repair it? Will she have the money to keep maintaining it? We don’t know about that.

My Tip for Others

But we can never understand anybody when you’re really flushed with cash. You need to see what they’re like when money isn’t forthcoming. Then you really know who they are. That would be my tip.

If you do have a lot of money and you are coming to Thailand and you are planning on meeting someone, don’t throw money at them in the early stages of your relationship. Get to know them well first. Don’t spend money like you have a lot. And then if they are genuine, real people, you will get to know that over months or even years before you can start saying what you actually have.

That would be what I would do again if I got into a relationship. But I definitely wouldn’t get married.

So that is the last thing I want to say.