Things Foreigners Do In Thailand That Thais Find Strange
the first one is the foreigners who insist on wearing flip-flops everywhere, okay? I personally don’t like flip-flops myself. I I prefer the kind of you slip your whole foot through. But you know what it’s like. Guys will buy a pair of flip-flops when they come here which is fine for the beach or maybe a casual bar but they’ll go everywhere for the whole holiday in flip-flops and the Thais kind of they the they if you look at Thais, they dress for the occasion, so they can be very, very casual, but they don’t wear the same clothes all the time. If they go around a mall, they’ll make a bit more of an effort, and they certainly wouldn’t wear flip-flops, okay?
So, they think that’s quite strange that foreigners do that, okay? Another one is walking around shirtless. That’s just not done in Thailand. You’ll see it mainly in tourist areas like Phuket and Pattaya, and I think the Thais are so used to seeing it that they just ignore it now, but you know, a guy will be sitting on the beach without a shirt, and he’ll walk into 7-Eleven, a couple of young girls in there serving, and they they blush, you know, they’re not they’re not used to it. maybe you don’t didn’t know that, but generally speaking, Thais don’t walk around with their shirts not having a shirt, rather.
Sunburn And Beach Habits
They find it extremely funny that people come here and get sit on the beach and get hot like lobsters, you know, they sit in the sun they say, “I don’t need suntan lotion. I’m only going to be half an hour.” And then they come off the beach 4 5 hours later, and they’re red raw, you know, and they they can’t even they’re they’re just aching everywhere. The Thais live here, they know how strong the sun is, so th- even me now, you get into a routine. When it’s at its strongest, you tend to do That’s when you’re in a mall shopping or you’re at at home doing what you’ve got to do at home.
Mornings and kind of late afternoon onwards is what the Thais do, as opposed to myself as well. When the Thais go out in the day, you’ll see you might think it’s a funny sight, but you’ll see them on a really hot day, they’re they’re completely covered up the face Even the guys, they wear they look like they’re going into rob a bank, you know, you just their eyes are showing, and that’s that’s to stop the sun penetrating onto their skin because they they they realize living in a hot country just just how hot the sun and damaging it can be as well. The next one is when you get the Now, the Thais find this really funny is when foreigners go into a restaurant and they say, “Look, I’ve I’ve just come to Thailand. I don’t want any Can you make the food not spicy?” They’re having They’re having Thai They want to try Thai food, but they they don’t want it spicy, so they’ll say, “Minimal spices.
” And okay, so the Thais they won’t they won’t put any chilies in it to but the mixture that’s a lot of it’s pre-prepared, the sauces and things, that already has spices and different things in there that it’s all pre pre-made as I say. So, even when they take it out, it might be very mild for a Thai, but you’ll see a foreigner who’s not used to it is drink Can I have more water? Can I have more water? Or another beer, you know? And they find that quite funny, as well.
Spending Money In Strange Ways
find it strange. Thais find this strange because I’ve spoken to Thai people about this is when you get people who come here and they they think nothing of going into somewhere like Nana Plaza and spending 4,000 5,000 baht on drinks and entertainment and everything, but yet when they go to buy say pad Thai on the street or fried rice, which is 50 60 baht in Bangkok, probably 60 70 baht now in Bangkok, you know, they’ll haggle over it and say, “Well, can you knock 20 baht baht off it? If it’s 70, can you do 50?” And the Thais just think that’s really strange because they’re most Thais are very frugal with money. They don’t waste it and they think you know, foreigners do kind of splash out on things they don’t often need and they just don’t understand why somebody can go out in an evening spend several thousand baht and then haggle over 20 baht. everybody who come in here thinking that the Thais want to learn English, you know, that’s all they want to do. A lot of them do like to learn English, especially the younger generation now, because it’s an international language, isn’t it?
Whether American English or whatever. You know, this is Thailand, they speak Thai and they’re quite happy to speak their own language. now, this is this is one that comes up quite often, believing every smile is in agreement with you. So, you’ll find a lot of the time with Thais what will happen is you might get into a bit of a dispute with say a taxi driver or a shopkeeper, somebody who’s serving you, and you start to argue a little bit with them and they’re smiling and that gets some foreigners upset because they think, “Well, I’m trying to be serious here and this Thai person’s smiling at me. ” For a Thai that It’s a Buddhist country, that’s a way of diffusing a situation, okay? Thais generally don’t raise their voice when they’re arguing, you know, they they would like to settle things amicably. So, if you’re talking to a Thai and they start smiling at you, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re happy, they’re just trying to diffuse a situation if you’re getting a little bit excited, you know.
another one is talking incredibly loud. Now, I won’t mention which countries do this, but we all know. You must have been in a restaurant, you’re in a nice Thai restaurant, lots of Thai families, it’s mainly a Thai restaurant, and you’ll get some tourists and they’re eating and they’re just shouting so loud at each other that you could the whole restaurant can hear the conversation. They They don’t think that’s funny, they just think it’s strange. Why would you want to hold a conversation that everybody in the restaurant can hear? It’s just not done in Thailand.
Complaining About Thai Heat
nothing but complain about the heat constantly. So, I mean, I’ve I’ve done it myself, I’ll be like, “Wow, it’s so hot, it’s so hot.” But you get certain people who come here, and they know it’s a hot country, it’s a tropical country, but they’ll come down for breakfast, “Oh, it’s so hot today.” You know, and then 10 minutes later, “Oh, I’m so hot, I’m so hot.” And that’s all day, “Oh, it’s so hot, it’s so hot. ” You know, Thais find that very, very funny.
Acting Like A Thailand Expert
certain people who come here to Thailand and they spend a couple of weeks here, maybe they’ve come once or twice, and they think they’re experts on Thailand, you know, especially there’s a lot of guys on YouTube, TikTok, and other social media platforms, backpackers, who have who have only been here once for 2 weeks and they’re giving out all this information, you know, I mean, I think I’ve got a little bit of credibility behind me because I’ve been coming here for 30 years, you know, but when somebody’s been coming here for 2 weeks and they they’re giving out dated advice or wrong advice, that’s that’s kind of that kind of I suppose annoys other foreigners rather than it does Thais. But another funny one for the Thais is wearing the elephant trousers, you know the ones that are baggy, they’re loose, they’re very, very comfortable, and they’ve got printed elephants all over them. they just think it’s funny because they don’t wear them. Now, there’s nothing wrong with wearing those trousers. I’ve never worn them myself, but I look at people who wear them, and they look extremely comfortable because they’re you know, they’re loose, they’re baggy as I say, and they’re thin. they look very very comfortable, so I can understand why people would buy a pair and wear them day in, day out. But, it’s like for Thais, when you speak to Thais, it’s like when they see somebody come on and say the BTS wearing them elephant trousers, they immediately know they’ve landed yesterday or the day before, you know, they find find it quite funny.
Another one is the people who come to Thailand and they expect everybody to speak Thai, you know, or they and instead of slowing down and trying to learn a few words of Thai like hello, thank you, goodbye, that sort of thing. and because Thais do appreciate it, you know, my Thai has really come on now since I’ve been living with my girlfriend, and you get treated completely different. When you go into a restaurant, if you can order your food in Thai, and it doesn’t take a lot to learn one or two words that you can use over and over, you just get treated differently. And you get these guys who’ll come in, they’ll say something in English, and the waitress won’t understand it because she’s Thai. She’s not It’s not They don’t It’s not like the Philippines, you know, they don’t speak Thai Everybody here doesn’t speak fluent English. And what will happen, the woman or the guy who’s trying to order something, the girl doesn’t understand him, so he gets louder. He’ll say the same thing but louder thinking, “Now that I’m shouting at her the same thing, she’ll understand it.”
which not really. And then you get people at the other end of the scale who who have learned just a couple of words like sawadee krap and some bits and pieces, and they think they’re fluent in Thai. So, I I I’ve seen this like you’ll be sitting in a restaurant, and the guy will be looking around, and he’ll he’ll he’ll say something in Thai really loudly. And then when the waitress comes over because he doesn’t know any more Thai, they speak really quietly because they want everybody to think around them to think they’re fluent in in Thai. Another thing, pointing at everything on the menu instead of again trying to have a go at ordering it in Thai. Ordering food in Thai, you don’t have to be elaborate and say the whole sentence. You can just, you know, if you want I’m trying to think of a dish now.
Getting Lost In Thai Markets
want chicken in it. You know, you learn the word guy. It means chicken. It’s very simple. The words are very simple. Another one that makes the Thais a big smile on the face is when you get these huge wet markets or vegetable markets, you know.
You’ll see the Thais are weaving in and out because they know exactly where the stall is they want to go to. They know exactly how the market’s laid out. But you’ll get a foreigner walking for the first time and there’s hundreds of stalls and you can see them. They just they freeze and they’re looking around like this and the Thais find they don’t laugh at them, you know. Thais are more polite than to do that. But they do find that quite humorous.
Drinking Too Much On Holiday
drinking too much on holiday. So they, you know, when There’s a lot of Thais go abroad now to Paris, London, and they go to they stay in a nice hotel and they’ll go out and they’ll be a tourist. There’ll be tourist attractions every day, you know, they’ll either go and see the Eiffel Tower or Big Ben or whatever [snorts] it is. They have a nice dinner and maybe a one or two drinks and that’s it. But a lot of especially well, I won’t pick out any certain nations, but there’s a lot of people who come here and they just get completely wasted every night, you know. And then they’ll sleep till 2:00 in the afternoon. I did it when I was younger, you know. I thought that was what it was all about.
But when you get older, you kind of realize you kind of you are wasting your holiday when you come here if that’s all you do. Unless that’s what you want to do. You want to come here and just get drunk every night. But the Thais find it extremely strange that people would fly to the other side of the world just to get drunk every day. Another one that does annoy people is the the guys who come out here and they keep comparing things in Thailand to their own country. You know, you know the sort of guy who’ll be walking down the pavement. It’s not quite straight, you know, a little bit cracked here and there. And it’ll would like, “Oh, in my country the road’s perfect.
the pavements to only in Thailand.” You know, that’s a kind of thing that’s said quite often as a joke. But, on a serious note, you know, part of the charm of Thailand part of the charm of Thailand is that everything doesn’t always work correctly. And sometimes it’s a lot of fun, but you you do get certain people who come here and they just criticize it all the time, and we do it like this in our country, and they criticize in Thailand. And I’ve heard it, and I thought, “What did he even come here for? He might as well stay at home and take up knitting or something like that.” Number 19 on my list is amazed by things Thai people see every day. So, even for me as a foreigner, you know, you’ll be walking in Benjakitti Park or one of the other parks, and you’ll see a monitor lizard big monitor lizard go across the pavement, and you’ll be clicking your camera or your phone camera at it.
Tuk-tuks, certain stalls and stuff. Thais, they don’t give it because they grow up with that. They see a monitor lizard going across a path, they don’t they don’t think twice about it. They won’t even look at it, you know, maybe just notice it. They don’t stand on it, but, you know, there’s certain things that foreigners take lots of photographs of that we’ve never seen before. You know, they have a lot of snakes here. I’ve seen a huge python, not here in Hua Hin, but in Bangkok years ago. Terrified me.
I’d never seen one, you know, out in spread across the road. Its head was as big as my fist, even bigger. And the last one is thinking Thailand is exactly the same everywhere. So, some people come to Pattaya for instance, a good example. They’ll spend 2 weeks in Pattaya, and they’ll think the whole of Thailand is about drinking and entertainment. You’ll get other people who go to Phuket, and they’ll think Thailand is the same everywhere. It’s all about beaches and you know, lounging around in the sun. And it’s not, you know, Pattaya is not like Hua Hin.
Hua Hin is not like Chiang Mai. Chiang Mai is different to Isaan. Every region has its different habits, you could say, different ways of doing things. And some people they’ll spend a couple of weeks here, and then they’ll think, “Oh, I know Thailand inside out.
