The two Thailands

We were a little negligent with the blogging in Thailand and are going to do some catch up with two different posts. One is the stories about our final stops in Thailand (the lower post, read first) the other is our impression of Thailand (the upper post, read second) and how we are feeling 53-days into our journey.

As hinted previously, Thailand is a complicated and paradoxical place.

On one hand there are many wonderful things --beautiful scenery; great food; an interesting and ancient culture; elephants and other amazing wildlife; meeting like-minded travelers; and the genuine, kind, and helpful Thai people like Nick, Tin, Vicky and Miss Little, and of course Om and his family.

On the other hand, some things drove us crazy and/or were quite sad -- complete disregard for safety on the roads; the constant vigilance required to avoid food-poisoning; disparity between the haves and the have-nots and potential for exploitation; the numerous stray dogs who loiter everywhere (the reality of rabies sets in the first time you face an unprovoked aggressive growling and snapping from a stray dog); obnoxious tourists who have no respect for animals, culture, or environment; obnoxious touts who have no respect for animals, culture or the environment; but most of all, the non-stop harassment from touts, hawkers, and everyone who is trying to dishonestly take advantage of the naïve tourists and the tourist dollar.

It is impossible to go five steps in Phuket or Bangkok without being bothered by someone trying to sell you something (Chiang Mai was not nearly as bad). The second you step off a bus or plane you are hounded by taxi drivers trying to charge you too much for a ride. They get in your face and don’t leave you alone until you are rude to them. They will grab your bags before you can tell them not to. If you stop to look at a map they pounce on you like wolves to meat. They will tell you lies and confusing stories to get you to go where they want you to go (e.g. to a store selling over-priced goods). If you make the terrible mistake to ask for help they will lie to take advantage of you. The taxis have a tendency to need to “stop at the office to sign in” which is of course a rouse to get the tourists to go to a travel agent arranging over-priced excursions. We had a tuk-tuk driver take us to a place we didn’t want to go at a price that was too much because he knew we couldn’t argue. Metered taxi drivers “forget” to turn on the meter then charge too much. You try to arrange a tour and then another person comes up to you with a story about “a friend who runs a cheaper tour”. They lie about prices to suck you in then somehow state that original price is no longer valid. You never know who to trust, you never know what things actually cost, and no matter what, they are better at this than you. These people practice lying to and taking advantage of tourists every day. They are professionals and we were “taken for a ride” many times.

This is the maddening part of travel in Thailand. There is so much good to see and do in the country and we did enjoy much of it. But, is it worth it? Do the positives outweigh the negatives? Much of the time we were not really sure in Thailand.

First, Thailand was more expensive than we expected. Maybe this is because we are not good at haggling or just couldn’t be bothered. We did do lots of haggling (mostly Erika, Tony just gets too mad), but it gets pretty exhausting after a while. Either way, we have found Malaysia to be cheaper than Thailand and this was unexpected. Second, the non-stop barrage from touts is annoying and rude. We wanted to return home telling people how great Thailand is and how much we loved it. However, it is so infuriating having to deal with the tout’s non-stop harassment that it ruins the experience. Even when there are beautiful, interesting surroundings, the touts make it un-enjoyable. Maybe some people love the haggling, and if they do, they should come to Thailand and enjoy the experience. However, for us after the first 5 minutes, we were tired of it. We would rather be charged a fair price to ensure an enjoyable experience. We found that when we paid a reasonable amount of money with a respectable establishment (usually having a website), we were not disappointed --Bicycling in Bangkok, Cooking in Bangkok, Elephant Nature Park in Chiang Mai, Fern Paradise in Chiang Mai. However, when we had to haggle, it means either we overpaid or were disappointed (e.g. our longboat ride in Bangkok) or the experience wasn’t worth the money or our time. Generally, if someone is willing to haggle over something, then they are not taking the time and effort to provide a good service.

Thailand was beautiful and amazing in some ways, but it was also disappointing. It definitely wasn’t our favorite country. We decided that (if there is a) next time we will need to get off the beaten path a lot more, and be willing to pay more to really be able to enjoy the country.