[LivinLOS]

Well my feeling is like this..

One on one Thais are easy going, on the surface welcoming, pleasant to you.. But collectively or perhaps subconciously the xonophobic attitudes come over and it would seem that this Thais love Thais.. Thailand is for Thais.. Attitude manifest itself much more as you go up the power chain into people in positions of governance. I also think that the advantages for women of liking farangs (we are percieved rightly or wrongly as being better husbands, not only through financially but Thai guys still live a very the man rules, I can go get drunk and ***** around, the wife does what I say, not going to do shit to take care of kids type of culture) is double edged.. On one hand it means that Thai women especially those form lower or low midlle class backgrounds will be interested in you but is this building a further growing resentment in Thai men ??

I also feel that we are more tolerated than truly welcomed but the Thais have a culture of smiling, being superficially welcoming that in simple interactions makes you feel welcome. Remember as Thais they are taught to be concious of class totally from birth, how they address each other in every sentance, how they wai and greet each other, every interaction. This is based mostly but not purely on finance (eg monks are highest of the high no matter how poor but also a poor but respectable poo yai baan is going to have more respect than a local mildly successful businessman but probably fail against a merc driving 'figure of influence').. But as farangs we are kind of exempted, we are expected to not know how to identify who is low-so and who is hi-so properly, we are assumed to all have major money, we chose to go around with dark skinned, issan flat nosed girls, we blow thier class conevntions to the wind.

So by doing so we are breaking the order of thier society in a way, we are allowing dirt poor issanites to have some money and not be abused by the ruling elite as slave value labor.. We are educating thier kids better than Thai school systems do. We are creating industries and providing for those industroies in ways Thais minds dont seem readily able to service which creates jealousy.

Theres another (conspiracy) theory.. This country is controlled inside out by the Chinese Thais.. Ethnic Thais are the poor Thais.. Chinese Thais run the banks, the gold shops, the tourist resorts, The media (look at the girls on Thai TV, thats not average Thais, thats Chinese), white skin products, media has made Chinese beauty what is 'beautiful'.. Basically the TC's have the country sewn up and under thier thumb. They came here 200 years ago, and they are smarter, they are hardworking and industrious, they think long term, they educate thier kids, they are a success story. They are the power elites.

Now we as farangs come along. We find thier country to out liking, we start to make inroads, build our business, we are the new immigrants, we have money, we have eduaction, many have euntrprenurial flair and can use western customer service ideas to improve on things. Well perhaps they dont want to competition. Perhaps they see us as a threat. Again educating ethnic Thais, giving jobs to people not based on the shade of thier skin or thier status but on how they do the job, letting money flow into the rural areas, perhaps even opening thier eyes to the world a little more. Theres a big difference between the ruling TC elites whose ability to travel and whose kids get educated in western schools and the ethnic Thais who do menail work and will not break thier social bonds. Farangs are destablizing that system, we dont accept that class is a reson to keep people down.

So old squarehead (another TC) and his boys can see that maybe these sneaky farang immigrants will destablize the class structures that have him and his sitting pretty on top the pile ??

Are the rules a direct result of discussions or thoughts like this ? Secret back room meetings ?? I doubt that.. But the cause and effect that I have stated above seems to obvious to not have some basis in reality.

You cannoty deny there is anti farang sentiment and also that it is semi pushed onto rural Thais who are in the main ignorant of us.. Look at the TV soaps, any time you get a farang character on there the mood music changes switch to 'ominous' and hes always the baddie, like arab guys on the A team or black guys on the Dukes of Hazard its reinfoced stereotyping at its most painfully obvious. But then at a grass roots level when a guy moves upcountry to live a simple life with his tilak and he takes care of his kid, maybe teaches english at a school, or basically acts like a good guy in the community, it creates a much stronger effect. An effect that works from the grass roots up and is more powerful.

So is there racism ?? Sure but what do you do ?? You simply rise above it, not get annoyed by it, act mature and be the bigger man, (after all the rural ignorant rice farmer whose never been further than his local city is the one with the limited life experiences isnt he).. Its not like they are lynching us or even being overtly nasty to us, its about whats in thier heads and that can be changed by positive interactions.