[junkhouse]

When I first arrived in Thailand, I was continually surprised to see how often Thais would tout and flaunt their education and the numerous titles that they had acquired over the years, especially if it involved graduate level university degrees, schooling abroad, or some type of government rank. It didn’t take long to realize just how meaningless these degrees and accolades usually were. In many cases, the recipient of a degree must have been lucky to have just graduated, much less learned anything.....or perhaps these people didn’t really do the work themselves. Several years ago, I met a woman from another country in Southeast Asia who had received her doctorate from the U.S., she mentioned how she had two fellow Thai students in her doctoral program neither of which were terribly competent, in fact they would often get ‘sick’ before every exam and then ask their fellow classmates about the exam before they took a make-up. These two students did graduate with doctoral degrees and one of them became Dean of her faculty at a prominent school in Thailand. My friend was surprised at this situation because she thought that scholars who rose to the level of academic prominence of ‘Dean’ in her country would be considered top scholars in their fields, and she knew that her former classmates simply didn’t have the intellectual rigor to be the Dean of a college in her country. Since I had attended school in the country, this Asian woman asked me what I thought of Thai students. I relayed an experience from my second year of graduate school.

While working on a graduate degree at a well-known university on the U.S. west coast in the 1980s, I was assisting with an undergraduate course in my field and had almost no input into the grade. On one occasion, I was invited to dinner by a Thai student in my class who was living with her Asian boyfriend. I decided to accept the invitation, and at the end of the night, the gal and her boyfriend made their pitch by talking about what it would take to improve their grades in the course and trying to suggest that maybe I could help them out. I got a real kick out of this blatant attempt to get a higher grade, as there was no way I was going to divulge anything about an exam, and the only thing I could provide was help in studying for the exam. Neither the gal or her boyfriend, ever bothered to invite me out after that, she (nor her boyfriend) ever dropped by to ask for help on the exam, nor did either one of them receive the grade that she was hoping for in the course. School for this gal didn’t seem to be about learning, but rather a necessary requirement for receiving a college degree from the U.S. and since no one would ever know the grades she received in her courses, it would be easy to lead others into thinking that she was a stellar student.

Because there was an active international student’s organization at my university, including a number of Thai students, it was easy to get to know many of these people and learn about their relationships, much easier than at my undergraduate institution where the Thais seemed to be rather stand-offish and had almost no interest in talking to me, especially in Thai. One Thai gal at my graduate institution, stood out among the others as she was both quite pretty and also seemed to change boyfriends every year, both Thai and farang. In three years I knew her, she had three separate boyfriends. Later, I learned from one of the boyfriends (farang) that at first he couldn’t believe his good luck in landing this gal, but over the course of the year he found that she was increasingly asking him for help with her school work, and by the end of the year he had written about half of her Master’s thesis before he graduated, moved, and they broke up. No worries though, as the next year this gal had a new boyfriend and was finally able to finish up that pesky thesis and return home triumphant in her ‘educational’ success! I know her last boyfriend (a Thai) felt a bit used by the situation, which just goes to show that it isn’t just the farang who can be duped by the pretty face and great smile. These reflections are just a few examples of the Thai students whom I have met over the years, and I am amazed at how adept many of them were, especially the women, at obtaining ‘help’ in their studies.

I don’t believe that this lack of interest in learning and the focus on getting the degree by any means, is an isolated example of a few Thais; take a look at the minor scandals that have arisen among Thai politicians over the past 20 years and involve the legitimacy of the degrees that they have received; there are several. This situation is also not unique to Thailand, though, as by the time I finished my formal schooling, the type of superficial learning experience I am talking about had become a major factor among many of students I met at school (here is an area where perhaps Thailand was leading a trend rather than following); it is probably also reflected in the type of westerners that increasingly seek to live permanently in Thailand.

A related issue to intellectual curiosity is face, which is so important that to the Thai it negates the importance of issues (that I believe should be) of greater concern - remember this is my view of what is important to a relationship. A Thai friend once told me that she had to spend a lot of time and money to dress well for her work, because how she dressed expressed what she was. Thais do seem to live life on the surface and appearance is perhaps the most important element in this quest. Unfortunately for me perhaps, I see things a bit differently. To take my friend’s argument to a logical conclusion, if I choose to dress a certain way does that really make me the kind of person that my dress mimics? In my very narrow Calvinist/Puritanist view of the world, if I try to appear as something that I am not, then I am a charlatan, and this issue has very important consequences to society. Suppose that because of the way I have presented myself, as a specialist in some area that I am asked to help. What do I do? The charlatans have considerable time perfecting the art of diversion, by claiming to either be busy or tied up with something else. How many Thais have you met who can talk all day about their abilities, but have never been required to demonstrate them. Some of you may not agree with this view, but I abhor pretense. Even if I were rich, I wouldn’t show it off, and if I were not, then I damn sure wouldn’t pretend to be rich or affluent. To me this is not just dishonest but ridiculous and embarrassing. Yes, I know this type of activity is a handicap in Thailand, to making Thai friends, and to attracting Thai women; however, my view is that I would rather not have a girlfriend or spouse with whom I have to live my life on the surface, or as an imposter. At some level, I think this is the issue what most people are addressing when they talk about the basic dishonesty among Thais.

Thais are very conscious of wanting to be all things to all people, and they spend incredible amounts of time and energy working and hoping that they are never pinned down to prove or manifest their abilities in an area that they have superficially made claim. This is why Thais have become masters of deception and duplicity, which helps them to avoid embarrassing situations while still allowing them to come off looking good. I think this is also one reason why Thais often seem to hire Westerners who are among the least capable farang I have ever met, as all it seems to take to impress a Thai is an easily acquired superficial appearance, rather than the much more difficult to acquire, ability, capability, and expertise that takes time to acquire and to ascertain in an individual. Thailand has attracted an assorted hodge-podge of underachievers over the years who have been able to ‘con’ their way into employment simply because they pass the ‘form-superficiality’ test.