The early years…

Thirty Years and Counting

Over the years I have often toyed with the idea of making some sort of record of the years that I have spent in Thailand. 30 at last count, and continuing – it’s interesting to see the reaction sometimes, when a person asks how long I have been living in Thailand and I mention that I have probably been here longer than they are old. With some friends I may try to make up a list of the foreign residents of Thailand they know who have been here longer than I have – obviously there are quite a few when it comes right down to it, but the numbers start to dwindle once you get to the 30 or 40-years limit.

More recently I started working on a blog – this particular blog you are reading part of right now, kensdaysandtravels – mainly because I wanted to share some of the stories of my travels over the years; stories about my most recent and longest continuous trip to a continent, South America; but also eventually about my previous visits to the continents of Africa, Europe, Asia, – well, every one of them except the Antarctic. As I was working on these stories or entries, I started thinking again about the stories I could tell about Thailand – after all, a blog with 2 entries per week will require a lot of material, and perhaps it’s time to utilize the past 30 years as a source for content. A good starting point would obviously be the ‘how’ and ‘why’ for my presence here in Thailand, and perhaps that is where the tale will begin, but sometimes chronology can be a mean task master, and I will inadvertently tell of more recent events even when you may expect something from the ancient past.

Chao Phraya River, 1987, near Thewet

Speak my Mind or Hold my Peace…

When I started writing this particular entry, I toyed with the idea of some direct comments on certain areas of life in Thailand, among those of course politics, certainly a few comments about religion, and the odd observation about society as it was and as it is now. I wrote a few paragraphs and then decided that perhaps for the time being I will not discuss those areas directly, maybe in the future, and have saved those observations for inclusion down the road. There are other areas of life that I could touch on, and perhaps as my story unfolds, I will digress to those areas, not necessarily as they affect me, but rather my thoughts or opinions on them. Inadvertently such thoughts or opinions may clash with those of more recent visitors, or even with the official beauty shots of the country, but then that is why they call it ‘opinion’ and ‘editorial’. Things have changed, dramatically – I will describe some of those changes, and if they do clash with perceptions, well I think 30 years should have give me a certain amount of insight and perhaps ‘right’ to voice my thoughts.

Peaceful canal life with fishing nets, Ratchaburi, 1988

Momentous Changes

I was lucky to have arrived in Thailand before the mega change transformed this country from one that was largely agriculture-based to one that is now driven in large part by manufacturing, consumerism, and tourism. Yes, tourism. In 1986, the number of people visiting Thailand was still in the low single-digit millions, but during the 1990s, hugely successful tourism promotion campaigns quickly brought the number of annual visitors to well over 10 million. Combined with rapid industrialization and a few other factors, the face of Thailand changed dramatically between 1986 and the mid-90s, and that change continues today, not necessarily at the industrial or manufacturing level, but at the societal level; at the level that initially enchanted millions, but has now become the divide or hurdle the nation must overcome to proceed.

Dessert of the Gods

Dessert of the gods: Sticky rice and Mango; and Mango smoothie with Sangkhaya (coconut custard)

Along with the boom in tourism came the recognition of Thai cuisine as one of the world’s most interesting and delicious, with thousands of column inches in newspapers and magazines around the world detailing exactly the taste and delicate aromas of Thai dishes. To me, there’s still nothing better than a good bowl of guaytiow with a nice slab of beef in it, followed by what is undoubtedly one of the most delicious desserts known to mankind, mangoes and sticky rice. I must say though that the latter is only good in the month of March, just as the mangoes are ripening – any other time of the year just doesn’t seem right, an abomination even, perpetrated on humanity by international conglomerates hell-bent on destroying the last remaining genuine food crops through genetic mutation and manipulation to create monster or Frankenstein foods that will leave farmers impoverished and the corporate fat cats licking the grease off their chops.

Rice threshing

Of Carrots, Rabbits, Goats, Sheep, and Agriculture

The talk of dessert has brought me in a rather circuitous and twisting route to fruits and food. I’ll have more to say about food for sure, particularly about the travesty of carrots being added to the local delicacies – I can’t recall the nation turning into rabbits (sheep and goats, yes, but rabbits? no.), so why the insistence on adding and feeding the masses with carrots in dishes that traditionally held no such content I cannot understand. More about cuisine later. From fruit and food, we come to the source of such things: agriculture. It is a safe subject, one that is not likely to offend anyone, as most people outside of rural areas have no idea what it’s all about, considering that there are enough people who think that organic milk comes from some plant. (Yes, in a way it does, grass (which is a plant) is consumed by cows, who then produce the liquid called milk, which is then processed and packaged in a plant – pedantics and the English language) It is a pastoral topic, one that many people have waxed lyrical over – at least the countryside anyway. And in a way, that pastoral setting is a very fitting beginning, the countryside and agriculture, as agriculture was the basis of Thailand’s growth and prominence for centuries (it was the world’s largest exporter of rice for decades, as well as seafood), and it was because of agriculture that I came to be here, and so that is where I shall start the tale.