Long-Term Psychological Issues living in Thailand
Over the past few weeks I’ve been contemplating whether I’m slowing going mentally insane living in Thailand. I guess the fact that I am aware of myself contemplating the fact reduces the possibility somewhat. That’s still not reassuring though.
I started getting these thoughts when my friends from England arrived a few weeks ago. I took them to Thermae, a freelancer Thai hooker bar. All the girls inside are freelancers and come and go as they please. Freelancers stand near the wall in a line and must wait for a guy to approach them. They will never approach you.
It’s a bit of weird place and I thought I’d show my mates as you don’t get this kind of stuff back home.
As we entered the bar at 11pm on a creepy Sunday evening, the place was packed to the gills with girls, Japanese expats who don’t even lift and a few middle aged farangs in Hawaiian shirts.
We got ourselves a beer each (110 baht) and took up a vantage point.
One of my friends was a little taken back by the whole thing and said how crazy it was. I told him to me, this is totally normal. I said if I walked into Nana Entertainment Plaza, I’m pretty much expecting a Thai ladyboy to grab my hand, arm or my smeggy penis if I walk on the second floor.
In fact, I’d be shocked if this didn’t happen. To me this is all normal and I don’t even bat an eyelid anymore.
But is it normal?
At first I thought this is Asia, the culture is different and the idea of what’s normal here is totally different to the England. But is it really?
Many consider Soi Cowboy, Nana, Patpong and Pattaya as a man’s fantasy land where anything can happen. Keyword: Fantasy land.
Then I did something I tell myself not to do – I started to think.
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Long time reader Harvie, I think this might be the most insightful and best piece of Writing you’ve done for this blog!
I used to read your stuff because it was really funny and mildly informative but I think your writing has progressed to a point now where the humour to information balance is at a better balance.
Keep it up!
My question is why do you feel there’s any reason to be concerned psychologically? What does that have to do with life abroad? I’m sure there are plenty of nutters in the UK as there are everywhere and let me also say, everyone has a bit of nutter going on inside their head from time to time. The fact it concerns you, suggests your not in the extreme case of going nutter.
Funny article mate, ha ha! And one I can relate to in many ways.. Lots of weird expats here but also plenty of decent guys. I’ve made some great friends here and they are of all ages in the spectrum.
Keep up the good work
I live here 6 years n dont even know about this freelance place god damn man!! haha nah but seriously there is good people here just there is loads of thick drunk fuckwits that just want pay for pussy. I have loads of friends from all kinds of walks but in general conversation has never been deep in uk or here, it is a worldwide thing of dumbing down imo, unless ur drunk then it all makes sense.
Your not crazy mate – just conscious. we live in a world of death culture, the main promotion for most business is death – a dead animal or a product that will kill you. So no surprise that people are also ‘dead’ and boring.
I think your right if you mean people who sit around in titty bars drinking poor quality beer and spirits, smoking cigerettes, eating shit food and slowly pittering their life away – sure ur already crazy doing that, so yes u will go totally mental in the end and get depressed. Same reasons any vice head gets depression, in uk its coke and prozzies also same problem, in america u got las vegas.
In thailand u have beautiful mountains, beaches and amazing national heritage sites. But mother nature keeps the wronguns from going their, we do not advertise it and you will be told to go away. Sex tourists are not allowed, written in thai at mostly all entrance points and also written – do not advertise to farang. You are not welcome to the nirvana, just the farm where they take money of you like cattle being herded to slaughter. So yes you are crazy and you should go home 🙂 Or come to the jungle and stop being a dutty heart. Up to you.
I have been on Holiday for the last 3 years and soon to be the year four in a few months. Although I only come for one month at each visit, it rewired my thought processes. I love it there and haven’t ruled out pulling the plug in the future and coming full time. I’ll never stop looking for the way to sustain myself there. I find your article spot on in regards to what I have observed and felt there. Things back home have bored me since returning the first time. I honestly never returned mentally or spiritually. What’s a guy to do?
Hi Harvie,
You clearly confused 2 concepts here: being an expat (and suffering from isolation, motherland distance, etc.) AND living in Thailand (at first enjoying the easy ladies, bars and restaurants then getting bored). I’ve been expatriate since 2007 now in different countries in Asia and I reckon a lot of the experienced facts you mention here but also I am in Thailand now and true it is hard to stay healthy but you can, it depends on you and just you, and the surrounding you choose to be yours.
You know a foreigner has been in Thailand for too long when the mention of “loosing face” or their “status in society” becomes a cause of main concern to them..
It sure does creep in if you don’t watch out!
Being an expat in thailand,…..red pill or blue. Must take one,….. The wonder world or the world of nonsense. I guess somehow you’ll swallow both.
The thing is. u spend too much time in those bars. Stop being a nightlife person, and u wont turn crazy.
I rarely go to bars or even drink alcohol. If you read my last few blog post you will notice that I almost never go to bars or clubs.
Interesting and funny article – I’m sure MANY expats in Thailand can relate to a lot of it. Although it can be fun for awhile, the lifestyle you discussed is superficial and certain to get old eventually. If you seek it out, there’s a lot more to Thailand than the places, lifestyle and people that you’ve mentioned, including great Thai people to be friends with (who even speak English if you’re too lazy or dumb to learn Thai). Perhaps I was lucky, but I was exposed to a lot more of Thailand in just the first couple of times that visited than what you’ve covered here. So, by the time I was preparing to move there, I had envisioned a a very fulfilling life with a lot more to it than you’re article entails. Although I did miss my family and friends, I never really missed living back in the U.S., probably because I had a lot more going on with as much or even more substance to my life in Thailand than I had in the U.S. before I moved there.
Being “normal” means slaving away at job you hate to support an overweight aging wife and ungrateful kids until you die of some combination of cancer and misery. No thanks.
And anyway who wants to hang around with stinky old western guys in sleeveless shirts when blowjobs from 20 year olds can be had on demand for 600 baht?
I always hear this and that about family back home..What is most or all of your family is dead ? Then there is no home to go back to..For me this makes the idea of relocating easier
uw0tm8?
Re; the bar scene ? Why ? the noise will destroy your hearing, the booze will destroy your body and the lack of purpose will destroy your soul
i really dont like the pictures youre using in this article
Couldn’t agree with your more mate. When living there most don’t seem to tell that they have or are changing until they return to their own country. Then when back to their motherland everything seems so strange and hard to bare. At first when returning home it feels alien and the feeling of wanting to go back to Thailand is strong. But after spending some weeks with family and friends who you can trust and communicate with with 100% efficiency is realized it begins to create some awareness of what perhaps was missing in Thailand.
I have many great friends in Thailand and a good life there, but at the same time back home gives me the comfort and trust unlike anywhere else.
Recently I have had a very bad experience with a girl and had to run and leave the country in fear of my life. In 3.5 months I have come back to Australia 3 times. I kept trying to resolve the situation in Thailand thinking it was safe to return. But to no avail.
The last time I came back to Thailand was 4 days ago. I had 1 night and day there where I lived and discovered finally why I also loved my life there. My great mates, and I have to say.,.in general, Thai people are very friendly…at least on the surface….there are many things easily forgotten when you have lived there for too long and negativity does seep in.
Shame I had one night in my house before I had to run in fear of my life again and get a plane to escape.
All this had made me think.
I think a healthy way of living , at least for myself, is to divide time between Thailand and my own country. Good for the mind and the health.
Once I get this very bad situation under control I will return again and live a life which I know is great in Thailand while remembering I moved to Thailand for the reasons in the beginning….because the place is great. But I will never forget my real home in Australia and the person I am.
Great article mate…..you hit a nerve in me with it co aidering the crap I am going through right now…thanks for the read.
Let’s be honest, most expats wouldn’t find it difficult to suss out the oddballs from the fairly saner individuals, but disguises are getting better by the year. Mnay of the odder ones are alone here and actively seek out conversation with a fellow expat. It’d be anyone, as they don’t have much of an idea who’s who.
You can get by at first by conversing about the usual stuff, weather, beer prices and what foods you miss from home. Then the conversation goes two ways. Loser expat will spoil a the conversation with some out landish claim to their background – special forces, successful business, who they know, and the usual one that has me heading for an exit is the ”need any help with visas call me” claim.
I’ve met ”gun runners” whose gun expertise had him quoting model numbers and calibre and security experts, alleged mercenaries on R&R before their next mission.
These lone Walter Mitty types are normally mere english teachers living month by month, nursing a booze priblem or a demanding low class GF. Generalisiing I know, but from my experience totally true. I’m clearly a magnet for these types, maybe it’s my inviting persona and vibe.
Adopting a miserable and scowling appearance can help.
People keep going on about Thai smiles being fake, they probably always have been – they smile, say hello and nod. What more do you wana talk about? A conversation on the benefits of a Labour government? Makes me laugh when expats give the ‘land of fake smiles’ rubbish to anyone who’ll listen. Which can mean it’s time to pack up and go, bitterness has set in.
Real friends are hard to come by, it takes time to make a circle of decent drink companions and like minded, but don’t lose heart, you mix in the right circles, steer clear of bars and do judge people on face value, can save a lot of crap beforehand.
“I watched a snail crawl along the edge of a straight razor. That’s my dream; that’s my nightmare. Crawling, slithering, along the edge of a straight razor… and surviving.”
For F$!#k’s sake Man, get it together! Please don’t go all COL Kurtz on us now….we need the great articles on where to bag a Hi-So Uni freelancer, who pleasures us for free, does our laundry, gives us some “walk around $”, and cooks one hell of a Pad Phik Whatever! 🙂
Keith
Some of the things you say are re isolation and alienation have nothing to do with Thailand per se, but happen to expats everywhere.
On some of the more specific points:
*) Whether or not Bangkok’s red light districts become “normal” is up to you. In the last 1.5 years I’ve been there only a handful of times, mostly with visitors who were curious. Bored of it or find it soul crushing? Don’t go.
*) “Making good friends in Thailand is hard” — Making good friends everywhere is hard, especially when you move there as a grownup since that generally means locals will (a) already have an established network of friends and (b) not have much time to socialize due to work etc. I experienced that moving to a neighboring country, where the language and cultural barrier was much lower than in Thailand.
*) “Fantasy land”: Once again, I think that very much depends on how you surround yourself with. My group of friends is a mix of short term expats, long term expats and Thais, and a lot of their problems are the same my friends back home have. I tend not to socialize with self-declared sex tourists and sexpats, though in all fairness you probably did so all your life, people just weren’t as upfront about it as they are here.
*) I have to agree on the sad sight of couples who barely exchange a word over the course of an entire meal. But if that’s something you don’t want for yourself, just don’t do it. There are plenty of nice Thai girls who speak a decent amount of English, and it’s really not that hard to find them. If you date a bargirl from Isaan who learned English from “friends” communication will obviously be more limited than when dating a well-educated girl who has a steady job and maybe lived abroad for a while (i.e. the type of girl almost all my long-term expats friends are dating).
It’s good that you are consciously watching yourself, introspection generally doesn’t hurt. If Thailand drives you crazy, it’s generally because you let it (impersonal “you”, not you specifically). I don’t judge other people’s life choices, if you’re here to whore and drink yourself to death, godspeed, I hope you have a hell of a ride. But if all you want is a “normal” life, I don’t quite see what’s stopping you from living one, except maybe poor impulse control. This stuff is hard, everywhere.
Absolute drivel.
How about getting out of places like Nana Plaza and start involving yourself with anything except the ‘expat’ community. You are a person living on a piece of land around many other persons who are also living on the land that just happens to be called Thailand. If you plan on living a long period of your time in any place, to integrate and communicate with the people already there is imperative.
Through a series of historical luck and geopolitical changes, you should begin to learn Thai, as that is what everyone speaks here. Start going to normal places, not ‘normal’ expat places. Be a part of Thailand rather than a stranger always on the fringes never getting involved in reality.
You may be going insane but its down to your own misconceptions that you are One and they are ‘the other’. It may stem from innate racism, it may come from how you were taught at school, that the ‘other’ is harder to integrate with. It’s just not true. Everybody is trying except you. Don’t blame Thailand for your lack of integration, blame yourself, and fix it.
Good luck.
What are ‘normal’ expat places Dan? Perhaps I will go there and find wise ole folk like you mate.
If you read it correctly, i said “start going to normal places, not not ‘normal’ expat places. AKA – dont go to expat places. ฝรั่งไอ้ขี้โง่่
I think you already going a bit wonky Dan. Showing off with Thai words and feeling a sense of being superior because you ‘fit in’ with Thai culture.
I could be reading it wrong, but I doubt it.
Sorry Harvie, you have misunderstood it. Basically I’m saying any foreigner who frequents such venues as the NANA shithole will clearly have a feeling of disenfranchisement from the culture he is in – because that is not Thailand. I for one am absolutely disgusted with anyone who goes to such a degrading place. I feel you are one of those who do.
I could be reading it wrong, but i doubt it.
If you live in any other country, you would also expect to speak the language before you can integrate properly, and also go places locals go, not sexpats.
Is that simple enough for you. Maybe i’d be easier to explain in Thai but you haven’t even tired learning it have you.
You’re very quick to judge Dan, many would argue that there is nothing wrong with going to Nana nor are they are disgusted by the people who go there. After all, it’s the oldest trade in the world that happens everywhere.
Seem you have some anger or resentment issues against certain types of expats, guess we are just as bad as each other 😀 .
Staying in Thailand for last 11 years.. and what I can say “Everybody has its own Thailand” – people find what they want to find 🙂 Most of the stories are unique as much as people who make different relations in Thailand.
I came without money and business experience… and from meeting to meeting I build company which helped me to buy the house, car, big flat TV and boobs for wife.. could send kids to international school. And then I’ve started to make relations with middle and high class in Thailand. People mostly educated in the west.. and I still enjoy staying here, haven’t gone crazy yet 😉
I arrived in 2003 for three months with £600. Ended up staying 7 years.
Wouldn’t wish it on anyone without a connection to the place beforehand. And I don’t mean ten days vacation in nana plaza
Didn’t rely on anybody for loans etc. Went out and found work myself.
Never told that to any other expats I met anywhere, ever. That kind of thing is looked down on by the affluent clued up expats who know everything.
I just want to warn you here, because you’re on the slippery slope to thinking you should move back to England and get with the program. You’ve tasted freedom now, realize that the lifestyle we enjoy in Thailand is only available to very rich people back home. It’s not so much the eating out, popping bottles, being a weekend warrior, but the fact you can as you say jet off to an island whenever you feel like it. You can go play tennis in the daytime 5 times a week if you feel like it. You get up when you want, get laid when you want, drink when you want, everyone treats you with superficial respect.
Anything resembling this kind of lifestyle is simply not available unless you are a millionaire in England.
Also consider that in a couple of years your good pals in England are going to be locked up with kids and full time jobs. There will be none of the hanging out bullshitting, then hitting on young hot chicks a couple times a week. Once a month if you’re lucky.
What I am getting at is, that if you move back home, do it because you want a normal stable family life with kids and a 9-5 job. That’s perfectly reasonable. Thailand isn’t a place for that imo.
Good points, but to live that lifestyle don’t you have to be in the 1% in England, which is not considered ‘normal’ as everyone else as you said is working 9-5s. Interesting comments for sure though brah.
Hey.. Why did you delete the last post about shipping and stuff?
Something was up with it, will be up ASAP.
Good part:
———————————–
I’m from poverty and still am in poverty so I definitely enjoy life 1000 times more doing poverty in Thailand instead of in Germany. Shitty weather, everything expensive, have to cook your own food, can’t afford to do anything.
But in Thailand it’s paradise, get to eat at restaurants every meal of the day, I would come here even just for that one single reason. I don’t need to make a long list of all the cheap luxuries you get in Thailand i think.
Bad part:
————————————
It’s like you said, all farangs are such asshole idiots.
In my home town neighborhood we take pride in being poor, if some asshole would come talking shit about being better than us he would walk home naked but in Thailand it’s the opposite.. all these assholes everywhere wanting to show off and make you feel like shit if you give the slightest sign of having little or less money than them.
Didnt I write a comment about this in an article you wrote a few months ago and got completely shut down?? Lol… This is exactly what I was talking about, you and other expats can’t make it in your respective countries, so you flee to Asia because you know you will be the man. Plus you don’t like having a job, because let’s face it you’re lazy and unmotivated to work like a productive member of society. The longer you are there the more you lose your grip on what’s actually real and the more delusional and crazy you become…. Expats living in those places dont get respect, and you end up with weirdo friends and terrible social circles, barely making enough to survive and wasting your money chasing girls that you convince yourself like you for more than your money… Have fun with that while I’m living the “rat race” making trump like wages, driving my beams, fucking IG models, and going to amazing events in LA.
Lol, doubt any of the last few lines is true if you read a blog or take time to write on blogs like this. 😉
Unfortunately for you farang… It is all true… Lol. And this is about the 4th time I visited your site. Pretty easy to look at blogs and comment while I still do what I do . Don’t go crazy…(er)
Harvie,
So many LOL moments for me during reading this.
I have really noticed the long term impact recently. I lived basically alone in Jakarta for 7 years and as you know I worked offshore which was basically solitary confienment.
I am now married and have a son and of course that means playing the social game and dealing with in laws. I literally am struggling to maintain sanity.
Living as an expat alone for all those years changes evrtything. You get used to having everything your way, being totally independent and doing what you like. When you try to fit back into a unit it is a huge mind fuck.
Also about morality – my mum visited and cried when she saw the street kids. It suddenly occured to me that I see ppl basically dying and living worse than dogs on a daily basis and it doesn’t even phase me. That can’t be healthy!
Anyway, I have tried to return to the UK before and I am going back for summer. Believe me when I tell you it won’t work out 🙂 Once Asia gets in your blood, that’s it.
hehe, glad it hit home for you, I feel the same way. I think I might be lucky that I am aware of all this now so I can perhaps control my mind bit better and not go insane.
I go back to the UK in June, looking forward to it!
Heya!
This is a really good piece of writing, really brings back the nostalgia when I was in BKK for close to a year.
Big thanks for the memories and i totally agree to all the psychological effects when staying a long time in BKK
Keep it together and stay sane, hopefully you’ll make stronger bonds and find a nice thai girl (not bar girl)
rmb you can take the girl out of the bar but you cannot take the bar out of the girl.
Good job, added your blog in my favorites!
P.S I would prob be your very good asian friend if i was in Bangkok still haha! opps which i will be on NYE! haha
Having lived in Bangkok two months, only today for some reason, a Sunday, I’ve recently noticed how bitter and downright irritated mid-aged expat falang are here. We’re talking 50+
Unfortunately westerners judge people by the total sum of what they see. These expat falang seem to have some entitled attitude that every falang they see is a creepy sex tourist.
And they are somehow sanctimoniously cleansing the the streets of the filth with their stares and offhand negative comments towards other falang.
The horror the horror.
were you the author of Morally Diminished?
haven’t read much but you seem similar to him