Walking to the night-market from my hotel, I get stopped by a dude who speaks perfect english. So so rare to find that here from a Thai, (dude dated a girl for 1.5years in California, traveled the us, loves the 49ers). He lets me know the market is closed, (doh!) but wants me to eat with his family. Wants me to teach his daughter piano, and his wife spanish for their mexico vacas. My little speaking of thai goes a long way with them, super-appreciative, "you speak such good thai, my english is so bad"

I think his verbatim approach to me was, "Sir, is there anything I can help you with, you seem a bit lost." Compared to GWM who needs to say something three times and then "cao djai" (do you understand) after and when they get it are just thrilled. So he's being a lot modest.

We eat some dank thai food, (30bt shrimp-fried rice) and I talk with him and his wife like I would with americans, which feels good. He has a beach house he wants me to come visit in some place i've never heard of - an island near Krabi, but forgot the name. He even knew about the Oregon Ducks and we have fished the same rivers in Oregon. Buys my meal, explains to me how my phone works and acting as a translator, the ladies at 7-11 fix it in like 1 second. Sweet!

While we're eating I hesitantly tell them the story about hitting on the wrong girl and being told I should probably go back to my table, and then seconds later dude doing creepy handshake. I show him and his wife the handshake, they laugh so hard.

Confirmed: this means 'I want to be on you/I want to take you home' Thais are sly like that. Looking back this dude was smiling bigtime and did it a couple times to me, did not look gangster at all, he looked a little metrosexual. So hey I got gay fans as well! The Thai dude I was kicking it with that night im sure tried to explain this to me, but he was offering whores so often I assumed he was just doing it again, and I was just like "Mai ow" so prob came off as huge homophobe.

Ecstatic to meet this guy, wants to do everything to help me out and it seems 100% sincere, (he's obv well off: had a sweet car his kids are rocking mobiles and the lil guy has a digital camera he carries with him and an Xbox back home) Guy loves his family, has a fondness of America I can tell, tells a story of going busto at an LV blackjack table after he just goes nuts at the concept of free drinks when you gamble- he still fondly thinks of that idea and respects the business concept lol, (no poker mention obv) He spent some years just traveling the states, hence the english and taught his wife. Kids are adorable, (little boy is running around taking pictures of me from all different angles, I practice english with their 5th grader, too cute) He just gives me some ideas to make side money, teaching guitar/piano to college students or kids out of my house, manages real estate properties he says and is very much a capitalist like yours truly, (just getting that weed money)

So going to be a great great resource, helping me get a bike/house for thai-prices, ("I'll be your real estate agent, auto dealer, I will even waive the comission!" he says laughing)

He wants me to come over to his house, I'll plan something this week.

My plan is to burn the Superbowl on a DVD, give it to him and watch it with him. Huge NFL fan, I might see if i can dl some old 49ers games or their championship videos. I'll also give him some of my gameday Ducks T-shirts I brought over, (which i would just sweat holes in and simply can't wear these days).

Also koolwhynot2, pm sent.

I'm not doubting your story at all. I hope it's good luck and good times only. But to be approached and pegged immediately by someone like that in a foreign country can be very dangerous. I'm not saying to stop seeing him immediately whatever, but just stay on your guard, obv.

ya lol this kid seems to follow everyone or go anywhere. If some random approached me and said come to my house there is like 2% chance that I would go. You make the wrong decision and your laying in a bathtube of ice, or your wallet is gone.

GWM,

I think the two poster above me are slightly/moderately paranoid. Many (perhaps even most) Thai people are extremely friendly, polite, and generous. I can agree with loosekanen a bit in that you shouldn't completely let your guard down, but the things that should arouse suspicion are usually easy to spot and his point is don't let the initial good interaction blind you to something that may be less than genuine later on. Chances are you just met a nice guy who was happy to speak English and share things with you.

100% agree with WillyT. I wandered into my first travels around South America with much of the same positive attitude that you display and it was absolutely wonderful. The poorest people gave me rides, shared their food and invited me to stay at their homes for no reason except my young naive white face. To miss out on all that because of unwarranted paranoia would be a very sad thing. I'm enjoying your posts too, so keep it up so we can live through the eyes of a Thailand newbie again.

agree 100% with the two posts above. in my experiences many thais are open and friendly like this, and from ur descriptions things seem sincere. There's just so little of that "omg omg stranger danger" thing like in the west. i wouldnt say keep ur guard down, but being willing and open to travel with other thais can open new doors and experiences.
in less than two months i made friends with a police officer in bkk, who spoke little english, but basically told me if i had any problems with any one or any police to call him. i think the police officer was talking about big events like if i ever had to go to jail or anything major though. anyway the police guy had a house about an hour outside of town, and invited me over and his wife cooked like this huge thai meal for me, which i didn't know how to eat exactly, bc at the time i was only used to subway and sukumvit restaurants. anyway the wife gets up comes over and starts hand making me lettuce tacos, stuffed with fish and noodles and shows me how to eat it. lol

Heading there next month for an extended visit and would like to meet some poker players over there

+1

its kind of like when your friends come into town and you bring them to soi cowboy. its like being there again for the first time. =)

either there is a different Chalong in thailand than what we're thinking of, or you don't really understand how small Phuket is.

Mmerli is talking about the town of Chalong, which is right in the middle of Rawai, Kata, and Phuket Town, damn near the center of all the 2+2'ers in Phuket.

Lol thanks Rutang, I guess I overestimated the size of Phuket. I'll be training at a Muay Thai gym in Chalong so thought I may as well stay there. If any of you guys have any other suggestions on where to stay, please let me know

I'm looking at spending up to 20k baht per month for about 2-3 months.

If this happened in non touristy area, chances are good that you have nothing to worry about. Thais are so friendly and helpful, it's ridiculous. Everybody has similar stories...

On the other hand, if this was in an area of town frequented by foreigners, I recommend more caution. This is where Thai and other, foreigner scamers prey on tourists and you never know. In BKK on Sukhumvit you really have to wonder why someone is randomly happy to see you and surprisingly they speak good English and also share common interests with you. What are the chances! haha... Lots of people get set up for that gambling scam for example, and they are not all stupid - they just let their guard down...

good reports so far... you gotta get a camera though...

Phuket people: what is your impression of the Kamala beach area? I have a lawyer friend who has the oppurtnity to work out there and he's wondering about housing, nightlife, etc.

I wrote a bit about it in the sticky.
there basically isnt a lot going on in Kamala. I mean the beach is okay I guess and you can get some pretty sick condos etc. with awesome seaview, but it's just too boring there. I have some friends there and there are quite a few fellow Danes there but it still isn't enough for me to want to stay there.

dc - got a camera, took some pictures, but i left the USB cord at home! So i'll check out the Thai-costco here if they have it. I'll post the stuff up.

Other stuff - I feel like i've got a good head on my shoulders. That being said I've done some dumb things, (getting wasted, hitting on a girl and being told that she's friends with the owner, taking rides from randoms late @ night)

This must stop, and there's certain things that will reduce these sort of things: getting a motorbike, getting a more solid crew, having a decent FB(s). A lot of these things that sound sketch i'm doing b/c of a lack of the aforementioned.

The Thai english speaking dude I met was pretty concerned that I was walking to the market @ night by myself, an action which I thought was totally chill except for dogs that I gotta yell at and "Would you walk through central Los Angeles at night? This is a small town, but with the bad economy it only takes one person." Very good advice.

Hey guys I'll be in Thailand from Tuesday is their still a lot of trouble to worry about in Bangkok? Me and my friend are thinking of going to Ko Samui straight from Bangkok if it's still bad.

What is the best way to get to ko samui from Bangkok? I would prefer to go by flight but the cheapest I can find is £180 is there anywhere to get them cheaper? I don't mind getting Train or Bus but heard some buses are bad for theft etc

i don't like the idea of living scared. i walk around shady parts of bkk alone at night, there's no way it's a problem in a smaller area like you're staying at.

The amount of times I ended up in a car with random thais I met at a bar and NONE of the english speaking guys I went out with was easily >5 (in BKK), and they all ended up being awesome evenings. But yea, obv now look back and think "wow i was asking to lose a kidney"

certainly avoid the business center with the redshirt rally, especially at nite.

yo guys, if anyone's looking to rent or buy in Koh Samui shoot me a PM. I've got a friend who just built some awesome balla houses round there

depends what ur lookin for. i know someone that is renting a room with A/C, standard room for 6k/month

Has anybody else had problems with the full tilt poker client connecting in the last week? I'm in Chiang Mai, and the full tilt poker website is blocked so I cant check for maintanence, but in the last week 3 times the client just keeps saying trying again.

I re-installed windows after the 3rd time (I needed to do this anyway) and everything has worked fine again for the last 4 days, now it just says trying again all the time.

Maybe its maintanence, but I doubt it as it is evening time in US now and so I wouldn't have thought they would do it now.

Any help anyone can give me would be much appreciated.

in CM now and it just loaded fine for me (8:30 a.m.)

in the next few days, once i figure out what the current roommates are doing, I'll be posting availability of rooms in my house. when are you coming here?

my place is not very far from Chalong, (i'm on the outer edge of Kata so basically i'm on the other side of the mountain from chalong, maybe 3 km) although it's possible you'd rather find a place right by your Gym.

You coming to bkk at all?

-Bill