Thais work hard and believe in serving with the personal touch.

Living as a 'farang' in
Thailand

 'Many Thais make light work'
Teachers Wanted
A Native English speaker? There is a job waiting for you in Thailand. click!
 Our Thai Link
Find out about our link school in Thailand. click!
 Thai News
An introduction to living as a white person in Thailand. click!
 Thai Workers
Thais work hard and believe in serving with the personal touch.
 Thai Capital
Discover Bangkoks real name and the other world records this famous city holds. click!
 Thai Culture
Read about this amazing culture. click!
 Thai Life
Every mode of transport is used, from elephants to tuk-tuks.
Read about Thai Cuisine of insects and rice.
click!
Thai Experiences
From visiting slums to shopping in Tescos, every day is a new experience for me. click!
 Isaan
Visit a part of Thailand not seen by many tourists. click!
 Teaching
Life in a Thai classroom. click!
 Thai Silk
Find out how silk is produced. click!

This above saying is very typical of Thailand. Thais believe in serving with the personal touch unlike in the west where machines seem to have replaced much of the work force. There seems to be a worker for every part of the working process.
Here are a few of the examples I have seen so far:

The Petrol Station

At the Esso station the other day I counted eight workers on the forecourt filling up cars with petrol and cleaning windscreens and three more workers inside the shop serving. If you drive a car into a petrol station in Thailand you do not even have to get out of the car. This, of course, is a blessing as most of the time it is too hot to stand the heat outside for too long.
This is not the same scenario in the UK. We fill up our own petrol tanks and then go and pay for it in the kiosk, where there will be only one or two workers.

The Car Wash

You can sit back and relax at this one. You are greeted by one or two workers . (Where are they in England?). You drive the car onto a conveyor belt, turn off the engine and wait for it to take you through the car wash. At the other end there are the same two workers waiting to rub your car down with a shammy leather. All for the grand price of one pound.

The Road Sweeper

We are used to seeing the road sweeper lorry out and about in the UK's town and city streets driven by one man. In Thailand, this again is entirely different. They have a lorry too, but the difference is that the whole process is carried out by about seven workers. There is the driver, then in front of the lorry is a man washing the road with a big hose and following on behind are five women sweeping the road with long brooms.

The Multi-storey Car park

Numerous numbers are involved in looking after this car park in Thailand. On the way in you collect a ticket from one or two workers, (one in a booth and one outside it) and then on each level in the car park is what we would call parking attendants, who salute and help you back into a space. The 'parking attendants' have whistles which they blow to signal safety or danger and to let you know when to stop moving. I have yet to work out the differences between the whistles. It all seems the same to me.
It is not unusual to 'double park' in the car parks. The brakes of these cars are left off, whilst the owners shop. This is to enable the attendants to shunt the cars back and forth to free the blocked in cars when their owners return.
On the way out of the car park, you give your ticket to another worker and then quite often there is a another man with a whistle to help you turn onto the main road.
In England, we would probably only have one or two workers, who would wander around the car parks making sure we have bought a parking ticket.

The Shops

Thai shops are just teeming with workers waiting to help and serve you. This feels a bit strange coming from the UK where it can take what seems hours to find someone to assist you.
In the bigger shops, you have to leave your bags at the door with attendants who will give you a tag and look after your bags whilst you shop.
In Supermarkets, your bags are packed for you and the cashier will start serving the next customer whilst waiting for you to pay for your food, thus saving time. There are also many more checkouts which leads to few queues.
Back to the top