Thailand: Why I Live There After my first night out in Pattaya, Thailand, when I met a lady on a blind date prearranged by one of my best friends, I sat up in bed and I recalled the details of the evening before. We had started in The Pig and Whistle, where I was staying on Soi 7. The Pig is a lovely, quiet, sedate, air-conditioned oasis of tranquility in a street, which is one of the liveliest, noisiest and busiest streets in Pattaya. We went outside into the soi and into a stream of people not unlike that of a queue heading for a football match, except that all the females were dressed in bikinis. We had called into one of those outdoor bars, where my friend had a surprise in the offing for me. His girlfriend of a time, whom I knew nothing about and a friend of hers who wanted to meet me. The four of us had stayed there an hour before walking the thirty metres to Beach Road. The traffic is one-way on Beach Road, so we took a Baht Taxi North travelling with the flow and got off two or three kilometres further on just before Walking Street, which is the most famous street in Pattaya. We had entered a complex of bars and sat at one at random. It was only then that I realized that the bars were all set out surrounding a Muay Thai boxing ring, where the fighting was continuous and free, although foreigners are expected to contribute a prize to the winner of each bout; 20-100 Baht suffices. We stayed there an hour and moved on to Walking Street to eat. We ate in a seafood specialist restaurant which has a pier or jetty as its dining area. The food was incredible and the mood was romantic with the moon shimmering on the sea and the atmospheric lighting. I don't believe I had had a chance really, I fell for my gorgeous date that night and I saw her every day for the rest of my 30 days vacation. We had a magnificent time and when I had to go, I determined to see if I could live in Thailand. I went home and worked out, that if I was careful and a few things went in my favour, I would most likely afford to live there for ten years. Six weeks later, I went back to Thailand and Joy was waiting for me at the airport. Nothing had altered between us and we took a bus to visit her family in northern Thailand. We slept in a room that her brother had given up for us and everyone made me feel very welcome. Joy's family live in a traditional teak house built on stilts and everybody lived and slept in one room in the traditional way, except for Joy's brother, who had built an extension, because he was hoping to get married soon. I love that village and still live there now, five years later. Joy and I are married and have our own home - a traditional, European, concrete-block bungalow not five metres from Joy's mum, who is a brilliant mother-in-law. Her family appear to realize what a big step it was for me to come here alone and are determined to be there for me, should I need help, like my own family in Britain would be. The job at hand is learning Thai as no one else in the village, except for my wife, speaks English.
Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on several topics, but is now involved with Khao Phansa - The Candle Festival. If you would like to know more, please visit our web site at Package Vacations to Thailand.