Real Thais - fabulous hosts

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Well after experiencing some of the worst of the Thais - the liars &
cheats who will look you straight in the face & tell you that the
musem / Embassy / Palace / whatever you want to see is closed today
because of a holiday (or anything else that they can think of), but
you should go on a Tuk-Tuk / go to a shop / go to a TAT (all of which
give them commision for sending you) - it's been neat to meet the
'real' people. These people treat tourists like gods & make us
ashamed that we don't do the same at home.

Over the last few days & many, many hours on trains we've found the
meaning to the phrase 'killed with kindness". The Thai's love
foreigners & all who can speak English talk to us, the rest stare &
smile. They are very helpful, very friendly & keep giving us things.
Of course it would insult them to refuse so what do you do?

We took a day trip from Bangkok to Kanchanaburi. This included, visiting the
bridge over the River Kwai, a cemetery, some beautiful waterfuls & a
place where we had a traditional Thai lunch (thank God we'd had our
Hepatitis injections as we all had to help ourselves to the plates
with our own spoons & the whole table passed them around. That was a
bit scary as we had to eat a whole table ful of things - we didn't
know what - watched by Thais - as we were the only non-Thais there.
with Last night, we were given whiskey (I asked Brendon to drink
it all), beer, dried mango, chips, pad thai noodles, fish balls (yes
Brendon the fish hater ate them too!!) and so on, plus a guide book of
the place we visited.

Today some kind ladies (school teacher & Principal) booked (by phone) our hotel
accommodation in Pitsulok & organised a chauffeur, so it was no drama
when we arrived, brought us dinner - fried rice & egg, some fruit
called Pusa, some yummy, almondy type sweets & bottled water. All of
this they gave for free as a gift & refused any gifts from us in
return. They brought it off vendors who walked up & down the trains
at stations. SO you can see, as we can't refuse, we are sometimes
eating food that is not 'hygienic' but so far we have been fine & have
had a great time - thanks to the lovely friendly thais. Last night a
girl paid for us to get on the subway - while we were still looking
for our change.

By taking the time to talk to these people, we really learnt a lot more about Thai culture - and food - far more than if we'd been rude or shy and kept to our selves. We have really enjoyed & appreciated this as its added a new dimension to our travels.

Very good treatment of tourists. Brendon said it made him feel bad that he hadn’t been more helpful to tourists back home. So next time you see someone looking at a map, looking lost, or perhaps struggling with public transport, why don’t you go over and give them a hand.

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