How to travel Thailand

First of all, you will hardly find people as friendly as the Thai are. And I told it before, but they are highly organised in this pandemic. At the airports as well as everywhere else.

To be polite and friendly in Thailand greet everyone you have to interact with with folded hands and a bow. In general, Rob and I included bows heavily in our body language, in Japan as well as in Thailand. When you are leaving a store say “thank you” and bow again. The store owners are thanking you as well for your visit, so thank them for their offers, even if they have nothing for you. Exceptions maybe drug stores that are filled to the brim or 7-elevens.

For transportation we relied on trains and busses that we booked via the website 12go.asia/en. It has a great overview over your general options, including flights, and operates for the whole of South East Asia. After the booking you will receive a pdf-file that you need to print out. For train tickets you have the option to collect them near/in the train station or to send them to your hotel. If you are colleting the tickets you can save around 200 Bhat. It is not much, but street food for two people can be around 150 Bhat. 😉 Just saying. For the busses it works similar, but there you need to show up at the ticket office near the bus stop to collect the tickets. Trains and busses in Thailand are comfortable and it is very easy to get from one point to another. It is cheap so you will get in contact with the locals.

The Grab-app is an app where you can order food, make parts of your grocery shopping and book taxis. It works like Uber, but way easier than Uber itself. I tried both and Uber drove me insane in the first few minutes. We used Grab to order a lot of food and to book taxis to get to the hospital. Some shops don’t have an English description, but for that I asked the owners of our hotel and the receptionist. It worked perfectly. Also, the more you use it, the more offers/coupons you will receive, like free delivery.

In the cities itself Rob and I walked a lot of times. Tuk-tuks and taxis will come along every few metres. The drivers will slow down our kindly ask you if you want to use their transportation. None will be mad at you for saying no. One time I even had a young woman stopping for me and offering me to drive me, because I carried a big package. I thanked her and kindly declined her offer. Local busses will slow down as well, but drive by as soon as you shake your head. Because of the masks, they can’t see kind smiles or the polite “no, thank you”. Tuk-tuks and taxis are around the same price range. The most expensive taxi within one city was the one we took from the train station to our hotel in Chiang Mai with 150 Bhat, the cheapest was 60 Bhats. Of course, in Bangkok it is way more expensive, because of longer ways and the toll of the high ways.

Durians! You know those stinky fruits? In every hotel we were there was a sign. No smoking, no Durians.

How to in a Buddhist temple. Before you are entering the area of a temple you will see signs, that say no alcohol and proper dressing. The signs for proper dressing are displayed throughout every temple complex. Proper dressing is covered shoulders, shirts to the hips, skirts at least until the knees. Inside the temple no shoes. If you are unsure of your dressing look what the locals wear inside the temples, that gives you a good impression. If you are sick you may enter the temple complex, but not the temple itself. Usually, you are not allowed to enter if you are wounded, but with the amount of mosquito that would be hard for the locals as well. You are definitely not allowed to enter a temple being sick, not only because of Covid-19, but because you are impure. If you are sitting down in the temple don’t point with your soles to the Buddha, that is a strait up insult. In general, bow before the buddha statues you will come across. Bowing to a monk means to put the folded hands at your forehead and make a deep bow. That is for holy persons. Therefore, do the same to the Buddha. In the temples are boxes for offerings for the temple. I always left something, for good karma and for the temple to survive. Something else: don’t photograph praying people, unless you have asked them for the picture.

I am sure I forgot something to mention, but for every country you could fill books on how to travel and how to behave.

I hope you had a nice week so far.

-Toni