Mike in Isaan
Mike is a resident of Northeast Thailand and gives us a little insight into the decision to stay there...
My story is a long one involving mistakes, chance events and turning right when I should've turned left but then who's life isn't like that anyway?
I met my wife during a well earned break in a sleepy Thai provincial town. It was purely an arbitrary decision to go to Thailand. It could have been anywhere in Southeast Asia. Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia were all on my shortlist but I didn't put a lot of thought into the decision as I just wanted to get away from my life for a few weeks.
It changed everything of course. After a few romantic weeks with my future wife, a visit to her family and a special bond with her kids, my future was sealed and I wondered how I'd stayed in my grey existence back in the West for so long when this paradise was here for the taking.
I spent a couple of years teaching English but I quickly realised that I was going nowhere fast. The wages are poor, the teaching market in Thailand awash with poorly qualified Westerners who don't even know their verbs from their nouns who have no place in the teaching industry. I just didn't see any prospects and certainly little chance of building a nest egg for a house and an adequate retirement.
Nowadays, I own a couple of properties in the U.S. that I rent out. After taxes are paid, a budget for buildings maintenance and the fees for the property management company I employ, there's not much left over. However, it's enough for a comfortable life in Rural Northeast Thailand.
If I'm honest, I don't like to mix with the burgeoning number of Westerners in this area. I'm lucky in that I live in an Amphur (county) where there are very few Westerners. Indeed, I like the attention I sometimes get as I'm still something of a novelty for these dear folk I live amongst.
I don't have any regrets about marrying my wife and certainly no regrets about leaving the U.S. behind. Life is just too fast and furious back there, how can we live like that? I keep abreast of important current affairs by means of an internet connection and a cheap laptop computer but with each passing year, I lose a little more interest in what's going on in the outside World. It starts to become understandable why the Thai's don't seem to care what happens beyond their own borders. Why should they? It certainly doesn't seem to affect them in any way from their point of view. How can disputes about nuclear materials, or China/Europe trade disputes etc have any relevance or interest to the life of a farmer in the little village I live in? I don't even miss television any more.
I got my wife, some kids to raise and some pocket money. What more could a man want?
Mike