Understanding Thailand: The Somtam Effect
May 24 2010 Categories: Understanding Thailand No comments yet
In Thailand, there is a “little something” in the air, I can’t point exactly what it is maybe too much somtam (local spicy papaya salad) or Singha (local beer) but from time to time an ordinary person will lose all focus and reason and over a few years will go from the status of a respected professional to a pitied fool.
As a boxer in a ring that lets his guard down is second from being knocked out, new comers in Thailand will be for a period at risk to lose it. It will not come as a surprise if I tell you that 99% of the subjects affected are males (is there something wrong with our chromosomes or too much testosterone maybe?).
What may surprise you is to learn that social status (middle class or high so), ages (young or old) profession (blue or white collar) status (married, single or widower) does not matter. Every man that comes to Thailand is at risk.
Father and husbands that have spent a few weeks in Thailand will leave their families and jobs and come back to try to scrap a living in Thailand. An expatriate working for a multinational company; with excellent career prospect; will upon to be transferred out of Thailand resign from his job and forfeit a promising career just to stay here. Professionals that were making 200,000 USD per year will often agree to take a job where they make 15,000 USD per year just to stay here.
Some of them (more than a few) will burn the candle at both ends and self-destruct and end up throwing themselves from the balcony of their condominium (sometimes after having first beaten or killed their Thai girlfriends) or ending up homeless, beggars.
The Somtam effect as I called it for want of a better word is also affecting foreign people in a more subtle way. I mean some will escape the worth of the effects I mentioned above but still they will not act as reasonably as they would in their home country especially when it comes to invest.
It is a by-product of this “little something” I was mentioning above and you will see careful and cautious businessmen, who never make an investment in their home country without having lawyers and accountants reviewing every aspect of the deal, making fools of themselves and throwing money away (you cannot call this investing) by deciding (within 1 hour) to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars in some existing business or vague startup company based on the shallow promises of a partner they barely knew and on a business plan drafted on a half paper napkin.
In ten years I have seen millions of US Dollars blow up in smoke. People that would not enter into an investment without having lawyers, accountants and other professionals working on the deal will invest millions and sometimes tens of millions of THB on investments that don’t stand a chance from the start and are all surprise when they lose their investment.
Thailand is really one of the nicest places to settle but at the end of the day, you have to choose which Thailand you want to live in, Thailand paradise or hell, your call…
Note: This post is an excerpt of Rene Philippe Dubout next book: “How to Invest Safely Into Thailand” to be published in January 2010
About the Author:
The author Rene-Philippe DUBOUT is a lawyer since 1990 when he was admitted to Geneva bar (Switzerland). He practiced as a litigator there for 10 years until he moved to Thailand in 1999. In 2002 he founded with a group of Thai lawyers Rene Philippe & Partners Ltd a local law firm that specialized in Cross Borders Investments and Real Estate. He has been lecturing in several Thai Universities and a speaker to numerous conferences and seminars. He is the author of a must read book:”How to Purchase Real Estate Offshore Safely: The Case of Thailand”.
http//:www.renephilippe.com
© Copyrights 2009 – Rene Philippe Dubout – This article may be reprinted if information about the author, the websites, and the URLs remain intact
Originally posted 2009-11-22 05:10:08.
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