Seeing Things As They Really Are, Thailand And Myself
I’m going back to Thailand. It’s been almost a year now since I was last there and I’m going back! Not so much to chase women. Thailand is the woman for me. Everything about her is female. The way she holds herself. The devious way she lures you in to her. Even the land with its gentle twists and curves. Yes, Thailand is all woman to me.
I have lived in Hawaii for the last five years and in that time I have visited the LOS 8 times. This has been the longest I have been away. It has taken that long to heal from the ‘realization of my lack of reality’ around a meaningful relationship with anyone there or here for that fact.
You see one time I took a Vipassana meditation course in Thailand. Vipassana basically translates into “Seeing things as they really are”. Unless you have your head up your ass so far that a pry-bar could not pull it out, Vipassana is going to make you see your part in the scheme of things. Take for example my track record in relationships. I have been married 2 times, umpteen million dates, a few light house keeping affairs as well as a couple of longish term relationships in Thailand. To be fair one cannot really call a relationship a relationship when you see your girl in Thailand one week a year for three years. Realistically you have only spent 3 weeks with her…3 weeks! Hardly a relationship. But because she has been living in our minds for those 3 years, somehow we have created the illusion she has been with us the whole time. That and the fact that in western society we connect giving money to a girl as ownership. I give her an allowance, therefore she belongs to me. A little childish isn’t it when you see it here in black and white?
Yes Vipassana, the best thing I ever did and the worst. Now I need to look at my part in everything…EVERYTHING! When I get hurt when I find out my “faen” just emptied the bank account for a shopping spree with her friends, was it not me that set that up for her? I created the account for her and gave her the ATM card. It was my assumption that I could trust her knowing she had never had a bank account. Why would she have ever had one? She never had any money. I would not take a 5 year old to a gas station, give them matches and say “remember, don’t play with matches” and then walk away expecting nothing would happen. It’s not that Thai women are so immature. They have not yet learned to be responsible. There is a big difference you know. Responsibility is a learned behavior.
This brings me to my next realization of myself. A person is in very poor company if they think they can learn responsibility from me. I have bought pets in the past knowing that I travel a lot. I knew this would be bad for the pet, yet I did it anyway. That was irresponsible. Eventually I adopted the animal out and all is well. Yes, later on I did the responsible thing but it would not have been necessary if I hadn’t set it up for failure in the first place.
Here is another hard fact to swallow… We are all the same. From the so called old, overweight and bald farang to the hip slick and cool young, movie star self-imaged egomaniac. We are all the same. No better, no worse. Behavior is the key, not looks. I have seen both ends of that spectrum boasting their wealth and physical prowess in Thailand as well as both showing respect and humility there. The Thais seen rather quiet around this but be sure that they see our actions and draw conclusions from them. I know too that you are known by the company you keep. This is why I travel alone.
I love Thailand. I love its people and I try to take everything at face value. Everything is as it should be. I never have gone there for the sole purpose of getting laid. Yet I do get laid there. I never know when or from whom. That is what keeps my life fresh and exciting. I may be getting a wonderful oil massage and asked by the girl if she can spend the night with me in order to learn more English. I find this a cute way of being approached. True, that would never happen where I live. You would have to jump through a few more hoops than that to get laid. It is what it is. Seeing things as they really are.
If walking through the Biergarten I spot a beauty that arouses the “imagination” and just have to feel it out…I do. To live day after day with the sole purpose of playing hide the salami, would just get too boring for me. Thailand has a lot more to offer once you are out of the main puttintang areas. I have been as far south as Yala where I had the pleasure of discovering a temple imbedded in a cave with an amazing reclining Buddha to the caves, north just outside of Chiang Rai. I have done some of my adventures with women and some without. Like I said before, I like traveling alone. It gives me time to go ‘inside’ and reflect a little about who I am and where I am going. You know, giving myself to grow up a bit. Vipassana taught me that if you do not go within…you go without.
I still wrestle with the thought of retiring there. It would be tough for me to do that knowing what I know about myself and about the woman named Thailand. Chances are I would do what I always do with relationships…bail once I become bored with her.
One thing I do know for sure. I love leaving Hawaii and I love coming back. I can say the exact same about Thailand. It’s a dilemma for sure and I know one shared by many a single, slightly aging Farang. Consider the alternative. Being in a bad relationship here or there living the semi-life called coping.
“Wait! That girl just smiled at me, I’ll be right back”…
Stickman's thoughts:
I would have to agree that there is so much more to Thailand than the women. In fact, when I think about the more enjoyable things I have done in Thailand, they have been away from the women.
