Leaving Thailand

I read with great interest that you plan to leave Thailand and make your home elsewhere, I don’t know all your reasons but I can guess a few. I have been feeling the same sense of alienation as you,

I have been in Thailand since 1993 and based in Thailand since 1997, with a wife of 18 years and a 15-year old daughter both doing incredibly well. My daughter moves in hi-so circles, has a major modelling / acting contract, is a national sporting squad and also is matching western standards in her education. She speaks 4 languages fluently and is learning another 2. My marriage is stable and happy, I have financial stability, a very good job and property here and a long term business with my mia noi of 9 years who makes me very happy and is perhaps my best friend in Thailand and much more than just a sex partner.

However, I don’t like spending much time here anymore, and prefer to spend more time back in Europe. I have seen many things get better and more convenient in Thailand but I enjoy my time here less. I can’t put my finger on just what it is. My wife and daughter come to the UK twice a year and the mia noi sometimes travels with me. I love spending time in the company of all of them. They don’t need or want to live in Europe. Hell, if my dad was not alive I might not want to stay in the UK as it's fxxxed up too and I don’t feel integrated in the society or the culture anymore, but the similarities between how I feel about UK and Thailand are similar.

Where will I settle? I don’t know and there is little pressure for a decision. I work all over the world and have visited 72 countries in the last 40 years and now spend 2 – 3 months a year in Thailand and maybe 3 – 4 in the UK as my dad is 84. I like to spend more time with him although he is still independent and very busy, but when he passes and I hope he goes on for many more years, then I will have to make plans as I will get a hefty and complex inheritance. But I can’t see myself settling permanently in Thailand even though my family and significant other are here. I have some very good educated Thai male friends and they actually seem to understand how I feel. Who knows where my daughter will end up? She has dual nationality and probably a successful future. My wife says she will one day retire to a temple.

I am a gypsy with homes in 2 places, all the toys, my motorcycle collection, but Thailand is too limiting intellectually. I don’t care for all the pussy anymore and my mia noi is all the woman I really ever wanted in one. That's new for me as I used to be a serial monger and womanizer. When I’m with her I can relax. But when in Europe I relax in other ways without the need for sex. Maybe this all seems a bit rambling and complex but over the last 3 years I have felt less inclined to spend time in Thailand.

Is it me who has changed, older now at 56? Or has Thailand changed…? I am older and a little wiser, more cynical but also more forgiving. I am a happier person than when I was younger, less inclined to self doubt.

Or is it the politics, or perhaps the lack of respect of farang by the powers that be? I don’t know. Let’s face it, all the world is potentially unstable, and injustice and bad things can happen anywhere – just look at the mess in Europe.

But I have an uneasy gut feeling about Thailand for non Thais which I never used to have and I have seen and been involved in some bad stuff here and shrugged it off in the past. But my gut instinct is good and now Thailand is giving me a rumble inside… It's great to visit, easy for the Thais to deal with, and fortunately I have Thais I can rely on to cover my arse. But something no longer makes the land of smiles feel like a singing, all dancing paradise.

I will still come but I need a personal place with more certainty of law and order, and mutual respect.

Whatever you do and wherever you end up, I hope it all goes well.