Sawadee ka!

"Sawadee khhhhaa" sing out the chorus of salespeople at Zara. All of them bow and fold their hands, in synch.

Coming from a country which also follows a similar tradition of bowing heads and greeting with folded hands, I realise some subtle differences between home and our current holiday destination - Thailand. Here, seemingly every time you enter the air space of a Thai person, you trigger the "alarm" and they shoot out a friendly greeting of "Sawadee ka" (hello). This could be a great game for a cheeky kid (hehe).

Scene: 1 cheeky kid + 1 friendly Thai

Location: Any service location (Hotel, restaurant, store, spa, airport, etc.)

"Lights, camera, action!"

Cheeky kid enters stage left and shoots accidently into friendly Thai air space.

Thai: (Bowing and smiling) "Swaadeee Khhhhhaaaa"

Kid: ???

Brat drifts a bit out of friendly air space. He then decides to try out his evil plan...he drifts slowly back into shooting distance of the Thai.

Thai: (Bowing and smiling identically to the first time): "Swadeee Khaaaa"

Kid:

Kid exits and partially re-enters the kill zone.

Thai: (3rd time a charm?): "Swaade.."

Kid leaves the zone...only to re-enter.

Thai (Thinking: "I hate kids"): "Swaa.."

And thus continues this horrible game..

I can truly see this happening. You see, i believe the Thais are THAT committed to service and seemed very, very friendly indeed. In central Bangkok, this is almost to a fault. An old INSEAD friend would always cry out "Sawaaadeeee Kaaaaa" when he started a story on one of his adventures in Thailand. I now get it!

Not to say that we are dealing with saints. We heard horror stories about Thai prisons, and God knows that Muay Thai (Thai kick-boxing) is seemingly reserved for men with cast-iron noses and Jean-Claude Van Damme.

But, all in all, Thais know how far service can go to building repeat clientele. They also know how to serve tourists like no where else in Asia. Tours of the Grand Palace in fluent Spanish, French, German, Mandarin & Japanese + Overall friendly atmosphere + Liberal mix of eastern influences & western indulgences = A great vacation!

As with all great stories, there is a caveat. And this one's a doozy. "Lady boys". WTF????

These cross-dressing wonders have befuddled single middle-aged white males for decades. What starts out as a great catch - a young, lissome exotic oriental babe who seems to like me inspite of my lack of hair, class or "a life" - turns out to be a shocking surprise. These "ladies" are thai boys who expertly disguise their manhood.

One night with one of these dude(ette)s will give more than a lifetime of memories (or shall we call them nightmares). :).

The questions you folk need to answer for me are:

1. How do you hide your Adam's apple?

2. How does a fairly conservative society have this practice so openly followed? I even saw school kids with one young boy wearing a skirt and with long hair (trust me, it was a boy!)

With 25% of the Thai GDP coming from various versions of the sex trade, I guess this land of service and hospitality does provide quite a few with a "happy ending". But, remember the old adage - sometimes things that appear too good to be true, are just that!!

Swaaadeeee Khhhaaaaaaaaa, all!