Thailand - Girls Page 5

The Changing Face of the Thai Scamstress

Last updated: 28th April 2009

Not so very long ago, there was a fairly typical profile associated with the kind of Thai girls that foreign men run into problems with. Typically, the girls would be uneducated and from the north or northeast of the country who were working in bars or massage establishments. Their motive for doing that type of work would be to support their families back home and they would target foreign men who were having a vacation in Thailand.

Even though men still run into problems with bar girls and the like, I believe this stereotype is becoming rarer. Not only are foreign men becoming more aware of the hazards of associating with bar girls, but Thai women are getting more sophisticated and this is coming at a time when Thai society is becoming more greedy.

The Internet has changed the way we do everything. Fifteen years ago you couldn't just switch on your computer and find stuff like this; nor could you get in touch with girls living half way round the globe but now you can.

I have no personal experience with meeting Thai girls on-line but I am reliably informed that there are tens of thousands registered on Internet dating sites. Getting in touch with Thai women has never been easier and it is no longer necessary to travel to Thailand.

The advantage for farang men is that they can write to lots of girls and go through a kind of vetting process before they even travel. Having selected their choice, they can then develop a rapport with the girl (or girls) of their choice. It all seems perfect but as is often the case; if something seems too good to be true it probably isn't.

Perceived wisdom tells us that middle-class girls from good family backgrounds who are university educated and have reasonable jobs should be a good bet and are unlikely to cause any problems; unlike poor rice farmer's daughters from Chiang Rai or Isaan who will constantly be on your ear for money. However, this doesn't necessarily figure.

What I thought at first was a one-off, and then maybe a coincidence, has started to become something of a trend. A number of foreign men now seem to be running into problems with Thai girls they met on-line who - on paper - shouldn't be troublesome. They are getting scammed and ripped off by supposedly good girls. So, what's going on?

Materialism has arrived in Thailand in a big way, especially in Bangkok, and - just like Madonna - a lot of middle-class, educated Thai girls want to be material girls. They are not from poor backgrounds but the lifestyle that is presented to them whenever they wander around Siam Paragon and other fancy malls is not one they can afford.

To get the money they need for the lifestyle they want they look where many Thai girls have looked previously - they look towards foreign men with infinitely deep pockets (so they believe). Their reasons for wanting money may have changed but the bottom line is that it is still only money they are after.

In many ways, these girls are a lot more dangerous because they are smarter and more deceptive. It doesn't always figure that a poor, uneducated girl will be less trustworthy than an educated one from a moderately wealthy background.

The greediest people in Thailand are often the wealthiest, and the people I have met who haven't had a greedy bone in their body have been some of the poorest I have met.

Personally, I don't think it is that difficult to figure out what is important to an individual. The way they dress; the possessions they own and lust after; what they spend their money on and what in life they believe is worth having or doing.

How important is merit-making (tum-boon) at the local temple to them? Good Thais (the majority) would much rather make merit than buy consumer goods. Some of the nicest Thai people I know have little and want even less.

What do they admire in other people? Do they talk about a person having a good character (ni-sai dee) or can they only relate to material possessions? Again, you will find that good Thais always look inward and not at external appearances. Someone's character is far more important to them than how rich they are or what they own.

Once you get to know how Thais think there are some very telling signs. Why do you think it is that so many foreign men have problems with Thai girls but very seldom do Thai men have the same problems?

It really doesn't take long to identify an obsession with money and that would be my cue to walk away regardless of all other factors. Don't draw up a mental list of attributes in a person that you deem good or bad because it doesn't always work like that. Take everything at face value and trust your instincts. You will find that your gut feeling is very rarely wrong.

Scam Warning Signs

Last updated: 28th April 2009

According to Internet folklore, the sweet young lady you met sitting on a bar stool in Pattaya will one day inform you of her family's sick buffalo back in Isaan which needs urgent veterinary attention in order to prevent financial ruin for the family who are of honest Thai rice farming stock and can't survive without their trusty beast.

A few thousand Baht is all it will take to save the poor creature and the family will be able to continue putting som-tum, sticky rice and grilled chicken on the dinner table.

Unfortunately, the scams masterminded by Thai girls to con cash out of gullible farangs these days aren't quite that easy to spot.

I have received some interesting correspondence from foreign men involved with Thai girls. I have also experienced a number of relationships first-hand with Thai girls. Over a period of time, a few common traits have started to emerge that I will share here.

There is no standard scenario - each will have their own variations - but certainly there are tell-tale signs to look out for. One of the biggest problems though is that men become emotionally attached to the girls (for want of a better expression, they fall in love) and they either can't see or can't believe - or don't want to see or believe - what is going on.

Even if deep down they realise what is happening - and even if everyone around them can see what is happening - they remain powerless to extricate themselves from the situation. This is very sad. It's the ultimate 'moth to the flame' situation where the flame proves to be an irresistible draw even though it will prove fatal in the end.

The 'con' in con-artist is short for confidence (confidence-trickster). The best con-artists gain their victims' confidence first, thereby persuading the victim to actually hand over money voluntarily without any need to steal or take it forcibly.

This takes time and Thai girls understand this very, very well. The first point to make is that a girl who intends scamming a foreigner will behave herself for a very long time. She knows that in order to do what she wants to do, she has to draw the man completely into her lair.

If she tries anything too soon - before the man has really fallen for her - there is a good chance he will just tell her to sling her hook and she will have wasted her time. She will therefore wait patiently for the right moment and during that time she will be everything a man could want.

A common theme with the correspondence I have received is that everything was perfect until a big problem suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Remember that in life if something seems to good to be true, it usually is.

So, when will the problems begin? With several men I have corresponded with, the problems start to come just before the man is about to make a serious commitment regarding the relationship.

As I said, there is no single scenario but the crucial stage seems to be just before a major commitment at which point the man will not want to start backing out. Another way to put it would be to say that the man is almost at the point of no return.

What seems to happen, typically, is that when the girl thinks the man is at the point of no return with his commitment to her, a major crisis will suddenly appear out of the woodwork. The crisis - whatever it may be - has never been mentioned before but comes completely out of the blue.

So, what could it possibly be? Once again, there is no single thing. It could be a contrived crisis of confidence, "You can't take care of me," or "I don't think you really love me," etc. It could be a financial one (but not a sick buffalo) - perhaps she says she or her family are heavily in debt.

It could be a love crisis. A Thai man (or perhaps another farang) has suddenly appeared on the scene, professed his undying love for the girl, asked her parents to marry her, and they have agreed.

Once the crisis has been aired she will be distraught; crying her eyes out on the phone and begging for help. If it's a love crisis she will insist, of course, that she has no desire for any other man apart from you and this will naturally tug on your heartstrings.

This stage will be very, very upsetting hearing her sob all the time.

But ... there is good news. Whatever the crisis may be, it can be resolved by the simple act of you sending her some money. After all, you're a farang aren't you, and all farangs have endless supplies of the stuff. Even the most stupid, uneducated Thai person knows this irrefutable fact of nature.

If it's about lack of commitment, then by sending money those doubts will be overcome. If there is a financial crisis, then by sending money you will prove your worth as a provider. If she has another suitor (supposedly), by sending money you will prove that you are the better choice. Get the picture? Who said money isn't the answer to everything? It is in Thailand.

Should this happen, what do you do? The answer depends a lot on your own emotional strength and I have corresponded with men who are both emotionally weak and emotionally strong. It can be tough. You have fallen in love, given up everything in your home country and booked a passage to Thailand when you suddenly get news that another foreigner on holiday in Pattaya has applied for the position of husband with the love of your life and has been accepted.

What do you do now?

I'm sorry to be cynical here but after hearing so many similar stories I would suggest forgetting about her. Just walk away. She will tug on every heart string but whenever I hear a story like this I always reagrd it as some kind of a scam.

Sex Addiction

Last updated: 28th April 2009

Dave seemed like a genuine enough man when he first started to send e-mails but I was to find out the real truth some time later. His real problem was one that I wasn't qualified to deal with.

His initial queries about how to avoid the pitfalls with Thai girls that so many foreign men encounter were all quite reasonable. He had read what I had previously written and appeared to want to take a very sensible approach. That was all good, but cracks started to appear quite soon afterwards.

He was looking at making a permanent move to Thailand and also made some enquiries about teaching English. However, he failed the TEFL test miserably and from his e-mails it was obvious that he only had a very basic grasp of the English language (despite being a native speaker) and that he wasn't suitably equipped to teach English.

He met his first Thai girlfriend through an Internet dating site. I am suspicious about such things because Thai girls who go out of their way to meet foreigners (such as those joining online dating sites) normally do so only for money.

Anyway, he was lucky in that she was quite a good girl. He didn't trust her though and his behaviour became extremely suspicious and paranoid. Every time she didn't answer her phone he assumed it was because she was with her Thai boyfriend.

He started talking about hiring a private detective to track her. My view then - as it is now - is that this is a complete waste of money. If you don't trust a girl enough that you consider hiring someone to follow her, just forget her and look elsewhere.

He didn't hire a private detective as far as I know but his behaviour got more and more paranoid. She got fed up with this; their relationship deteriorated fast; and they split up.

While he was with her I started to get an idea that everything wasn't quite as it seemed when he started boasting to me about how many times he had sex with her in one day. Not only did the number of times seem unnatural for a man of his age; but also the fact he felt a need to boast about it to a stranger.

After the relationship failed he said he was so upset with what had happened that he could never return to Thailand because it would bring back too many painful memories.

A little later he was back.

Although his initial questions about meeting good Thai girls were good, it soon became obvious that he wasn't interested in heeding any of my advice. The next girl he met actually approached him in a Bangkok shopping mall. This is a very bad sign because a good Thai girl would never do this.

He was ecstatic at first because the two of them got in between the sheets straight away (another bad sign). He then started boasting to me again about how many times they had sex.

When they weren't having sex he didn't really know what to do with himself and, being a suspicious person, started checking up on her phone calls and bank account. It soon came to light that she had several other farangs on the go. This didn't surprise me at all, seeing as how she had approached him in the first place.

Foreign men from all around the globe were sending her money. She didn't work and she rented an apartment in Pattaya where one of her foreign boyfriends would visit her. It all started to get very messy but then he told me she had agreed to drop the other guys and just be with him.

The last I heard, he had gone back home but had picked up a serious - and untreatable - STD that he had caught from her. With sex being such an important part of his life, and now having a serious sexually transmitted disease that couldn't be cured, he was almost suicidal.

In our later conversations he told me how he was addicted to sex and always had been. An addiction to sex is just like an addiction to anything else and needs professional help. It affects a lot of men and there have been some high profile cases in recent years.

Getting on a plane to Thailand probably isn't the best way to deal with sex addiction. Sure, there are a huge number of prostitutes in the country and it will work for a short term fix but that won't fix the underlying problem.

Using Thai prostitutes permanently starts to get expensive and creates a very high risk of contracting an STD, or even AIDS. Also, when immediate sex is the first priority when looking for Thai girls, you are guaranteed to meet all the wrong kind of Thai girls.

Meeting a good Thai girl takes a long time and with the vast majority of good girls there won't be any quick sexual gratification - sometimes not even until after marriage.

Thailand is not the answer for this problem but it is still the reason why many men visit. In my humble opinion, a clinic that has doctors who can offer professional advice might be a better bet than a flight to Bangkok and a taxi to Pattaya.

Marrying a Thai girl

Last updated: 14th May 2011

Security is everything to Thai girls and so it follows that most are normally quite keen to get married. It's quite understandable and if you give the commitment of marriage you should find that you get a lot in return. (Most are also keen to have children if they don't have children already.)

The Thai marriage ceremony is very different to anything I've seen in Western countries. You don't go to a temple as you might go to a church elsewhere. The ceremony is normally performed at the bride's house or at a hotel.

It's quite amusing that no one person seems to know what should be done. There are lots of customs and traditions which various people throughout the day will remind you of. No one cares that the bride and groom don't know what to do, so long as they do what they are told.

One of the customs, for example, is that friends or relatives of the bride will make 'gates' to prevent the groom from getting to her. The gate might just be a chain held at each end by two people. The groom must pay for the gate to be opened. Envelopes containing suitable bank notes should be prepared by the groom for this purpose.

Another custom is that a young Thai lad will clean the groom's shoes. Of course, more financial remuneration should be given contained in an envelope.

A lot of wai-ing and paying respect takes place but all a Western groom needs do is follow what his bride is doing.

There was a multitude of stuff that went on behind the scenes at my wedding that I didn't have anything to do with. For example, in accordance with custom and tradition various items needed to be prepared and presented on silver salvers for symbolic reasons.

Some old aunts of a friend who were well versed in the art of Thai weddings took care of this for us.

On my wedding day the ceremony took place in the morning with relatives and close friends and there was a less formal event in the evening for everyone else. The official wedding photographs are normally taken in a studio before the wedding.

With regard to who pays, Thais don't follow the Western tradition of the bride's family paying for the wedding. It's the 'rich' farang who pays, of course.

Wedding guests normally give gifts of money (in envelopes, again) and this money is expected to cover the cost of the wedding ceremony and party. If your guests are generous you may even make a profit.

My wife and I both rented wedding clothes and this seems to be standard practice. The groom wears traditional Thai dress for the ceremony and then a black or white tuxedo for the party.

The wedding ceremony involved an early start and so I was pleased that the day came to a close quite early. All the guests had gone home in the evening by the time an English wedding starts to get going.

The Thai wedding ceremony is just that - a ceremony - and nothing is legally biding. After the ceremony you are as unmarried as you were before. To get your marriage legally registered you have to go to the Amphoe office where you live.

Of course, if you are a farang it is never that easy. And anyway, you may be already be married so the Thai registrar will want some evidence that you aren't.

This needs to come from your Embassy in the form of an "affirmation of freedom to marry" document. I'm British and the British Embassy in Bangkok provide all the information you need: Guidance for British nationals wishing to marry in Thailand.

After you complete the document it needs to be validated at the Embassy. It then needs to be translated into Thai and taken to the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs. If the people at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs are happy they will endorse the documents and they can be taken to your local registrar at the Amphoe office to get the marriage registered.

As is often the case in Thailand there are agencies who make a living helping foreigners who need to get paperwork done in Thailand.

In Bangkok there are a number of such agencies in a small road adjacent to Ploenchit BTS station. They are very useful. After you submit your "affirmation of freedom to marry" document all you need to do is give the agency power of attorney to do the rest.

They will collect the affirmation from the Embassy, translate it, take the translation and original to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and then collect the documents again. You can go off sightseeing while they do the legwork and collect everything when it's ready.

I used the services of Professional Translation & Travel Service Limited Partnership. They were very good and the fee was Bt2,000, which I didn't think was expensive.

Taking a Thai girl back to live in the UK

Last updated: 28th April 2009

I have no personal experience of this but I have talked with British men who have been through the process. It is not an easy process and nothing is guaranteed. Some men try unsuccessfully for years and eventually give up. Here is a basic list of the things that are required:

• Phone bills to prove that there has been regular telephone contact
• Bank statements to prove you can support her
• Savings accounts to show that you are financially secure
• Your last two years Inland Revenue tax statements
• Photos of you together to prove that it is a valid relationship
• Copy of your passport with photos
• Copies of the pages in your passport with Thai stamps to prove your visits to Thailand
• Your last two years accounts in the case that you are self-employed (presumably two years worth of salary slips if you are not self-employed)
• Letters to each other (I'm not sure about e-mails but I doubt it as they can be faked so easily)
• The envelopes in which the letters were sent with postage date stamps
• Receipts from any money you have sent her (not money you have transferred to yourself in Thailand and then given to her)

I believe that the girl should be present during all the interviews and obviously she should look the part. If you met her in a bar it is not advisable for her to turn up at the British Embassy in her regulation micro-skirt and six-inch platform boots. It would also be advisable for her to wear clothes that cover her tattoos.

One chap I spoke to told me they didn't like the authentication stamps on certain documents. The stamps were in the wrong place or the dates were wrong, or something. He had to get new copies of the documents and then make another trip to Bangkok. He spent months making trips to and from the UK, Bangkok and where he was staying in southern Thailand.

Personally, I would never consider taking a Thai girl back to the UK. The primary reason is that I don't want to go back myself but there are other reasons. Thais love Thailand and all things Thai, and many would be very unhappy living abroad.

The bottom line is that we all think differently and have different circumstances so it is a very personal choice. Just be warned though that if you do want to take a Thai girl home with you, it probably won't be easy. I don't know what the process is for taking girls back to countries other than the UK but probably quite similar.

Thai Girls' Revenge

Last updated: 28th April 2009

Thais can be very vengeful and life is cheap in Thailand. I've heard lots of bad stories about how Thai girls have taken revenge on men (both Thai men and foreigners) who have done them wrong.

Thailand is not the West and the rules are different. Be very careful. I don't wish to go into details but if you get involved with a Thai girl and start messing around it can be quite dangerous.

In the West you occasionally hear stories about how women vandalise the cars of cheating men but Thai women won't usually bother with something as unimportant as a car.

This guy got let off lightly: Thai woman bites Belgian tourist's organ

Never Satisfied

Last updated: 11th October 2010

On my first visit to Thailand in 1987 I was completely wet-behind-the-ears regarding Thailand and Thai girls, and as naive as any tourist could be.

On that trip I met a Pattaya bar girl that I quite took a shine to - as you do. I noticed that when she was with her friends she was always laughing and outwardly happy, but as soon as we were alone together she was completely miserable and morose.

I asked her what the problem was and, of course, it was money. Not having enough money is always the problem with Thai girls. I offered to help. Without knowing anything about my wealth she told me that I wouldn't be able to give her enough. How did she know?

These words stuck in my head and years later - after having lived in Thailand for several years - they started to make more sense.

With many Thai girls, it doesn't matter how little they have, how rich you are, or how much you give them. It will never be enough. The more you give them, the more they take it for granted, and the more dissatisfied they become.

When I talk about Thais being bad Buddhists, this is exactly the type of behaviour I am referring to. The Buddha understood that constantly craving for money and material things leads to dissatisfaction with life.

The only way to free yourself from this dissatisfaction is to cease the craving and desire. It's a simple truth but it is difficult for many people to put into practice because it goes against basic human nature.

Thais constantly demonstrate superficial adherence to Buddhism by wai-ing at temples and carrying out acts of artificial merit-making but the really important messages contained within Buddhism are lost on them.

Thais want happiness in life and their chosen religion provides all the answers on how to live a happy life, but what is really ironic is that they ignore the important advice.

With the majority of Thai girls, expect them to be very demanding and never expect them to be satisfied with what you give them.

Also, be aware that this greedy behaviour is seldom shown at first. The girls know that men don't like girls to act this way and that it will scare them away. Thai girls are very good at being 'perfect' initially until they have got their man, but then - when they sense they are in a position of power - everything changes.

Since I put together this site, a number of foreign men have written to me. What is interesting is that every time this happens the subsequent course of events always follows exactly the same pattern.

The man has a holiday in one of Thailand's beach resorts and meets a 'perfect' Thai girl working in a bar. He knows all about the problems with Thai bar girls but the one he meets is different to every other bar girl in Thailand. She always is.

She tells him she doesn't like her job; she doesn't like the men she goes with, but she is forced to because of economic reasons; that she loves him and that she doesn't need much from him.

He is completely besotted, goes home, and then immediately starts to plan his next trip. At this stage I try to warn foreign men but they aren't interested in anything I have to say. After all, my advice only applies to other girls because this girl is different to all the rest.

Meanwhile, the girl knows how besotted he is and is planning her list of demands. When he returns to see her again, instead of meeting the sweet little girl who didn't want anything, he is confronted with a long list of things for her and her family.

This is when the relationships always start to go very wrong. Make the most of that first trip and really enjoy it because when you come back again to meet the girl, things will never be the same.