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Asian fortune tellers – three visits, three different futures

Fortune telling – possibly an even older profession than the Oldest Profession – is huge in Asia. (The Oldest Profession is also huge in Asia, but that’s another blog post). In western cultures, fortune telling is relegated to circus side-shows and party tricks, a goofy remnant of a long-forgotten superstition. But if you read the daily headlines in Asia you’ll see that everyone from the girl selling coffee on the street corner to the leaders of most countries rarely make a major decision without consulting their favorite seer. […]

Greg2016-11-20T14:59:06+00:00Asia, Bangkok, Culture, Thailand|6 Comments

Meanwhile, in Bangkok: The Cutting Edge of Coconut Technology

As the world’s 9th-largest exporter of coconuts, it’s no surprise that they’re available pretty much everywhere in Thailand. But recently I’ve noticed something interesting – it seems that the resourceful Thai coconut industry has melded the humble drupe (I looked it up, it’s a drupe, not a nut) with some pretty crazy technology to produce some very weird and unique consumption possibilities. […]

Greg2016-11-21T04:21:03+00:00Food, Meanwhile in Bangkok..., Thailand|0 Comments

Taste-Testing Those Weird Little Health Drinks in Thai 7-11s

Anyone who has spent any time in a Thai 7-11 has probably seen those little bottles of…drink…stuff. Everything from bird’s nests to collagen to essence of things. They’re peddled on television, usually by alarmingly young women wearing tight clothes who seem to be having just a wonnnnnnderful time hanging out and laughing together. Anyway, every time I walk by there seems to be another type of colorful little box, so I decided to find out what the hell they were. Also, it’s a long weekend and I have a new baby, so I’m stuck at home. Don’t let it […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:43+00:00Bangkok, Food, Fun Stuff, Thailand|14 Comments

Monkeys & Elephants – Visiting Two Very Different Animal Sanctuaries

For westerners, there are no animals more exotically Asian than elephants and monkeys. Usually only glimpsed behind thick glass or from a distance at some cheesy zoo, to be able to get up close and actually touch one of these beasts is a truly unique experience. This is why I was excited when a recent visit by my beloved family (hence my long online absence) allowed me to visit not one, but two animal sanctuaries where I could interact with monkeys and elephants in ways you normally can’t, and which I had never done despite being in Thailand nearly […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:44+00:00Holidays, Thailand, Travel|0 Comments

Three Things You Will Always Find in a Thai Office

In my time in Thailand, I’ve worked in a lot of offices, and they’ve all been very different – from a small family-run operation to a huge, multi-cultural office spread across multiple floors and buildings. In formulating my previous ~~rant~~ post about working in an office, I thought a lot about what it meant to work in an office in Thailand, and made a stray observation that I thought was interesting – in every Thai office you’re in, you will almost always find the same […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:45+00:00Culture, Thailand|0 Comments

What is a Digital Nomad? And Why Don’t I Want to be One?

Back before everyone had a supercomputer in their pocket, only a very few people were able to finance their travels by working from the road. This was usually done by writing, and meant long stretches of lonely research and a bag of handwritten notes you had to turn into a book. People like legendary travel writer Joe Cummings paint a colorful picture of what it was like (especially when he was a guest on the Bangkok Podcast), but things have changed so drastically that an entire new classification of travelers has arisen – the ‘location independent entrepreneur’ or digital nomad. […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:45+00:00Bangkok, Thailand|9 Comments

Expat Survey: When Did You Realize Thailand was Home?

On July 25, 2014, I celebrated my 13th anniversary in Thailand. Not too bad considering I originally came here for a 4 month vacation. By the time I passed the ten year threshold, I was solidly comfortable with my life in Thailand, and I wrote a post about what it felt like. But as I reflected on 13 years, I started wondering when, exactly, Thailand went from being “the place I’m living right now” to “the place that I call home.” […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:48+00:00Asia, Culture, Thailand, Travel|0 Comments

What are People Googling about Thailand?

I never really knew much about the power of data until I started working in my current job, where we analyze data to find patterns and trends. It’s kind of like the global financial system – you don’t really notice it until you’re exposed to it, and then the rabbit hole just gets deeper and deeper. Some find this manipulation of data creepy, some don’t care, but it’s interesting either way. So just for fun, I wanted to see what people were searching for when they wanted information on Thailand, so I started typing half-sentences into the search box to […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:49+00:00Fun Stuff, Thailand|0 Comments

Living Through a Coup in Thailand

As you’ve probably heard by now, Thailand is in the middle of its 12th coup since 1932 (not including seven attempted ones). After 6 months of increasingly turbulent and violent protests, General Prayuth Chan-ocha finally had enough and said “Yeah, I’m in charge now.” This is my second coup in Thailand, and while neither I – nor most people – can say with any certainty what comes next, I can say that living through the Thai coups so far has not been what an uninitiated westerner would imagine them to be. […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:50+00:00Bangkok, Current Events, Politics, Thailand|14 Comments

A Bike Ride in Pictures: Samut Sakhon to Samut Songkhram

One thing I enjoy about Bangkok is getting out on my bike and exploring the hidden corners that one rarely sees. That does the trick most of the time, but sometimes I get ambitious and plan a longer overnight trip, which is what I did this past weekend. In retrospect, it was probably a bit too hot for the route we chose, but sunburned, muddy, and very, very tired, we arrived at the hotel with a sense of accomplishment and a hint of amazement that we actually made it. Some pictures below, many courtesy of Andrew. […]

Greg2016-11-17T15:47:51+00:00Biking, Health, Thailand, Transport|0 Comments