You speak Lao, you not foreigner

Yesterday at IKEA: a crowded shopping mall, and we are afraid of not getting a taxi home. A taxi van then stopped, we told the driver that we want to go to Samrong Nuea and he refused to take us. "No, No" he said. I took a picture of his car, just to remember the number for an optonal complaint later (depending on my level of anger and frustration divided by the time we have to wait for a taxi that takes us). It took not more than five minutes and the taxi van came back. The driver opened the door and shouted at us we should go in the taxi. I asked again if he will takes us to Samrong and switch on the meter, and he said yes. So we jumped in.

After a few meters he started asking me in Thai if I took a photo. Of course not, I answered in local honesty, why should I? "You take photo", he repeated, swearing about foreigners always doing this. I was a bit scared if we are now trapped in a taxi with an angry driver - heard stories about a not so nice outcome. But it seemed that he received some complaints before and learned his lesson and was just blowing off some steam. Then he asked about directions, and I explained him to use Banga Trad and then turn to Srinakarin road. He replied that there is a traffic jam, and I accidently asked "Yu say?" in Lao instead of "Yu ti nai" in Thai. (Where?)

He suddenly changed his mood, turned around and asked why I speak Lao. I explained that we lived there for three years and that I picked up a bit. Turned out he is - as most of his collegues - from Isan, and forgotten was all picture taking. We had some fun talking Lao and finally he said "You speak Lao, you not foreigner" in English, and when we arrived at our home, we were best friends already.

There is a reason why I always insisted at my Thai language school that I want to speak average Thai peoples language, not something that just exists in books and some very official meetings. And I am thankful for having learned enough Lao to be able to speak with many people who work in the so important service sector in Thailand. 

The rainwater people

It seems that the northeast and the north are the match-winners in Thailand. The red shirts like them because they are their people, and the "Democrats" make them so important that they want to pull their right to vote. So it seems decisions are made on the countryside.

In last weekends Bangkok Post Andrew Biggs wrote in his Sunday column about vote-buying and the people upcountry. He better had not done this. What followed was a shitstorm as we call it in German. In front Andrew Marshall, the out-of-country-but-still-knowing-it-all-journalist, and right next to him @forestmat who tweeted this gem: "can you check for me if he's spent time in a rural NE village, drinking rainwater, cooking on a charcoal fire?"

So I learned today that only if you had your cup of coffee made of rainwater and your pork steak made on a charcoal grill you are qualified to understand and analyse the Isan folks.

Here is the thing: As long as we refer to the people in North- and Northeast Thailand as countryside guys, Isan people, farmers or even worst "the uneducated", we discriminate them. They are as Thai as everyone else. Actually the fact that there is less education shows that the oh so smart Bangkokians aren't able to provide education in the whole country. And look whats graduating from the universities in the capital? Generation selfie. While at the same time Thailands best programmers and finest vets are educated in Khon Kaen.

All my friends in the Isan part of Thailand have nice houses, and yes they may drink rainwater because they built a sophisticated rainwater-recycling system that cleans the water and makes it drinkable. And yes, they use a charcoal grill, because that's how you do BBQ. Only the rice is done in the rice-cooker, and the cake got a warm-up in the microwave.

See, of course there are some very poor people on the countryside. And some very uneducated. But they are everywhere, in Bangkok, in Phuket, in Chang Mai, Ubon Ratchathami and Hat Yai. That's how the world is - different. Smart guys and stupid guys, eductated and not educated, with knowledge and without knowledge.

We should stop thinking what makes a differences between people living in different parts of Thailand and start thinking of what they have in common. It is more than some advocates of either side of politics may think.