Thais & Geometry

[Guest kjun12]

After approximately five years living in Thailand I have come to the conclusion that Thai people are intellectually challenged in geometry. This feeling comes from some of their driving inabilities. Have you ever noticed that they often take at lease 4 forward and backward movements with their vehicles when parking? And, forget it when they are trying to parallel park. That is an impossible maneuver for them.

 

I am trying very hard to learn patience while driving in Bangkok but this does not come easily to me. Perhaps I need more time at a Wat.

[kokopelli]

As the Thais are exposed to motorbikes as children they become skilled in maneuvering them, same as Westerns are raised in an automobile environment from early childhood. I do agree they cannot even pull into any parking spot much less parallel park. Every time I drive with the bf in his car I am scared shitless although I have a Thai friend who is even more a granny then I when driving a car.

[Guest fountainhall]

Do you think this is related in any way to the inability of most Thais I know either to give directions accurately - even to a fellow Thai - or to read a map?

[PattayaMale]

It is difficult for me to understand why most people living in Thailand that I see, love to back in to a parking spot instead of pulling in forward. But that is the way they do it.

 

Most Thais are pretty good at following or giving directions I think. I have not seen that as a problem...compared to my friend in USA!

[Guest kjun12]

 

Most Thais are pretty good at following or giving directions I think.

Sorry, but I have to agree with Fountainhall. My experience is that they can't give directions worth a darn. If you ask three Thais for directions, you usually get three very different answers.

[PattayaMale]

Sorry, but I have to agree with Fountainhall. My experience is that they can't give directions worth a darn. If you ask three Thais for directions, you usually get three very different answers.

 

kjun12.....

I think you are becoming like FOX news (USA). Only quoting part of a statement so it gives a different meaning......Most Thais are pretty good at following or giving directions I think. I have not seen that as a problem...compared to my friend in USA!

 

[Bob]

Most Thais are pretty good at following or giving directions I think.

 

That's not been my experience at all. They generally are directionally challenged (have no clue about north/south/east/west) and have little clue about how to give directions or understand directions. They're not stupid - they tend to fully know routes to places they've been to before but sometimes I think they found the places the first time totally by accident. And how they orient themselves (it isn't north/south/east/west) is simply beyond me.

 

As to the driving, the worst example is the the middle-aged Thai lady driver who seems to totally ignore all surrounding traffice. Sometimes it's so bad that it's funny.

 

And, yes, I too have wondered why most of them back into parking places (often holding up traffic while they do their slow maneuvers). I realize it's a whole lot easier to leave that way but I'd guess that 99% of US drivers don't do it that way. Maybe it's just the way it's always been done here (hmmmm.....is it difficult to back up an elephant?).

[Rogie]

My experiences are in line with most of you here. Thai people are very good at getting around in places they are familiar with, but if I am in a car and we are lost and I get my Thai companion to ask for directions (from a Thai bystander) I know we are in for a dose of frustration.

 

I hadn't noticed that Thai tendency to back their cars into parking spots. Rather like Mr Spock I try to be logical when parking my own car. I have a small hatchback saloon and if I need to use the boot (trunk), for example when I go shopping I go in head first so I can easily access the tailgate. Otherwise I must admit to preferring to back into a spot - maybe I just like the challenge!

 

Can anyone corroborate my opinion Thais can be very stubborn? On my visit just after all the rains and ensuing floods in October last year I was staying at my hotel in central Bangkok awaiting the visit of a lady I knew. She was coming from Isan (a tedious 7 hour journey even in normal conditions) but I fully expected her to phone and say she'd had to cancel, or at least postpone her journey. I knew the trains weren't running and reckoned nobody in their right mind would attempt to get through by car. How wrong I was. She phoned as she was nearing Bangkok to apologise she'd be slightly delayed - she duly arrived totally unflustered an hour later . . . talk about determination.

[Guest]

In my limited experience, Thais & their colleagues from neighbouring countries have not the slightest clue about maps. Should some kind soul offer you advice when you are checking a map, it will invariably be totally useless.

Even if that is a city with many physical landmarks AND with a "helper" who speak good English, I recommend you politely listen to their advice. Then disregard it.

[KhorTose]

I remember coming to Thailand four years ago with my IPhone and showing tuk tuk, and cab drivers where I wanted to go on my GPS map. I have yet to meet one driver who can see the map and recognize where they are and where I want to go. As for parking, I can always find a parking place even at the crowded events. All I ever have to do is find a gap large enough for my car as no one parallel parks.

[Guest GaySacGuy]

Is there any chance that the majority of you are dealing with Bangkok when you speak of directions???

 

My experience leads me to believe that Bangkok is one of the most difficult cities anywhere to get around and understand directions. Most cities seem to be laid out in some pattern, but Bangkok is like an artwork that the painter threw the paint from across the room. I have made my way around a lot of cities, but Bangkok is the worst. Maybe it is because they can't tell east from west because they never see the sun through the smog???

 

One example of directions given that worked to my amazement. When we moved from Pattaya to Ubon, we hired a pickup to haul a load of our junk. He showed up at Yensabai condo at 0500 and we loaded the truck. The boyfriend spoke to him with directions, and we parted ways headed for the boyfriends village 70 kilometers north of Ubon. Realize the from the main highway you take a more rural road, and then turn off on a mostly dirt road, and travel a while and then into a village where you turn and then drive back out into the country before arriving at the bf's home.

 

We traveled without much stop except for fuel. We arrived, had something to eat, and I wondered how long before the pickup driver would call??? Well, about two hours after we arrived, the pickup arrived and backed into bf's driveway. Never would have believed it if I wasn't there to witness it!!

[Bob]

Is there any chance that the majority of you are dealing with Bangkok when you speak of directions???

 

My experience has been in Chiangmai....where at least all of the old city and some of the rest is set out in a somewhat straight directional manner. But I can understand how one would have difficulty applying some of those concepts (north/south/east/west) to Bangkok given how it's a city originally laid out along a meandering river.

 

I've always been orientated to those directions and I'm always puzzled by people who have no clue about them. Two days ago, I went to lunch with a falang friend and his about 30-year-old boyfriend. I asked the bf if he understood "north", "south", and the like and he assured me he did. So, I asked him on what side (north, south, etc.) of the old city was the Chang Phuak gate. No clue at all. Then, figuring I'd switch to an easy one, I asked in what direction were the mountains. He eventually said it was "north." I politely indicated that, no, it was "west" and, as we were driving in that direction at the time at about 4:00PM and could see the sun somewhat receding right over our windshield, I mentioned that (figuring he understood the sun rose in the east and receded in the west). Not much recognition of any of those concepts.

 

I'd guess....but don't know at all....that Thai farmers have more sense of directions given they have more involvement with surveyed farm fields, laying out lines of plants or fruit trees, and can even have a very accurate sense of the time by the sun's position in the sky.

 

P.S. I would note that the very intelligent falang with me in that car also at first asserted the mountains (and 4PM sun) we were looking at out the windshield were north. But at least he quickly accepted that "west" was the right answer.

[Guest fountainhall]

I am talking mostly about Bangkok. But my remarks also refer to what I feel is an inability of Thais in general to communicate and/or understand directions, even when given by other Thais.

 

I have a friend who lives on the outskirts of the Bangkok. Getting most of the way there is a cinch on the expressway. Thereafter, though, there are a couple of complicated turns, and from then on it's just straight ahead. The problem is there are quite a number of gated communities with no signs in English.

 

The first time I visited, my taxi made the correct turns, but then got confused about the turn off, even though my friends had sent a map in Thai. When I was sure we were past their turn-off, the driver got out of the car and looked carefully at the map in the headlights. No, he indicated, we had to go on. I called my friend's bf. He and the cab driver chatted for at least 3 minutes, after which the taxi driver smiled, pointed ahead and proceeded to go forward. After about a couple of kilometers, we had run out of city! So the driver turned back. Another phone call. This time we had gone past the turn off in the other direction! The bf had to come out and find us!

 

I have more stories like that. I always wonder if it is something to do with Thai logic being so very different from western logic.

[Guest]

Actually, shoddy maps seem to be quite common in SE Asia.

Those little maps showing saunas, hotels & so on often have basic failings. For example, there may be a detailed map showing 2 streets, but finding out where those streets are within the city can me a major forensic exercise.

Then there are some guides where all the streets are shown in a grid @ right angles, irrespective of the actual geometry. These maps may then compound the problem by deleting whole streets and not naming some of those that are shown.

 

With maps like that, is it any wonder people struggle to navigate?

 

While we are at it, I would suggest every business puts it's GPS co-ordinates on the web site. Then if the map is no good, at least the potential customer can use google maps.