Hey markomalley,
I've spent several hours learning a tiny bit of this and that about Thailand. That would be a life! I'd be unable to resist the small Islands. Exciting. I like small islands a lot.
Do you mind sharing what city or area you're in?
A few questions. I like to ask questions you probably don't normally get. A little frivolous maybe but with honest curiosity and zero disrespect.
How do the people generally feel about the renaming? - When I was a kid I heard about Thai-Sticks. Are those a thing? - Is the “Turnstile Joke” well known in Thailand?
My wife is drawing our life's memories. Here is me on a small island where we had a cottage. In the summer it was a middle class resort, in the winter fairly deserted and often unreachable.
No worries.
I am in a small town on the coast of the Gulf of Thailand just a little north of Hua Hin. Very peaceful and relaxing during the week. But, particularly on long weekends, it gets really crowded with people coming down from Bangkok. (If you are familiar with Ocean City Maryland and the crowds that hit it on the weekend from DC, it’s sort of a similar vibe)
Renaming Siam into Thailand? Honestly, I’ve never heard anybody discuss it before as a matter of pride or a matter of contention. They still use “Siam” in a sense, talking about traditional times and things. One interesting piece of trivia that I don’t think I’d mentioned before (excuse the senior moment if I’m repeating myself): they still play the national anthem every morning at 8 AM from town public address systems all over the country and at the beginning of every movie. And people, while I don’t see them pop to attention, will stop what they are doing and give a respectful silence when they hear it. I have to give them props for that.
Thai sticks were a thing during Vietnam up through the 70s. I am not really into smoking ganja so haven’t ever seen them since I was a young man in college. Both Ganja and Kratom are legal here (Kratom is most often made into a tea, along with other flavoring to offset its astringency. Ganja is traditionally used as a cooking ingredient — just the leaves, so not something one gets high from — and is also used in traditional Thai medicine). The biggest problem with drugs here is called “ya-baa” (literal translation: crazy medicine). a/k/a amphetamine pills. In recent years, you start hearing about some people taking “ya-ai” (ya ice), or crystal meth. That is not at all commonplace and usually is with the urban youth.
The “turnstile joke”? I had to look it up. It is definitely not a thing here with the Thais as the Thai name for Bangkok is “Grueng Thep Maha Nakhon” (the full name is far, far longer...), which roughtly means the City of Angels, the great metropolis...
So the turnstile joke really wouldn’t make any sense to the locals as “Bang Kok” was just a little port town opposite of the former city Thon Buri. (If you ever were to travel there, you’d find a lot of the districts in BKK called “Bang- _____” Bang- means “district along the waterway”).
In regards to the Islands, there are definitely a lot of islands and they are all beautiful. Unfortunately, a lot of tourists also find them beautiful and like to visit them and so during the peak tourist season, they get overrun (peak tourist season is from Mid-November through mid- to late-January). But there are some smaller islands that haven’t really been overrun because they are too remote for all but the most adventurous tourist. Those are the best, but don’t expect to find 7-11s on every corner. Don’t even expect full-time electricity or solid 5G coverage (solar power is changing the former though). One thing: if you ever were to travel to an island, expect everything to be up-charged as it all has to be shipped in.
Your wife does a beautiful job with the drawings/paintings. I wish that I had that talent as I would love to be able to sit on the beach and draw...sadly, I don’t think that I’d want to hang a drawing of stick figures on the wall ;)