absolutelyBangkok archive · Being farang
Originally published May 28, 2009
You may live in a high floor Bangkok condo with tight security. Your main means of transport is the secure Skytrain and life around downtown Bangkok seems peaceful and safe. But watch out.
The city may look completely different when you live in a single house in one of the labyrinthesque green sois. We got robbed five times within three weeks. Despite utmost care. Yes, we got an alarm system.
There’s a lot of despair out here in current Bangkok. The maid saw him, a small burglar with a cap. Maybe a drug addict. Each time going for the cash in a wallet, a mobile phone or a laptop. It adds up. Yes, we’re stupid.
How he finds the wallets? And leaving the credit cards untouched? At first my wife started talking about black magic. Until we got more and more evidence of a very talented burglar.
But save yourself the trip to the police. They wouldn’t move their arse, as too many similar muggings take place all the time all around Bangkok. After a first call they even pretended they didn’t find our house.
So we went there. And they thought me stupid farang wouldn’t grasp a word of Thai. They basically suspected me or my son for the robberies. It happens all the time, they assured my wife.
So much about the current state of Thai society. And no, it’s not the maid. We can make sure of that.
If the police would have added 1 + 1 they may have found out that it makes little sense for me to steal the stuff I gave my wife for Christmas.
Police didn’t even care that recently when the maid — the maid! — got her cash and mobile phone stolen we were out of town.
“Your husband, sure,” the policeman assured my wife.
But then again, first you have to be able to add 1 + 1. And the thief’s extremely audacious.
We got his traces along the fence and windows he entered. The police wouldn’t care. Recommended my wife to install a camera surveillance system. They’re not cheap. And what if you got a mug shot of one of the millions of Thais in the city or a migrant worker?
Maybe if you lie in your own blood on a floor the police would move. Along with an army of local news photographers.
And as a farang don’t even try to fight an intruder. Told me a lawyer: “If anything happens to a thief, you as the foreigner are always guilty. A stun gun? What if he has a weak heart? You’d go to prison.”
Pepper spray, maybe, he said. If you spray him inside your own house. But not sure.
You’re robbed in your own house — and have to step back.
A recent afternoon I spent with mixing cement, smashing old bottles of wine into broken pieces of glass — and decorating the top of the wall with it where we know the guy jumps into our premises.
Oh, and not to mention the regular robberies in our soi by guys on motorcycles in broad daylight. Guys snatching handbags, necklaces, anything.
Just don’t ask the police for help. One’s left to one’s own.
Or as my wife says: “Thailand is a great place. As long as you have no problem.”
You never had a problem?
We didn’t have for years. Just watch your back. You could be next.
I loved to have the doors and windows wide open. Especially now with this lovely season’s breeze and rains Not any longer. The place is all locked up.
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