Thailand Land of Smiles» Thai Books

Thailand Fever

Talen — Fri, 29 May 2009 07:04:45 +0000

Many men go to Thailand every year, meet a Thai lady and fall in love. Sounds easy enough because love conquers all right? Well, there can be a lot more to it when you are talking about cross cultural relationships. Different religions, values and priorities can be major stumbling blocks when it come to such a relationship and Thailand Fever does a pretty good job of helping you to start understanding where your Thai girl is coming from and vice versa.

Thailand fever was written by two authors, Vitida Vasant and Chris Pirazzi, a Thai woman and an American man who know all too well the hurdles and obstacles a cross cultural relationship presents.

Each page of Thailand Fever is written in both English and Thai so you can read one side and the opposite is translated into Thai for your lady to read.

The book covers all the major problems such a relationship will face from cultural differences and family to money and marriage. A lot of foreign men think they know a lot about the Thai culture and in some cases they do but they overlook the intricacies and how they relate to them and their new Thai love. As well many Thai women don’t understand the culture that these men are coming from and often misinterpret what he says or means. Not only do the authors tackle frustrating subjects in the book but they also add in their invaluable advice to give you a leg up.

It all comes down to understanding your partner’s culture,” say the authors. “Never forget that you and your partner grew up in cultures that developed separately over thousands of years. To have a happy relationship, you must understand that your partner does not share some of the basic beliefs and values you have taken for granted your whole life. You must be open-minded in ways you’ve probably never considered. In this book, we will make you aware of these surprising differences.

Although the book is a little light all the important areas get covered enough that your lady will understand better where you are coming from and you will understand better what makes her tick and how to handle the family. While advice is offered for certain situations by the authors there are many instances where you and your lady will have to go it alone and work your way through the problem but the book can help immensely.

Overall you won’t find a better book to help you both start to understand and explore your cultures together.If you’d like to try it before you buy it you can read the first 35 pages online at Thailand Fever Preview.

My Thai Girl and I

Talen — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 18:19:39 +0000

Recently released by Andrew Hicks, author of the best selling novel, “Thai Girl”, “My Thai Girl and I” is a departure from the fiction of his sophomore release . My Thai Girl and I is about his life in Thailand after retiring early as a corporate lawyer and university professor in England to live in rural Thailand with his Thai wife Cat.

This is how I met Cat, a ‘Thai girl’ half my age and how we set up home together in her village out in the rice fields of North Eastern Thailand.
I’ll tell you of toads in the toilet, of ants’ eggs for breakfast, how we took up frog farming and how I got married without really meaning to.
It’s also a book about the countryside, of the old Thailand where the rhythm of the seasons and belief in the spirits and Buddhism remain strong.
Though how could I, a greying English lawyer, ever fit into the lives of a Thai rice farming family. Can Cat and I with our many differences really be compatible?
If you’re curious to know what it’s like to start a totally new life as I did, to slow down and ‘go with the flow’, I’m sure you’ll enjoy reading the story of ‘my Thai girl and I’.

With many books published and being published about the Thai/falang (Thai word for foreigner) relationship and experience it’s refreshing to see one thats written from the rural Thai experience instead of the tried but true Bankok or Pattaya settings.

I started writing it when we’d been together about two years. I went back to my diaries and I racked my brains but it wasn’t difficult as I had a vivid recall of the many special experiences we’d shared together. I wanted to write about Isaan, the dry North East of Thailand where we live among the rice fields and that’s exactly what I’ve done.

I hope it’s funny and I hope it’s fair. I hope that it portrays the agonies and the ecstacies of reinventing oneself and finding a new life in a context I could never before have imagined I’d find myself in. And it’s about a very special relationship and of building bridges across our vast differences of culture and age.

So how hard is it to retire in Thailand in the bosom of a Thai family and to find happiness then? Well, you’ll have to read the book to find out!

Andrew Hicks first book “Thai Girl” was written out of despair for the lack of Thai credibility and experience so often encountered in books about, or set in Thailand. One notable book ” The Beach”, supposedly set in Thailand, really had nothing to do with Thailand at all and what traces of Thailand that were injected resorted to typical stereotypes showing Thai people as gun toting thugs or prostitutes.

I wondered if I could write something different with strong Thai characters and which made the Thai setting pivotal; not just an exotic cliche? but a place inhabited by real people that was fundamental to the story. In particular I wanted the book to challenge readers to think about Thailand and its people and perhaps to learn something from it.

But that was not to be an easy assignment. Dickens was good at social comment, but as the novice author of Thai Girl, I have little idea if I have succeeded in my aims for the novel which I now present to you.

I love Thailand, and issues such as poverty, and tourism and commercial sex trouble me; it is so easy for visitors to exploit the Thai people. I therefore hope Thai Girl does not look like another trashy Bangkok bar story. It is about well-meaning young people taking a life-check and briefly travelling through Thailand and is not about the older hoodlums of the typical sex novel. Mass tourism brings visitors of all sorts here in large numbers and they are bound to have an impact. Perhaps that is what the novel is about.

This looks to be an interesting read especially for someone such as myself that is thinking about making the move to Thailand and living in the the rural areas of Issan. I’ve just ordered the book and will let you know what I think once I read it.

If you are interested in finding out more information on ” My Thai girl and I” or “Thai girl” there is a website dedicated to the books and author: Thai Girl

Likewise both books can be found at Asia Books

Andrew Hicks also has a blog if you would like to find out more about the author and what he’s up to Thai Girl 2004

Love, Betrayal And Death In Thailand

Talen — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 01:34:15 +0000

Private Dancer, a book by Stephen Leather, is the story of a doomed relationship between a British travel writer and a Thai bargirl. Based on the realities of the Bangkok bar scene, Leather delivers a highly readable thriller that delves deep into the relationship between a bargirl named Joy and her newest boyfriend Pete.

The story It’s written in the first person, from the point of view of all the characters involved, and is based on a lot of stories Stephen heard around the bars in Bangkok.

For many years Private Dancer was only available as a free download through his website. It became something of a cult classic and over the last five years was downloaded sixty thousand times from more than forty countries. He gleaned much of the information for the book sitting in a bar called Jool’s in Sukhumvit Soi 4, just down the road from Bangkok’s infamous Nana Plaza red light area. The owner, Big Dave, knows pretty much everything there is to know about Thailand, and he’s the basis for the Big Ron character in the book.

Hodder and Stoughton didn’t want to publish Private Dancer as it is so different from his regular thrillers, so he decided to publish the book himself in Thailand, through his publishing company, Three Elephants.

You can download a huge chunk of the book below Courtesy of Stephen Leather… it will leave you wanting more!

Private Dancer PDF

If you like what you’ve read then head over to his website at StevenLeather.com to check out his other works.

‘CHILDREN OF THE TSUNAMI’ KHAO LAK – A STORY OF HOPE An inspirational book

Talen — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 04:03:04 +0000

All profits from the sale of this book go directly to the education and schooling of the children of Khao Lak and other tsunami affected regions of Thailand – the ‘children of the tsunami’.

All photos © Children of the Tsunami

For the
‘Children of the Tsunami
This is a unique project which was undertaken by students for the benefit of students. Photo © Robin Nagy

Photo © Robin Nagy

Photo © Nicholas Mak

Photo © Robin Nagy

Photo © Nicholas Mak

Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – a Story of Hope is an inspirational book project championed by 52 students and a team of dedicated staff from Bangkok Patana School, one of the city’s leading international schools and an important part of the Bangkok community, for the children of Khao Lak and other tsunami affected regions of Thailand.This important volume not only honours the courage of tsunami survivors and the memory of those lost but also aims to raise significant funds to further the education of children affected by the disaster.Despite the scale of the disaster and the terrible loss of family, friends and property, Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – A Story of Hope focuses on the positive stories that have emerged from the tragedy. Children of the Tsunami is a positive, story of hope. It is the story of how the children of the Khao Lak region of Thailand witnessed those unexpected, horrific and catastrophic events of December 26, 2004 and how their lives were permanently altered by the Tsunami. It is also a story of how ordinary children: the students of Bangkok Patana School, decided to do something about it and how the Tsunami Book Project was born.

The official launch of Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – A Story of Hope on November 23, 2005 is the culmination of an exciting and ambitious project, the first of its kind, in which children have helped children to help themselves and their own community.

The book is a beautiful collection of photographs of, and stories, poems and pictures by, the children of the Khao Lak region of Thailand. Its focus is on how the community of the Khao Lak region, and in particular their children, have moved on in one short year, from being ‘victims’ to becoming examples of hope to us all.

The book concentrates on the positive aspects to have come out of those terrible events; it re-tells stories from the children’s perspective: stories of community, of bravery, of hope, of motivation and of love.

All the artwork for the book was drawn by the children of the four schools in Khao Lak, Thailand – Pak Weep, Bang Niang, Bang Sak and Watkommaneeyakhet School.

On the advent of the first anniversary of the Asian tsunami, Bangkok Patana School, the British International School in Thailand and a centre for excellence in education, has proudly made a lasting contribution to the lives of those children affected by the disaster. Over 900,000 baht in sponsorship funds were raised by an energetic and passionate team of children and teachers and 5,000 full-colour hardback books have been printed.

All profits from book sales will pay for the education of Thai children affected by the tsunami. The project has already captured media interest here in Thailand, both in the national press and on TV.

Mr Robin Nagy, Project Coordinator for the Tsunami Book Project explains, “Profits from the book will enable local children who were affected by the tsunami (some of them orphaned and many of them made homeless) to help themselves and to raise money for their own education. (All profits from book sales will go back towards the education and schooling of the children of the tsunami affected regions of Thailand). This is their book, earning money in order to help themselves and their community. They gave us all the material – the students at Bangkok Patana School simply helped them to make it into a book.”

But the book is about more than that.

“We hope that it will also inform people all over the world that the Andaman coast is open for business once again and that it will attract many tourists back to this beautiful part of Thailand, a region whose long-term economic survival is so dependant on the tourist dollar.

“It is also a story about how the impossible becomes possible with enough imagination and determination. We were told by major UK publishing houses that it was simply not possible to produce a book in the timeframe we were planning and that it was unfeasible that we could have a book ready in time for Christmas. This group of children proved them wrong!

“This is a unique project which was undertaken by students for the benefit of students. The book has been published in time for the first anniversary of the Asian Tsunami and I hope that it will receive the worldwide publicity that it deserves.

“I feel privileged to have worked alongside so many inspirational and dedicated young people and staff.

“There is an old saying that ‘for evil to triumph, all it takes is for good men to do nothing’. Surely it also follows that when good people refuse to do nothing, truly remarkable things result. Because of people like the children of Khao Lak, the students and staff of Bangkok Patana School, the sponsors of this project and because of every individual who buys this book – good has indeed triumphed,” Mr Nagy added.

Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – a Story of Hope will be on sale in Thailand for B950 in Asia Books and B2S as well as other good bookshops, and in the UK for £14.99 in W H Smiths and other leading bookstores.

Acknowledgement to the Sponsors
The tsunami project would never have got off the ground without the trust and generosity of the sponsors, in particular to Amadeus, Chevron, Souer Co. Ltd, and Mermaid Maritime who donated the most. Austrian Airlines offered to ship 1,000 copies of the book to the UK free of charge and the Sheraton Grande Sukhumvit Bangkok hosted the official book launch on November 23, 2005.

Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – a Story of Hope
ISBN 974936311-6
All artwork for the book was drawn by the children of the four schools in Khao Lak, Thailand. Illustrations, photographs and stories compiled by the students of Bangkok Patana School. Edited by Robin Nagy

Available in Thailand for 950 baht from Asia Books, B2S, as well as other good bookshops, and in the United Kingdom for £14.99 in W H Smiths and other leading bookstores.
Related articles:
Transcript: speech by Robin Nagy, Project Coordinator for the Tsunami Book Project – Children of the Tsunami, Khao Lak – a Story of Hope
Please click to view

For bulk orders, please write to:
E-mail: tsunami@patana.ac.th

To order online, please visit Amazon.co.
Amazon UK

Amazon USA

For more information please contact:
E-mail: nich@patana.ac.th
Tel: +66 (0) 2398 0200 ext.198
Fax: +66 (0) 2744 5924

Source: Bangkok Patana School press release, November 23, 2005

Thailand Land of Smiles» Thai Books

Thailand Fever

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