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05/11/07 Draft Thoughts: South East Asia
DELHI, INDIA (10,223m ALTITUDE) - The in-flight map is telling me my location, we’ve just passed over the Tibetan Plateau at 4am local time, and I’ve managed to keep my eyes open with the hope of seeing the silhouette of a peak in the Himalayas or Kashmir ranges just 2000m below. I’m en-route home from my first trip to South East Asia with work. This was a very different experience from passing through as a tourist. Here are some thoughts I noted about Bangkok in Thailand:
* Crazy city. But beautifully crazy.
* Service Driven Society. Service appeared a key personal measurable for Thai’s. Courtesy, Courtesy, Courtesy.
* There are 3 people employed to do every job that we can afford 1 person for in Europe.
* In business, the expense of man-power is not a limiting factor.
* In the most congested chaotic roads I’d ever seen, I never saw any road-rage.
* On a London salary, nothing felt unaffordable (40mins in a taxi for £1.20).
* Incredible duplication/replication skills from branded outdoor gear to designer ball gowns. I suspect the same holds true for code. If you want a copy of a web app or software written, I suspect this is the place to get it done.
* Work colleagues come in just behind family, but ahead of friends in importance. This makes offices an interestingly social place.
* You can bargain a Tuk Tuk ride down from £3 down to 16p in 2 offers. If tourists are paying £3 and locals 16p (or less) for the same journey, do locals suffer in priority levels?
* Nobody turns away business - you will get a ridiculously low price offer. Once you give a ‘buy sign’ it just comes down to negotiating the lowest a price, you WILL walk away with the product/service.
* The only thing that could bring eBay down is when the Thai street seller gets eBay enabled. You will see a barrage of ‘product spam’.
* There are only 3 gadget brands in Bangkok… ‘Made in Korea’, ‘Made in China’, ‘Made in Thailand’. This is what determines their purchases.
* Phantip electronics market is impressive. I saw true ability, ingenuity & skill as young men & women re-soldered canabalised phone parts to make new full ones. How do we harness this?
* They know their trade. The 12yr old girl who sold me my MP4 recorder knew the feature set inside-out, she knew the specs off by heart of every gadget on the shelf. Yet - I was pretty sure she’d never used them.
* A cool-head, gracious behaviour and a show of respect wins in Thailand, every time.
* When can I go back?
(Note: This post was written on an A4 pad and posted retrospectively on landing in London)
Tags: asia, bangkok, draft, south east asia, thailand, thoughts
1 Comment
Sounds like a crazy place alright. Nice experiencing it from a business perspective as ya say.
