News Forum - PM praises public after Bangkok rating for best city in the world for a “workation”

[Thaiger]

Bangkok is the best city in the world for a so-called “workation.” At least that’s what Holidu, a website for vacation rentals says. The listing, which had Phuket and Chiang Mai both at number 10, was widely shared in Thai media and touted by the Tourism Authority of Thailand. It even caught the attention of PM Prayut Chan-o-cha who is now thanking citizens and local organisations for making Thailand an attractive place for digital nomads and tourists, especially during the Covid-19 crisis. What makes Bangkok the best place for a workation are the speed and availability of Wifi connections, the […]

The story PM praises public after Bangkok rating for best city in the world for a “workation” as seen on Thaiger News.

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[vendetta]

"Holidu also added that most people in Bangkok are able to speak English which is good for an investment and a great place for business people to stay."

 

What a joke! English standards are kinda low given the crappy education from 12 years old on...

[Dancbmac]

28 minutes ago, vendetta said:

What a joke! English standards are kinda low given the crappy education from 12 years old on...

Can you expand on this, as it is quite a broad comment, and what standards are you basing your comment on?  Example: age groups, general areas or businesses you experienced this and why education is crappy from 12 years on?  My wife was a high school history teacher and is interested in the education comment.

[Artemis080]

I really don't doubt that Thailand is a fantastic place for people able to remote work, myself included.

If there was a genuine visa option to support it, like that offered by the carribean countries or Dubai, then I have no doubt that Thailand's economy would reap the rewards.

Right now though, a tourist visa or Elite visa is uncompetitive in the global market at a time when remote based work is here to stay.

[Marc26]

6 hours ago, vendetta said:

"Holidu also added that most people in Bangkok are able to speak English which is good for an investment and a great place for business people to stay."

What a joke! English standards are kinda low given the crappy education from 12 years old on...

I have travelled to a lot of countries in a lot of regions

 

I would say Thailand was one of the easiest to navigate in terms of locals being able to understand at least basic English

 

I have travelled to Latin America quite a bit and you run into issues of people not understanding English way more than you do in Thailand.......

[Mazz11]

9 hours ago, Marc26 said:

I would say Thailand was one of the easiest to navigate in terms of locals being able to understand at least basic English

I agree, I have travelled in India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand and found that once out of the big cities communication can be difficult for English speaking tourists in most of these countries.

In Thailand I almost always managed to find someone who could speak enough English to get my message across.  

[HiuMak]

Philippines is easier with language

[Mazz11]

1 hour ago, HiuMak said:

Philippines is easier with language

That is somewhere I have not yet been, maybe one day

[Stonker]

12 hours ago, Mazz11 said:

In Thailand I almost always managed to find someone who could speak enough English to get my message across.  

Agreed, @Mazz11, but despite that "someone" is still hardly "most".

[Stonker]

On 12/9/2021 at 4:25 PM, Dancbmac said:

Can you expand on this, as it is quite a broad comment, and what standards are you basing your comment on?  Example: age groups, general areas or businesses you experienced this and why education is crappy from 12 years on?  My wife was a high school history teacher and is interested in the education comment.

Are you saying the education system isn't "crappy"?

If so, I'd be equally interested to know what that's based on!

[Marc26]

12 hours ago, Stonker said:

Agreed, @Mazz11, but despite that "someone" is still hardly "most".

Why would that matter to a digital nomad though?

The subject is on Bangkok

There is not one place in Bangkok that you can go that you can't find someone that understands English if you needed any sort of help.

 

Plus I don't think the locals understanding English is really that high on their list of needs.

 

So the local's command is irrelevant 

And their care of the local education system is non-existent unless they have young kids

Which many do not 

 

 

 

[Mazz11]

12 hours ago, Stonker said:

Agreed, @Mazz11, but despite that "someone" is still hardly "most"

Not sure what you mean here.

When I said 'most', I was referring to countries not people

On 12/10/2021 at 8:43 AM, Mazz11 said:

can be difficult for English speaking tourists in most of these countries.

 

[Marc26]

On 12/9/2021 at 4:43 PM, Mazz11 said:

I agree, I have travelled in India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand and found that once out of the big cities communication can be difficult for English speaking tourists in most of these countries.

In Thailand I almost always managed to find someone who could speak enough English to get my message across.  

We both agree

J was shocked at how much better English communication is in Asia than in Latin America 

Given Latin America is next to a huge English speaking country and lots of people in Latin America have family in the US 

 

But as I said to Stonker 

I don't even think English communication is much of a concern for a digital Nomad

As long as they can get by, they mostly work remotely out of their own country 

 

They don't really need to communicate a lot with locals

[Stonker]

3 hours ago, Mazz11 said:

Not sure what you mean here.

What I meant was that while what you're saying ("In Thailand I almost always managed to find someone who could speak enough English to get my message across.") is absolutely spot on and 100% correct, what others are saying isn't.

The article reported that ""Holidu also added that most people in Bangkok are able to speak English which is good for an investment and a great place for business people to stay" and @Marc26 said that "I would say Thailand was one of the easiest to navigate in terms of locals being able to understand at least basic English".

Both are laughably misinformed as far as "most people" and "the locals" are concerned.

The statements are certainly correct where tourist and business areas are concerned, which is probably all that matters for those on a 'workation', but as far as "most people" are concerned it's wildly incorrect.

[Stonker]

3 hours ago, Marc26 said:

Why would that matter to a digital nomad though?

The subject is on Bangkok

There is not one place in Bangkok that you can go that you can't find someone that understands English if you needed any sort of help.

Plus I don't think the locals understanding English is really that high on their list of needs.

So the local's command is irrelevant 

And their care of the local education system is non-existent unless they have young kids

Which many do not 

I'm not suggesting it matters at all - just saying that  Holidu's report that "most people in Bangkok are able to speak English" is laughably misinformed since "most" aren't.

That may not - and probably doesn't - matter in the slightest to a 'digital nomad', but that doesn't make it any more correct.

[LoongFred]

1 minute ago, Stonker said:

I'm not suggesting it matters at all - just saying that  Holidu's report that "most people in Bangkok are able to speak English" is laughably misinformed since "most" aren't.

That may not - and probably doesn't - matter in the slightest to a 'digital nomad', but that doesn't make it any more correct.

Should have said if you want to live happily in Thailand as a DN or anyone else, you need to be able to communicate in Thai.  Commication in the native language should be important everywhere. 

[AdvocatusDiaboli]

9 minutes ago, Stonker said:

I'm not suggesting it matters at all - just saying that  Holidu's report that "most people in Bangkok are able to speak English" is laughably misinformed since "most" aren't.

Maybe the Holidu should stick with what they do as a primary website (notice I didn’t say do best) and that is provide assistance for rental properties. 
 

and on the pecking order only 28 percent of Thai can speak English.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population

 

 

[Stonker]

2 hours ago, AdvocatusDiaboli said:

Maybe the Holidu should stick with what they do as a primary website (notice I didn’t say do best) and that is provide assistance for rental properties. 
 

and on the pecking order only 28 percent of Thai can speak English.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_English-speaking_population

87th on the list - and I'd suggest that '28%' is pretty generous.

[Marc26]

7 hours ago, Stonker said:

What I meant was that while what you're saying ("In Thailand I almost always managed to find someone who could speak enough English to get my message across.") is absolutely spot on and 100% correct, what others are saying isn't.

The article reported that ""Holidu also added that most people in Bangkok are able to speak English which is good for an investment and a great place for business people to stay" and @Marc26 said that "I would say Thailand was one of the easiest to navigate in terms of locals being able to understand at least basic English".

Both are laughably misinformed as far as "most people" and "the locals" are concerned.

The statements are certainly correct where tourist and business areas are concerned, which is probably all that matters for those on a 'workation', but as far as "most people" are concerned it's wildly incorrect.

How would my statement be laughably misinformed ?

 

It's my personal experience from traveling to 40-50 countries

 

I've found it easier to communicate in English in Thailand than pretty much every Asian country I've been to, and I've been to almost all of them

Even outside the tourist areas

 

And it is far, far easier to find people to communicate in English in Thailand than most Latin American countries I have visited 

 

None of that means I'm going to walking around Samut Prakan or Bang Sue having in depth conversations in Thai

 

But I wouldn't go too far in either place or most places in Thailand without finding someone who speaks English if I needed help.

Any supermarket, banks etc, you would likely find someone who you could communicate with in English. And as a digital Nomad that is all you would need.

 

Much more easier than say Japan, I would say, for example 

[Marc26]

12 minutes ago, atiger said:

Prayut is delusional. Wait for the PayPal changes next year forcing anyone receiving money from PayPal to start a Thai company and pay tax.

Wait for the big insurance premium next time you renew your yearly visa.

All this on top of dual pricing, the fact foreigners can never even buy i rai of land even if you've been married to a Thai for 40 years.

Singapore and Hong Kong offer a much higher standard of living.

Did you even read one sentence of the article?

 

Your comments literally had nothing at all to do with the article

Not even one part of your comments

 

1st Prayuth didn't write the article, he's commenting on it, as any leader about positive news for their country 

 

2nd.....it was about "worktations"

Everything you complained about had absolutely zero to do with a "worktation"

 

But I guess you got your moan in......

[Stonker]

1 hour ago, Marc26 said:

How would my statement be laughably misinformed ?

Because while it may be your personal experience, which I'm not disputing at all, the idea of many "locals being able to understand at least basic English" outside the tourist and business areas in Thailand is laughably misinformed - a glance at the link provided by @AdvocatusDiaboli puts Thailand at 87th.

You may disagree, but that's what the reports say and I doubt they're all wrong.

[Poolie]

51 minutes ago, atiger said:

Prayut is delusional. Wait for the PayPal changes next year forcing anyone receiving money from PayPal to start a Thai company and pay tax.

Wait for the big insurance premium next time you renew your yearly visa.

All this on top of dual pricing, the fact foreigners can never even buy i rai of land even if you've been married to a Thai for 40 years.

Singapore and Hong Kong offer a much higher standard of living.

Singapore and Hong Kong offer a much higher standard of living. And a much more expensive one.

[Marc26]

1 hour ago, Stonker said:

Because while it may be your personal experience, which I'm not disputing at all, the idea of many "locals being able to understand at least basic English" outside the tourist and business areas in Thailand is laughably misinformed - a glance at the link provided by @AdvocatusDiaboli puts Thailand at 87th.

You may disagree, but that's what the reports say and I doubt they're all wrong.

I don't disagree 

What I meant was Thailand is the easiest to navigate in English because I have found I can find more people that speak passable English for me to get by, than most countries I have visited.

Even outside main tourist areas 

And I found that quite surprising when I 1st started traveling there.....

 

Which is all a digital Nomad or someone looking to take a "worktation" would need 

I wasn't commenting on Bangkok's English-speaking proficiency as a whole or their education system.

 

 

 

[AdvocatusDiaboli]

10 hours ago, Marc26 said:

Which is all a digital Nomad or someone looking to take a "worktation" would need 

A Dell, HP or Lenovo?

[Dancbmac]

On 12/10/2021 at 8:28 PM, Stonker said:

Are you saying the education system isn't "crappy"?

If so, I'd be equally interested to know what that's based on!

Did I say that?  I have no idea if Thailand’s education system is good, average, or crappy since I never went to school here or had kids that went to school here.  Maybe you didn’t read my whole question?  I believe I asked @vendettaand not you if he could expand on his comment for better understanding on how he knows about this and also my Thai wife was interested on more details.  How can I say if the education system “is crappy” or “any good” without any data, which is why I asked the question.  So since you often question most comments people make in this forum and sometimes put words into other’s questions like, “Are you saying the education system isn’t “crappy, when someone like myself just asked a question, because I did not know when I asked so I went and looked it up and Wikipedia had this ranking for education 54 of 70 countries (2015) and has been dropping since 2012.  Not sure why Wikipedia only ranked 70 countries, as my understanding according to worldmeters.info, there are currently 195 countries globally??  Anyway, since I did not get an answer from the person I asked, I found an answer based on some data from the internet and @vendettawas generally correct, but not sure how he based the 12 years old age comment and he might have other data or experience as I did not find this info and really not that big of a deal for me.  I just wonder where the figure came from that is all.

My sources in case you want to know that I based my reply to you on, though the data is dated (2015)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Thailand

https://www.worldometers.info/geography/how-many-countries-are-there-in-the-world/

 

I try to participate in this forum, but I have to say many, not all, longtime members make the experience miserable so I usually just move on without adding anything.

 

On 12/10/2021 at 8:28 PM, Stonker said:

Can you expand on this, as it is quite a broad comment, and what standards are you basing your comment on?  Example: age groups, general areas or businesses you experienced this and why education is crappy from 12 years on?  My wife was a high school history teacher and is interested in the education comment.