Read excerpts and sample sextalk expressions from:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 7 Modern Courtship and Dating
Excerpt

Values and customs are subject to change and influences from within and without the culture that comes with the spinning wheel of time.

Not so long ago sexual prudishness was the norm, then fell out of fashion and is now coming back in many places. Take America for example, where some teenagers have recently started a sexual revolution u-turn, going the way of “second virginity,” possibly rebelling against sexual liberation that was so much part of their parents’ generation. Half the world away Thai teenagers are busy losing their virginity as though trying to make up for their parents’ lost time.

This, of course, makes Thai parents and Thailand’s ever-worried Ministry of Culture quite queasy. They bemoan the “degeneration” of Thai sexual virtue among modern youth and expediently blame the influence of the West. Evidently, they forget that historically our ancestors weren’t always so hung up about sex, nor so fanatical about sexual chastity, even for women (as discussed extensively in Chapter 6). Perhaps the changing sexual values among Thai youth today can be viewed as a return to our own sexually relaxed roots as much as a moral “corruption” by foreign influences. . . . A new kind of romance has also emerged in modern Thai sexual culture. Thai-foreign relationships, especially between Thai women and Western men, have become a trend. So, I also cover these relationships, which beg much cultural and historical discussion.

Seeing
khuuang (kan) (v.) ควง(กัน) (ก.)
mii nát (kàp) (v.) มีนัด(กับ) (ก.)
nát bÒOt (v., n.) นัดบอด (ก., น,)

The fact that the adopted English word “date” is widely used doesn’t mean that there aren’t homegrown Thai words for dating. Khuuang, literally meaning “(to be) arm in arm,” can be used in the same sense as “to date.” To khuuang covers both going out with someone on a one-off occasion and going steady as a couple. Example: Daeng excitedly tells Nan, “Apple will khuuang Tom to a party tonight!” Nan knowingly replies, “Sure, Tom finally won her over and they are now khuuang kan lÉEw (“already going steady”), isn’t that something? Apple mii nát (“has a date”) kàp (“with”) Tom often these days.” Daeng is incredulous, “Really? I can’t believe it. Apple wasn’t interested before. That’s good, though. Apple won’t have to go on another blind date (nát bÒOt) again.”

Speed dating
dèet dùuan (slang, n.) เดทด่วน (แสลง, น.)
dèet jaan dùuan (slang, n.) เดทจานด่วน (แสลง, น.)

What about “speed dating”? Sure, we Thais have adopted that too, and have given it a no less catchy name—dèet dùuan or dèet jaan dùuan, meaning “fast date” not unlike “fast food.” For those who have been hiding in the bushes for the past ten years, speed dating is like dating in a game of double musical chairs: the potential male and female dates are rotated so that all have a chance to meet for 3-8 minutes. At each meeting, both parties can speedily interview one another and get an impression on whether they would want to see the other for a real date later.

Speed dating is usually a well organized event and often caters to a specific group of people, in similar age range or sexual orientation for example. The participants are typically asked to register (and pay) in advance. The meeting place is often a restaurant or a public place. It is no doubt very convenient for people looking for a lover in a hurry who have neither the patience nor inclination for the rough and tumble of dating the usual way. Speed-dating proponents say it is safe, efficient, tailor-made, and (almost) rejection-free.

As it happens, there is at least one speed-dating organizer in Thailand, the Bangkok Network of Women (www.bnow.org), which was started by a Thai woman in 2004 and is now run by the original founder and a few expatriate women. “It’s Just Lunch,” a US-based dating service for busy, high-flying professionals, has also opened a Thailand branch.

Just friends, more than friends
pen fEEn (kan) (v.) เป็นแฟน(กัน) (ก.)
pen khÊE phûeaan (v.) เป็นแค่เพื่อน (ก.)
pen mâak khwàa phûeaan (v.) เป็นมากกว่าเพื่อน (ก.)
pen kík (v.) เป็นกิ๊ก (ก.)

When two people are already in a romantic relationship, they are said to pen fEEn kan—in other words, they are each other’s “lover” (fEEn). This is a flexible word adopted from the English word “fan” (as in “fanatic,” not an electrical appliance). In Thai its meaning covers boyfriend/girlfriend, lover/partner to husband/wife, meaning you can call someone whom you’ve just decided to go steady with, or your wife/husband, fEEn. In a way it is a wonderfully convenient word to use with a lover of indeterminate status, but in another way it is vexingly ambiguous.

Now, if you are “just friends” the exact Thai expression for this is: pen khÊE phûeaan. But if you are “more than friends,” you say: pen mâak khwàa phûeaan. But if you’re “more than friends but not quite lovers,” there’s a perfectly fitting new slang term: pen kík. A kík, a casual, temporary squeeze, may or may not turn into a long-term lover (see more about kík and its evolution in Chapter 8).

The train crash
rôt-fai chon kan (idiom, v.) รถไฟชนกัน (สำ, ก.)
sàp raang (idiom, v.) สับราง (สำ, ก.)

Dating more than one person at a time risks a danger of a “train crash” (rôt-fai chon kan)—that is when two dates run into each other due to a technical mix-up on the part of the common lover. This is a potentially serious romantic accident that could cause both trains to derail. So, it is important for those aspiring to keep multiple love trains going at once to learn the skills of a good train conductor to “coordinate the rail changes”(sàp raang). Or the consequences could be greater than loss of face. (See also Catch a fish in each hand in Chapter 2.)

Thai-farang relationships – “farang son-in-law” phase
saw baa (informal, n.) สาวบาร์ (ปาก, น.)
phua nÔOk (informal, n.) ผัวนอก (ปาก, น.)
khoey fà-ràng (informal, n.) เขยฝรั่ง (ปาก, น.)

After the Vietnam War, as American bases in Isaan were closed, poor Isaan women (along with some men) streamed into Bangkok to look for work. In the 1980s and 1990s The Thai economic miracle did wonders for Bangkok and a few major urban centers, expanding the urban middle class, but it did little to improve lives in poor rural provinces. Isaan remains impoverished, as ever, but material demands now exceed what people can afford by staying at home and working on shrinking family farms.

While Isaan men became Bangkok taxi drivers and builders of skyscrapers, along with many Isaan women and other poor rural migrants, a small minority of Isaan women became the face of Bangkok’s red-light districts. They came to be known as “bargirls” (saw baa)—the new incarnation of the “rental wife.” Patpong, Nana and Soi Cowboy bars, and any number of after-hours places catering to foreign tourists, became a fertile ground to seek a farang (and now also other foreign) husband.

In a good scenario, after a short while in the bar a poor Isaan girl breaks out of the cycle of poverty and lack of opportunities and finds a decent phua fà-ràng (“farang husband”) or phua nÔOk (“husband [from] abroad”). In one scenario, a bargirl becomes accustomed to the bar lifestyle and easy money and after a while traditional relationships become difficult—drugs or pimping Thai boyfriends further complicate things. In another common scenario, a bargirl marries a foreign husband, moves to his country, and is stuck in a life that proves dull and oppressive. It isn’t what she had pictured it would be—the prince charming no longer seems as charming in his strange land. Language barriers and lack of understanding on both sides cause many such “success” cases to struggle in order to keep the marriage intact.

Like any other type of relationship, there are successes and failures in farang-bargirl relationships, whether in Europe or America, in Bangkok, or in a rural province in Isaan. But few in the village get to, or want to, hear about problems—tangible benefits are easier to see than emotional difficulties. Successful ex-bargirls return to a home village adorned with gold and a big bundle of cash to build a new house, buy a pick-up truck, and pay family debts. A daughter made good inspires others to follow.

Over the last several years, just about everyone from the media to anthropologists to social policy researchers have looked into the phonemenon of some Isaan villages turning into the land of khoey fà-ràng (“farang son-in-law”), identifiable by the many European-style mini mansions. Poor families with daughters are said to (not so) secretly hope that they will someday get a khooey fà-ràng too, and move up the local social ladder to a better lifestyle.

This may sound very mercenary. What may have started as a sacrifice to ensure economic survival becomes an effort to keep up with (or ahead of) the Joneses. The neighbor buys a new Honda; the pressure is on the family to buy a better model Honda. Status is not just about not starving; it is about having a symbol of rank. These underlying motives fuel the romantic fire. Here the romance that turns mercenary isn’t from passion but from plan. But even so, it is not all without feelings and affection.

This farang-son-in-law phenomenon intrigues and perhaps also repulses the Thai urban middle class and the Bangkok elites (the image of Thai women abroad represented by ex-prostitute country hicks is not exactly what they have in mind). Meanwhile, many poor country girls, ex-prostitute or not, have broken out of a low place in a highly hierarchical society in a spectacularly unconventional way. Who can blame them for not giving a hoot about how high society judges the methods used to get there?

[Read more in the book.]

back to top