Thai people's awareness of others

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Pleng
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Re: Thai people's awareness of others

Post by Pleng »

JD wrote:When having a conversation in English with a Thai person, any other Thai will walk up and butt in on the conversation in Thai and totally ignore you or what you were saying.
Happens when you're speaking in Thai too. I think it's an attention-span issue (or maybe I'm just dull! :D)
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hhfarang
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Re: Thai people's awareness of others

Post by hhfarang »

^ Quite a few Americans do that too :oops:
My brain is like an Internet browser; 12 tabs are open and 5 of them are not responding, there's a GIF playing in an endless loop,... and where is that annoying music coming from?
oakdale160
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Re: Thai people's awareness of others

Post by oakdale160 »

My company had a minibus going to pattaya for a two day meeting there, but the first day was free so we were looking forward to getting to our 5 star hotel. 8. Out of the 9 arrived at the stated time, but one was not there. I was told that she had phoned in and would be there soon. We sat for 20 mins and she arrived all breathless. Much to my surprise NO apology for keeping us waiting and wasting out time. I was particularly surprised as she is a nice polite young lady.
I was sitting next to a lady who is half Thai, half american and grew up in the US. She explained that the whole concept of 'wasting my time' is a very western one and that Thais feel no shame about lateness and conversely are not upset about people keeping them waiting.
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dtaai-maai
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Re: Thai people's awareness of others

Post by dtaai-maai »

I'm quite surprised that anyone involved in business in Thailand isn't already aware of the different attitudes to and concepts of time in the West and in Asia (linear v. cyclical). Surely international companies brief on this sort of thing?
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Vital Spark
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Re: Thai people's awareness of others

Post by Vital Spark »

JD wrote:When having a conversation in English with a Thai person, any other Thai will walk up and butt in on the conversation in Thai and totally ignore you or what you were saying.
This happens almost on a daily basis in my workplace, it annoys the heck out of me and it's damned rude. As Pleng quite rightly said, it's an attention span thing. I also get irritated when the person I'm speaking to starts reading something on their desk, or turn their head away to look at the computer screen when I'm in the middle of a conversation with them. Maybe I'm boring them.... :? I've come to the conclusion that about 5 seconds is the maximum attention time when replying to something they've said.

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