Southeast Asia forum

When in Rome, do what is comfortable and does not offend...

Cheers

The clothing styles here vary just as much as everywhere else in the world. "Traditional" clothing is dead as fried chicken. Sure, some people, esspecially in boring villages that are pointless to visit, still wear some "traditional" accouterements. And I'm sure some hill tribes are too poor to wear anything other than what they make themselves. But generally, in all the cities, people wear "normal" clothes. I wear the same clothes here I wore when I lived in Germany in the summer or Africa. Me wearing "fisherman's pants" here would look as foolish as me wearing Lederhosen were I living in Bavaria.

I prefer the short legged fisherman pants when I,m down on the islands.Cheap to buy, easy to rinse out and dry and pretty comfortable. Having said that I don.t wear them when I'm Bangkok as such.Prefer a standard pair of cotton shorts and s/s cotton shirt.Can't abide by t shirts and jeans bit too hot for me

>>Do people come here and suddenly morph?

WHAT GIVES??? Cut off twice in a row!

I've wondered the same thing myself many, many times, especially when I used to wander KSR on the odd evening a while back. The cornbraids, the ubiquitous and monotonous tatooos, the piercings, the fishermans' pants, etc.

I'd always wonder if this is how these folks are at home, or does being away from the social restrictions of home suddenly free one up to be who they really are, or have they all just had a bit too much to drink and will regret the spiderweb tatoo now gracing their face?

Suppose this could be the subject for an entire thread, and I'm sure there would be many interesting observations, especially from those who have seen the changes over the last few decades.

But, to the question at hand, I try to dress appropriately and according to the situation. For example, I could never understand why I was always the last one sitting alone on buses and trains until I stopped wearing shorts when going from A to B. Oh ... I stopped drinking beer on the buses, too. That helped.

I lived and worked with a guy in a small village near Lopburi, and this guy figured he'd be more respected and accepted if he fit in more. So he took to wearing fisherman's pants, the dark blue cotton shirts, and a rice-picker's hat whenever he went out. People would cover their mouths laughing, and point at him whenever he walked by. Hardly the acceptance and respect he was expecting. He just looked like, as Fivesilver says, "a complete klutz," and as out of place as "wearing Lederhosen were I living in Bavaria." I refused to be seen with him. Tough in a village of less than 400.

I think that if one wanted to dress as an average Thai dresses, one would have to make a serious investment in English Premiership football jerseys of various sizes and colours, focusing on Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester, and Chelski.

Yes, I did. That might be the problem because whenever I seem to get cut-off it is when I am pasting someone else's quotes, and I use those symbols instead of quotation marks.

Good observation, and thanks for passing it along. Mr. Somtam will take note of this.

Cheers

Thanks wanderingcat, it looks like it was a prob with lines starting with <"

So if Tilapia was quoting someone like this:

<"I think fisherman pants are groovy

Then everything after the <" would get nuked.

As you can see it is no longer happening, but if you come across the same prob elsewhere, do let me know.