A dream lifestyle in Thailand
Does Chiang Mai offer the perfect place to live and work? Well, live anyway
I'll put my hands up and admit I've been somewhat unkind to Chiang Mai in past blogs. On past visits, I've usually had the job of playing tour guide to my ageing parents and a couple of their friends. It's never easy to move a group of elderly folk around a sizeable Asian city without having every tout and unofficial tour operator descending on you from miles around
How expensive has Bangkok got?
Have you noticed how much more we have to pay for things?
I’m not coming at these price differentials from the angle of an expert economist. I’m just an average Joe consumer who looks at the prices on menus and clothes tags and wonders what’s wrong with this picture.
Four times the salary of a local Thai?
What a load of bullshit!
Nothing irks me more than reading that statement and you see it all over the web wherever the topic of teaching in Thailand is discussed or promoted. It’s a statement that’s both grossly misleading and wildly inaccurate.
Thailand on 30K a month
Is it feast or famine?
With many teaching positions on the ajarn jobs page paying 30,000 baht a month (some even less) forum member Hollow has decided to put things to the test and record his daily spend. Many employers tell us that 30,000 baht a month is enough to live a very comfortable lifestyle - even in Bangkok. I've heard Thai people describe that kind of dough as 'luxury' Then again perhaps that's a load of old tosh. So does 30K a month enable you to lord it up right until the last day of the month or are you going to be stumbling through the final week on a diet of pot noodles and tap water? OK Hollow. Pencil? Notebook? Let's begin.
Low teacher salaries
Is ajarn.com partly to blame?
No, ajarn.com isn't responsible for low teacher salaries - at least not according to Louis Minson. Louis says that not presenting a realistic picture of the overall job situation would be sweeping things under the carpet.
Not all about the money
Postbox letter from Ralph
As the old saying goes - money isn't everything
Why complain about salaries?
Postbox letter from Don
A breakdown of where my monthly salary goes.
To Mr Crazy
Postbox letter from Long term ajarn expat
You like the word naïve and use it freely…be sure you use it well and understand who is really naive. Just knowing the facts does not, a wise man make.
Wake up and smell the coffee
Postbox letter from Mr Crazy in Chiang Mai
Come on schools, think about it. You’ve had your time of getting native speakers for pennies. That time is coming to an end.
Bangkok vs Chiang Mai
How do the two biggest cities in Thailand measure up?
Read a terrific account from a teacher who gave up the Chiang Mai lifestyle to go and work in the capital Bangkok. It's very much a tale of two cities - and how one dedicated teacher fared in both.
