Cost of Living in Thailand – Part 2/3

Francis:

How about cost of going out? Let’s say, you and me, we go where you’re living into the next club, dance our asses off and pay for lots of drinks.  

Stefan:

First of all, this does not exist here. There are no nightclubs.

Francis:

What about bars?

Stefan:

Yeah, there are many bars. This is the night amusement in Asia. You don’t have nightclubs. I assume it’s because it’s so hot but I don’t know why. People in Asia don’t seem to like clubs like as we know in the western society. I don’t know why but it’s…

Francis:

I wouldn’t mind. I wouldn’t mind that too much.

Stefan:

And there’s like open door bars. You know, you have a bar and it’s open, you don’t go in. It’s like outside. It’s like in a German beer garden, for example. But it’s a bar and you sit down and get orders and whatever.

That’s very common here. Every 10 meters, you have a bar. And the price wouldn’t be high like, let me think, 50 cents to 1 Euro for a beer or something. Very inexpensive.

Francis:

That is like a dream come true. Is there any entrance fees?

Stefan:

No, no. This is a normal bar. This is like a restaurant.

Francis:

Okay.

Stefan:

You just come in.

Francis:

How about amusement? I take a boat tour around the islands.

Stefan:

Ah, yeah!

Francis:

How much for a boat pass?

Stefan:

I was looking on the boat too because where I live we have some boat and some islands in front of the coast where it was really like paradise.

Because where I live, we live on the land not on an island and when you want to drive out to islands; it costs you about 40 Baht like $1 one way.

Francis:

It’s crazy.

Stefan:

Or if you want to rent a boat for the whole day, it’s about 1500 Baht per day for up to 8 people. And he just drives you at wherever you want for the whole day. 

Francis:

That’s about $40.

Stefan:

Yeah and you can be 6-8 people. You can go all day like from one island to the next island and he waits for you until you’re done. And when you’re done, you just go to your boat and tell you want to go back.     

Francis:

That’s amazing. How much is the flight to Thailand from Germany?

Stefan:

One-way or two-ways?

Francis:

Let’s say, one-way for simplicity.

Stefan:

One-way is about…because when you book two-ways…you actually have to book two-ways.

Francis:

Then we’ll take two-ways.

Stefan:

Let me explain. When you go to Thailand, you aren’t allowed to go to Thailand if you don’t have a ticket to leave again because of the visa stuff and everything. 

You need to have further travelling tickets. Let’s assume you travel to Thailand and then from Thailand, in 3 weeks, to Australia – Melbourne for example. Then you only a one-way ticket from Europe to Thailand and that’s about 400 Euros. And the two-way is around 700 Euros. So it’s a little bit cheaper.

Francis:

It seems extremely affordable still. Are they any downsides you can think off of having a holiday in Thailand?

Stefan:

Holidays? No. But living here is not as perfect no-problem as what you think because many people think it’s perfect and you have no troubles at all. But for holidays, there’s no problem. 

If you want to go for a vacation, Bangkok if you want to see a big city which has everything. It’s like crazy. It’s really crazy. You never have experienced anything in Europe like that. It’s like a melting pot. You have crazy stuff in it. 

Twelve million people explains everything, we don’t even have that many people in somewhere in Europe. It’s like imagine New York but with a mixture of New York and… 

Francis:

…and a big beach party or a festival?

Stefan:

Yeah, something like that. I mean, you have, everywhere, cooking food stands and people are using small canals for travelling through the city through their old waterways. Because there are still waterways and it’s like paths, okay? I mean, where and in what continent, in what city does that exists today?

Anyway, the other city I would recommend is Chiang Mai. It’s like Bangkok but it’s smaller. A friend of mine lived in Chiang Mai and says it’s amazing because it’s the most western city of all Thailand.

And the third thing I would recommend is where I live, in Krabi in the south, because this is all where all the beach action happens. The place that I would never recommend is Phuket. 

Francis:

That’s the place everyone knows.

Stefan:

Yeah but I would highly not recommend you to go there.

Because it’s extremely touristic. It’s extremely expensive. It’s a rip-off.  It’s where you can eat for 30 times the price that you eat 100km further, you know.

So the whole area of Phuket is huge rip-off. You arrive at the airport in Phuket and you cant leave the airport. The only way to leave the airport is by taking a taxi which costs like 20 Euros or $20. For a taxi-drive, that costs you $3 normally and it’s not possible because there’s a curtail or mafia, basically, around it. You can’t even leave the airport without it because they are put far away from any society.

So I would never recommend Phuket. Stay away from there, alright?

Francis:

Thanks for the tip. I think many of the readers will appreciate it or perhaps, protest forcefully against it lower down in the comments. Let’s see.