Welcome to the new era of the generic ex-pat. It used to be that people would ‘end up’ in remote corners of the world because of some curious connection- marriage, work, research, ethnicity, or such. The highly motivated immigrant would likely be well-versed in local lore and quite proficient in the local lingo. He had to be. He might even ‘go native’ and adopt the local garb and hang out with the local residents. All that’s changed now. These days the connections are more spurious than curious, and the local garb is Kmart classic. The only question facing the would-be ex-pat now is “Which country?” as though the only differences were quantitative, particularly financially. Though many countries are wary of casual ‘unofficial’ immigrants like me, there is a plethora of those courting the retiree trade, especially those with a surplus of nurses, like Thailand. These guys usually are largely ignorant of the local culture and rate their experience by its similarities to ‘back home’. Similarly, they rate locals by how Westernized they are, particularly linguistically. Thais even rate each other by how well they speak English, as if any of them were qualified to judge. The Mexican border area also rates well in this area of service and, accordingly, those areas have their fair share of retirees and weekend adventurers, Americans usually, of course. But you can go to the Dominican Republic, Philippines, Morocco, Guatemala, Brazil, Bali, India, or many others, and find similar situations. This is a growing trend, pasturing the herds. What they all have in common are low prices (relatively), nice weather, appropriate services, and a reasonable level of safety.
‘Convenience’ ex-pats like this tend to follow geographic and linguistic lines. So Spaniards, Portuguese, and especially, Italians, tend to gravitate toward Central and South America, linguistically and culturally similar. French can go both ways, of course, but heavily support their cultural and linguistic cousins in North and West Africa. Au contraire that they are, they tend to grant higher status to black Africans in France itself than they do to Arabs, different from most other ‘high’ cultures. Familiarity breeds contempt I guess. If they hurry they can still find some francophones in old French Indochina, that is Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, though those numbers are fading fast before the onslaught of English. Englishmen and northern Europeans tend to prefer those who prefer them, cultural pragmatists like Thailand that prize the English language above all else, and the genuine English speakers like the Philippines, India, and Anglophone Africa. Southern Europeans are conspicuously absent in Southeast Asia and the ones who do wade through the mental confusion might wish they hadn’t. Once I was summoned to translate for an Italian who found himself lost in my neighborhood. He and I had a nice conversation in Thai while a group of Thais stared on dumbfounded, finally ‘getting it’ toward the end. He spoke no English. We didn’t get around to Spanish.
Many times I’ve spoken ten or fifteen minutes in Thai with Thais when they suddenly felt inspired to ask, “Can you speak Thai?” What can you do? Patience, patience, suffer it gladly; or suffer it still, whether gladly or not. Still the pragmatism and wifely flexibility shine through. One prominent Thai web dating service has information in eight languages, including Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese, and Swedish, none of them major languages, but excluding Chinese and Spanish, the world’s first and third most-spoken languages in the world. They know where the bread is being buttered. It even has Thai language; what the Hell, why not? It’s surprising how many Western men in the Thai dating service are in their thirties. The women are overwhelmingly in their twenties. That may be more the medium than the message, youth being more ‘net’-oriented. The reality ‘in-country’ is certainly toward older foreign males. Maybe the new generation of Thai females doesn’t want to wait around to be dumped by their Thai husbands as they turn thirty.
Then there are the ex-pats like me, long-time travelers and avid adventurers, imbued with ethnicity and in love with language. It’s not necessarily like we could be anywhere, though we almost could, it’s more like we want to be everywhere. We don’t look for the easiest places to be, the paths of least resistance; we look for challenges. We look for authenticity. Personally I wouldn’t be in Thailand if I weren’t inextricably involved at this point and a bit over the hill where oats are usually sowed. Thailand’s really almost TOO easy, too willing to emulate the northern European model to the point that authentic Thai culture has to be searched for at deeper levels, with mixed results. You can avoid the interface people and the interzone girls, refusing to speak English, but ultimately you can only do that effectively by moving to areas where that is minimal, and those are few. Everybody wants the new hybrid reality, almost in direct proportion to the extent that they celebrate their ‘Thai-ness.’ It’s always been that way, the Siamese being a hybrid Chinese blend long before they ever thought about affiliating themselves with their tribal ‘Tai’ and Lao cousins. The word ‘Tai’ entered the English lexicon in 1895. The word ‘Thai’ followed in 1902. Siam changed its name to Thailand in 1939, under an onslaught of Chinese immigration.
This is similar to the Irish celebrating their Gaelic ‘Irish-ness’ while following customs and language that are generally English. The English and Americans do it, too, ‘Celtic’ traditions apparently being transmitted through Irish pub culture and traditional music. In reality the last stronghold of Celtic language in the British Isles is in Wales, though it’s not Gaelic, and it’s hardly acknowledged. Nobody goes to Welsh pubs. The language closest to English language itself is to be found back across the channel in the Frisian islands, those who never left with their Saxon and Jute cousins, speaking another modern tongue whose ancestor was Anglo-Saxon, just like ours. It’d be interesting to hear how intelligible it is, if at all. Do the French celebrate the same thing as the Irish when they remember their Roman-era ‘Gallic-ness’? I wonder. Do modern Turks celebrate their Roman-era ‘Galatian’ roots, now long assimilated? I doubt it. They aren’t usually kind toward minor cultures within their boundaries. Ask the Armenians and Kurds. The Celts, probably one of the earliest of Indo-Europeans to break away from the pack, seem to have abandoned their language at every juncture. I suppose it wasn’t a very good one. They were better at applied mechanics, and beer. The culture hangs on precariously. Score one for Sapir and Whorf. Pragmatism loses a point.
So where do you go if you want the third world without leaving your modern developed country? After all, that’s what people like me are after, regardless of where we actually find ourselves. We’re culture jocks looking for culture shock, in the downtown slums and in the remote border areas. If you’re European, you head for the far reaches of the Carpathians and the Pyrenees, and even then you might not be satisfied. Cost is a factor, after all. You’ll do better in America. There are still ethnic enclaves in Cajun Louisiana, the Mexican border areas, and Indian country, especially the southwest. When I first came to Flagstaff twenty years ago, you could still see Navajo women on the street in full silver-and-turquoise regalia, not to mention street drunks frequenting several Indian bars. They’ve long been replaced by lawyers and dentists, Deadheads and Trustafarians. The ethnicity may still be there, or out at the WalMart, at least, but the scene has been sanitized. That random element of disorder is priceless. It can’t be mocked-up at tourist-oriented ‘Indian villages.’ That’s what the Third World is all about, and to some extent, any place will do. When I’m stuck in the States, I found solace across the border in Ensenada. If I’ve got a month to kill, hardly enough time to go back to Asia, I’ll catch a cheap flight to Peru and a seven-hour ride to Huaraz- instant Andes (and no jet lag). Or maybe go to Guatemala and hang with the Mayans in Quezaltenango or the Garifuna at Livingston. The possibilities are endless. The flights are cheap, probably cheaper than living in the US full-time, certainly Europe. Of course, there’s always Alaska, where you can kill two birds with one stone, ethnicity and the elusive Arctic Circle. I saw the northern lights at Fairbanks in my first hour there. It’s like Flagstaff twenty years ago, Indians and college students. Athabascans across the border in Canada even call themselves Dene’. It’s a small world… and a narrow strait. Is Tijuana really any different from Tangier (Tanjah), the ‘other TJ’? When you get the itch, head for the border, any border.
