Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Lifestyle
Individual lifestyles vary according to family background, income and geography. In many
ways Bangkok is its own phenomenon where upper- and middle-class Thais wake up to an
affluent and modern lifestyle: smartphones, fast food, K-pop music and fashion addictions.
The amount of disposable income in Bangkok is unparalleled elsewhere in the country,
though affluence is on the rise.
There continues to be a migration from the countryside or small towns to the urban job
centres. It was once standard for Thais to send a portion of their pay home to support their
parents or dependent children left behind to be raised in the village. This still happens
today in some socio-economic strata, but increasingly affluent parents don't need financial
help from their adult children. In fact an important social shift has occurred: parents contin-
ue to support their adult children with big-ticket purchases of cars and real estate that entry-
level salaries can't afford. As a result, the older generation often criticises today's youth as
having an inflated sense of entitlement.
In the provincial capitals, life is more traditional, relatively speaking. The civil servants
- teachers and government employees - make up the backbone of the Thai middle class
and live in nuclear families in terrace housing estates outside the city centre. Some might
live in the older in-town neighbourhoods filled with front-yard gardens growing papayas,
mangoes and other fruit trees. The business class lives in the city centre, usually in apart-
ments above shopfronts, making for an easy commute but a fairly urban life. In the cool
hours of the day, the wage earners and students head to the nearest park to jog, play bad-
minton or join in the civic-run aerobics classes.
One of the best places to view the Thai 'lifestyle' is at the markets. Day markets sell kit-
chen staples as well as local produce and regional desserts. Night markets are good for din-
ner and people-watching as few Thais bother to cook for themselves.
Though fewer people toil in the rice paddies than in the past, the villages still survive on
the outskirts of the urban grid. Here life is set to the seasons, the fashions are purchased
from the market and if the water buffaloes could talk they'd know all the village gossip.
From a demographic perspective, Thailand, like most of Asia, is greying. Women pursue
careers instead of husbands; unmarried women now make up 30% of the population (plus
they start to outnumber men in their 30s). Successful government-sponsored family-plan-
ning efforts and professional opportunities have reduced the fertility rate so successfully -
Search WWH ::




Custom Search