I Left ENGLAND and Moved To Thailand. Why I’ll NEVER Go Back. #thai

About a year ago, I made the massive

decision to leave my home in the UK and

basically permanently move to Bangkok in

Thailand. So today I want to talk about

why I permanently left my home in the UK

and just how much my quality of life has

improved after moving to Thailand.

So the main reason why I ended up coming

to Thailand in the first place was

actually because Japan was closed to

foreigners for the last 2 years, and I

actually really wanted to go to Japan.

But I couldn't. So I was waiting around in

the UK, saving up money, trying to be

patient for Japan to reopen. But I kind of

ran out of patience and I got fed up being

in the UK for too long. And I thought,

well, Thailand seems like an interesting

country and I've never been here before.

I booked myself a ticket for Thailand,

booked myself a hotel, and I thought I was

only going to be here for a few weeks,

maybe a month or two whilst I wait for

Japan to reopen. But over a year later, I

find myself still in Thailand, and I

actually don't really want to leave. And

out of all of the countries I've been to—

I've been to pretty much every single

country in Asia and a lot of countries in

Europe— and I find myself thinking that

actually living in Thailand is not only

not that bad, it's actually also pretty

good. And, um, that kind of caught me by

surprise. One of the main things I enjoy

about living in Thailand is the fact that

I visually fit in. So as you can see, I'm

not white, but I was born and raised in

the UK and I have a British accent. On the

inside, I feel like I'm white. I feel like

I'm British. But most British people, and

actually most people around the world,

would not really see me as a British

person, as like an English person, based

solely off the fact that I'm not white.

I'm actually half white, but you can't

really tell that I'm white at all or have

any kind of white DNA. So I never really

feel like— never really felt like I fit in

in my own country, in the UK. And going

outside in the UK, I usually have a lot of

problems with either kids yelling at me

weird things or insults about the way I

look or the shape of my eyes, or I have

some kind of problem where people ask me

where I'm from and this doesn't really

make me feel good inside. So I feel like

an outcast in my own country. The funny

thing is I feel like I fit in here in

Thailand more than I ever did back home in

the UK, even though I'm not Thai at all.

I don't have any kind of Thai blood or

Thai DNA. I don't really speak Thai. I

know basic Thai. Like a few words. I know

basic sentence structure. I did take a few

courses for a few months here to learn

Thai, so I know basic Thai, but not enough

to be able to talk to locals or understand

what locals are saying. Culturally, I'm

not really Thai either. Culturally, I'm

still British. I identify as a British

national, so my beliefs, values in life

are going to be kind of different to Thai

people. But visually, I never felt like I

fit in more in a country than I've ever

felt before. So I feel pretty good just

being here. I know for a fact that Thai

people think I'm Thai because just going

to the train station, there's been so many

times where I was just waiting for a train

and Thai people came up to me and asked me

for directions speaking in fluent Thai.

And obviously I didn't understand what

they were saying, so I had to say, uh,

sorry, I don't understand, and then they

just walked away. But they thought I was

Thai, which is why they came up to me and

spoke to me in fluent Thai. I don't know

about you, but as someone who spent his

entire life feeling like an outcast,

feeling like he was a foreigner in his own

country. The feeling of other people

thinking that you are their fellow

countryman actually feels pretty nice. It

made me feel like I'm welcome and this is

my home, even though it's not. It actually

feels nicer feeling like somewhere is your

home when it's not really than actually

being in your home when you don't feel

like it's your home. Do you know what I'm

saying? So based on that alone, I feel

much safer and much more comfortable going

outside here in Thailand than I ever did

back home in the UK. I don't feel scared

that a bunch of kids are going to start

pointing at me and laughing at me because

I got Asian eyes or I got black hair.

Apart from that, there are plenty of other

things I enjoy about living in Thailand.

For example, the weather is also always

nice and warm and hot. Sometimes it is a

little bit too hot, but then you can just

stay at home and turn on your air

conditioning. But I do like how it is nice

and warm when you wake up in the morning

or you get out of the shower. You never

have to worry about it being freezing cold

or snowing, or, you know, just feeling

cold in general is something you kind of

forget about. Also, things are really

cheap here. Things like rent and food are

really cheap. My place here, this condo or

apartment that I'm living in, only costs

about £220 a month, or about $250 a

month, which is insane considering that is

pretty big. We've got multiple rooms, a

kitchen in its own separate kitchen room,

not just like a little kitchen unit in the

living room. There's also a swimming pool

and a gym on the lower floors of the

condo, and there's also a shopping area—

7-Eleven, shops and groceries, cafes,

hair salons— all on the ground level of

this condo building complex, which is

really nice because you just don't

actually have to go outside of your

building complex to buy food and get stuff

done. You can just live in the building

complex your whole life and not have to

venture out into the city. Compared to the

UK, it's just so much better. I used to

live in Manchester for about a year, and I

rented an apartment in Manchester which

was about half the size of this place here

that I'm living in now, but it costs 4

times more in terms of rent. It cost me

about £900 for rent plus about £100 a

month for bills like electricity, water,

and stuff like that. And it was about

£1,000 in total a month for a place that

was half the size of my place now, didn't

have a free-to-use swimming pool or

free-to-use gym. So for a quarter of the

price in terms of cost of living, you can

get a much better quality of life,

standard of life, just by coming to

Thailand and getting a nice condo,

minimum apartment, and having this luxury

lifestyle that is so much cheaper than

anything you could even get in the UK.

And then for food, food is really cheap

here as well. If you go to food court,

you can get some kind of noodle dish or

rice dish for about 50 or 60 baht, which

is like £1 or $1. In the UK, I'm pretty

sure a dish like that would cost about

£10, or maybe £5 to £10. So 5 to 10

times more expensive to get the same meal.

Internet and electricity is really cheap

as well. I think our electricity bill is

about 1,000 baht, which might be about

£20. My electricity bill in the UK was

like £50 or £60. And then internet, I've

got really good high-speed internet, 500

megabits up and down, and it costs about

600 baht a month, which is like £12 a

month. I think my fiber optic broadband in

the UK was like £40 a month. So everything

is just so much cheaper here in Thailand.

People are also much more laid back and

less stressed out here. They've got this

kind of attitude of, you know, don't

really stress out about things, don't get

angry, because they believe in karma.

They believe in Well, they're a Buddhist

country, so they believe in not putting

out negative energy. And even though the

traffic is pretty insane here, you don't

really hear people horning at each other

all the time or road rage in comparison to

a country like South Korea where the

people are very angry and stressed out all

the time and they're just constantly

hammering the horn at each other. It's

actually quite peaceful here when it comes

to the traffic. Okay, the sound of engines

and motorbikes is not peaceful and it's

quite noisy, but in terms of people

honking at each other, it is quite

peaceful. So for those reasons, I don't

really see myself wanting to go back home

to the UK anytime soon, and I could

totally see myself living here in Thailand

for the long-term foreseeable future. The

only one thing I do kind of miss about

living in the UK has to be the food, but

that's just because I grew up eating that

stuff and I like British food. I like

sausages and bacon and baked beans. You

can get some of that stuff here, but it

just doesn't quite taste the same as the

stuff back home.