The touts here in Thailand are a pretty tame bunch compared to some places (I’m talking to you, India), but they can still be annoyingly persistent at times. The best way to handle them is to simply not engage them in the first place. When you first hear “Hello, Sir!”, just give a slight shake of your head and a dismissive flick of your hand and keep going. Done. Vigorously shaking your head, saying “No!” loudly or giving them the “speak to the hand” treatment just marks you as a noob and they’ll often continue bothering you just for sport.
Occasionally, however, you will get cornered — perhaps while resting or drinking water — and then you’ll want to short-circuit their spiel as quickly as possible. First they will ask where you’re from and follow up with praise for your country of origin. For Americans, the preferred response seems to be “Obama! Good man!”
Now comes the second question and this is your chance to skip the next ten and proceed to the end of the conversation — much like dialing zero on one of those annoying automated voice response calls.
When they ask “First time in Thailand?”, simply lie and say “No, this is my second time”. That usually does it. That phrase is code for “I’ve been through this routine way too many times, dude.” The next thing you should hear is “Oh, very good. Enjoy your stay!” rather than the “I take you on tuk tuk ride, one hour, only 20 baht!” that was coming.
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Great tip! I can’t wait to use it when I’m in Thailand.
.-= SpunkyGirl´s last blog ..Unique Canada: “The Donair” =-.
awww… thanks. You’re gonna have a blast here.
Man, you’ve got tuk tuks dialed! A simple “mai ow khrap” (gals add kaa instead of khrap), works wonders with all varieties of touts, polite Thai for “I don’t want, thank you”. They will usually chuckle and nod, and not pester you further. For tuk tuk touts, add a quick “jai dern bai”–”I like to walk”.
haha nice tip mate, everybody needs to take note of this one.
.-= Chris – The Aussie Nomad´s last blog ..Travel Blogger Friday 14 =-.
thanks, mate!
Such a good tip, you want to be honest but it doesn’t get you anywhere but a suit shop looking through books :)
yup. honesty does not pay, alas.
Haha just saw this now mate, wish I knew about it when I was over there last year! Some of those blokes are so bloody pushy “you want DVD? suit? tuk tuk?”, they can really give a bad impression of a country.
Heh, yeah… that they can. Most are okay but some can be really pushy… I think Saigon was the worst for me — really felt like a slab of meat there…