Welcome to Thailand, the place where satire is real life.
The year of 2017 was filled with many facepalm moments, colorful characters, and those who could use a little reality check. Coconuts Bangkok prides ourselves as being the source for viral entertaining stories, and every day, there’s something new, something wackier, happening in Thailand. Every day, we write, we shake our heads and say to each other, “Is this for real?”
We give you the worst facepalm stories of 2017:
In a country where locals work an entire day to earn what Westerners make in an hour, locals and expats were angered by this year’s phenomenon of “begpackers,” the tourists who abuse their privileged passports to enter Thailand and beg to fund their travels.
One of the most famous cases of all was the woman who was photographed begging with her baby girl in Chatuchak Park, before they were spotted joining the baby daddy in Chiang Mai for some more begging.
Then, just last month, the backpacking upgraded to selling Thai flags on the street. A blonde woman, who claimed she was deaf, was photographed selling miniature national and royal flags in the Old Town.
Meanwhile, the world’s most infamous begpacker of all, big-legged Benjamin Holst, seemed to have stopped begging after he was thrown out of several Southeast Asian countries for spending donated cash drinking and womanizing. Just last week, he got married to a local woman in the African nation of Gambia. He wrote on Facebook, “Never more Asia, only Gambia.”
One of the most popular stories this year is about a rant from a Thai commuter who had to bear a farang girl’s stinky feet on his van headrest. He said, “The smell from her feet was filling the whole bus. I asked her many times to put her legs on the ground and she would not do it.”
Yikes. We hope to no one ever has to meet this girl on any public transportation.
Another story in the file of unusual tourists, is the mystery woman who hung dangerously for two hours from a cable inside Suvarnabhumi Airport earlier this month. She appeared to be very fit and had a tattoo that read “2014 Olympics” on her back, leading many to believe she might be a professional athlete.
Spirituality is a big part of Thai culture, and a woman ruined a perfectly good car after she lit incense sticks to pay respect to the “goddess” living inside her Toyota.
So she put the incense sticks in the tiny space between the vehicle and the license plate and went back inside her apartment. Then before she knew it, the car was on fire.
Camel toe was in this year.
Adding to the list of plastic surgeries Thai girl dream of, this year they’ve added “3D Vag” surgery to the list. The procedure allows women to have their own fat injected into their mons pubis to achieve a youthful, fuller-looking hoo-ha.
This illustration to promote the THB50,000 surgery from Le Lux Hospital went viral in October, and many women left comments that they were truly interested in getting it. Yup.
A broke, jobless, homeless American who couldn’t afford to marry his Thai girlfriend (who’s literally half his age) starred in American reality show “90 Day Fiance” this year.
David Toborowsky, 48, met Annie, a 24-year-old singer in a bar, and they got engaged after 10 days. But the problem is, David didn’t seem to have enough money to pay for the dowry, wedding gold, and the two water buffalos Annie’s family demanded.
Speaking of marriage, this woman was arrested for marrying eight different men and fleeing with the dowry money, claiming she had “business” to take care of and never returning. She also left with many of their hearts. One husband even called her a “charming women” despite what happened between them.
Last but not least is the story of Praiya Suriya, the Thai woman who advertised herself as having dated 5,000 rich men and vowing to train other Thai women to become gold diggers.
Praiya became the talk of the town this year. She was criticized and, at the same time, idolized for her Facebook posts explaining her online courses on how to catch and keep foreign men. For a fee, Praiya promised to give away the secrets of how to ask men for money, how to feel confident in bed, and how to negotiate cash up front before “a date,” or whatever she called it.
Besides being the wackiest, Praiya’s story was also the most-read story on Coconuts Bangkok this year.
