Asian Window

Aakar Patel in The News:

A visit to Thailand takes the Indian aback because the civilisation is so advanced. We’re used to landing in cities and discovering that they are more modern than ours, and have superior infrastructure. Indeed, it’s not easy for the Indian to name a nation whose cities are in as much disarray as his. This difference is fine when we go to Europe or America, because we see white people in a different way, and expect them to be better than us. But a coloured race showing its superiority is troubling. And the slap in Thailand comes not from infrastructure or modern cities, but from culture.

Thais behave as Europeans do. Let us look at how.

Traffic is disciplined, and always in formation. Cars and rickshaws stay in their lane. This is not because they are policed (I have visited Thailand a few times and cannot say what a traffic policeman looks like), but because that is the culture.

Bangkok, with two million (20 lakh) cars, has evening jams as bad as those in Bombay. But these are silent jams, and this is the second thing we observe in Thailand: people do not honk. Cars remain in their place, moving forward when their turn comes. There are no signs that instruct them not to: they just don’t honk. But why not? Because there is trust that the driver in front and to the side is going to act correctly — and inevitably they do. Cars do not cut across each other or scramble for position or occupy space merely because otherwise someone else might. In India the trust is missing and, that is why, so is the discipline. More:

[Image: Audrey Sel / CC]

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