Day 2 [Jan 5]

Wat Rong Khun (The White Temple)

The renown White Temple (Wat Rong Khun) was our first stop of the day en route back to Chiangmai. Upon arrival at the temple grounds, we got down to conducting interviews with the people working there, specifically the secretary of the temple and shop owners. I was looking forward to visiting this attraction and talking to the workers because based on our primary research, there were reports of bad behavior of Chinese tourists a few years ago. The inconsiderate behavior of the Chinese tourists was so intolerable that it prompted the temple owners to impose a temporary ban on Chinese tourists. It was reported that a Chinese tourist had allegedly defecated in an ornate golden building within the temple grounds and dropped used toilet paper into water tanks. We were hoping to get some feedback or opinions (be it positive or negative) from the temple staff and shop owners. However, on the day of our visit, the majority of the visitors were Caucasian. There was hardly any sight of Chinese nationals.

On reflection, I surmise that this is probably due to the huge impact media has on society. The media is a double-edged sword that can be used to create a positive influence or in this case, it propagated the Chinese stereotype and drew attention to the negative behaviors of some Chinese as representative as other Chinese nationals. It is clearly evident that the incident was an isolated one. Many of the reports of the undesirable behavior of the Chinese nationals were of incidents which occurred 4 – 5 years ago during which there was an influx of new rich Chinese nationals. In my opinion, back then, the tourism authority of Thailand might not have expected such an influx and hence had no counter measures to cope and deal with the problems caused by these tourists. In present day, the situation has improved.

The interviews with the store owners and the secretary of the temple revealed that the locals remained hospitable and welcoming to all tourists despite bad press about the Chinese tourists. The secretary of the temple also highlighted the steps they have taken to mitigate the problems. Some examples he gave was the putting up of mandarin signage reminding the tourists on acceptable and unacceptable behaviors within the temple grounds. Through conversations with Peter, our tour guide for the trip, I realized a common cause of similar issues is the lack of cultural understanding. Every country or community has its own culture that determines what is appropriate and what is not. Unintentionally, we can easily offend the locals if we do not make the effort to respect and understand the local cultural practices. The only way to bridge this gap would be to promote mutual understanding on both sides. As a tourist, we can always do some research about our travel destination, especially being aware of the basic do’s and don’t’s. On the other hand, countries promoting themselves as tourist hotspots should also come up with measures to bridge this gap. So in the case of Chiangmai and Chinese tourists, the travel etiquette guide introduced by the tourism authority of Thailand proved to be an effective initiative.

Muay Thai Exhibition Match

Another cultural immersion experience that we had an opportunity to partake of is a Muay Thai exhibition match held near our hotel. To my surprise we were the only Asian tourists at the match. The rest of the spectators comprised Caucasian. This could be reflective that although the number of Chinese tourists to Chiangmai has been rising in recent years, one of the main players in the tourism market remains the Caucasians. Those present at the matches were as rowdy and as loud as the Chinese nationals. This scenario has led me to question why Western tourists are often more favoured than Asians.