Topic: Dress Code in Thailand

[Dumbo]

What is with dress codes in Thailand? Thailand is having a problem attracting qualified teachers. I can't understand the deal in Thailand, pay substandard wages and make teachers dress up in shirts and ties.

Other countries seem ok with a nice pair of blue jeans and a polo shirt. New jeans, nice polo shirt, pair of nikes. That sure looks a lot better and feels better ofr the teachers than some white shirt, tie, and black slacks. With the recent yellow shirts directive, I have taken liberty to start wearing them with a nice pair of black jeans. Not only is it a lot more comfortable, but I look just as professional as I would in a shirt and tie.

But why the heck do we have to live in shirts and ties?

[Mods-Rockers]

Probably for the same reasons that Thai teachers have to wear the same! Form over substance. You have to live with it.

[NamTok]

Mods-Rockers et al,   

   We share the same view expressed in this thread.   

   However, actually, there is substance to the form of wearing uniforms. The substance, of course, is uniformity of thinking, attitudes, expectations and performance.
     
   I've been teaching in Thailand 8 years now and, before that, in Korea 2 years. A large number of Thai students of mine who've returned from studying and living in the US loved the freedom of not having to have worn a uniform (tho in the US elite prep schools and Catholic schools, among some others, require uniforms).

   One Grade 10 (M4) boy returned to our school in Thailand showing me photos of him in school in the US with spiked hair, which he was not wearing on his return visit to Thailand. I say "return visit to Thailand" because he'd already signed up for another year of study in the States. Back home in Thailand his hair was long but not spiked. (His hair was "spiked-ready" one could say for his return to the States!)

   Another student who left our school here in Thailand in Grade 10 still is in the States at uni. A lot of Thai students never return to the Old Word, 3rd World uniformity and education systems of conformity and deference.

   Yes sir, I'll take the Socratic method anytime. Here, I ask a question and the class recites/repeats the question. It takes forever for them to get the Q & A format. Uniformity! Immitate. Etc.   

[monkey woods]

Isn't this post about the dress code for teachers?

I think the Thais like to see people properly turned out. To the untrained eye, 'smartness' means 'professionalism' means 'good teacher' means 'Somchai will speak good English soon'.

In reality, however...

[blackmail]

Maybe this should go under Thai cultural myths.  I had been told it was impolite to wear jeans--Hogwash.  It is more of a status symbol--they are relatively expensive here.  I was an outpatient at a hospital here, and every Doctor was wearing--you guessed it:  Jeans.

The polyester has got to go.  It just doesn't breath.  I'm sure that kickbacks play a role in some of this school uniform business.

[monkey woods]

I was an outpatient at a hospital here, and every Doctor was wearing--you guessed it:  Jeans.

These doctors, weren't they Thai?

This comes under Rule 487a paragraph c(i) of the Thailand Double Standards Manual (unabridged version). Translated, this reads:

"Farang must look good for commercial purposes, if no other. Money must keep rolling in."

[NamTok]

monkey woods,

   That "Thailand Double Standards Manual" (unabridged version) is exactly on the mark. Congrats!

   For instance, at a school where I taught for 6 years in Bangkok jeans were (and I'm sure conntinue to be) prohibited except for special events such as sports day. Short pants, again only as designated for wear, had to be below the knees. No sandals except, again, as rarely designated by the school.

   Another instance of why each of we farang teachers need to have a copy of the Thailand Double Standards Manual!

[Mods-Rockers]

Nam Tok
Are you saying that these were rules that only applied to Foriegn teachers? as if they equally applied to thai teachers there then I fail to see how they are double standards.

[monkey woods]

Mods-Rockers, the school I worked at did not brutally apply the Double Standards rule, but there were things that made me think: "Hmmm.. that's not quite right". A good example of this is that farangs were required to wear a shirt and tie at all times, whereas Thai staff dressed in a "smart but casual" style. Some of the Thais also wore the sandals mentioned above; this was a no-no for farangs, who had to keep their dirty little toes covered up.

I'm sure I could think of many more instances of Double Standards, M-R, couldn't you?

[Mods-Rockers]

Nope, I dare say that when you state "smart but casual" you mean the traditional thai style safari jacket (long or short sleeve) and certainly my last two matayoms have allowed farang to wear the same, along with sandals which are acceptable but not flipflops/thongs.

Mind you froma  farang point of view I would not be caught dead in a saf suit well not since the mid 70's anyway.

[monkey woods]

No, the safari suits are cool but I don't mean that kind of "smart but casual". I mean no tie, open-necked shirt, short sleeves, trainers, tracky tops in "cold" weather - that sort of thing.

And by the way, if you were wearing safari suits in the 70s, you must be nigh on ready for a tartan blanket to keep your legs warm, na? 

[Mods-Rockers]

Now that is below the belt. but yes kinda semi retired.

[monkey woods]

Well, I've heard we all get old eventually - if we're lucky

[Mods-Rockers]

if we are lucky we grow old gracefully...if we are really lucky we ...

[NamTok]

Mods-Rockers,

   Yes, that's precisely what I am saying. The dress code I described applies ONLY to foreign teachers.

   The dual dress codes at my former school are just about the same as the dress code described by monkey woods, ie, farangs in shirt (preferably long sleeves) and tie, shoes etc while the Thai teachers were allowed to wear the "smart but casual" clothing. Farang women could not wear pants (Of course, Thai women teachers wouldn't think of it).

   One year the school asked farang teachers to buy the oficial school safari suits to complement the safari suits that only the women Thai teachers wore. (Male Thai teachers wouldn't be caught dead in the school's official safari suits.) The pale green color added to the onerous nature of the school's official safari suits. Farang teachers were not required to purchase or wear the official, pale green, school safari suits, however.

   Nonetheless, the school attempted uniformity when it required all farang teachers, male and female, to wear the same color schemes of clothing on Tuesdays and Thursdays. (Can you take this? Regardless...) That is, on Tuesdays: blue tops and blue bottoms; Thursdays: white tops and black bottoms. Or a farang teacher could on Tuesdays and Thursdays wear the school's official safari suit. This slapstick day-color or official school safari suit scheme was a requirement (of all farang teachers only). 

   Stay with me please because there's some INTENTIONAL comedy in this. Two younger farang male teachers, one Australian and one from the US, got together on the day-color or the official school safari suit scheme and bought specially tailored suits of bright green with thick black vertical stripes to wear on Tuesdays and Thursdays. No one in either the Thai or foreign hierarchy, respectively, ever said a word to the two about the clown suits (basically clown suits!) that the two happily wore each Tuesday and Thursday throughout the school year. (The two teachers mortified the student body by ( joshingly) saying with straight faces hat the zoot suits would replace the present uniforms of the students the next semester! Hah!! THAT was all the more funny!)

   TiT.

   monkey woods...What's the Manual say about this stuff?!?

[monkey woods]

Section 14c 3a(ii) clearly states: "Farangs are clowns and should be treated as such."

Once you get past that, it's easy to believe that they were allowed to dress like accordingly. It's worth noting though, that they would have been regarded with some ridicule by Thais - secretly, you understand, and not to their faces.

To their faces they would have been complimented: "Today you very smart." 

[NamTok]

monkey woods, Mods-Rockers,
 
   Yes, it would be the standard Thai cultural response to view the two farang teachers who dressed in the absurd and asinine zoot suits as themselves absurd and asinine in every respect. To the foreign teachers, however, thier "attire" constituted the identical statement about the dress code requirements of the school, which recently were rescinded. So the fact that the school did rescind the ridiculous dress code requirement, I think, speaks to the effectiveness of the statement made by the two farang teachers and of the actual and real reaction of the Thai (and farang as advisors to) hierarchy of the school. 

   I think the good guys won out on the dress code requirement. The farang hierarchy of the school succeeded in getting the point across to the Thai hierarchy (in confidential meetings, of course) that the dress code just was not acceptable to the farang teachers. We especially did not like the Thai teachers and the Thai office personnel regularly and frequently stating to us the interogatory: "Isn't it easier to get up in the morning and not have to think of what to wear?"  Can't have or allow any thinking, youknow?!?

   Anyway, the "Manual" is an accurate guide but perhaps at this point needs some revision and extension.

[monkey woods]

I remember a guy I used to know telling me that he had a new job working for a company who provided polo shirts with the company logo on them. They were compulsory and, according to him, not very fetching.

I had no problem with a shirt and tie. On the one occasion I wore a safari suit, I got laughed at.   

[NamTok]

  Some Thai hierarchy at the former school regularly wore safari suits, as did (does) the farang director of all foreign staff. One year, a Grade 12 (M6) student of mine from a very wealthy family looked one time too many at a Thai "hot-shot" wearing a safari stuit and quipped: "That guy is dressed like my father's chauffeur."

   The only way at the school farangs could avoid wearing a shirt and tie was to have a safari suit or two, so I broke down and had a couple made to my specifications. Given that the farang director of all farang staff wore them no one laughed or was disrespectful. (In private might have been another matter, but I never got any word that anyone was laughing privately.) I liked the open collar but the suits were warmer to wear than a collar and tie. Six of one and a half-dozen of the other, I guess.... 

[monkey woods]

There was another guy who worked for our company but who was contracted-out to a kindergarten near Silom. He loved his job and the kids he was teaching. He loved it so much that he got one of the yellow shirts that Thai students wear for doing PE, to match what the kids were wearing. The kids thought it was great, but the Thai staff...well, you can probably guess what the Thai staff thought.