As a South Carolina native, I thought the South had the warmest culture of hospitality in the world. A major aspect of my culture is Southern hospitality as it reflects throughout the way I treat others and within my outlook of life. This summer I have had the opportunity to travel to Bangkok, Thailand for a semester abroad. Thailand is the first place I have ever visited outside of the United States and as you can imagine I was worried about relating to a new culture and society. It is hard to know how you will be treated, viewed, or welcomed in a foreign country or culture. However, my time abroad in Thailand has demonstrated hospitality and kindness transcends across borders and has shown me embracing new cultures isn’t as scary as it seems.
Thai people take pride in being generous, and friendly, and go far out of their own way to embrace people of all backgrounds and cultures. This kindness stems from Buddhist beliefs of being compassionate, appreciative, and tolerant of all different forms of life. Thai people hold these beliefs dearly as the population is 95% practicing Buddhists. In addition,Thailand is the only country in Southeast Asia to have never been colonized by the Western world so there are little generational scars between the Thai people and western foreigners.
One of the most impactful experiences I’ve had with Thai hospitality was during my visit to the Wat Samphran temple. It is translated to “Dragon Temple” in Thai and it is a hidden gem on the outskirts of Bangkok in the Nakhon Pathom province. The beauty of this temple does not just come from the huge emerald dragon encircling the 17 feet structure, but from the warm and hospitable monks and maechi. The day I visited it was a raging temperature of 117 degrees, I was practically frying like an egg in a skillet. Noticing my struggle with the heat, the temple keepers and monks helped me cool down by generously giving me water, fanning me, and lending me a handkerchief to help battle the sweat. The maechi (female monks) toured me all through the temple grounds explaining the power of petting the dragon’s beard as a luck charm and taught me how to tie a ribbon along the dragon for the well-being of my friends and family. One monk even walked alongside us as we made our pilgrimage around the temple in an act of prayer and meditation. He used google translate to share his knowledge of Buddhism and show the importance of the temple to their community. Each person we encountered was so grateful to have us visiting Wat Samphran and they treated us as we were equally apart of their community.
As a Southerner, I have always been taught the importance of being neighborly to all by welcoming everyone as my own family. It is amazing to see how these two different cultures can still share the share mentalities all the way across the globe.