Living 20 years
in Thailand
doesn't mean you've understood it.

There's a line I often hear among some expats in Thailand: "I've lived here for 20 years." It's usually delivered like a verdict. As if time spent in a country automatically made you right about everything.

But to me it's one of the biggest illusions of life abroad.

Because living in a place doesn't mean you've understood it. And staying a long time doesn't necessarily mean you've grasped how it works.

You've been in Thailand, but have you been through it?

You can spend twenty years in the same neighbourhood, with the same habits, always moving in the same circle of people. Delegating every bit of paperwork to an agency, every document to a partner, every problem to a local acquaintance.

In the end, yes, you've physically been in Thailand for twenty years. But that doesn't mean you've truly been through it.

Many expats don't live in Thailand. They live in a filtered version of Thailand. A version mediated by agencies, translators, girlfriends, local friends, other foreigners, Facebook groups, always-identical routines and ready-made solutions.

And to be clear: at the start that's normal. In fact, it's inevitable. When you land in a country where the language is a huge wall, you look for support. I did it too. It would be silly to claim otherwise.

The problem starts later. When that support turns into a permanent crutch.

Language is the invisible border

In Thailand, language is one of the most underrated borders.

Many think the problem is just "talking to people". In reality language decides how far you can genuinely get into the system. If you understand nothing of Thai, you don't understand the documents, you don't understand the nuances, you don't understand when a "yes" is a real yes or a polite yes. You don't understand what's being said when you're present but not really part of the conversation.

And that creates a constant dependency.

I'm not saying that someone who doesn't speak Thai understands nothing. That would be nonsense. You can observe, study, ask, build a clear picture of the country even without mastering the language.

But someone who doesn't speak Thai, knows only basic English, always lives in the same bubble and then thinks they've understood everything just because they've "lived here for twenty years" — maybe they should ask themselves a few questions.

The difference between experience and repetition

There's an enormous gap between gaining experience and repeating the same life for twenty years.

Gaining experience means exposing yourself. Getting things wrong. Going to the offices. Trying to understand the documents. Asking more than once. Watching how people respond. Realising that in Thailand the official answer and the real answer aren't always the same thing.

Repeating, on the other hand, means always living inside the same pattern. And then mistaking that single pattern for absolute truth about the whole country.

One person knows a slice of Thailand. The other thinks they know the whole of Thailand. It's an enormous difference.

You see the real Thailand when you get your hands dirty

I haven't lived here for twenty years. Precisely for that reason I've no interest in pretending to know everything.

But one thing I'm starting to understand: you don't get this country just by being inside it. You get it when you start getting your hands dirty with its mechanisms.

When you have to sort out a document. When you have to buy a home. When you have to understand how a Thai bank actually works. When you have to deal with a government office. When you have to solve a real problem — not a dinner at a restaurant or a day at the beach.

That's where you start to see the real Thailand. Not the holiday one. Not the reels one. Not the bar-talk one. Not the one of the expats who always have a ready answer for everything.

The real Thailand is made of nuances, silences, indirect answers, procedures that change depending on the office, the person, the moment.

And if you've lived here for twenty years but every time you have to face something you need someone to speak, translate, decide and interpret on your behalf — maybe you're not really an expert on the country. Maybe you've just got good at surviving inside a bubble.

Which is a different thing.

Getting help isn't the problem. Never understanding, is

I want to be clear on one point, otherwise this comes across as unfair.

There are long-time expats with an incredibly deep knowledge of Thailand. They speak the language. They've worked with locals. They've built businesses, families, real relationships. People you can only learn from.

But there are others who use their years here as a medal. "I've lived here for twenty years." Sure. But how did you live them?

Did you live inside the country or on its margins? Did you learn something or repeat a routine? Did you try to understand the system or always find someone to face it for you? Did you build autonomy or dependency?

Because in the end, that's the whole point.

It's not about how long. It's about how much you've tried to understand

It's not about how long you've lived in Thailand. It's about how much you've genuinely tried to understand it.

And to understand it, sooner or later, you have to take the training wheels off. You have to accept getting things wrong. Not understanding. Feeling stupid in a government office. Discovering that your European way of reasoning doesn't always work here.

Only there do you truly start to learn.

Thailand is a country that looks simple on the surface. It welcomes you, it smiles at you, it lightens your life in so many ways. But under that surface there's a complex system — written rules, unwritten rules, hierarchies, habits, cultural codes and mechanisms you don't grasp if you stay parked in the same corner.

Information is easy to find. Experience isn't.

It's also the reason why, at a certain point, I started sitting down one-on-one with the people who asked me.

Not because I think I know everything. Quite the opposite.

Today information about Thailand is everywhere. Blogs, videos, reels, Facebook groups, ChatGPT. Anyone can find out how a visa works, how much a house costs, where to open a bank account. Information is a commodity.

Experience isn't.

Experience is what happens when the information you've read collides with the reality of a Thai office on a Tuesday morning. It's knowing which answer to accept and which to push back on. It's understanding that a "standard" procedure changes depending on who's in front of you. It's having already paid for the mistake you're about to make for the first time.

That's what I try to pass on when I work 1:1 with someone. Not the data — you can find that on your own. The lens to read it through.

And when the subject gets genuinely technical — unusual visas, company formations, tax structures — I don't improvise. I work alongside a Thai law firm I collaborate with regularly. Because knowing your own limits is part of the method I'm trying to describe in this article.

Whoever tells you they know everything is usually exactly the one who knows nothing.

Living in Thailand is easy to talk about. Genuinely understanding it is another craft

I don't want to be the guy who says "I'm right because I live here". I want to be the guy who says: I tried this, I got it wrong, I paid for it, I studied it. And now I try to tell it to you better than it was told to me.

Because living in Thailand is easy to talk about. Genuinely understanding it is another craft.