Chatwan Mongkok Digs Into Bangkok with His ‘Soiciety’ Newsletter [S8.E12]

Greg 00:00:05 On this episode, we talked to a young fellow by the name of Chatterton Mongan, about his brand new news site, society.

Ed 00:00:11 So if you've ever wanted to dig into the nitty gritty news stories about Bangkok behind the scenes, you'll dig this episode of the Bangkok Podcast.

Greg 00:00:36 So this is the Bangkok Podcast. My name is Greg Jorgensen. A Canadian who came to Thailand in 2001 but has since seen his native born skills with a Z deteriorate, such as snowball making, ice skating and firewood chopping with an axe.

Ed 00:00:52 And I met Knuth, an American who came to Thailand on a one year teaching contract over 25 years ago, fell in love with trying to tell the difference between Harry Holy and Harry Basil. So I never left.

Greg 00:01:05 I thought that was going to go in a different direction. I, I don't I don't know what the difference is. I would love for someone to give me a little bit of a taste test so I could figure it out.

Ed 00:01:15 Well, it was a bit of a deep cut.

Ed 00:01:16 So you and I did talk about it on the bonus show. So listeners out there, if you want to, if you want to know the secret to Basil in Thailand, become a patron.

Greg 00:01:26 Yeah. I still would like a little taste test, though. I might have to go out and look for it.

Ed 00:01:29 Yeah, let's do that.

Greg 00:01:30 Okay. Can you imagine trying to explain the difference in Thai to, like, some shop worker, like. No, no, no, I'm trying to find the three different types of basil and then mangling the names of the other ones. It would be just maddening.

Ed 00:01:42 Well, this is the. This is the kind of expertise that that you and I will build up to make ourselves special Basil experts. All right. We want to give you a big thanks to all of our patrons who support the show. Patrons get every episode a day early, behind the scenes photos of our interviews, a heads up to send questions to upcoming guests and access to our discord server to chat with me, Greg and other listeners around the world.

Ed 00:02:03 But best of all, patrons also get an unscripted, uncensored bonus episode every week where we riff on current events and Bangkok topics on this week's bonus show. We chatted about Greg's frustrations with setting up a new PC for his son as a proud Mac fanboy. Updates from my ongoing moving saga, which seems to have been sorted out mostly, as well as further updates on the Thai political situation, and a shout out to the mad scientist at the DC store at the old Post office, where Greg recently bought and enjoyed some vinegar flavored ice cream to learn how to become a patron and get all this good stuff. Plus full access to over 800 bonus and regular back episodes. Click the support button at the top of our website.

Greg 00:02:53 Totally. And if you don't forget, if you listen to us on Spotify, you can now hear all of the bonus shows there as well. If you're a patron, simply link your Patreon account to your Spotify account. Add your ad, our new little feed called Bangkok Podcast Badass Patrons Only, and you can hear the regular and bonus shows in the same place for sure.

Greg 00:03:10 All right, on this episode, we are joined all the way from New York by a young fellow by the name of Chatwan Mongkol. You might not know the name, but if you spend any amount of time on the Bangkok interwebs, you might know his brand new product, a website and newsletter called society that focuses on the news and issues that make Bangkok tick. Not far from the sanitized and hyper edited news from the big news sites, as well as the cheesy tabloid style news from the trashy nightlife websites, society discusses stuff that real Bangkok nerds can sink their teeth into, and which probably isn't covered in the in the day to day English media. Things like trash collection fees, water pollution stories, behind the scenes transit news and issues from City Hall and the BMA that affect the day to day life in the city. It's a really refreshing take on the Bangkok news, so Chatwan joins us to discuss how he does it, why he does it, and what's on the horizon for society. Well, we are very happy to be joined by a young fella by the name of Chetwan Mongkol.

Greg 00:04:14 And there's no superlatives there, no coons, no misters, no senior titles or anything like that. Just plain chat. One as we have been instructed. Couldn't chat one oh, sorry. Chat one. Welcome to the Bangkok Podcast.

Chatwan 00:04:27 Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Greg 00:04:29 How are you doing over there? Where are you? Where are you? Where are we calling you from? And what's going on?

Chatwan 00:04:34 Yeah, I'm in New York right now. have been here for a few years now. I just finished grad school, but I plan to return to Bangkok probably by the end of the year. December or January.

Greg 00:04:46 Oh, okay. Permanently?

Chatwan 00:04:47 Yes, I hope so. Yeah.

Greg 00:04:49 Oh, wow. Okay. And of course, a lot of the interviews we do are there are often just with me, but we're also joined by my esteemed co-host. Where are you?

Ed 00:04:57 There I am here, I'm here. It's nice to meet you. Chat one.

Greg 00:05:01 So the reason we, wanted to get you on the show was that you are the brains behind a really cool new website and newsletter called society.

Greg 00:05:10 And I have heard a little bit about this from several different people, and I checked it out, and I'm really impressed by it, man. It's a really cool site that is sort of aimed. It's kind of doing in print what we try to do in audio, which is talk about Bangkok for Bangkok geeks and people who really want to understand how the city works. And I think because you're Thai and can obviously read Thai much better than we can, you're able to get a sort of a little bit deeper into some of the issues. And it's really interesting reading for people who are interested in how the city works and what's going on. So can you talk a little bit about how you arrived at it and, and what the process was to get you where you are now.

Chatwan 00:05:56 Yeah. it's it's something that's really new. Right. I just started it in July. So. Two months ago. Actually, tomorrow in two days would be two months. anniversary, I guess, if you can call it that.

Chatwan 00:06:10 But. So the idea of it is just like, I feel like Bangkok doesn't have local news. And even though it's the capital city and everything runs through Bangkok, every media outlet is in Bangkok. But most coverage is nationalized, right? National politics, national economy. But there's nothing that's like local. When, when, when local things are the things that actually affect how people live in daily life. And a part of how I came to that was like working in the States. Here I was a local reporter in Connecticut for a few years, a few years and, covering Town Hall Hyatt and then, you know, reading Thai media. It's just like a different perspective of things. And now being in New York to a big city, to a lot of like local news outlets here, that's like hyper focus on different neighborhoods, hyper focus on the city hall rather than what's happening in DC, right, or what's happening in Albany, the New York State Capitol. It's something I feel like it's a big gap in Bangkok, where it's a city of, what, 11 million people.

Chatwan 00:07:21 Right? But there's no really reliable source of local news that you think it's like, oh, I want to know about Bangkok. I go to this website and and it's even harder to find in English.

Ed 00:07:35 Interesting. Yeah. Chao. Do you mind me asking, how did you end up in the States? What's your what's your background?

Chatwan 00:07:42 Yeah. I went to high school in Thailand. until like 10th grade, I think. And then I came here for a year for, like, an exchange year. here for a year in Michigan. And then I just applied for college here. So I skipped one year of high school because I graduated from high school here, and I got, like, a real diploma. so I went to, first year of college in Seattle, and then I transferred to Connecticut for journalism school.

Ed 00:08:15 Oh, so you did go to journalism school? Cool. So that's your that's your proper training.

Greg 00:08:19 That's awesome. It's funny that you mentioned, like, a lot of the, the English language, like, so you were talking specifically about English language reporting on Bangkok because the society is is an English publication.

Greg 00:08:32 and you're right, you hit the nail on the head because a lot of the times, us foreigners, I mean, the whole project of the podcast here is for us to try and figure out Thai culture and language and society in our place in it. But it's often there's that barrier, no matter how you know, unless you're really fluent in the language. It's really hard to dig past a certain level, and one of the things I'm constantly surprised at when I'm reading random Reddit threads and things like this, is how much resources are out there for people to see that we never get exposure to, that we don't know about. And for an example, in one of your recent stories, you did something on a bunch of dead fish and wastewater fees, put Bangkok polluters on notice. That was a headline. Interesting story. But you also linked there to a map that lists all of the public bathrooms in Bangkok, which is crazy useful. I had no idea that existed, and I think that's the kind of stuff that society can really expose and get to and tell people about.

Chatwan 00:09:43 Yeah, I feel like one of the goals for local news, right, is besides, keeping people informed is also make people feel like they are part of something. They are a part of some community. Right. And, my hope for for society, was it for it to be, like, a useful tool? like, we're not trying to report on breaking news or or, you know, who just became the prime minister? Right. We're trying to look into things that's like, more, more useful in, like, day to day life. and that can be like small things, like trash fees. Like, I think yesterday there was a headlines on on. Bangkok finally got them recognition, designation, I guess as, like, low pollution or something. Low pollution zone. I think that's in English. but then all the headlines are like, yeah, they got this resignation designation, but what does that mean? Like, you know, what does that mean for like, people day to day life? Right.

Chatwan 00:10:47 If they drive a car, what does that mean for them? And then, you know, they're are actually like three things that Bangkok are trying to do right now. And it's actually affect drivers. And they have to inspect their cars to see like the black smoke, if it is like up to their standard, you know, things like that that I feel like goes underreported a lot.

Greg 00:11:07 Yeah. You're right. And let me just read real quickly from just the front page of the site here. Dead fish and wastewater fees put Bangkok polluters on notice. Bangkok's 15 minute parks show no health benefits, study finds. And this is what you and I were talking about on on last week's show. green Line extension may leave commuters a kilometre short. 77% of vegetables from inner Bangkok are contaminated. You know, these are the day to day things that you don't read about. In the post.

Ed 00:11:35 I saw that headline about vegetables. That's kind of scary.

Greg 00:11:39 Yeah.

Ed 00:11:40 Chat. When are you, scanning Thai sources.

Ed 00:11:44 So is part of what you're doing translating stuff available in Thai and making it available in English?

Chatwan 00:11:50 Yeah. Most of the time, yeah. yeah. So, like, doing this first phase, my goal was to just, like, summarize things, right? from, from Thai sources. But some of the issues, it just, like don't exist in Thai. For example, like some stories they have like this public report from the, the BMC. Right. The council. But then nobody even reported that on that in Thai. I think I wrote about that. if you scroll down, it's that trash fee story and then Bangkok health clinics story. It was this report from from from the BMC on, how how the waste system is not ready for the city's increasing the, the trash collection fees right from 20 to 60 unless you saw your trash. And then there's a report on how there's, like, a major staff shortage at public health clinics. it's, it's not something that, you know, I don't think non Thais would use because.

Chatwan 00:12:54 Yeah, but but it's something else. Like even in Thai media, it's not. It's not being reported in there.

Greg 00:13:02 Yeah that's interesting because like I, I don't use clinics, I just go to the hospital, mostly because my wife works at a hospital and I have to. That's the rule. But, you know, this nonetheless. These kind of stories give you sort of the that, that sort of intangible texture of how the city is working, the pressures that it's dealing with and the bureaucratic stuff that normal people might not notice but definitely feel, you know what I mean? So even even if the story is not directly relatable to me or someone reading it, it still gives a very good picture of, like I said, of how how the machinery of Bangkok is working.

Ed 00:13:42 Chat one are you? So you're you're not providing news in Thai or or are you linking to Thai sources or. no.

Chatwan 00:13:49 Yeah. I'm linking to Thai sources. I'm trying to find a way to link to the thing that's most useful.

Chatwan 00:13:57 Like, if I can find that source in English, most of the time I can't. But I'm seeing if if there's a way I can link to, like, I can put that original source to like a translation tool, and then I can link to, you know, the reach of that translation tool. I ran a poll a few weeks ago to see if people like how well they are in Thai, in reading Thai, and in speaking Thai, and most of them cannot, speak tightly. The initial goal was this to, you know, both target non Thais and then bilingual Thais. Right. But so far the majority of the the readers are not Thais right now. So trying to find a way that, you know, works for them. But another thing that I've been hearing us or it's like People who who who don't speak Thai, right? have no way of accessing those information anyway, so it's helpful for me to link to those sources in Thai. so and if they want to dig deeper on their own, they can put it through Google Translate or something, right?

Ed 00:15:05 Right.

Ed 00:15:05 No, I'm sure there's, tons of stuff. I've often wondered about that. because, as as Greg and I talk about on the show, like, you know, our Thai is pretty bad. I mean, I think we can both read kind of slowly, but I'm nowhere near able to read a newspaper article. It would take me. It would take me a whole day to read a newspaper article.

Greg 00:15:24 Yeah. Yeah.

Chatwan 00:15:25 I mean, there there there are things like, say, for example, like when there's like a public hearing on, on Green Line extension. Right. the bank of post or the nation may report on that, but then they're there like public documents out there about, here's the details of the plan. Here's what the study entailed. Here's what they heard from the people. And you know, those sources don't link to that. Even tie sources don't link to that. You just have to, like, navigate the internet to find out.

Greg 00:16:02 You know, it's funny. Years ago probably.

Greg 00:16:04 Probably about ten years ago now, when the, the they were the new train extensions were just about to open or they were getting ready to open. The only maps I could find online were these beautifully designed maps that only showed like 45 and 90 degree angles of all the train lines, and they didn't give you any sense of scale or where the lines actually ran. So I thought, well, the hell with this. I'm going to build my own Google map with an overlay on the actual streets where the thing is going to run, and I think I even beat Richard Barrow to this one. I think I was the first one to do it. but so I embarked on this project to go to all of the different websites and all of the different companies that were listing the progress of the construction. And dude, it was a nightmare. It took me weeks because every site was different. Half of them had broken pages and links and they were all in tie and there was no consistency for it. And it was just really, really hard to find something simple and straightforward or something you'd think would be relatively simple and straightforward.

Ed 00:17:05 Yeah. I mean, the amount, the amount of information on the web is, astounding, but, it needs it needs curation, you know, it needs someone, I think, like what Chatwan is doing to go through it and, and filter it and, and, you know, and present it to an international audience.

Greg 00:17:22 Right. And you said that the the the a lot of the stories on your site are sorry, are they reported in the Thai press or are they just generally not reported?

Chatwan 00:17:34 Both.

Greg 00:17:35 Really. So why like why why wouldn't some of these stories be reported in English in the post or The Nation or other or other sites like it's useful, valuable information. It's not super esoteric. Why wouldn't they talk about this kind of stuff?

Chatwan 00:17:53 I don't know. That's a good question. I don't know. Yeah, but if I have to make, like, speculation, I would think that, the idea, like, journalism has always been, like, very top down, right? It's like editors telling you, journalists telling you what to know.

Chatwan 00:18:13 But I think I'm trying to, like, come at it from like, a different approach. I like to ask my readers what information they need, and then I go from there. And a lot of people are like, if you subscribe to the newsletter, there's like a reader survey that like onboarding survey that you replied to, when you subscribe. And I use that to inform what type of stories I'm going to prioritize. a lot of people say transportation is a big thing. So. And you see that in in the back end. start to like story about the Green Line extension, right. May lead commuters km short when the headlines is about public transportation or infrastructure. A lot of people read it and open read click rates. it would be really good. you look at like what link people click and links to like map for 15 minute parks did really well. Links to your map of the of the every electric train MRT and SRT lines have done really well to your. so so yeah, I think the, the approach is a little bit different.

Chatwan 00:19:31 If I have to give you the answer to that. But I don't know why I covered this stuff. I think it's useful to. And maybe their focus is more like national, you know, stuff. Right. And like local. You know.

Ed 00:19:43 I have a question. Obviously, since your product is in English, it's geared primarily towards, foreigners mostly. But I wonder if, there are English speaking Thais or like Inter. You know, I teach international programs, so I'm familiar with inter Inter ties. and I wonder if the kind of stuff you're reporting or the style of your reporting, it might be something that they can't easily find in Thai. And so I wonder if just especially the fact that you went to school in the States, maybe, maybe your style of stuff could have, could appeal to actually Thai people. Like, do you know if there are Thai people using your site or if there are many?

Chatwan 00:20:28 it's like very, very small. Like, I don't know what percentage, but I would guess less than 10%.

Chatwan 00:20:37 yeah. Now.

Ed 00:20:38 Now, when you choose, when you're curating, do you, Is your is your framework? This is for anyone living in Bangkok or is your framework? Expats would want to know this right now.

Chatwan 00:20:55 When I, when I started, it was like everyone. But right now I'm narrowing it down to expats now. Okay. Yeah. Say for example, like I don't write much about the BTS fare anymore because it wouldn't have applied to expats anyways, right?

Ed 00:21:14 Oh I see. Okay.

Greg 00:21:15 oh yeah. Because we have to pay the full fare, right? We don't get the 20 bot fee.

Chatwan 00:21:19 Right?

Greg 00:21:20 Yeah, yeah. That's bullshit. We started on that.

Chatwan 00:21:24 Yeah. And. Yeah, yeah. Does it make sense? I'm trying to think of, like, how I should respond to this, but, like, I think. Yeah, yeah, you're right. That stuff that I write can sometimes be found in Thai sources too. But the way I write it, it's like sometime they write about this thing.

Chatwan 00:21:45 But then if you want context about that particular topic, you have to go find stuff that they wrote about this also. But, you know, two months ago. But then here I'm trying to do like here's what happened. What's driving the news this week or for this particular topic. Here's the big picture. Here's the context that you need. Here's why it matters to you. And here's what you can do next.

Greg 00:22:06 I think that that's the key phrase is that I find as a thread throughout your site, is that why does this matter to you? Which which I think is, is very much appreciated. You know.

Ed 00:22:18 I'm going to throw this out there. I don't want to I don't want to be too harsh on other sources, but I really feel that the English language news in Thailand, I feel like it's just gotten worse over the years. It's just degraded. I think part of it is that you have traditional outlets that were geared towards like old school newspaper stuff, and of course that business model has completely collapsed, but I just feel that those institutions have gone down.

Ed 00:22:46 I mean, I won't name them, but I just feel like I hardly ever go to them. I mean, occasionally I come across a link and so I do read them sometimes. And then there are some newer sources in English, that they do have a lot of stories, but it's very, like it's overridden with like ads.

Greg 00:23:06 And.

Ed 00:23:06 It's, it's kind of, I don't want to say sketchy, but it's just it's very web based and I feel like it's been SEO to death. And it's just there's like three ads for every story, and I don't know. So I, you know, I actually think right now there is I don't, I don't know of a really quality news source in English. I don't I would throw out some names, but I don't, I don't know of, I don't know of a great English language news.

Greg 00:23:35 It's not so much the best as is like the least worst. It's like choosing a politician, right?

Ed 00:23:39 No. You're right. there. There.

Ed 00:23:41 There isn't a really good one. Yeah, except maybe. Maybe society. Maybe that's going to be the answer.

Greg 00:23:48 Hope so. Yeah. So you send out a newsletter, too. Can you talk a little bit about how that structured?

Chatwan 00:23:53 Oh, it's just like newsletter. So I sent it out every Sunday. And that's the main distribution channel right now. everything I post on social is try to get people to convert to newsletter. because I think having a newsletter allows you to have that like direct relationship with your readers. And it I feel like it's more sustainable in a long way in terms of like that relationship that you built compared to because you own your audience. Right. You're on your on your list. If you distribute on, say, Facebook or Instagram, then it kind of like depends on the platform if they're going to push your stuff out. and then. Yeah, the. When I look at the stats, I look at like open rates. I look at CTR instead of like pageviews because the focus is on the newsletter.

Greg 00:24:54 Yeah, you've seen that with all the platforms like, you know, like Substack, which is massive. and I think the big media organizations, when Facebook first started to dip its toe into the news pool, I think they went all in on it and a lot of them got burned real badly. So Substack had a sort of a different model, which lets you control to a greater degree who sees what. But I think keeping it well within your own control is probably a smart thing to do. One thing I would make a special request for me, and also I'm going to speak on behalf of my buddy Scott, who sometimes co-hosts the show when Ed's not around. what we hate, especially with the Bangkok Post, is when we read a story and they have a story about something geographically in Bangkok. They never, ever use a map. And I don't know about you guys, but whenever they say like, oh, in the Ponca Puka district or something, I don't know what that is. I don't remember all the districts in Bangkok and they never, ever use a map, even online.

Greg 00:25:53 And it would be so helpful even if they just had a Google embed code or something like that, a Google Maps thing. So please, can you try to have that because it would really help the readers out. That's a special plea. Yeah, yeah.

Chatwan 00:26:06 Yeah, I've been trying to do that. I think one story that I've seen, not sure it was from the Bangkok Post or somewhere, but I guess everywhere when they wrote about songbird, a couple weeks ago, everyone was writing about that. Yeah. But like, and I looked for, like, comments. You were like, so the only thing you forgot to say was where the location is.

Ed 00:26:27 Where it is.

Chatwan 00:26:28 Yeah. Or like how to get there, which is you would think it's the most important thing for people to know, right?

Ed 00:26:35 The other thing I like is you're focused on practical information because there is a, you know, there's some quality information in English, but it tends to focus on nightlife or bars or this cocktail place, which is fine.

Ed 00:26:51 You know, that's a that's a type of journalism, you know, like what what to do in Bangkok this weekend. You know, there's there's that kind of stuff. but I like this focus on, hey, I'm living here. I'm going to be using public transportation or this, you know, this fare is going to go up like this type of nuts and bolts. I kind of agree. I don't it doesn't ring a bell. I don't know any other source that's focusing on that type of stuff.

Greg 00:27:17 Have you gotten any, any pushback or contact from like when when a Thai person launches, an English language publication like this? I mean, I don't you're just a single guy doing this. It's not like you have a corporation behind you or anything like that. But do you get any contact from other Thai news organizations who are sort of in the same space, or is there any outreach or.

Chatwan 00:27:39 Yeah. No.

Greg 00:27:40 No. Okay. That's good. No one's no one's leaving notes taped to your door with a knife or something like that.

Greg 00:27:46 No.

Ed 00:27:47 I was curious how you're getting the word out, because I only heard of it through Greg. Is there any special way you're promoting it, or. What's the what's the what's the marketing plan?

Chatwan 00:28:00 I don't really have a marketing plan right now. It's something I'm trying to work on, but we're at about like 400 readers right now. But how I got this 400 was like the first week I think I posted on Reddit and and.

Greg 00:28:17 That's where I saw it.

Chatwan 00:28:19 Yeah. Yeah, it was mostly on Reddit. first couple of weeks and I didn't have time to post. I reached out to like, different groups, like different non-profit groups, chambers of commerce. you know, posting on different Facebook groups, but. But that's about it. And I've been making some videos on Instagram and Facebook to try to get some conversion to. But yeah.

Ed 00:28:47 Is is the main is the direct website the main way to consume it. That's like the gateway and the social media feeds into that. Or is that the is that the way it's set up?

Chatwan 00:28:57 Yeah.

Chatwan 00:28:58 so the goal is to try to get people to like, subscribe, like to sign up. Right. And then hopefully they read through email. I've heard from some people who are just like waiting for the link on Facebook. And I have to tell him that sometimes the, the, the issue comes out on Sunday morning, right? I don't post on Facebook until like Tuesday because I don't have it scheduled because it's like not the main distribution and it's just like me doing it, so. Right. It's like, I don't have time to like, yeah.

Ed 00:29:31 Okay. So email is the main way.

Greg 00:29:33 Yeah.

Ed 00:29:35 Gotcha.

Greg 00:29:35 Gotcha. Right. So looking ahead to the future, then, like you said, you're going to be coming back to Bangkok by the end of the year. Are you going to keep it going? What? Do you have any long term plans? And, some question is this. This isn't your main gig, is it? Is it just going to sort of like a a side project for you?

Chatwan 00:29:53 it's a side project because for now.

Chatwan 00:29:56 But I hope so. I'm trying to spend like the first six months to try to see if there's, like, if it's viable for it to be, you know, a real business. Right? I can do by myself and, like, generate enough income for, for just for me, like, without any employer or anything. but it's not my main thing right now. I also run another newsletter in the US focusing on student journalism, in the US. And then I do some consulting work with like publishing teams of like a firm that, that that helps with like student media organizations in the US too. But long term plan. I'm exploring how to monetize society. Right now we have a voluntary support program called Soil Builder. There's no benefits to it whatsoever besides like getting a shout out and then have your name listed on the supporter wall. But we have like, 15, 16 people on on that already. but like brainstorming, premium parks for it. I'm thinking maybe look into like original reporting.

Chatwan 00:31:09 So the, the goal for this to be a tool that's useful for people. Right. So I'm thinking of original reporting on stories like I already thought of the section. So the, the main newsletter is like from the main road because it's soil. Right. And then from the main words like from government or, or from like official channels. And then section is going to be like from the sources, which is like the story is about the business feature of a foreigner, and then they talk about challenges they had to overcome in opening a business as a foreigner. And then here are like advice or here are like action items. You can, you can if you want to open a business to here action items, you can you can do you know, things like that. But look into more original reporting. I thought about like public bathroom reviews have seen different public bathrooms. yeah. So that's another space. And I'm thinking about, like, reaching out to, like, potential sponsors to. But the goal is to keep this main newsletter free though.

Chatwan 00:32:17 And then other premium products will probably charge or be paywall.

Greg 00:32:24 Years ago, I had an idea to make an app on your phone that would show you the nearest good public bathroom in Bangkok, but I never went anywhere. I thought that'd be interesting.

Ed 00:32:36 Anyway, I hope this project works. I love the concept, I. I really think there's. There's just a shortage of quality stuff in English. It sounds weird because there's a lot of stuff out there, and and you can find good stuff. But, you know, I think what you're doing, like I said, is you're you're kind of funneling it and focusing it on, you know, people living in Bangkok and they're practical issues, and I like it. I think it's a cool idea.

Greg 00:33:03 Yeah, I think, I think it serves it. It feels a whole. And there's, there's really good, newsletters out there and websites too, that deal with things that I'm interested in. There's, there's, there's Tai Island Quest by by my buddy David Lukens.

Greg 00:33:19 There's, future Southeast Asia by James Clark, which is really good. what's his name? Ken Loach. And he also writes pretty good stuff in English. our buddy sucks. It also does really good stuff in English, but each of those things has a very specific niche that has nothing to do with Bangkok, which is where my interest lies. So I think society is is is a really great project. And like it said, we wish you the best of luck and everyone definitely sign up for the newsletter like I have. It's a great sort of summary of what's going on and gives you a really unique insight into into the city that we are trying to figure out every day.

Ed 00:33:58 Greg, when you first sent me the that this, this concept, I thought you were misspelling the word society. I'm like, is that a typo? I'm like, is that a typo? So listeners it.

Greg 00:34:10 Is.

Ed 00:34:11 It's soy city soy.

Chatwan 00:34:14 Yeah. If I can explain the meaning behind that, I spend a lot of, you know, weeks and days when it's brought me that name.

Chatwan 00:34:21 So I thought it was supposed to be something just like useful and practical information. Right. And I feel like life in Bangkok happens in soils, Always right. So I'm like so like society. So. So I like it to reflect that like urban focus.

Greg 00:34:39 I like it, it makes sense to me. It makes sense to me. Well Chatman, thanks for for coming on and chatting to us. This is really cool. Where where can people find you on the website and on socials?

Chatwan 00:34:49 Yeah, you can go to society comm. That's all. I c I e t.com. And then you can put your email address there and on Instagram is society dot BBQ and on Facebook which is society right.

Greg 00:35:05 Okay well thanks man. This is really cool. And I continued success with this and I hope it's I hope to see you grow and be around for many, many years giving us the good stuff. So, we will have to, hopefully invite you to one of our meetups when you're back in town, and we can have a beer.

Chatwan 00:35:20 Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Greg 00:35:21 Thank you. Man.

Ed 00:35:22 Very good to meet you.

Greg 00:35:30 And just to be clear, that's not my Canadian accent messing things up. That's soy city. Soy city.

Ed 00:35:36 Man. Like I said, I really hope it succeeds. I like his, I don't know what to call it. I mean, his practical approach, like, he's almost saying, hey, I'm not going to do sexy stuff. I'm not going to do flashy stuff. I'm not going to try to grab people's attention with, you know, nightlife stories or, you know, like how to marry a bar girl in five steps, like, he's totally, you know, you know what I mean?

Greg 00:35:58 Like his. Yeah.

Ed 00:35:59 His approach, his approach is, no, I want to have useful stories for people who live in Thailand, primarily expats. It's it's it's kind of nuts and bolts. like, as he talked about, it's kind of like local, like there's a lot of local news outlets in the States that he's he now understands how it works.

Ed 00:36:21 And I do think there's a bit of a hole in the market here for that solid local practical news.

Greg 00:36:28 Yeah, I agree there's a really good newsletter that I get called Morning Brew and it's it's really good and it's a very similar structure. I think society has a very similar structure, and it's just sort of hits the sweet spot between like useful news, but in bite sized chunks, and it gives you the option to learn more if you want to chase it a bit further. So. Right. Like like he said in the interview, it's it's news that is is useful actually. That's useful.

Ed 00:36:53 Yeah yeah.

Greg 00:36:54 Yeah.

Ed 00:36:54 No I love it I love it. I wish I knew more. I just I don't know much about the business of journalism and of course, like most business these businesses these days, the business models have changed with technology and AI. So I have no idea how to make something like that profitable or how to monetize it, but he seems like he's on top of it. Hopefully, hopefully, you know, got my fingers crossed.

Greg 00:37:19 Yeah, yeah. And it's good when I hear when I see, you know, young Thai kids like this, I sort of sit back and I'm like, all right, there's, there's, there's good people out there with a good head on their the shoulders that are hopefully going to steer the country right in the future.

Ed 00:37:31 Yeah, doing interesting stuff. And, yeah. I'm I'm a fan.

Greg 00:37:36 Me too. and again, highly recommend signing up for the newsletter. Good stuff. And we wish, Chatwan. All the best.

Ed 00:37:42 For.

Greg 00:37:43 Sure. Cool. All right. Let's get into some love, loathe, or live with where one of us picks a particular aspect of living in Bangkok, which we discussed to decide if it's something we love about living here, loathe about living here, or have come to accept to something that we just have to learn to live with no matter how we feel about it. And this weekend, I got something fairly esoteric for you.

Ed 00:38:01 Okay, more esoteric than Basil.

Greg 00:38:05 I think probably about on the same level, but, you know, recently I just got back from a trip to Canada with my son, and, one of the things we always joke about is the the strangeness of being able to just get a cup and drink water right from the faucet without worrying about anything. Right, right. But one thing I also noticed, and I want to know how you feel about this. Was that in the kitchen, in the bathroom, anywhere in the house you have two faucets, hot and cold. And for me, when I was there, the hot tap makes the water like hot dude, like nearly boiling hot.

Ed 00:38:42 Oh, you mean when you were back home?

Greg 00:38:43 Yeah. And the cold makes it real cold. Now, in every place I've lived in, in Thailand, there isn't that. There's a single tap for lukewarm, right. So do you or do you miss that dual temperature thing on the taps, or do you prefer the lukewarm one?

Ed 00:38:59 Oh, this is a great question.

Ed 00:39:00 It is a bit of a deep cut. This is the exact kind of thing. You could you could, add this to the list of things like putting ice in beer. I remember when I, I remember when I first got here and I was dealing with kind of the single tap situation, the lukewarm. And I thought it was like, really odd. And I didn't like it, you know? So when I first came here, I was just like, where's the hot water? Where's the cold water? You know, it it it seemed like a big deal. But then I think in a couple of months I just got totally used to the way it is here, you know? Right, right. You know, so I, I hardly ever think about it anymore. Except when I go back home and I'm like, oh yeah, yeah. Like real, like real, real hot and cold water. Right. It's one of those things that, okay, the ice and beer thing was a bigger deal where I was where I just said to myself, I'm never going to do this.

Ed 00:39:52 And then it was it was one of those jump cuts in movies where you immediately jumped to the person doing the thing, right. Record scratch. But but it probably I don't think I put ice in beer for a year or so, I don't know. I mean, so I did hold out for, for a while, but I just, I think probably after a month I got used to having lukewarm water.

Greg 00:40:16 Yeah, it was funny because when I was back there, I turned it on and like I said, the water that was hot was like steaming hot. Okay. And then the cold water was ice cold. Right. But what what I ended up doing most of the time anyway. Was turning on a little bit of the hot. A little bit of the cold and sort of finding a temperature in the middle, which is what Bangkok has by default anyway. So true that, you know, it could be a little bit harder, maybe if you like washing your face or something or a little bit colder for something else.

Greg 00:40:42 But I think the Thailand way of just having a simple faucet with room temperature water is probably a very acceptable.

Ed 00:40:50 Yeah, it's fine, it's fine. So I, I'm certainly I'm certainly live with.

Greg 00:40:55 I'm definitely a liquid. I'm not a glove because it's like it is what it is, but it doesn't bother me in the slightest.

Ed 00:41:01 Well, next week we can discuss the issue of water pressure, which I have a lot of opinions on. And my when I when I moved to this new place, I think I'm going to try to put my water tank on the roof so I can have more water pressure. So that'll be that'll be our discussion next week.

Greg 00:41:15 I Skinless Edge joins the podcast.

Ed 00:41:19 No I'm a big water pressure guy.

Greg 00:41:23 Up to a point.

Ed 00:41:25 All right. A final thanks to our patrons who support the show. Patrons get a ton of cool perks and the warm, fuzzy feeling knowing that they're helping and are never ending. Quest for cool content. Find out more by clicking support on our website and connect with us online.

Ed 00:41:39 We're Bangkok podcast on social media, Bangkok Podcast on the web or simply Bangkok Podcast at gmail.com. We love hearing from our listeners and always reply to our messages.

Greg 00:41:51 True. To add, you can also listen to each episode on YouTube. You can send us a voicemail to our website. We'll feature that on the show. Hit me up on blue Sky. Greg. Thank you for listening, everyone. Take it easy out there and we'll see you back here next week.

Ed 00:42:03 Absolutely.