I get asked this a lot, and I’ve noticed I usually give the short answer — “wanted a change,” “always liked it here,” something that fits in a sentence. This is the longer, more honest version.
This wasn’t my first stop, and Thailand wasn’t a leap
Before Thailand, I’d already lived abroad — a year in Korea, stretches in a handful of other places. I’d also gone through a whole run of “I could see myself living here” that didn’t pan out the way I expected. I thought I’d stay in Costa Rica longer than I did. Same with Colombia. Same with Brazil. Same with South Africa. Good places, real time spent in each one, just not the ones that ended up sticking.
Thailand was different, but not because I showed up and fell for it on the spot. I’d actually been back and forth to Thailand four or five times before I ever moved here for real. It wasn’t a whirlwind decision — it was a place that kept pulling me back on its own, trip after trip, until moving here stopped being a hypothetical and started being the obvious next step. Eventually I got the 5-year DTV visa and made it official.
Even inside Thailand, it took a few tries to land on Bangkok
People assume I landed in Bangkok and knew immediately. Not even close. The first time I landed here, I stayed one day and didn’t like it. From there I went to Phuket, and for a while I actually thought that was going to be it. Then Pattaya, thinking maybe that was the one. Neither of them ended up being the place. Bangkok is where it actually clicked, and only after I’d ruled out the others first.
What actually made it stick, beyond just liking it
I love the place, plainly — the culture, the pace, all of it. But liking somewhere isn’t the same as it working practically, and Thailand works on that level too. The cost of living stretches what I earn in a way most places don’t. You can get a real level of reliability and even luxury here at a budget that wouldn’t get you close to the same thing elsewhere. That combination — genuinely loving it and it making practical sense — is rare, and it’s really the actual answer to “why Thailand.”
Is this the last stop?
Honestly, I don’t know, and I’m not going to pretend I do. Given the track record — Korea, Costa Rica, Colombia, Brazil, South Africa, a handful of Thai cities before Bangkok — I’ve learned not to declare anything permanent too early. Right now, this is it. That’s a true statement without needing to also be a forever one.