Thai smileWhat does a smile mean to you? If you are from a western country, you most likely associate smiling with feeling good. That is not always true in Thailand. Thai smiles can mean many things. There are over a dozen words in the Thai language that refer to all different types of smiles. Thais use smiles to express emotions of politeness, happiness, embarrassment, frustration, indifference, condescension, nervousness, or just to mask their real feelings.

Does this mean that the famous Thai smile is not real, that it is a fake? No, it just means that you have to expand your definitions of what it can mean. Read the rest of this entry