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by The SW Eden | August 28, 2009 · 6:52 am

Welcoming Celebration for the Fresh Men (รับน้อง)

This is 2 years after those days, I believe that all my friends who stood with me in that darkness can remember as same as me. Really, it was just a kind of celebration for the fresh men in University, but the seniors did it in negative way. They were just older than us, the fresh men, only 2 years. They said that what they did, are important and beneficial for us, and we all had to do the same thing, but until now, I have never found any benefit that they gave us.

The seniors faked and betrayed the fresh men. Because the university was in country where was far from Bangkok city around 2 hours on high way, whose parents did not have car or did not have time, had to rent apartments or rooms for their children. For my house, it was just 1 hours to get the university, so I did not need any room for staying there. For the students who lived in that province, they should not rent any room, too. When the first day at university came, the senior tried to pretend us that everybody all had to rent a room because the first year Architecture students had a lot of homework and a lot of group work, and many time, we had to stay at studio till midnight. Most of my friends believed them, and that was possible for us who were not the sophisticate. I believed them, too, so I asked my parent to rent a room for me, and that was pretty expensive because I did nothing on it after I know the realistic of the savage seniors. The first year student did not have any hard homework or a lot of group work. We had never stayed at studio till midnight, but we had to stay at lower level from 6 pm till midnight on Monday to Friday. The savage seniors always called every fresh man to be there and began roar around us who had to close the eyes and bow the head down. They called this act, “the repair”, it meant the repair of our behavior because they thought that our behavior was wrong, anyway it was right. I was one of the fresh men who could not escape from this rule, but when I could not endure with the seniors’ jeering roaring anymore, I swore with myself that I would never come to “the repair” again. After that, I was in the dilemma between I hated to go to “the repair”, and all my friends who could not bring me to “the repair” had to get the punishments from seniors. Most punishments were push-up for the boys and sit on the air for the girls.

Once in that semester, we had a lot of individual homework and had to finish it within one day, but we had to go to “the repair”, too. That was not my problem because I would not go there, but it was my friends’ problem. There was a group of pretending seniors who seemed like kind women, they advise some of my friends to copy the homework for other students and let other students go to “the repair” without doing any homework, so my friends did. When the deadline of that homework came, The professor knew that my friends was the copiers for all students in the class, that was evidently from that pretending seniors who told the professor. The professor deducted every student’s grade and deduct my grade, too although my homework was not from that copier friends. I grasped that we were just the foolish of the betraying senior who could not have any pretext.

All he seniors’ rules were so absurd to do. They always told the first year students in “the repair” that 1) Who were here before are older, and who were here after were younger: 2) The olders were greater than younger: 3) If the olders did something wrong, went back to see 1) and 2). That was the reason why the fresh men had to do everything by the seniors’ orders. There was an order which I thought that was a little right, but it was still absurd, the girls could not be in any place without the boy. Really, it kept us to stay secure, but in university was already secure because there were only students from other major who walked around as same as book store or library in a regular university. Here also meant I could not go somewhere with only the female friends, too. In my opinion, if I went as a group of girls, I did not need the have a boy in the group all the time. Each girl had to have a male buddy to follow every time. If the seniors saw a girl or many girls go somewhere without the boy, they would remember and punished the buddies of those girls to push-up. The senior also wanted us to remember all friends’ student ID. I thought this was the most stupid thing to do. There were more than 90 students in my major, and each student had 7 numbers in student ID. If they found that I could not remember, they would blame me in front of all my friends that I did not care them.

A year later when my friends were not the fresh men anymore, there was no rule and “the repair” (ซ่อมน้อง) so we was able to do whatever we wanted, but many things that the seniors left were still stick to us. Most of us hated the senior. Some of us hated each other who let them get the punishment. There were 2 students had gasp disease, they were easy to have convulsion when they were tired. One of the two was a girl. The tall seniors crowd around her and blamed that she was not endure. For the boy, the seniors pushed him down and let him wallow on the floor, then he convulsed, but the seniors did not have any drug for him. Our parents also hated the seniors especially the boys’ parents. The male seniors required 200 baths from each first year students to buy alcohol for their party, but some students did not have enough money, they had to ask from their parents. Another thing that they did for celebration of the welcoming us was the boys who wore their new uniform (because they are 1 year student, they had new uniform.) had to wallow in soggy mud. The seniors did not think about the parents who just brought new uniforms for their child. After that, those uniforms could not be washed so the students had to throw them away. More than the bad things that the seniors left for us, they also left the bad health. Most of the male fresh men had never smoked before, but the seniors forced them to smoke till they became addicts. These were just some bad things that we could not left then behind.

This smack was so strong, hard and bitter. I did not want to keep it for my juniors when I became the senior. I said solely to my friends who wanted to do this to our juniors as same as what we got together. They just ignored and said that was the tradition of Architecture in this university. For the professors, they did not care, and some of they also support because those professor had been the senior before. Now, I do not understand how they can be happy on other pain, or it was just for revenge to the next juniors.

Words and Photos : Sw Eden (สว อิเฎล)

Relationship between Employees & Managers in Thailand & USA

The relationships between employees and managers in Thailand and the United States (in Ehrenreich’s article) are very different. Because of Thai traditions and current economy, the managers cannot do anything they want. In most Thai company or shop, people who work in treat each other more like family than in United State. Managers are also not the most important thing that the companies have. In Thailand, the companies have some tests for new employees, but it is not as serious as in the United States.

Thai managers are more considerate of their employees than US’ managers. Indeed most Thai people are considerate of everybody. They did not feel that they are the best or bigger than the others. They did not think that their employees are something which can be played and can be changed or kicked out whenever they want as in the US in article by Ehrenreich. All Thai managers want their employees to love them because the employees will be able to work very well with their mind, and the employees will write about them nicely in checking form that effects a lot in career of the employees. In important feast days such as New Year until both their birthdays, the employees and managers will give some presents to each other, and the presents that employees give to their employees have to be more worthy because of their seniority. If considering about seniority, the managers have to respect their employees who are older than them.

In the United State, the managers try to find something wrong in their employees and retire them because there are many people need job, and then it is very easy to find the new one. In Thailand, the managers cannot find something wrong in employees easily. Thai society hates that behavior so much. If many people know that some manager does, they will be anti and force until that manager cannot do anymore. There is a real case that a Thai manager tried to find something wrong in their employees by the videotape. The result was that manager got accused and had to pay for their employees in allegation, breaking human privacy.

It seems like in the United State, the employees get retired very easily, but in Thailand, the managers are easier to get retired. I believe that nowadays every country has the same problem about weak economy. Many people in every country also do not have job. In Thailand and the united state do not have the same group of people who need the job, maybe because Thailand is agriculture country and United State is industrial country. Most employees are not rich people. In Thailand, this group of people can be both in company or work in their own farm. In United States, there are many people from many races live so they cannot own some large land, then; they have no job to do. They need to work in some businesses that were own by someone else. It means in Thailand, the employees do not need to care about their employers, but in United State the employees have to care. With weak economy in Thailand, all companies do not want to pay expensive salary for every employee includes the manager. Entrepreneur will check how successful of the managers’ work. If they cannot work well, they will get two warning before get retired. Then the entrepreneur will select the best employee to be next managers. This is the way that the entrepreneur can pay less than before because the old manager who worked for long, he or she got high salary, but for the new one who just work in this position, will be happy just with the salary and position that better than regular employees.

In Thailand, there are some tests in pre-employment, too, but not chemical and electronic testing of snooping and drug testing as in the United State. Thai companies do not serious about disease or health. Most Thai companies need the resume (profile?) and need to check some biography. They do not want the people who get retired before and the people who had been in jail or do some criminal. I believe that this case is the same as in US companies. Only some companies in Thailand that need serious test especially the color blind. People who have this syndrome cannot work in many companies such as medical company, Engineer Company, Food Company and also Science Company.

In this article, I totally believe that if you are a manager, you will want to be in the United State, and if you are an employee, you will want to be in Thailand. In my opinion, there are many companies in the united state that are already being in standard. The managers have to work on their work and do not need to find something wrong on their employees. Everybody can be retired not because of the others’ effect, but because of Key Performance Indicators (KPI) that the entrepreneur will know how that employees or managers are.