Re-trying a 2011 FT Xiaguan mini cake

 

It's been awhile!  I don't know if I've ever taken a full month off posting here, or even off reviewing, but that just happened.  I moved back from Honolulu to Bangkok again, a cycle that will seemingly keep repeating for awhile, so things have been busy.  It's odd being slightly overwhelmed by the heat and humidity, again.  Running has been rough; a lot of outings cut back slightly for distance while I acclimate.

Nothing is really new related to tea, except that I recently met one of those next level tea experts, Olivier Schneider, which I don't plan on covering in detail here.  He's nice.

This post is about retrying a sheng version I've not checked on for a couple of years, a Xiaguan mini cake, not so different than their tuocha shaped versions, but for whatever reasons not as earthy.  This earlier vendor description (it's from the Chawang Shop) covers what it is:

FT(For Taiwan)" means this small iron cake was a special order of "Fei Tai" Company. Fei Tai Company is the biggest Xiaguan TF and Menghai TF pu-erh tea distributor in Taiwan. It is claimed that the customized products of Fei Tai company reaches a higher quality in Xiaguan TF. The high-level "FT" tea chose better raw materials. Iron cake is tightly compressed, so its qualitative transformation is slow. Definitely tea for longer-term store. High quality early spring large-leafs material from 2009 and 2010, and was used Cang Shan mountain spring water for the steaming process. This cake is not too smokey, typical for Xiaguan teas. The taste is strong and powerful, floral and sweet huigan.

Odd that FT stands for "for Taiwan" when it's that vendor name's initials, right, Fei Tai?  I've seen that for Taiwan reference before; maybe it just worked out that it could mean two things.  It's interesting that this is a blend of material that is now 13 to 14 years old, even though the cake is 12, the pressed version of that older material.

Review:

First infusion (after a rinse):  brewed a little strong, so the effect is a bit intense; I guess I was still trying to get it to open up.  Flavor range seems positive, not atypical for Xiaguan, but on the fruity side as those go.  I just re-tried another larger size tuocha version recently that includes more of the smoky and mushroom range, which isn't a favorite.  For that tea I was wondering if even another decade would shift flavor profile, feel and the rest, into a place I really like it.  I do like this.

Earthiness is present, for sure, which people could interpret in all sorts of ways, as aged wood, tree fungus, leather, or however else they might see it.  Feel is resinous, full, and a little dry, so better brewed a little lighter than this round.  Beyond that there's a fruitiness that I'll try to unpack better next round.

Second infusion:  by fruit of course I mean warm, towards-earthy fruit, maybe most like dried Chinese date (jujube).  This isn't so complex that there are lots of layers to it, or a very refined character; intensity and complexity is good, but it's straightforward.  Bitterness hasn't dropped completely out but this might be another half dozen years away from a more fully transitioned, aged character, or maybe a decade.  Then that's a funny thing, because teas age really fast here in Bangkok, so that fresh, floral sheng versions seem much different a single year later when stored here.  I don't remember this being any different several years ago.  The earliest impression I have is from an early round of a review 4 years ago:

There's a faint hint of smoke, a decent level of bitterness (especially for being a light infusion), and an unusual oily feel to the tea, along with dark mineral content that is somewhere between petroleum and well-corroded metal.  Oddly that's all pleasant. 

I mentioned that I liked this enough that I might buy more to age, and I finished that 125 gram mini cake later, and bought two more to store, one of which I'm first trying now.  I think I remember this tea differently because it aired out a good bit as I drank it over the course of the year or two after that.

Smoke is not noticeable now, and the oily feel I would now describe as sapiness.  What I interpret as fruit I remember from trying this before, not that early time, but over the course of drinking the rest of that.  It seems a little odd that I liked this that much for the description, and for not really loving edgy, dry, smoky sheng versions back then, nearly as much as I could relate to them a few years later, after a lot more exposure.  I've been considering buying another cake of a standard full size version in a Chinatown shop here, one I've barely touched for it being not quite ready as a 2006 version, but one I see a lot of potential in (this one, an 8653).  It's odd that spending 17 years in Bangkok isn't enough aging transition time, but in a few more it should come together.

Fourth infusion: there's something really catchy about the way those flavors balance.  I might be missing an input people describe as camphor; it's hard for me to isolate anything as being like that, in most instances, but this is in that range.  It's not that one part of the flavor is so pleasant, it's the overall effect.  The sweetness and range I interpret as fruit helps it achieve that balance.  Probably as with the 17 year old full cake needing more transition time this 12 year old version will be considerably better in another half dozen, and I shouldn't be drinking much of this.

Fifth infusion:  a little stronger, brewed a little longer; the earthy rock and rusted metal range really picks up if you don't brew this light, which is the only way to drink it at its best, it seems to me.  Not using a maxed out proportion would help with that, but it's longstanding habit, so I go with really short infusion times to compensate.  I could imagine this including a touch of mushroom more than smoke, but it's not as heavy on both as the other Xiaguan tuo I mentioned.  That's this one, a 2010 Xiaguan Teji Tuo, identified as special grade.

To be clear where I stand on all these I really like a completely opposite style of younger sheng as much or more than this range, even if these were optimized, aged for 20+ years instead of less than 15, or 17 for that larger cake.  Some versions I love as brand new tea, and some really shine after a couple years of transition, or in some cases can be great after 4 or 5.  I only took one sheng version in this age range to Honolulu for that 2 1/2 month stay, a purple leaf version, and I kind of missed aged teas, but it was nice going through that different cycle of experience.  Experiencing variety is nice, and sometimes I crave older sheng experience, or teas like this in the middle, with some rough edges but also interesting character.

Sixth infusion:  a bit lighter again, brewed faster, and better.  It's not transitioning enough that I'll keep up with notes; it is where it is.  The mouthfeel and aftertaste inputs are more positive than I've described so far, a nice resinous structure, and a sweet and mineral intensive aftertaste.  It's nice.  I've been able to appreciate a one year younger Xiaguan tuo version that I keep buying from a local shop, reviewed here along with two Dayi versions, for appreciating the pleasant range mixed in with some relative harshness.  I might be as interested in how slightly aged sheng varies along with having the experience itself, not just learning about and experiencing the end-point potential, but the stages the teas go through leading up to that.

A tangent about goji berries

Kind of taking this tasting summary off the rails a bit I tried mixing the next round in with some goji berries I have soaking in hot water.  I drink that infusion and eat those berries about every other day, when I think to get to it, as a diet supplement of sorts.  They're a "super food," but who knows what that means.  I suspect that them being high in vitamin A content is a lot of it, but it could go beyond that.  The taste was interesting; that's one way to try sheng with a lot of fruit input, to mix it with a dried berry infusion.  I just looked for a good reference source on that "superfood" claim but mostly only turned up light references, like this one:

...this small red and shiny berry is a real source of essential nutrients for the well-being of your body. It is particularly rich in vitamin C and polysaccharides which are two powerful antioxidants. There are also vitamins A, B and E, but also 18 amino acids, 8 of which directly participate in the proper functioning of the body. Otherwise, organic goji berries also contain 21 minerals and trace elements, including iron, selenium or copper...  The composition of goji indeed includes zeaxanthin, an antioxidant that promotes better and lasting vision... 

That reference claims that it helps preserve organs, slow aging, and protect against cancer; who knows?  Looking further here's a peer-reviewed form of source; it does sound good, as they summarize it:

Goji Berries as a Potential Natural Antioxidant Medicine: An Insight into Their Molecular Mechanisms of Action

The health benefits of goji berries include enhancing hemopoiesis, antiradiation, antiaging, anticancer, improvement of immunity, and antioxidation. There is a better protection through synergistic and additive effects in fruits and herbal products from a complex mixture of phytochemicals when compared to one single phytochemical...

There are studies that reported the presence of riboflavin, thiamine, nicotinic acid, and minerals such as copper, manganese, magnesium, and selenium in goji berries [7]...  The high biological activity components in goji berries are polysaccharides, carotenoids, and phenolics [8]... 

One of the most common carotenoids found in goji berries is zeaxanthin in the form of dipalmitin zeaxanthin...  As for now, the best natural source of dipalmitin zeaxanthin is goji berries. The fractions of beta-carotene (35.9 μg/g), cryptoxanthin, and neoxanthin (72.1 μg/g) are also detected in goji berry extracts [8]...

Sounds good, I guess, but of course I can't connect their claims about health benefits with that information about compounds present.  It is odd that I'm not experiencing greying hair much, beyond my beard, even though I'm 54, and haven't needed to use reading glasses yet, but I have no well-grounded idea what main causes for that might be.  Exercise, eating a good diet, and sleeping enough are supposed to improve general health, and I attempt all that, and have other more exotic theories about inputs I'll skip passing on here.  

This aside is more about passing on a potentially helpful diet input suggestion than a claim or endorsement; it's easy to buy some goji berries and eat a little every other day, much easier than including foods like sweet potatoes and blueberries in a normal weekly diet.

I did recently write about Bryan Johnson's attempts to stop the aging process, here, and I don't think I mentioned goji berries in that.  Other than ginseng I can't think of another input described as offsetting aging, not that I follow such subjects.

I am losing my hair; it's not as if I'm not aging at all

Conclusion:

This version is pretty much how I remember it, since I probably drank the last of that small cake two years after first trying it, so two years ago now.  I don't necessarily think this needs more time to age, in the sense that it's not pleasant now, but I think it will be more pleasant in another 5 or 6 years, so I probably won't drink much of this over the next few years, just checking on it once in awhile.  For these kinds of teas it seems to make sense to buy even more than I did, if budget allows, since if I do drink this 125 gram cake over the next 5 years and it really is optimum then I'll be down to 125 grams left, when it's actually at its best.  I'm on a tight tea budget, so it is what it is.

I like this version a little more than maybe all the Xiaguan tuocha versions I've tried so far, which isn't so many, maybe only half a dozen, totaling to a dozen versions of related forms (Xiaguan full cakes, other similar style but different producer tuos).  It's not refined, or amazing in quality level, just pleasant and nicely balanced, with good intensity and transition potential, and essentially no aspect range I interpret as negative.

nice visiting the Bangkok Chinatown again

reunited with this family member!

an iconic part of my work commute

a baby monitor lizard in a tree joining my lunch in a park

Bryan Johnson and his project to stop aging

photo credit a British GQ article (not cited or summarized here)

Not so long ago I read an article on Bryan Johnson (probably the Bloomberg version), a internet company millionaire (said to be worth around $400 million in multiple sources, but who knows), who is trying to stop his own experience of the aging process.  Longevity isn't a new theme; it has been a popular topic for awhile.  David Sinclair, a related researcher, went on the Joe Rogan podcast three years ago discussing the topic; a guest appearing there is a normal enough milestone for public perception uptake.

Writing here relates to seeing more on Bryan Johnson and this theme based on a Chris Williamson YouTube interview.  A second Youtube interview with Tom Bilyeu covers slightly different scope, based on differing interview style and background interests of the two Youtubers.

This can't really serve as a summary of what Bryan Johnson is attempting, because it's too complicated to summarize in a standard 1500 words of writing, and those other references already get to that.  I'd like to "react" to it, to offer an impression of the theme, approach, and points Bryan made, which will double as a very incomplete summary.  If the subject is of interest looking up more information is easy enough; Bryan's Blueprint website covers what he's doing, drugs he's ingesting, measurement steps identifying outcome and helping refine approach, his diet, and so on.

Before going further, one might naturally wonder if any of this actionable, short of spending the $2 million per year he does on this venture, going through countless tests and treatments and taking dozens of compounds and supplements daily.  For example:

w/Dinner (most compounds he takes with breakfast; this is the short list)

Acarbose 200mg (Rx)
BroccoMax 250mg
C 500mg
Ca-AKG 1 gram
Cocoa Flavanols 500mg
EPA 500mg 
Garlic 2.4g equivalent 
Garlic 1.2g (kyolic)
Ginger Root 2.2g
Glucosamine Sulphate 2KCL 1,500mg
Hyaluronic Acid 300mg 
Lysine 1g
L-Tyrosine, 500mg
Metformin ER 500 mg (Rx)
N-Acetyl-L-Cysteine (NAC) 1,800 mg
Nicotinamide Riboside 375mg (6x wk)
Turmeric 1g

A lot of that is just standard supplements, like vitamin C, or garlic.  I think Metformin is a standard longevity drug, the kind people into that "body hack" interest theme often take.  Nicotinamide is probably what it sounds like, the drug you ingest smoking cigarettes.  There are plenty of starting points for improving supplementation, and diet, in what he's doing, so of course some review is potentially helpful, even without sorting it all out, the approach and measurement themes.  

Anyone could be skeptical that the entire project makes sense, or how he portrays it, or about any one input, but surely most of it is well-grounded, whether or not it adds up to a way to stop aging.  Or to extend his final life-span; it's not clear that the two are exactly the same thing.

Again this will be my impression, partly informed by reviewing longevity related content and issues over a period of years.  I'm not a great reference for deciding any single point, but at least I've been exposed to a broad range of ideas.

Does it probably work?

Let's back up further; could this work, is he extending really slowing aging and extending life-span, or just becoming quite healthy?  What evidence can he show that it's working at all?  "Science" has developed a range of different markers and metrics for approximating biological age, and of course that's the kind of thing Johnson and his team are optimizing.  If you accept that these measurements work well then he is surely succeeding.

The one interviewer, Tom Bilyeu, thinks it's worth considering since Bryan looks like an elf.  Really?  He's the subject of a complex and multi-layered skin conditioning and regeneration program, using drugs, moisturizers, and treatment processes that includes laser therapy (zapping blemishes?).  I think he looks unusual related to holding a 5% body fat, so he lacks the normal level of fat under his skin, looking a bit gaunt, pale, and frankly odd.  

That brings up an aside worth considering:  he lives at a permanent calorie deficit, per his description offered in discussion.  I didn't catch how that's supposed to even be possible, or could make sense, since ordinarily that just means that someone is in the process of losing weight, and he's not.  By definition he can't be living long-term at a calorie deficit and remaining at the same weight, unless "deficit" here relates to a gap below a conventional norm, not taking in less than he is expending (the normal meaning).

Related to that broad array of age and health related markers, part of his story is that he's essentially a 18 year old, related to the story all those tell, even though he's in his 40s (45).  Or probably different markers tell different stories, so maybe secondary claims that he has delayed aging and experiences it at a slower rate (a rate which he cites) or has rolled back identified age by some time-frame, per varying age-marker measurements.  

It all must be real enough.  It's hard to really accept that his health must be optimum, or to extend all this to concluding that he's likely to live to be 100, or any other milestone.  I've seen 120 mentioned as a target upper limit age, but if that's not from him (or his team) it's not even tied to their ungrounded speculation.  He might end up killing himself taking up such an artificial and extreme diet and drug regimen; stranger things have happened.  But I can easily accept that a lot of his organ functions could be operating at a relative optimum.  He makes the point in one interview that if longevity treatments become more effective over the next few decades, which seems possible, then he doesn't need to live to over 100 based on adjusting this current protocol, he only needs to minimize aging impact until better treatments replace it.  Fair enough.

His philosophy

This isn't just about optimizing aging, restricting aging process to an absolute minimum.  That is the main driving goal, of course, the principle he's based his life on.  It's important to consider why he is doing that, and what it means to him.

His explanation might not be interpreted as adequate.  It's framed as a relatively natural goal, that if someone likes life they would naturally pursue living more of it.  Then it factors in that if longevity pursuit progresses over the next few decades someone would need to still be around then to benefit from it, so a 46 year old would naturally want to slow the aging clock as much as possible, to get in on that.  He broke up with his girlfriend when she developed breast cancer, per news stories (so allegedly; who knows really), which raises two points, with only one relevant to this main theme.  That experience, along with prior conditioning, could have triggered a concern over mortality in him.  And it paints a picture of him as a narcissistic and poorly socially conditioned individual, if he did drop a life partner in a time of need based on filtering centered on self-interest, which may or may not apply broadly.

From that basic start he portrays it all as about having a vision, doing this project as research, using himself as an n=1 research study to suspend the aging process.  It's for his own benefit, of course, and also for others who can parallel and further the same research goal.  I guess that works?  For sure he's already selling whatever it is related to this pursuit, not just developing it towards what he can profit from, but paralleling the profit-taking to compensate for or overtake the $2 million annual spend on this project.  Again all fair enough.

The parts about comparing his personal vision to other geniuses seems a bit much.  There are lots of longevity-interest practitioners out there; he is just better funded, takes a different approach, and he might be considerably more dedicated to the goal.  This doesn't seem much like Steve Jobs driving Apple's progress, the case of a guy trying to live longer, drawing on a broad and deep range of ongoing research, and tons of "expert" input.  His team probably is pretty good, but it would take a lot of doing to review that.  The spending and the claims are the interesting parts, and it's really not easy placing the latter.

The relation to vampirism, and range of other practices

Per Bryan's own communication he is using his son's blood as an input to offset aging.  Creepy AF!  Maybe this isn't as questionable as it sounds, since it's voluntary on his son's part, and normal enough for people to donate blood or plasma, but him having unusual degree of leverage in this situation changes the optics, him possibly passing on his fortune to his son, or maybe not, especially since he plans to not die on a normal time-frame.

It brings up a larger question:  just what range of treatments and inputs is he undergoing, beyond supplements, diet, exercise and drugs?  Some seem to clearly be cosmetic; he has had cosmetic surgery in the past, use of fillers if I remember right, and dies his hair, which is probably going grey.  Then he is also maintaining low body weight, undergoing lots of testing (which isn't a treatment, more monitoring and feedback related), laser treatment and extensive other treatments for skin, and that blood transfusion process.  And what else?  He's on a vegetarian diet, framed as an ethical decision, not necessarily an anti-aging input.

It's interesting what isn't included.  He doesn't use heat or cold treatments, the now popular sauna and ice bath combination.  There is no clear explanation for why not; in interview questioning he simply states that he goes by the recommendations of his team of experts, not attempting to try out everything out there, or whatever is popular, so he isn't concerned if he doesn't get to some range of practices.  It's odd range to omit though.  It doesn't sound like he's experimented with this range in the answers, and it seems feasible that cold treatment really could adjust hormone balance and inflammation.

He's not fasting.  Per interview discussion he claims that earlier diet input was based around a one meal a day approach (OMAD), but that the same calorie input (around 2000) caused him to drop to 3+% body fat, an unhealthy level, and that switching that to eating over a 5 or 6 hour window allowed him to move back to 5% instead.  Is that ok, living at 5% body fat level?  I don't know, but I've certainly experienced living out a calorie deficit myself related to wrestling in high school, and it's not pleasant.

A couple of related thoughts come to mind.  People into fasting claim that there are substantial benefits to pausing eating for 4 days or so at a time, autophagy and such (a switch-over of body functions to recycle damaged cells, which may or may not occur in ways that match popular conceptions).  Here one would either accept that Bryan's experts are probably as good a reference as anyone on whether or not that's worth pursuing, or could instead guess that he's arranged for a half dozen doctors (or however many) to promote whatever they are inclined towards, so all of this is probably a bit random.

Related to the low body weight input, and vegan diet, I've always guessed that this input may have slowed my own aging input.  I was a vegetarian for 17 years or so (not vegan; it was hard enough balancing diet with limited dairy and eggs input), and was fairly underweight through most of my 20s and 30s, only moving above 150 pounds or so at the end of my 30s (at 5' 8", if that helps place it).  I'm not visibly aging normally, without developing skin wrinkles, grey hair, and muscle tissue loss.  It's hard to say how that relates to other internal organs, or my brain.  Exercising a good bit across that time may have helped too, but I quit routine exercise in my 40s, picking it back up at 50 as a running habit, and I still haven't developed much grey hair.  Which I can't place as a general age marker, of course; the point is to connect unusual personal experience to these themes as best I can.

Comparison to other longevity research and practices

This extends beyond what I can cover reliably, but I have ran across some interesting input for this, so I'll share some thoughts.  I really liked catching some of the Leo and Longevity content creator perspective on these themes, even though he doesn't seem to be accepted by the "longevity community" as a spokesperson, or representative of normal perspective.  Leo's Youtube channel is here (no longer updated, he died in a likely murder, an odd twist given that theme of extended life-span), and a Reddit longevity sub (group) is here.  Reddit groups can be a little rough, a short step towards Twitter for negative exchanges coming up, but that one seems grounded and civil.  A Reddit group related to fasting isn't bad either, another subject I've brought up, but it talks about personal experience and guidance most, not discussion of research claims for benefits. 

It's my take (do I need to keep placing that?) that conventional longevity research and uptake relates to drug use first and supplementation second, to researchers identifying compounds that relate to links in normal life-experience and bodily response that relate to longevity, and using those as drug inputs to try to approximate or enhance conventional experience.  Fair enough; all that matches the modern medicine paradigm, and the standard interest form of "body hacks."  But fasting is something else, adjusting a life-experience input towards a similar end.

Here is where I add that I can't describe what I've heard about researched compounds enough to do any justice to presenting them, so I'll drop most of what would be informed, practical discussion.  Bryan Johnson and David Sinclair, the best known anti-aging researcher, both discuss use of drugs for this purpose, so further research into that wouldn't be difficult based on their claims or discussion, which others in different related groups or review articles and videos could help place.

That Youtube creator, Leo, experimented on himself, taking a lot of different compounds over time to try to determine effectiveness.  Maybe far too many, since he was not only interested in longevity, but also earlier on in body-building (use of steroids and growth hormone), in healing compounds (peptides and SARMs and such), in nootropics (mental function boosting drugs and supplements), and in sleep experience adjustments, trying to stay awake for extended periods of time, in addition to helping maintain sleep.  He was also into fasting, and experimented with exposure to cold, and surely many other inputs.  All that couldn't be healthy.  And he couldn't really isolate inputs, varying practices like that.  He did use routine blood testing to analyze outcomes, to the extent he was able to, but had to do so without the benefit of a panel of supporting doctors and a $2 million / year budget.

Where does this lead, or end?

Bryan will either live to be 120, as intended, or die in a reasonable late 80s / early 90s span, which is good, or else complications will come up and he'll probably scale all this back.  I doubt he'll kill himself by going to an extreme, but maybe.  I saw a post that leads to that consideration in a Youtube status, which I found again on Twitter:

Started NDGA today. 50mg daily to begin. It ranks 36th in wild type mouse lifespan studies, 13% medium lifespan, 7% maximum lifespan increase. Nordihydroguaiaretic Acid is a type of lignan, a class of organic compounds found in certain plants. A potential autophagy enhancer. 

It has been used in a randomized controlled trial for prostate cancer at 2 g a day dose, but doses as low as 100-500 mg may cause sub-clinical liver or kidney damage which we will be monitoring for to prove long term safety. Unclear safety stacking with rapamyicn, metformin, aspirin and other autophagy enhancers, which we are assessing for too.

It's probably fine, but there must be some risk in trying out a number of new drugs or extra supplements that are probably fine.

All this must sound negative, but I really admire and feel positively about his conviction, approach, resolution, that all-in attitude.  Even the "strange guy" theme is fine, whether or not it's contrived.  I tend to like unusual people better; to me that's a good reason to see what else is going on with someone, not a queue to avoid them, or feel negatively, or judge their ideas more harshly.

For almost everyone I think approaching health conventionally would make a lot more sense; cleaning up diet, to an ultra-clean level, exercising, drinking plenty of water, going on limited vitamin input, getting plenty of good sleep, doing some fasting, stretching, meditation, spending time outside, and so on.  Other experimentation seems reasonable, but really why go that far?  It's possible to push good health to higher and higher levels, to make a primary interest and life pursuit out of that.

Deeper lessons learned from living in a foreign country

being married in a Thai wedding ceremony

It's a familiar enough theme that significant exposure to foreign cultures broadens one's perspective, and teaches life lessons about how worldviews can differ.  I’m American, and I’ve been living in Thailand for almost all of the past 15 1/2 years. Shorter exposure to culture and perspectives elsewhere can teach us a lot, especially about our own worldview, but after a longer time really assimilating a foreign way of looking at things enables awareness of deeper levels of assumptions.

I’ve been living back in the US for 4 of the last 8 months, returning to the last place I lived, Honolulu, where my wife and I met in grad school, but that’s a different story. Maybe returning back does help with the comparison, going through reverse culture shock and re-acclimation.

Lots of trivial differences come up living abroad, which I will only sample for reference here. People eat different foods, and observe different norms related to social roles, or forms of expression. Something like tipping stands out (or not tipping restaurant servers, elsewhere), or female cleaning staff working in the men's bathroom while you use it. It will be tricky to identify what matters most, without piling up a lot of examples of how roles and communication vary, but let’s consider a few.  These examples are selected to highlight some fundamental differences, not so much how to navigate slightly different expectations, but instead how views of reality and self can radically differ.

You can’t get angry in public in Thailand; that’s different. Eventually people will, if pushed far enough in situations, and then they tend to blow up, like a bomb going off. You just can’t do that at work, not even the early stages of getting upset, like a heated meeting discussion. Of course you can in the US; crossing the wrong person is political suicide at work, but emotionally charged disagreement can be a healthy form of exchange, for sorting out people seeing next steps and background themes differently.  We're still not there related to the most fundamental defining themes, but narrowing potential range of expression is significant.  It's funny how Thai soap opera tv shows highlight this difference, with emphasis on the "blowing up" part, landing in about the same place American soap operas do.

People are less independent in Thailand, in the sense of experiencing social connections as more binding, and more a part of how they define themselves. This ties back to the anger issue; work is about a group of people coordinating shared experience, not a group of individuals working together as distinct cogs in a larger machine (although this is really a continuity, not an opposition). In the US older forms of employee training sessions geared to build teamwork were really about functionally integrating people to enable them to work together.  This works out differently in Thailand, about helping redefine self-identity, really building shared perspective.  

The same general point goes for family, about limiting individualism and independent self-definition.  You don’t move out from living with your parents as quickly or as often, even in wealthy families, where expense is not really a factor at all.  The parent-child social bond doesn't drop out to the same extent at 18 or 21; it remains a defining input for all of one's life.

Paying respect means more. That’s easy to say, but hard to define, at the level it really applies. It’s not about giving your parents something nice on Mother’s Day, instead about keeping those parents included in your life, forever. Not tied to infrequent weekend visits with grandchildren; Thai nursing homes barely exist because people would much rather take care of that older generation until the very end. Maybe it sounds better, in the sense that the connections would mean more then, and worse, in that the experience of individuality and freedom is highly valued by Americans. I suppose both judgments work.

These examples don't necessarily stem from a common underlying layer, supporting all the effects from these examples, that highlights what is really going on, what is different. Thais are Buddhist, but that changes less than these other factors. Formal religious ceremonies take other forms, and people have different reasons to “do the right thing,” but in the end it’s about the same. Actually believing in Christianity, or Buddhism, or being atheist doesn’t seem to have to change all that much to me; people can be ethical or not regardless of accepting or rejecting supernatural story lines, or more practical abstract teachings.

Fate is viewed differently, and that does change things. Let’s consider the “soul-mate” theme; if someone takes that seriously, and truly believes in it, then they also tap into and accept an underlying degree of external control acting in the world. Maybe God is doing that, or spiritual forces, or someone might accept it without even thinking it through as caused by something clearly defined. Thais go further; they would accept the soul-mate idea, and also that people have a time to die (we do; I mean a more pre-ordained version), that a job hunt should work out as it’s supposed to, that serious diseases are tied to fate as much as normal root causes (poor diet, genetic inputs, etc.), and so on. They’re more open to astrology, or ceremonial forms of making wishes, ways to interpret this external control, and ask for favors. So what does this change then?

Personal responsibility is scaled back just a little. That matters less than one might think; even in the Western atheist’s stone-cold, rational perspective external factors (bundled as luck, or just accepted as lots of individual bits) are as much a life-input as personal control. Still, to an American it can feel like Thais are only leaving one hand on the wheel, that they aren’t leaning into trying to control everything as much as waiting to see how it works out. 

It’s not just “making moves” that is reduced as a result, deeper belief in independent self-development, there is less of an emphasis on unpacking layers of external root causes we can’t normally clearly define or understand. Then again it doesn’t necessarily help Westerners, or Americans, since we never get much completely figured out, and the practical life-coaching self-help themes and content are usually more about selling material and seminars than piecing together functional sets of ideas. Studying psychology can be interesting, but in the end you don’t really reconstruct what makes you tick. Maybe you could dodge a lack or insight or awareness here or there, which is something.

It would be nice if mixing with a range of foreigners in a foreign country enabled really unpacking how a broad range of worldviews work, or if travel accomplished that. It’s not that simple. If you have a close friend from another country, from a similar or dis-similar culture, that’s going to help with working out how they see reality differently, but a two week vacation really won’t. You’ll be stuck back at how people use silverware differently, or don’t eat while walking, are more reserved in general, do or don’t queue as effectively, and so on. It seems like if you have a foreign co-worker you’re gaining a lot of insight, but really trivial differences tend to come up and stand out.  

My kids have attended two Western schools and two Thai schools, each, not counting living in the US right now, and that broad range of varying experiences covers too much ground to sample easily.

my daughter at an international school, with students from lots of different places

Being married to a foreigner should enable all sorts of depth of insight, right? It seems like it depends on the person, and the relationship. It’s all too easy to make the other person the “bad guy” when serious communication or perspective difference problems come up, because based on your own assumptions they are doing odd things, easily regarded as ignoring other’s perspective and focusing on self-interest.

Or positive differences with your life partner can be seen as cute, more superficial, or just particular to them. You need real stress, real stakes, and problems to come up to really dig down to that next level; having kids helps with all that. Little differences can seem like “deal-breakers:” should they be vaccinated, do we hit them or use time-outs, how many different activities strike the right balance, are A’s and B’s ok, or only A’s, or should focus on other range instead make getting C’s a reasonable thing, when the kids have less potential in a subject?

Other examples would keep turning up other minor differences, which might seem to imply a few really important layers of perspective differences. In the end people are really more the same than different in different cultures, since human nature covers a lot of common ground, but these smaller differences do end up meaning a lot.

Are many Asian cultures similar in broad ways; can we at least shift to considering this level or type of question? Yes and no. A lot of what I’ve covered about emphasis on social placement, defined roles, and importance of family are common across different countries in Asia, but on the surface level cultures seem quite different, to me. Japanese people are very reserved; Thais are socially open related to engaging others and seeming positive but less so related to truly sharing personal perspective; Chinese people and Koreans are more straightforward, a bit less reserved, with different rules and norms structuring how they interact across different scope.  

It was interesting visiting Shanghai with a Chinese family friend, a fellow parent at a Bangkok school who had moved back to China, how she would negotiate pricing at local markets, eventually getting angry and starting to raise her voice at the vendor, as part of the negotiation process.  I could only imagine that she blamed them for trying to take advantage of us, but I couldn't know.  Then they would settle on a fair price, and become friendly again.

Then mixing together how everyone in a country or culture only goes so far; personal differences, and differences across social levels, or in varying regions, in urban versus rural settings, etc., all factor in. This makes culture the kind of thing you unpack and sort out over years, not weeks, because every experience and highlighted difference only relates to one context and one set of inputs, related to a few people.

out of Bangkok lots of places have a smaller-town feel, familiar from my rural PA background

It’s interesting experiencing mixed-culture kids growing up trying to balance having two perspectives. My kids can “do” both, American and Thai outlook and forms of personal exchange. Before living in the US this past 8 months — we moved back to get them experience in schools here, since my son started high school, and will go to a US university later on — they were clearer on Thai perspective, even though I’ve always been a main influence on them. It makes all the difference to experience lots of examples of a cultural perspective, to interact within that medium. Media content certainly helps with passing on some Western / US perspective, but that only goes so far. It has to be lived out.

There aren’t really final “lessons learned,” or take-aways. It’s interesting how it all works out, and very complicated. Different people with claims to certain years of exposure, or having lived in different places, vary in what they’ve picked up from that. Plenty of US expats (Americans living abroad) who are married and then divorced from Thai ex-wives seem to not really ever piece together what caused all the disconnect along the way. They land on “Thais are irrational,” or deceitful, and to me the first is closer to the truth, although that’s really too simple. They see things differently, acting on different assumptions, based on different self-definition in relation to society and relationship roles. No one is really completely rational; a lot of life experience is about projecting out next steps based on hunches, about how past patterns will extend to next steps. Meaning and emotional connections settle here and there.

I suppose broad exposure to foreign cultures should make one wiser. Maybe I experienced that, but I don’t feel all that wise, for any number of different reasons. It does seem like I have a more balanced and informed worldview than many others, but I’m still working from a limited set of capabilities, so it’s only so helpful.

Pictorial samples of my own experiences

not long into it I ordained for two months, providing insight into that foreign religion

Loy Krathong; floating rafts to carry away your sins

my son was ordained as a novice monk at one point

the Bangkok Chinatown; sub-culture perspective goes with such images

again and again varying looks match common experiences more than varying perspectives

not something I'm familiar with, but this muay Thai stadium had a unique old world feel

ice skating; we did a lot of that in 2019 to 2020, when the kids took lessons